For years, World Vision has exercised amazing compassion in the two-thirds world. It is not called “two-thirds” because it has two-thirds of the stuff, it is because it is the bulk of the world. Sadly, much of it is in the grip of poverty. Depending on the area, some projects of World Vision have been holistic, not only dealing with physical poverty, but also addressing spiritual needs. Some of the World Vision leaders in East Africa are among the greatest evangelists, bringing not only projects, but truly bringing Good News.

Last week, that inspirational agenda was all but completely upset with the news that World Vision was going to hire people in the US who were in same-sex marriages. What followed was a tsunami of complaint with a vast number of financial supporters tweeting, Facebook posting, Instagramming, emailing, and smoke-signaling that they would no longer be giving to World Vision as a result of their decision. In a dramatic reversal, World Vision president Richard Stearns and board chairman Jim Bere wrote:

“In our board’s effort to unite around the church’s shared mission to serve the poor in the name of Christ, we failed to be consistent with World Vision U.S.’s commitment to the traditional understanding of biblical marriage and our own statement of faith, which says, `We believe the Bible to be the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God,”‘ Stearns and Bere wrote. “We are brokenhearted over the pain and confusion we have caused many of our friends, who saw this decision as a reversal of our strong commitment to Biblical authority. We ask that you understand that this was never the board’s intent.”

Now, with that reversed, all is well with the world…Not! While World Vision seems to have avoided income, vision, and purpose suicide, the momentum of our current superficial culture continues to wreak havoc. Pressure to advance the liberal agenda (like with what happened with World Vision) will continued to be multiplied. The initial decision of World Vision did not happen in a vacuum. It was influenced by the press of the culture moving in a direction that is not in concert with Biblical revelation. Each time one of these incidents happens, sadly, there is a further march toward the liberal assumptions that are pressing the culture. The march continues even if there is a reversal of the individual decision.

In the early 1970’s, I remember hearing the President of Hollywood’s Screen Writers’ Guild on the radio. He said, “We are going to fundamentally change the values of America. We are going to write TV shows and movies that show homosexuals as witty and bright. Christians will be portrayed as hateful, out of touch, bigots. Within a generation, the culture will change. Homosexuality will have won the day.”

Tragically, that is exactly what happened. Scripts have emerged, and they have done their work to bring revolution. Given the amount of air time that same-sex relations get, it is hard to believe that those who act on same-sex attraction number well less than 3% of the population. (See this report from the National Catholic Register on Hollywood’s gay culture and its influence.) Overwhelmingly those with the microphones, TV cameras, and printing presses view the World Vision reversal as a tragic demonstration of homophobic troglodytism. The “enlightened” decision to seek to further normalize same-sex intimacy, they see as being overwhelmed by hate mongers and archaic thinking mouth breathers.

There is, however, another dimension to the story. It is the harvest of ill that comes from pursuing paganism. That is actually what we are dealing with. Remember that at its heart, Paganism is not just raunchy parties with all manner of misbehaving. Fundamentally, Paganism is a world view that sees everything as part of “one.” For a Pagan, there is no distinction between the life of a tree and the life of a person. They believe that there should be no distinctions of behavior or gender. There should be no rules in society which could cause divisions, and no distinction between God and His creation. In their view everything is part of one big ball of everything. It is not that there is Creator and creation. Everything that is makes up god. (intentional “g” instead of “G.”)

Christians understand that God is eternal and essentially “other.” He is different from us, and we are different from Him. He creates. He reveals. He sets the rules. It is He that is the author of life. Because He is entirely good, the laws He has set in place are for everyone’s good. The only ones who do not benefit are those who rebel. The problem is that the pathway that He has set out is the pathway of blessing. Living in another way is not “liberating,” it is stifling.

Scripture says that sexuality is a gift, and a powerful one, but it has to be lived out within the paradigm that God has designed. When sexual expression happens within the context of His design of marriage it is creative and life-giving. That is epitomized in the gift of children, but of course that is not the only life-giving result of marital intimacy. When sexuality is expressed outside God’s design it is not life giving. Really loving people is sometimes costly. Sometimes it means saying “no” when they want to do something that is not life-giving.

With moral decisions, pretty much everything positive involves a negative challenge to begin with before a benefit is received. With negative decisions, there is a temporary reward with a long term negative result. For example, large quantities of chocolate cake provide a short term positive (tastes great) and a long term negative (too many calories). It is not surprising that people give in to sexual temptation that is outside the parameters of expression that are laid out in Scripture. It may seem enjoyable for a time, but moral laws are just as immutable and inviolable as physical laws. Attempting to violate the law of gravity will bring a painful consequence. Violating God’s design for sexual expression will also bring a painful consequence. As the Church, we need to do a better job in preaching and teaching about God’s design and why He sets the limits he does. We need to be telling young people not to settle for the immediate little pleasure but invest in the long term great reward. Rather than just providing a set of rules, we should be sharing the Good News with people that they can come into a relationship with the Lord that is truly satisfying and fulfilling regardless of the temporal circumstances in which we find ourselves.

The other day, I had a conversation with a mid-twenties person who said basically, “What possible reason could there be not to have sex with my boyfriend? It’s fun and we plan to get married eventually.” I told her, “There are lots of them, but I expect that you haven’t considered the tender parts of your relationship that need to develop if it is going to be able to stand the test of time. Premature sexual expression overwhelms those things and they simply can’t develop. It’s like you can’t hear a whisper when there is a lot of shouting.”

“I never thought of that,” she said.

The fact that one decision by World Vision was rolled back is not cause for all out celebration. It is better than if they had stayed off track, but there is open war over Paganism, especially concerning sexual boundaries. Rather than just gritting our teeth and fighting back when there is an assault on Biblical values, we need to take the initiative to share the wonders of doing things God’s way. For example, there are interesting statistics about marriages that last. In general, one marriage out of two ends in divorce. However, people who seriously practice a traditional religious faith—whether Christian or other—have a divorce rate markedly lower than the general population according to this post from the Gospel Coalition.

We may not have the strength of the Screen Writers Guild behind our messages. We do, however, have the strength of the Holy Spirit. That makes the outlook for the future much brighter.

This time, the worst of it was averted with World Vision. They came back to Biblical vision. Thank God that we avoided having yet another Western body exporting ill health to the two-thirds world. The leaders of World Vision are to be commended for repenting and returning to Scriptural teaching. The pressure of the Pagan world is tremendous though. Tomorrow, we might be the ones facing the challenge to make a right decision and make it in a way that is truly loving. Costly but right.

Bishop Bill Atwood is Bishop of the Anglican Church in North America’s International Diocese and a regular contributor to AAC publications.