This film might not depict anything visually distasteful, but it is not for the weak-hearted and is difficult to watch. It is honest about what this world is and does. I heard crying throughout the entire theater audience — it is beyond moving. At the end of the film, I wanted to clap, but it felt inappropriate. It was similar to watching “Schindler’s List.” What exactly are we celebrating by clapping for films like this? The heroism I suppose, but it doesn’t feel right. Silent repose seemed to be the most appropriate response.

“Sound of Freedom” follows the true story of Special Agent Tim Ballard who specialized in catching sex criminals, particularly in regard to the exploitation of children on the internet. But Tim is challenged early in the film by the seeming futility of catching criminals when real children’s lives are at stake. Years of looking at the darkest side of humanity has broken his heart to pieces, and the only way he can see to rebuild his humanity is by liberating the lost and forgotten victims of the sex trafficking network. He goes on a quest to South America to do just that.
Jim Caviezel plays Ballard. His classic no-frills acting approach is perfect for this role. Caviezel is best known for playing Jesus in Mel Gibson’s controversial “The Passion of the Christ.” He brings the same level of intensity and compassion from this role to Ballard’s story. In fact, Ballard’s mission to seek and save lost children is a distinctly Christian value based on the theological principle that each child is uniquely beloved by God. 
When Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me,” he was making a revolutionary claim. Children, the most vulnerable and dependent members of society, had a special place in his kingdom. They mattered to him in a way that no other religious founder has ever envisioned. The faith of a child was the type of faith Jesus wanted from his followers — one free from the pollution and cynicism of adulthood, one of total dependence on their Heavenly Father. 
These values aren’t universally understood and accepted. Ballard’s story is proof of that. According to the movie, the child sex industry brings in $150 billion dollars every year. This industry is powerful and is not nearly as niche as we would like to think it is. While its visible activists are milquetoast perverts we can easily jail, the invisible perpetrators are the ones who do the real damage — the cartels, drug lords, and even our own politicians enable the child sexual slavery that is more prominent now than ever before.
At the end of the film, Caviezel addresses the viewers and makes the point that this story isn’t about a movie production or even about Ballard. It’s about the children — lost, invisible children who suffer in the depths of hell every single day.
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Mary Eberstadt’s new book, “Adam and Eve After the Pill, Revisited,” agues, not only has the sexual revolution been disastrous for American society, politics, and churches, but it has become a simulacrum of a religion, with its own dogmas, creeds, and saints. One of the most arresting substories of Eberstadt’s book is how the sexual revolution — and its celebration of contraceptive sex — resulted in the exact opposite of its promoters’ promises. Instead of reducing abortion, out-of-wedlock births, divorce, and fatherlessness, it accelerated them. Eberstadt cites a 2015 study that found contraception encourages sexual encounters and relationships that would not have happened without it.

In the days leading up to Texas federal Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk’s ruling on a lawsuit seeking to revoke U.S. government approval of abortion drug mifepristone, the Washington Post ran a front-page feature (read: hit piece) on him. It is not difficult to intuit that authors Caroline Kitchener and Ann E. Marimow wrote the article to undermine Kacsmaryk’s credibility by painting him as a religious zealot whose rulings are influenced by his adherence to “biblical scripture” (their bizarre phrase, not mine), rather than a careful, unbiased consideration of American jurisprudence.
It’s unsurprising the dogmatically pro-abortion WaPo would run such a piece. But what is curious is that WaPo ran the article despite having so little ammunition to support their not-so-subtle thesis. Among the evidence weighed against Kacsmaryk includes that he was raised in a pro-life Christian family; he served on the board of the pro-life organization Christian Homes and Family Services; and he “prays often … and is constantly rereading the Bible.” Beware those Bible-reading (excuse me, “biblical scripture”-reading) federal judges!

Besides proving the embarrassing religious ignorance of leftist corporate media (the piece went through at least three rounds of edits, for goodness’ sake), the WaPo feature also demonstrates something else: the pervasiveness of the fruits of the sexual revolution over our culture, especially that of our secular elites.

In that sense, the response of the Washington Post — and, for that matter, all institutions of the secular left — to the fallout from the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson ruling adds further credence to Mary Eberstadt’s new book, “Adam and Eve After the Pill, Revisited.” For, Eberstadt argues, not only has the sexual revolution been disastrous for American society, politics, and churches, but it has become a simulacrum of a religion, with its own dogmas, creeds, and saints.
The Exploitation of Women
One of the most arresting substories of Eberstadt’s book is how the sexual revolution — and its celebration of contraceptive sex — resulted in the exact opposite of its promoters’ promises. Instead of reducing abortion, out-of-wedlock births, divorce, and fatherlessness, it accelerated them. Eberstadt cites a 2015 study that found contraception encourages sexual encounters and relationships that would not have happened without it.
“In other words, when couples use contraception, they agree to sex when pregnancy would be a problem,” the study’s author argued. The frequent consequence of that choice, unsurprisingly, has been more abortions.

