Counterfeits

This is going to be another one of my rather philosophical rambles, but I was started off on a train of thoughts when I read a sentence about counterfeits in the realms of the spirit.

What is the enemy of 'good'? It is easy to answer 'evil', but that is misleading, because only rarely is 'evil' an effective opponent of 'good'. More often 'counterfeit good' is a much more effective opponent of 'good'.

This is a theme I invite you to explore with me.

We are currently in the middle of a debate about Section 28, which made it an offence for local authorities to promote homosexuality as a 'pretended alternative to family life', or some such phrase - for I am quoting from memory. I have a great respect and affection for those few open homosexuals I know as friends, and do not know if they perceive their chosen basis for sexual relationships as an alternative 'family life' or not.

Can two men, or two women, create a union that is equivalent to the union between a husband and wife? It is one thing to cover the relationship in law, and to allow rights that a common law spouse enjoys to be enjoyed by common law partners of such a homosexual partnership. Broadly speaking there is a sort of natural justice in this, and no doubt society can demand quite properly that such rights need to be established formally in law. But the nub of the issue that Section 28 enshrined in law is that a homosexual pair are not a family in the same way that a husband and wife are, and that young people need to understand this. Young people may need to be protected from influential protagonists wishing to mould impressionable minds in an unrepresentative way. To wish to protect the young from unfair influence is not to condemn individual homosexuals at all, but to seek to limit how and where they may promote their personal lifestyles.

The enemy of family life may not be a denial of family (the state taking over all upbringing of children is such a denial) but a counterfeit concept of 'family'. An apparent family, but not a real family. I am actually more worried about the state replacing parental authority and responsibility than I am about a partnership of two homosexuals wanting to adopt children. If the alternative is continued residence in a local authority 'home' for orphans then I would vote for their being adopted by a homosexual couple, assuming there were no childless families of loving husband and wife available.

This opening illustration of the effectiveness of the counterfeit as the opponent of the real may do more harm than good, and I do not want to press the point too far. Let us look at an area that I do feel strongly about. There is a most wonderful statement made by Paul, writing to his friends in Galatia: "The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control."

If it is true that the only way we humans can experience real love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control is by opening our spirit to the Spirit of God, then any pretended love, joy, peace etc. are the true enemies. And I think we can detect some of the more obvious counterfeits.

The whole drug culture offers a counterfeit joy and peace, with one drug which some are arguing should be legalised actually called 'ecstasy'. The culture of sexuality offers a counterfeit love. The culture of counselling offers an even more enticing counterfeit of peace and self-control. If only our natural selfishness could be converted by conversation into true love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, how relieved we would all be. This is not to say that all counselling is evil, but we need to know what its limits are. If it offers to supply true love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, then it needs to be exposed as a counterfeit.

For the Christian message is that there is something so deeply 'wrong' with us that only from the gift of God can we receive true love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. And that not suddenly, like flicking a switch, but only through a total habit of 'living by the spirit' which becomes a gradual transforming force in one's life.

And every Christian I know, and I know myself best of all, realises that this process still has far to go in him, and that in truth it has only just begun, and he wishes he could enjoy more of its fruits sooner. The process will not be complete this side of the grave, for we have everything here 'in part' and only there will we be released to be transformed fully.

So this Sunday morning I ponder on the counterfeits I see around me, some more appealing than others, and I challenge myself not to be fooled by them.