By Harold Keller / L’Observateur / April 1, 1998

PERMISSIVE ATTITUDES CONTRIBUTE TO WOES

Last Saturday morning, I attended a Bible study that a group of men hold every Saturday during Lent and monthly thereafter on the second Saturday of the month. I really enjoy the fellowship, and the sharing by the othermen speaks to my heart. It’s one of the few times that I am open and readyto receive.

This past Saturday, one of the men wanted to read something from a book.

When he finished, another said he was reading a book about mind control. Iinterrupted (gently, I think) and said, “It’s time we concentrate more of what the Bible says than what other people say. After all, this is a Biblestudy, and the Bible has the answers to all of our problems.” The Bible is,and I believe, the infallible Word of God.

Last week, in Jonesboro, Ark., an 11-year-old and his 13-year-oldcompanion killed four of their classmates and a teacher. It was cold-blooded murder. It was well-planned. Everybody was in shock. Just whenwe were about to forget the similar murders in Kentucky and Mississippi, and now we wonder what community is next? The question is: Why? Professional and law enforcement personnel, school administration, parents and children are looking for the answer. I don’t think you have tobe a rocket scientist to find the answer. It’s simply that we, as a nationfounded on godly principles, have deserted the morals on which our country was built.

Our Founding Fathers were wise. Their book of instruction was the Bible.After many years, man decided that he could improve on God’s law with a humanistic approach. The results were tragic. Prayer and the TenCommandments were taken out of the schools. I guarantee that today thebig majority of school-age children cannot repeat three of the Ten Commandments.

Forty or 50 years ago, everyone could recite the Ten Commandments in the order than God gave them to Moses. As told in Exodus 20, one of thoseCommandments was: “Thou shalt not kill.” It’s sad, but the children notonly at that school but at any public school in America never saw the Ten Commandments displayed on the walls of their schools as we did.

Two weeks ago, the famous Dr. Benjamin Spock died. His funeral, as herequested, was a fun time – women dancing on top of the hearse, jazz music and all that goes with the “eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you die” mentality. Dr. Spock was 93 years old. His book on how to raisechildren sold more than 50 million copies.

Before his book, families seemed to be doing OK in raising their children.

Dr. Spock’s book, in my opinion, was partly responsible for the beginningof our permissive society. Absolutes were on the way out and a newsituation ethics philosophy was embraced in our society that slowly crept into our schools.

Another book by another author came out shortly afterwards titled: “I’m OK, You’re OK.” That book instructed adults not to feel bad about anythingthey did. In other words, if it felt good, do it.Am I blaming these two books for all of America’s ills? No. The supply anddemand factor applies here. The public wasn’t satisfied with God’s book,the Bible. They were looking to man for answers, with hopes of finding aneasier, softer way, thinking this would make them happier.

Reviewing the last 50 years, we can see embracing this philosophy was a disaster. Just think! If the 50 million people who purchased Dr. Spock’sbook would have studied the Bible that most of them had in their homes and followed God’s instructions, I guarantee this country would be free from the horror that the people in Jonesboro experienced last week.

Am I suggesting we quit reading books? That would be ridiculous. Muchknowledge comes from reading what man has written, but only wisdom comes from above.

If people only realized that whatever they desire, whether it be raising children, going into business, choosing a wife or husband or overcoming any trial, the book to turn to is the book of all books, the Bible. If wesearch the Scriptures, we can find the solution to any of our personal problems, or society’s problems.

Harold Keller is a regular columnist for L’Observateur.

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