Oak Hill Baptist Church © 2008-2009

Have you ever wondered how the Supreme Court could declare something unconstitutional that has been constitutional for the life of our country? Are you surprised, more specifically, that the Iowa Supreme Court has declared marriage restricted to a man and a woman as unconstitutional? Let me make a suggestion.

 

A new philosophy called Postmodernism started in the 1970s. Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and Richard Rorty were the big names in the early days of the movement. Postmodernism, as its name suggests, is a rebellion against something called Modernism or Modernity. Since the late 1600s western society has been built on a confidence in reason. We can manage life and even improve it through science applied in every aspect of life.

Derrida and the others came along and said, “Nuts! Look at the mess our world is in. Centuries of so-called progress haven’t helped a bit.” They concluded that truth based on reason was nothing more than a good PR job. Truth is the art of convincing the people around you. Listen to another group of people, and truth changes. So Postmodernists affirm all viewpoints. No one is wrong. People just buy into different ways of thinking and living.

 

While we could discuss many practical aspects of Postmodernism, let’s just note one more. “The winners write history” (at least up to the Postmodern period). History as we know it is suspect. Minority reports were not accepted. Our knowledge is based on the thinking of the people who had the most power. We must go back and view events from different perspectives. Maybe we should not celebrate Columbus Day. It was a raw deal for the people who lived here before us: small pox, venereal diseases, the destruction of ecosystems, and all that. Maybe the Holocaust didn’t happen or maybe it was actually a good thing. You get the idea.

 

Now we come to the Supreme Court, Constitutions, and other strange notions. The framers of our Constitutions (federal or state) never in their wildest nightmares could imagine redefining marriage or removing Christianity from the public square or making abortion legal or any number of postmodern notions. But it really doesn’t matter what they thought. They are dead and long gone. We are free to say they said what we want them to have said. (Follow that?) What they said was just what the victors said, enforcing their words through power.

Postmodernists are frequently right in their criticism of the confidence we have had in human reason and technology. But Postmodernism fails rather deeply in several directions. Here is one. Postmodernists are willing to use power to force their ideas on everyone else. “We have decided that marriage between two men or two women is just as valid as marriage between a man and a woman. If you disagree, you are wrong. Your words of disagreement, we will call ‘hate speech,’ and we will punish you for it.”

 

I am not a prophet, but I suspect more is coming. We are already seeing a push to require medical personnel to perform services for all comers. Will a pro-life doctor soon be forced to perform abortions (or lose his license) despite his convictions? Isaiah wrote about his own time when “truth had stumbled in the streets” (59:14) and “whoever shuns evil becomes a prey” (59:15). Tougher times are ahead. May we be ready, knowing the truth and being willing to stand for the truth.