Contraception, as much as it has “empowered” women to delay or avoid pregnancy, has also enabled men to avoid the responsibilities of fatherhood through what sociologist Mark Regnerus called “Cheap Sex” in his 2017 book. Economist Timothy Reichart in 2010 examined data from the 1960s onward that showed “the contraceptive revolution has resulted in a massive redistribution of wealth and power from women and children to men.”

How? By creating a “prisoner’s dilemma” in which women are encouraged to “enter the sex market and remain there for as long as possible,” even though the ultimate result of this will be less happiness for them, as well as increasing the likelihood of divorce, infidelity, and the desire for abortion.

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Putting sin to death, likewise, is a difficult duty for the Christian, but Paul teaches us that it is necessary and possible. Romans 8:12–13 states that life in the Spirit includes liberation and mortification. We are no longer debtors to this present, evil age, so we walk in a different direction, think after the realm of Christ, and relate to God in a covenant of grace. Since God has delivered us, we are indebted and enabled to walk according to the Spirit, and we express our indebtedness by putting sin to death in the power of the Spirit. 

Squatters are notoriously difficult to evict. They may disappear for a while, making you think they are gone, yet they always find a way back and may even bring a few friends along. Indwelling sin is not so easy to evict either, but it is a necessary duty of the Christian life. We are Christ’s temple, therefore all squatters must go. In Romans 8:12–13, Paul teaches us that mortification is not only necessary but possible. Putting sin to death is necessary because Christ has delivered us from this sinful age and possible because the Spirit of Christ leads us in holiness. This means that we are no longer debtors to live according to the flesh; rather, we are indebted and enabled to live according to the Spirit.
No Longer Debtors
Paul concludes the first eleven verses with a negative implication: “So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh” (Rom 8:12). You are no longer a debtor to the powers of this present, evil age because the Spirit of life has set you free from the condemnation of the moral law (v. 1) and the law of sin and death (v. 2). When the Holy Spirit takes up residence in your heart, he changes the direction of your life, the object of your mind, and your covenant with God.
Prior to regeneration, you were a debtor to the flesh. You walked according to the flesh (v. 4), set your mind on the things of the flesh (v. 5), and lived at enmity with God (v. 7). Outside of Christ you were spiritually dead, but you were by no means static or lifeless. To the contrary, you walked in the same direction as the world and followed the powers of this present age (Eph 2:1–2). Like those floating down the lazy river in an amusement park, so you were floating along in the same direction as this rebellious age. Furthermore, you set your mind on the things of the flesh. Your thinking was restricted to this sinful age, not the spiritual age of Christ. This means that you gave little thought to the divine, heavenly realm, to Christ and his gospel, or to God and his Word. Perhaps you did think about heaven–a life of eternal bliss and freedom from pain–but you did not think about Christ, your Savior and Lord. You were captivated and lured by the sins of the age. Finally, verse 7 teaches that you not only walked with the world, thought with the world, but you were at enmity with God. Before the Spirit of life united you to Christ you were in Adam, your federal head, and related to God through a broken covenant of works.
Now that you are indwelt by the Spirit of life, you are no longer a debtor to this age. You do not have to live for the flesh. This is the emphasis of Paul’s “therefore” in verse 12. Since you are united to Christ and indwelt by the Spirit, you are no longer a debtor to this world; rather, you are a son of God and heir with Christ (v. 15–17). When the world demands your allegiance or worship, you are free to refuse because you belong to another master. You were delivered from this world and bought by the Son. While we live in this world, we do not live for this world. We walk in this world, but we do not walk in sync with this world. Since we are sons of God, and no longer debtors to this age, we walk upstream in a downstream world, set our minds on the permanent age of the future, not the transient age of the present, and relate to God in a fulfilled covenant of grace, not a broken covenant of works.
Now, Paul is not just saying you do not have to live according to the flesh. In verse 13, he emphasizes that you ought not to do so. The transition from v. 12 to v. 13 is a shift from deliverance to warning. In verse 12, Paul emphasizes that you do not have to live for this world because you have been delivered from its grip. In verse 13, Paul shifts to a warning, saying that you ought not to live according to the flesh because those who do will surely die.
Verse 13 “If you live according to the flesh, you will die.” The first thing to note about this conditional warning is what it is not saying. It is not saying that those who have been delivered from this present age can lose their salvation. Rather this is a warning to the unrepentant, those who hold Christ in one hand and their sin in the other. Death is the eternal punishment for those who willfully persist in unrepentant sin, who obstinately refuse to part with their beloved sins, and who claim God as their Savior but deny him as their Lord. Death is the just punishment for those who walk according to the flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh, and live according to the flesh. 
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