TWO THINGS LIBERALS WILL NEVER TOLERATE

Whether it be political or theological liberalism, there are two things liberalism in both camps will not tolerate.

INTOLERABLE 1

The first of the intolerables is the truth that human nature can't be changed; we are as Paul said, "by nature the children of wrath." We are as David wrote, "We go forth estranged from the womb" and "in sin did my mother conceive me."

The liberal position is that what man needs is information and, based on reason and logic he will make the "right" and "moral" decision. This leads to getting people educated, so the "right" information is distributed to the schools and the schools will be the conduit to carry the information to the students, and, armed with that information, they will turn out to make the proper decisions.

The examples are numerous, but one will suffice: drug addiction, membership in gangs, and violence are seen as the problems, so in 1983, the Los Angeles Police Dept., in cooperation with the Los Angeles Unified School District, founded D. A. R. E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education).

The result of the program: Researchers at Indiana University, commissioned by Indiana school officials in 1992, found that those who completed the D.A.R.E. program subsequently had significantly higher rates of hallucinogenic drug use than those not exposed to the program. Wait. What? Yes, you read that correctly.

CALIFORNIA DREAMIN'

Indiana University didn't stand alone in their conclusion: In 1995, a report to the California Dept. of Education, Dr. Joel Brown stated that none of California's drug education programs worked, including D.A.R.E.

The  report concluded, "California's drug education programs, D.A.R.E. being the largest of them, simply don't work. More than 40 percent of the students told researchers they were 'not at all' influenced by drug educators or programs. Nearly 70 percent reported neutral to negative feelings about those delivering the antidrug [sic] message. While only 10 percent of elementary students responded to drug education negatively or indifferently, this figure grew to 33 percent of middle school students and topped 90 percent at the high school level."

In some circles educators and administrators have admitted that DARE increased students' exposure and knowledge of unknown drugs and controlled substances, resulting in experimentation and consumption of narcotics at a much younger age. Criticism focused on failure and misuse of tax-payer dollars, with either ineffective or negative results state-wide.

To summarize the reports, they were official statements saying, "Oops. We're sorry we wasted the students' time and your money."

WRONG STARTING POINT

The political liberal and the theological liberal will turn, every time, to the government and to education to solve whatever it is that they deem as the problem, but, in reality, their presupposition that human nature is malleable and improvable is flawed from the start. Their stating point causes them to treat the with symptoms, not the cause, man's innate fallen nature. The solution isn't education. Paul wrote that human nature is such that, even when we realize what's wrong, sinful, and even hurtful, and we swear we won't do it, that's exactly what we do. (Rom. 7) Human nature can't be educated away. If it could, universities wouldn't need campus police.

INTOLERABLE 2

The second thing that both political liberalism and theological liberalism won't tolerate is authority. Liberals in both areas have a problem with keeping established rules if things don't go to suit them. We see this almost weekly, yea, albeit daily, in our society. If the results of an election don't go their way, then it's time to riot, loot, burn things down, and break stuff. If things don't go their way, demand to change the rules, eliminate the electoral college.

In school, we learned that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. But, liberalism says, "If it gets in the way of we want, we'll ignore it."

If theological liberalism doesn't like what the Bible says, it changes the interpretation to one more preferred. If one doesn't like God's plan for marriage: change its definition. If one doesn't like hell, eliminate it. If Jesus words offend, then say that He never said them, author made them up.

Political liberals don't like the Constitution if it gets in their way, ignore or change it by saying it's "a living document" and changes with the times. Theological liberals do the same thing with the Bible.

THE COMMIES

Ever wonder why communists and dictators of all stripes loathe and try to destroy the Bible and the church? It's because both the Bible and the church stand firm on the fact that there is an authority higher than the dictator and higher than the government and that's intolerable. For the dictator, there can be no higher authority than the  government; he is the government.

Yet, there is the Christian, there is the church saying, "The beginning of wisdom is the fear [a postitive response] to the [authority of] the Lord."