So inquired a headline in the Houston Chronicle (November 14, 1996, p. 18A). "Sam Nunn and William Bennett . . . teamed up . . . to launch a commission to study what they say are social pathologies that imperil society.

"Nunn, a ... Democrat, and Bennett, a leading Republican voice on moral issues said they are alarmed by signs of a nation succumbing to drug abuse, crime, pornography, and family breakups, among other problems."

.. America is the most powerful and affluent and enviable nation in the world,' Bennett said. . . . `It is also true that America leads the world in rates of murder, violent crime, juvenile crime, divorce, abortion, children born out of wedlock and consumption of cocaine and other drugs. Something is wrong.'

Bennett and Nunn want a panel to find out "why so many social institutions — schools, churches, families — have seemingly fallen into disrepair." Sadly, "They said they saw no obvious remedies" for the problems that imperil our nation.

Surface problems have been identified. The signs and symptoms of the diseases that are eroding our society have been labeled. Too often, "panels" and "commissions" attack the surface, the signs, the symptoms. They do not reach the core, the base, the heart of the malady that is destroying America.

The central malignancy that ails us is that of the heart. "Out of it are the issues of life" (Prov. 4:23). An itinerant carpenter and preacher once said that "those things which proceed out of mouth come forth from the heart: and they defile the man. For out of the heart," he said, "proceed" all the infirmities that corrupt individuals, undermine society, and threaten the nation (Matt. 15:18, 19). It is only after the heart is taught and trained that any disease can be treated and defeated.

As the heart is the root of man, so the hearth and home are the soul of society. For too long, the twin towers of heart and home have been indwelt by soulless spirits of unbridled lust and undisciplined "freedom."

As the heart is the root of man, so the hearth and home are the soul of society. For too long, the twin towers of heart and home have been indwelt by soulless spirits of unbridled lust and undisciplined "freedom." Indeed, "freedom" has been the cloak under which lust has satisfied and gratified its sensual self. But, as it was true three thousand years ago, so it is true today, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." Fed, fat flesh, and starved, emaciated spirits encourage lust and endanger liberty.

Romans 1:21-32 and 2 Timothy 3:1-8 chronicle the elements besieging and besetting our nation. Nunn, Bennett, and their panel would do well to seek the wisdom that dealt with that wickedness. God is the doctor. His word is the remedy. Until men and nations turn to it, "evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived."

It is sheer folly to decry the evils jeopardizing society on the one hand while government legalizes, funds, and promotes them with the other. In part, our society and government condones and encourages abortion, condoms avail-able at school, easy divorce, protection of the "rights" of pornographers to publish and peddle their product, restraints against the use of discipline, no condemnation of one's sexual behavior, whether promiscuous fornication or perverted homosexuality, in the name of "privacy." Yet, unless I am totally mistaken, these things are at the center of `the social pathologies (and behaviors) that imperil society" Nunn, Bennett, and their commission need to address this in-consistent feeding of the very things they say are destroying us.

As long as commissions and panels ignore the wisdom of God, and as long as they endorse government policies supporting that which they admit is imperiling society, I, like Nunn and Bennett, see "no obvious remedies" in sight.

Guardian of Truth XLI: 3 p. 7
February 6, 1997