Waking up to Something Better by Gary H. Lovejoy, Ph.D.

We have seen in recent years the powerful draw that “woke ideology” has had on American society, and, indeed, on Europe as well, at least to the extent that western civilization has remained a bastion of individualism. Yet, oddly enough, in the 21^st Century, this individualism has morphed into profound conformity by the social media revolution, in which communication can now instantly travel around the world. The woke culture is so named because it’s presumably a call to awaken the sensitivity of people—predominantly far left progressives—to the perceived inequities of culture, including racism and attitudes toward non-binary genderism, and sexual orientation. It has penetrated our traditional culture more rapidly than almost any liberal movement before it, its tentacles reaching into business practices, the cultural lexicons of every-day social interaction, and even into the basic theology of the church.

The fundamental underpinning principle of woke culture is the claim to victimhood, whether real or imagined. It has produced a cultural shift in which nearly everyone, except, of course, the “white, privileged, oppressively patriarchal male”, is expected to proclaim themselves as victims. Even if injustices must be fabricated in their troubled minds, it’s necessary for spinning a tale of suffering that they believe fully deserves commensurate sympathy and compassion. There is an insidious helplessness to this victimhood that kindles resident anger and resentment toward others who seem to be free of major problems and who seem to have reached a level of success they otherwise don’t deserve. They feel deeply disgruntled toward anyone who seems happier than they are, and who seems to find more meaning in life than they do. They end up blaming their own dissatisfaction with life on these people in particular because they believe the contrast is fundamentally unfair. It also spawns a subliminal jealousy as well as a supraliminal loneliness that demands an answer to the question of life’s inequities. Is it any wonder, then, that equity, not merit, is the obsession of these rebels?

It may seem, therefore, ironic that many of those who have jumped on the bandwagon of wokeism are young, relatively wealthy, white liberal elites who are actually anything but downtrodden victims of the culture. But, in reality, without any genuine family cohesion, without any values to motivate them beyond the emptiness of wealth accumulation, and, especially, without any religious faith to guide them, they are in a constant search for a cause that gives them a reason for living. Claiming solidarity with those whose unhappy stories of discrimination of one sort or another strike a chord, they have found what they believe is a legitimate reason to overthrow all the traditional mores of culture and to give open expression to their depressed feelings about their otherwise meaningless lives. That’s why guilt is often weaponized to coerce others to comply with their demands—ultimatums that are, strangely enough, given credence and social power by corporate America (which pays keen attention to this demographic) and the federal government, which issue statutes normalizing their ideology. 

One of the central tenets of western civilization, built, as it were, on essentially Christian principles, was the importance of family and, by implication, of strong marriages. If you are going to fundamentally transform culture, you must begin with breaking down the influence of the family unit, and you do that by attacking the institution of marriage. It’s no accident, then, that marriage has been assailed as promoting the “blasphemous ideology” of patriarchal oppression, which is believed to be an obsolete, indeed highly toxic, vestige of white European culture long in need of eradication. Instead of discussing what healthy, loving relationships between husbands and wives should look like, they try to silence such concerns by pronouncing “traditional marriages” as part of the problem of discrimination. In their iconoclastic fervor, they contend that any argument in favor of these marriages is a statement against other kinds of relationships dictated by sexual orientation, transgender considerations, and, more generally, “non-stereotypical arrangements”.

It’s not surprising, therefore, that studies show a dramatic decline in the percentage of the population of married men and women. In fact, they are, as one writer has noted, “getting married at the lowest rate in American history”. Correspondingly, single parenting is soaring, which means more children are being born out of wedlock and are subsequently raised in fatherless homes than ever before. This is a reality which has been particularly devastating to the African-American community. We have seen, for instance, the crime rate for African-American young men radically increase over the last 60 years, due largely to the breakdown of the family unit, which, by definition, means the absence of their fathers.

American society is experiencing a near eclipse in its understanding of what constitutes the critical factors operating in an intact family. Along with this has come ignorance of the basic qualities of a healthy, fulfilling marriage. Most people don’t really know what it takes to bring about happy, joyful relationships. They haven’t seen it in their families of origin, nor have they observed it in their friends’ marriages, and they certainly haven’t found it in their own marriages, as evidenced by the dismal statistics on divorce.

As indicated earlier, the church has been likewise affected by these trends. The divorce rate has increased, too, within the Christian population, even in evangelical churches. Though Christians should know what the Bible has to say about marriage, they usually have only, at best, a sketchy knowledge of the Apostle Paul’s writings on the matter, together with a few things Jesus said, but know little, if anything, about the Bible’s descriptions of actual marriages in both the Old and New Testaments. Yet, these descriptions, sometimes presented in considerable detail, give us God’s actionable blueprint of what works and what doesn’t work in marriages. Whether you are a Christian or an unbeliever, or even an atheist, checking out the behaviors that make for better relationships as well as those that can damage them, sometimes irreparably, can be very well worth your time if you’re interested in a happier married life.

Book Summary:

Have you ever wondered how God sees your marriage and what He would say about it? If you read the Bible carefully, you will discover how God describes a variety of marriages. There’s a reason He shares these marriages in detail, including some marriages that are good, some that are dysfunctional, and some that are spiteful. Marriages in the Bible, the sixth offering from Gary H. Lovejoy, Ph.D., reveals God’s perspective on biblical marriages so readers may discover the essential ingredients for happy, fulfilling, lasting unions as God intended – and how to identify ways to shipwreck them! 

Video Link: https://studio.youtube.com/video/PUwMKjEauNk/edit

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