Though politically sidelined, Churchill persistently sounded the alarm. He warned of fascism’s rise in Germany, of its ruthless embrace of violence, and of the looming threat it posed to world peace. Yet, by the time his warnings were finally heeded, it was too late. The storm had already broken.
In retrospect, it is tempting to ask, Why did they not listen? But hindsight is a luxury. At the time, the British public clung to Neville Chamberlain’s soothing assurances of “peace for our time”. The nation wanted to believe there would be no more war. Their ignorance was not mere naivety – it was wilful. To confront reality was simply too painful.
The Deeper Issue: The Heart of Man
From a biblical perspective, this should not surprise us, because “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (Jeremiah 17:9). Man's sinful nature is neither reformed by culture nor enlightened by reason (1 Corinthians 2:14). Our natural instinct is to reject uncomfortable truths in favour of reassuring lies.
In Noah’s day, people ignored his preaching and carried on with life as usual, blind to the fact that judgement was coming. The present was too comfortable; the idea of a global flood was unthinkable. The Lord Jesus warned that this same pattern will repeat itself (Matthew 24:37-39). A day is coming when the world will again embrace deception, on an even more terrifying scale. The "man of sin" (2 Thessalonians 2:3) will be welcomed, not in spite of his lies, but because of them (2 Thessalonians 2:11). Humanity's reflex is to choose comfort and familiarity over truth and repentance.
The Church is not Immune
It is easy to apply this critique to unbelievers who embrace secularism or evolutionary theory, both of which clearly contradict God’s Word (Hebrews 11:3). But we must also examine ourselves. The church is not immune from this same “heart” problem.
Over the past fifty years, many churches with a long history of recognising biblical authority, including those I have been associated with, have experienced a steady, heartbreaking decline. Around countless supper tables people have struggled to diagnose what went wrong. While no single factor can fully explain this decline, several threads stand out. British culture has become aggressively secularised; biblical voices are mocked and marginalized in the public square. Yet not all causes lie outside our control. We must also face hard questions about our own failures. Has this decline come upon us suddenly, or were there warning signs, clear indicators that a storm was gathering?
In generations past, there were men who courageously warned of this trajectory. Like the prophet Micaiah, who was despised by King Ahab because he “never prophesies anything good” (1 Kings 22:8 NIV), these preachers spoke boldly for God, only to be dismissed or rationalised away. Their messages were uncomfortable; their warnings unwelcome. Congregations preferred preachers who soothed rather than convicted. And what about today? How do we respond to the modern-day Micaiah who refuses to preach what is popular, and dares to expose the sinfulness and hardness of our hearts?
For many in 1930s Britain, the thought of another world war was simply too painful. It was easier to hope and to imagine that such horrors belonged only to the past. Likewise, as Christians, it can be painful when the Word of God pierces us (Hebrews 4:12), exposing our spiritual complacency and calling us to repentance. It is far easier to dismiss the weakening of church testimony as just “a sign of the times”, “the day of small things” (Zechariah 4:10), rather than to accept our own responsibility.
The Lord Jesus threatens to remove the lampstand if a church does not repent (Revelation 2:5). When spiritual vitality is lost, either as individuals or collectively as churches, we must not comfort ourselves by assuming it is merely an inevitable decline. Could it be that the warnings were given, but we chose not to listen?
Will we Silence the Messenger?
When someone preaches a message that cuts through our spiritual apathy and exposes our lukewarmness and compromise, our instinct might be to silence the messenger. But we must resist that temptation. Instead of rejecting the “prophet”, we must listen for the voice of God speaking through him.
The storms of assault are never far away from the Church. As Churchill once reportedly said, “you cannot negotiate with a tiger when your head is in its mouth.” There will always be the temptation to agree with those who protect the status quo and choose rational comprise over self-sacrificing obedience. Will we recognize the warning signs of the coming storm, and, like Joshua, choose to say, “But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15)?
