My name is Alex Toth, a regular dude from small town Colorado.  College grad, History/Government major, construction worker, yadayadaya. Great sinner saved by grace.  Happily married with three beautiful children with, Lord willing, more on the way.  Now, please keep in mind that I am a blue collar, small town, self- employed guy, and though I love to read, writing has been one of those things I haven’t done in over a decade.  Though I have my four-year degree (best 8 years of my life) I am hardly an educated elite. So please grant me a little mercy as you read these words of mine.

I find myself in a predicament, being a man in a fallen and broken world, and yet being born into an amazing country that was built on Christian principles and many a good man’s blood. Our nation is not without sin, but rather it is filled with it. We seem to have gone quickly from being ashamed of many of the sins in our nation to proud of them.  We as a society have begun to, as Isaiah puts it, “call evil good and good evil.” And as such, we will corporately suffer for it.  We are in this predicament because, to loosely paraphrase Edmund Burke, good men have stood by and watched evil triumph.  And when good men do that, they themselves become corrupt. Proverbs 25:26.

So, what are we to do? How are the children of God, those who go by His name, supposed to live and act in the here and now?  Do we just sit here and without a fight hand the world over to evildoers? As a people, we have been doing that for far too long.  It seems to me that the curse of Adam’s cowardice has indeed been passed down to us, and we continue to capitulate our God given responsibilities over to Church and State (particularly the latter in these days), and we do so to our own demise.  In fact, it seems most people are willing to give responsibility to anyone who would take it.  Well, God never said it was good for government to have such power and sway over man, and indeed, as Solomon bears witness to in Ecclesiastes 8, that “there is a time when a man lords it over others to his own hurt.”  Here in our country, man is ruling over man more and more and many in our country seem to desire such tyranny. If God’s people don’t fight for their birthright and the honor of God and have no problem allowing evil ones to have their way unhindered, then we are saying in our hearts “let them have it, I guess its fine.”  We are no better than Esau who sold his birthright for a bowl of soup because we are too fearful of confrontation or of even appearing to be combative, even over righteous things. So, after much contemplation, I finally realized I was done bowing down to the Baals of the land. I was also tired of rendering unto Caesar the things which are God’s, and I know that I am not alone in this resolve.

Now, moving forward, there are some spiritual and mental wrestling matches to be had for sure, but people must begin to make stands.  We must decide what REALLY matters in this life.  There are many good things out there, retirements, jobs with benefits, family vacations, coaching little league, and so much more that must be put on the backburner so that we can make a stand against the coming storm.  We are about to have a moment where, to steal from the Lord of The Rings, if we don’t start to make these sacrifices, “there won’t be a Shire, Pippen!”

People, we must begin to lay down our lives and find where we can start to pit ourselves against a world that hates its King.  I think many Christians get discouraged about making such stands because we think our primary goal is to be gentle stewards of the Gospel, sharing the message of Christ to save souls, and indeed, that is one of the biggest responsibilities and privileges we have this side of heaven.  But as ambassadors of Christ, we also have the responsibility to preach Truth…any and all of it.  Because we have the very word of God, all Christians are guardians and keepers of truth, and we must continue to be witnesses to all things that are classified as such. We must speak out to the things which are good and against those that are not.  We must speak on the things that are true, and against those that are false.  And yes, especially to ourselves, but also to those “out there.” We are to stand for those things which glorify God first, and then love our neighbor second.  The gospel is our great message and God’s greatest gift, but we must bring with us every ounce of Truth that God has given us in the Scriptures.  Because without truth, which describes who and what God is and who and what we are, the gospel is just an ungraspable kite flying away in the sky with no anchor.  I mean really, what is the point of the gospel if we don’t know what we are being saved from and what we are being saved to?

Let us also remember that John the Baptist, though he knew Jesus, indeed, even baptized Jesus, was imprisoned and killed NOT because he preached the gospel, but because he preached the Truth.  He spoke out about the sexual immorality of King Herod Antipas and thus lost his head. So in my quest to do just that (speak truth and possibly lose my head), I have started HOW WE FIGHT, a blog on HOW we should go about fighting wickedness as well as precise things we can do to combat its advance.