Voddie Baucham on How to Best Apply God's Unchanging Truth to Today's Contemporary Issues

It has often been said that the more things change the more they stay the same. Think for a moment about our current cultural climate from a Judeo-Christian perspective. As it has been for generations, truth is still under attack in our culture. 

"The person who believes in ideas, concepts, values, or facts that are true for all people in all places for all times is rare indeed,” says noted pastor and theologian Voddie Baucham.

Baucham, who currently serves as founding dean and senior lecturer at Zambia’s African Christian University, strongly believes that much of what has become readily accepted in the current marketplace of ideas is not only unbiblical but is often utterly illogical.

In his newly revised and updated book, The Ever-Loving Truth: Can Faith Survive in a Post-Christian Culture, Baucham takes a closer look at the price people pay for being a 21st Century Christian and guides his readers on how to best apply God’s unchanging truth to today’s contemporary life issues.

I recently sat down with Baucham to discuss why our Biblical worldview is under attack, what has supplanted it in contemporary culture, and a few practical tips for how to deal with societal criticism when speaking up for your beliefs. 

I should note that this book is an update from your originally published work in 2004. For so many authors, there is a certain trigger point or something inside of you that makes you say to yourself, ‘I have to write this book.” When you originally wrote The Ever-Loving Truth, what was that moment for you?

Interestingly enough, this book was born out of my preaching ministry, and I was actually asked to write this book. It was the first book I ever published, and I was actually asked to do it, which is kind of unique. It was a burden of mine. This is what I was preaching about. This is what I was teaching about. This is what I was warning people about at the time. And so, I was encouraged to put those warnings and put these issues into written form. So, it's really just sort of me condensing my ministry at the time into a book.

What inspired you to revise and update The Ever-Loving Truth?

What I've done is I've sort of just updated it. For example, in 2004, I was really pressing on the issue of secular humanism. That was kind of where things were. And those were the main pressure points in 2004. Today, those main pressure points would be more neo-Marxism. Different players, but the same game. It's still that same process in this post-Christian culture that we saw in Acts 4. In a pre-Christian culture, we just have a different adversary. And so, I’ve updated some of the ideologies, updated some of the players, but I'm encouraging the same game plan.

From a real broad view, from your perspective, why should we believe in the Bible?

This is a question that I answer in the book, and I give this answer. I choose to believe the Bible because it's a reliable collection of historical documents written by eyewitnesses during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses. They report supernatural events that took place in fulfillment of specific prophecies, and they claim that their writings are divine rather than human in origin. That comes from II Peter 1. That's the argument that Scripture makes. I don't believe God calls us to any kind of blind faith. We serve a God who has spoken, and a God who has preserved that for us in his Word, the Bible. The Biblical worldview has always been under attack and will always be under attack because of the world, the flesh, and the devil. The world hates God. This world system hates God, hates the biblical worldview, and the flesh. Our flesh is an enemy of God. We are born in sin and shaped in iniquity, and we're enemies of God. Our flesh rails against God in a worldview. And of course, the devil is a real adversary and has been an enemy of the Word of God and the Biblical worldview since the beginning.

Why do you think the Biblical worldview is under attack?

Because there is a God, and we will all stand before Him at the judgment, because Christ is Lord. He's not trying to be Lord. He's not hoping to be Lord Christ. Christ is Lord of all. He's Lord of everything. And because God is who God is, everything does matter. Whether we acknowledge that or not. One day, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. It matters.

What worldview has supplanted the Biblical worldview in contemporary culture?

There are a number of them, but primarily what we're seeing today is a neo-Marxist worldview, a neo-Marxist ideology that views everything through an oppressor oppressed paradigm. There is no absolute truth. It's very similar to the secular human worldview in a number of ways, in that it's atheistic. It also argues for relativism and pluralism. There is no absolute truth in the neo-Marxist worldview. Roles, norms, mores, these things are a product of what they call hegemonic powers. So, it's not that these things are objectively true, it's just that the people in power have created this ideology and this worldview in order to entrench them in their power and order in order to oppress people who are outside of their power. So for the contemporary, through the neo-Marxist Christianity, is that hegemonic power. It's not objectively true. There is no God. This is just something that people have invented in order to oppress outsiders.

If we dig into Scripture, specifically into the New Testament book of Acts we find some eerie similarities to what we are experiencing today. What are the parallels between Acts 4 and today’s attacks on the biblical worldview?

A couple of things. Number one, that the attacks came from within and without the attacks there were not only from a pagan Roman culture, but also from the religious elites of the Sanhedrin. And we see that as well. We see the Sanhedrin trying to hold onto its power and to its authority by persecuting and marginalizing the Christians. Secondly, we see that neutrality was not an option for them. There was no live and let live. There was no way we will worship this way. Let them worship that way. Nope. In order for them to hold onto their power, neutrality was not an option. And they had to marginalize and vilify Christianity. Finally, they had to silence Christianity by removing its core. They didn't tell them, you can't worship anymore. You can't believe anymore. They told them, don't preach anymore in that name.

Just don't preach in the name of Jesus. And again, all of that is prevalent today. People don't mind religion. They don't mind Christianity. They just don't want a Christ centered, Cross centered, Bible-centered version of Christianity. So, when Raphael Warnock is preaching an adulterated gospel and calling for abortion and same-sex marriage and whatever else, we're fine with him being the Reverend Raphael Warnock and the pastor of a church, and running for the U.S. Senate. But if somebody who actually believes the Bible starts doing that, then we start screaming Christian nationalism and saying that it's inappropriate.

For many Christians, they are well intentioned in their beliefs but often become hesitant for standing up for what they believe. Do you have any practical tips for how to deal with criticism from society when speaking up for your beliefs?

Always be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks you the reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect. I can't say it any better than Peter did. He starts off by saying, “Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good?” By reminding us that it's better if we should suffer, it should be God's will that we suffer for righteousness sake. I just want to always encourage people to remember that Christ is the Lord who wins in the end. We are in Christ, which means we win in the end. Even if we don't win today, even if we don't win right now, even if we don't win in this particular iteration of the battle, we win in the end because we are in Christ and He is victorious.

After people have read The Ever-Loving Truth, as an author what would you like to see your readers get out of the experience? What is your greatest hope for the book?

My greatest hope is that people will have an a-ha moment, and they will say, on the one hand, this does make sense. Because right now everything just seems crazy. It just seems like there's no rhyme, no reason. It's just all crazy, and craziness piled on top of craziness. I hope that people will see what we're dealing with, that this is not new, that this does make sense. And then, I hope people will recognize that it's been dealt with before, it's been overcome before, and it will be overcome again. There is an answer and there is hope. 

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