Change Has Come
There is much to say about what yesterday's election means for America, the church, the unborn and the world. But in the third paragraph of Barack Obama's victory speech last night, a watershed moment came and went almost without notice.

It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled — Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of red states and blue states; we are, and always will be, the United States of America.

Don't miss the significance of this sentence. For the first time in American history, the declaration that approval—not mere tolerance, not simply the recognition that private sins are none of anybody's business in the public square, but hearty approval—has now been granted to a particular class of moral misbehavior. Along with gender, racial origin, socio-economic status, physical disability or political viewpoint, homosexual activity is, in the new president's view, elevated to equally protected and respected legitimacy in the United States.

The reason the statement slides by with so little notice is of course that it's been a long time coming, and is already the de facto assumption of popular culture. But make no mistake, a corner has been turned. We have been asked first to tolerate, then accept, and now honor.

Those Christians who still take seriously the Epistle to the Romans' description of godlessness and cultural decay are neither naive nor surprised. They understand that sin of every kind is rampant around us—and sometimes within us—and that all sin puts all people in peril of the judgment of God, that the line between good and evil runs through the middle of every human heart. But with the sobering implications of Obama's statement, they also understand that another full rotation in the downward spiral of America is now complete.

...and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them. —Romans 1:32 NAS