I think we’ve come to the point in the United States where it is time for widespread civil disobedience among people of faith. Is it possible to love and follow God without standing against evil?

The President announced that he will be sending letters to every public school district in the United States forcing them to let transgender students use the locker rooms and bathrooms of their choice – no matter what sex is listed on their birth certificate.

Slowly but surely, America has been dying. The root cause of this slow and painful death has been our swallowing the lie that disagreeing with someone is equivalent to hatred and that it is only possible to love someone when we agree with them. When did it become acceptable for people of faith to be paralyzed by a lie? Yet this is exactly what we’ve allowed to happen – and it’s killing us en masse. With the President’s new aggressive measures targeting people who embrace the biblical view of sex and sexuality, the lie threatens to accelerate our demise at what is sure to be a spectacle the world has never before seen – unless people like you and me stand up with humble courage.

It’s entirely wrong for the President and the radical LGBTQ community to present a moral wrong as if it were a civil right – but this is exactly what they are doing. They are, once again, inserting their theology into politics and legislation through the language of political correctness. They are theologically, morally and ethically wrong. They are also defying common sense. Genesis 1:27-31 says:

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them . . . and it was so. God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (ESV, italics mine).

The very image of God is under a full-throttle, out in the open attack. The President and the radical LGBTQ community are not merely bullying us. They are bullying God. This is incredibly dangerous ground because no one in all of history has ever done so successfully. There are grave consequences for defying Him. The same Bible that says “God is love” (1 John 4:16) also says this: “And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says ‘I know him’ but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected.” - 1 John 2:3-6, ESV

To hate God is to ignore His commands or worse yet, to corrupt them. Christians and people of faith have been branded as “haters” while the real haters are those who have ignored and perverted His teaching.

Don’t be fooled: This is not about locker rooms and bathrooms. It’s about control. The President’s decision is not about civil rights, it’s about using confusion to gain control. He and the LGBTQ community talk tolerance and love while doing things that fly in the face of God’s design, agenda and image.

The President’s decision will have massive ramifications for students, teachers and administrators around the country. It will also create huge aftershocks far outside bathrooms and locker rooms. It will affect what used to be normal around dining room tables and houses of worship across the country. And anyone who disagrees with him will be called “intolerant” and a “hater.” How ironic. How twisted.

If you’re not upset, you’re not paying attention. But if you are only upset, you’ve not gone far enough. Today should provide ample fodder to stimulate a humble revolt among people of faith around our nation – but will it happen? So far, we have allowed ourselves to become the marginalized majority – a group of people who supposedly have strong convictions but so far have done little more than complain against evil. Complaining against evil doesn’t put evil in its place.

We seem to have forgotten what our Lord Jesus said, and its particular relevance today:

“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” (John 15:18-19, ESV)

How far we’ve strayed from Jesus’ words. What we need today is humble courage. Humility and courage seem, at first, to be opposites. But when we read our Bibles and look at how evil was defeated in the past, we learn that humility and courage are siblings. They always showed up when evil was defeated. If they didn’t, evil won the day.

The President and the radical LGBTQ community are unified. Are we? We would be if we truly cared about the things that concern God. I’m afraid that we’ve allowed ourselves, instead, to become very distracted when we should be standing at attention. Talk is cheap. It’s time for action. If they, in the overwhelming minority, are able to achieve so much, then what about us who are in the overwhelming majority? Where are we at this key time when humility, courage and faith are so desperately needed?

We are now being faced with a moment not unlike that which Daniel faced in the lion’s den. It is akin to what Peter and the Apostles faced in Acts 5. We are being told to obey man rather than God, and it’s high time we stop worrying about being called a name. Why do we care so much about the opinions of people whose views don’t really matter?

So, what do we do? How do we respond? Will we, like Daniel, respond with humble courage and stand with God? Learn a lesson from Daniel and the lion’s den: Because the lions slept, Daniel was not in jeopardy. It’s only when a lion is roused from slumber that it poses a threat. Isn’t it time, people of faith, for the sleeping lion to awaken? We should be responding the way people of faith have always responded when the tide of evil has reached new levels – with humble courage.