But more than this, increasingly the ungodly man will blind himself to the consequences of his sin in order to justify his continual pleasure in the sin. It is evident to all that homosexual practices lead to sexual diseases including the HIV virus. Does this curb homosexual practices? No. The solution to the problem, according to the world, is not to refrain from sin, but to find a cure for sexual diseases. And anyone who dares to say that the prevalence of HIV is God’s judgment on the sin of homosexuality is in danger of being tarred and feathered, if not worse. Though divorce and remarriage lead to badly hurt children and open fornication, still man closes his eyes to the terrible consequences of such immorality and approves of the practice, even legalizing it. What is worse, the church itself approves.

This too is the development of sin. As wicked man thinks he can sin without having to suffer sin’s consequences, he indulges the more readily in his corruption. When he knows that fornication could result in an unwanted pregnancy, his fear can be assuaged by the knowledge that obtaining an abortion is not difficult—and that the government may even pay for it; and so he continues in his fornication and, indeed, becomes increasingly promiscuous, because he fears no unwanted consequences.

One more element must be considered in connection with the development of sin. Man was given the so-called cultural mandate prior to his fall. He was to be fruitful and multiply, and he was to subdue the earth. Now it is that last part that is of interest. To subdue the earth means to use the whole creation and all its powers in the service of God and to the glory of His name.

When man fell, the cultural mandate remained in effect and man remained able to keep it insofar as subduing the earth is concerned. Man was still called to subdue the earth. And he eagerly assumes responsibility for doing this. But what he does not do is use the creation in the service of God and to the glory of God’s name. Rather, he uses whatever powers he discovers in the creation and whatever contraptions and tools he can make to increase his means of expressing his sinful nature. He harnesses these powers in the service of sin. He is bent on forcing all these powers into the sinful use of them to satisfy his own lusts, and to promote his own false theories of evolution.

This is a major contributing factor in the development of sin. Cain could not sin with a Lexus sports model and Nimrod could not sin with a TV set. People in bygone years could not sin with our modern inventions and pornography could not become so all-pervasive without the internet and cell phones. Or, to put it a little differently, with every modern invention man has a new way to express his depravity, something he is bound to do. The sleaze and filth that have become so much a part of our modern culture would be impossible without modern technology. The creation is God’s and its powers are marvellous, but everyone of these powers in the hands of the wicked has become a new way to sin.

It is true, of course, that modern inventions can be used for good purposes. The miracles of modern medicine can and do prolong life. (Whether this is always good is quite another thing. It doesn’t take too many visits to nursing homes filled with doddering and irrational people to make one wonder whether long life is a good thing.) Communications bring people closer together. The power of the atom can generate electricity and drive ships over the seas. But all these "good" things only prove that there is no evil in the creation itself nor in the powers that man discovers; but sinful man uses them to sin and to satisfy his own lust for pleasure and prolong his life out of fear of death and the judgment.

This doctrine deserves more extensive treatment, but I reserve further discussion until I discuss the doctrine of common grace that teaches that the unregenerated man can do good.

As man discovers the powers of creation and puts them to his use, his sin becomes worse, even though man claims that by these powers he is solving the problems of society and bringing prosperity to the world. As a matter of fact, he will undoubtedly be successful in this endeavour as well. He will, according to Scripture, attain to a kingdom of universal peace and prosperity. It will apparently be such a "wonderful" kingdom that people will be duped into thinking that Christ’s kingdom has indeed been realized here in the world and all the promises of Scripture brought to reality by the might and ingenuity of man. But in fact it will be the kingdom of the Antichrist who claims that he is Christ (II Thess. 2:3-4).

In that kingdom I have no doubt but that all the powers of the creation will have been discovered and put to man’s use. The earth will have been entirely subdued and man can expect no more inventions, for he has attained his goal. But it will be a kingdom of great sin, for Antichrist is called in Scripture "the man of sin" (II Thess. 2:3); that is, he will be the total embodiment of all sin that preceded him and that reaches its culmination in him.

But in that kingdom there is no room for the faithful people of God (Rev. 13). The Antichrist, with the full cooperation of the wicked world, will commit that greatest sin of all, the extermination of the church. It is the same world that crucified Christ that now vents its hatred of Christ by destroying Christ’s bride. No greater sin can be committed. The church is Christ’s bride, the object of His love, the bride for which He gave His own life. His one great concern throughout all history is the salvation of His bride, which bride is His reason for His universal rule. His love for His bride is so great that He will do anything at all for her. That bride the world spits on, slaps in the face, mutilates and abuses, mocks and scorns, and finally kills. Does anyone think that Christ will witness this dreadful treatment of His bride without being moved to the fiercest of anger? With such a great sin, the cup of iniquity is filled and judgment is not longer restrained.

The mighty and apparently glittering kingdom of Antichrist will be shown to be a house of cards that collapses by its own internal rot, and judgments come both swift and terrible.

Such is the teaching of Scripture. Any one who cannot see this happening in the world around him is one who deliberately shuts his eyes to reality. The world getting better and better? It takes some powerful self-delusion to convince one’s self of the truth of this notion.

I close with a personal experience. In a time when I corresponded at some length with an ardent post-millennialist, I asked him how he could justify his position that the time would come when the world accepted the Reformed faith—how he could maintain this in the light of every-day experience. One need only read the newspapers and their sad tale of sinful horrors to abandon that position. His response said something to the effect that, yes, the world was getting worse, but this would continue until the world itself realized that it had made a mess of things and that solutions to the world’s woes were to be found elsewhere. The place where the world would find solutions to its problems would be, he claimed, in the Reformed faith, and to it the world would turn out of sheer desperation. That idea is not much on which to pin one’s hope for the future.

With warm regards,

Prof. Hanko