We need to be honest about the root causes of our national problems.

In last week’s Editorial we said that successive Governments have undermined the central importance of marriage and family, thereby damaging the social stability of the nation. This is a major reason why we are now seeing so many children and young people who have no understanding of right and wrong and whose behaviour is uncontrollable. And this is why so many young people are dying on our city streets in a wave of knife crime, drugs and gang warfare.

20 years ago, I was working with Home Secretary Jack Straw MP, compiling a report to Members of Parliament on the health of the family in Britain. It was presented in July 1998 at a meeting in the Moses Room (appropriately) - with its great wall murals depicting Moses receiving the 10 Commandments.

Mr Straw promised a White Paper stressing the importance of measures to strengthen family and marriage in Britain. In a Green Paper, Supporting Families, he had correctly stated that marriage was the most reliable framework for raising children: but this caused dissension from LGBT members in the Cabinet which prevented him from issuing the White Paper or taking any concrete measure to support and strengthen married families.

The rallying cry of the secular humanists driving Government policy was “the family is not deteriorating, it is only changing”. They said that all kinds of family are of equal value. This was the beginning of Government policy focusing upon ‘equality’. Hence the value of the married couple family could not be taught in school in case a child from a single-parent family was made to feel inferior.

The rallying cry of the secular humanists driving Government policy was “the family is not deteriorating, it is only changing”. They said that all kinds of family are of equal value.

In defiance of all the evidence, children were taught what is now known as ‘alternative facts’ (laying the groundwork for ‘fake news’!). This was a milestone in the reshaping of Britain in accordance with secular humanist objectives.

Church and State Collude

At that time, the Lords and Commons Family and Child Protection Group recognised that child poverty, ill health, drug abuse, mental health problems and youth crime all stem from marriage failure and family breakdown. The evidence was said to be conclusive and incontrovertible, but ‘political correctness’ prevented the Government dealing with these root issues. In the Foreword to the Report The Cost of Family Breakdown it was stated:

Different sexual and child rearing lifestyles are decisively not ‘equal’ in the sense of ‘equality’ that is applied in all other areas of legislation; that is, ‘equal’ in their average results for good or harm on the present population and on generations to come.

Although the Report was received warmly by MPs on both sides of the House and in the Upper House, there was no change in Government policy. It was as though a veil was drawn over the eyes of politicians of all parties shielding them from the truth.

Worse was to come: at the time this report was published in July 2000, an Education Bill dealing with what pupils should be taught in school about sex and child-rearing was going through Parliament. A peer attempted to include Jack Straw’s statement in Supporting Families saying that “marriage is the most reliable framework for raising children”.

The Government fiercely opposed teaching children the truth that married families are the most reliable unit for raising children. There were extraordinary scenes in the Lords with the largest turnout of the session. No fewer than 234 peers voted against the Amendment, including nine bishops! It was a very tight vote and if the nine bishops had voted the other way it would have been carried. So, the Church of England’s representatives in Parliament voted against holy matrimony being taught to children in the schools of Great Britain!

In 2000, Church and State colluded to destroy family and marriage on one of the saddest days in our Parliamentary history.

Church and State colluded to destroy family and marriage on one of the saddest days in our Parliamentary history. Therefore, surely, in the sight of God, the Church of England must be held responsible for what we are now seeing on our city streets!

Veil of Deception

The veil of deception is still over the eyes of senior Church leaders today. I have seen evidence showing that the Bishop of Liverpool, a strong LGBTQ+ supporter, is using his power to prevent evangelical clerics from being appointed to Liverpool churches.

The Methodist Church has appointed a homosexual man as their National Director of Evangelism with the specific intention of creating more LGBTQ-friendly inclusivity; and the Methodist Central Hall in Westminster has banned evangelist David Hathaway from hiring it. He held a prayer meeting there last month but evidently said some things that were unpopular with some of the staff.

As I said in my recent book, The Reshaping of Britain,

The intensity of the great shaking of the nations is increasing rapidly. We may all soon be engulfed in a modern ‘Babylon’ of unbelievable intensity. But God is offering to Christians the most incredible opportunity, because only those who have put their trust in him will be able to stand and be overcomers.

Spiritual, Not Political

What we need to recognise is the hand of God in the deepening national crisis! Truth being upturned in the public square, confusion over Brexit, violence on the streets, soaring mental health problems, public institutions on the verge of collapse: all speak of a nation under judgment – both Church and State.

We have turned the word of God upside-down and he is saying, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight” (Isa 5:20-21).

We need to recognise the hand of God in our deepening national crisis!

As the Brexit crisis deepens and the confusion among politicians increases, we have to recognise that there are no political solutions to our problems, because they are primarily spiritual.

The cleverest politicians in the land will not solve the present crises! The only solution – the only way forward for the nation – is repentance and turning to the word of God. If we do this, whether we have a deal OR no deal, God will reach out and restore peace and prosperity to Britain. But if we simply continue as we are today, the result can only be catastrophe.

The People’s Vote

The people of Britain are being offered a choice at this astonishing juncture in our national history. This is the true ‘people’s vote’!! Joshua presented the same choice to the people of Israel: “choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve” (Josh 24:15). To the people of Britain, the choice is whether we will serve ourselves, and the pagan gods of the European Union, or the God of the Bible who has preserved us and so richly blessed our forefathers in times past.

To Christians in Britain, the choice is whether we will stand up and declare the truth, or stay silent. The good news is that it is always in times when God shakes the nations that the greatest opportunities for evangelism are presented.