The anti-HIV/AIDS movement has called upon all and sundry to abolish the egregious habit of having multiple concurrent sexual relationships. Surely, this practice harmfully fuels the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Be it as it may, even if this call can soar, it’s unlikely to produce heavyweight impact for its unintelligently superficial. It’s hugely anchored on limited human wisdom. Thus, it lacks an understanding of the sociology of our spiritual poverty.
The basic point raised here is that unless we faithfully collaborate with Jesus in the war against HIV/AIDS and other social vices, it would be difficult to achieve sustainable behavioural change. The HIV/AIDS pestilence is not a simple behavioural and moral problem; it’s fundamentally spiritual.
Unfortunately, the natural man doesn’t understand the things of the Spirit of God for they’re foolishness to him; nor can he know them because they’re only spiritually discerned (1 Corinthians 2:14). But every single one of us has an obligation to learn about God through His word of integrity and wisdom. It’s a sin not to know God and believe and uphold His sacrosanct word.
Disappointingly, when HIV/AIDS campaigners enthusiastically urge morally decadent youth to break sex networks, they ignorantly omit to advise them to apply 2 Chronicles 7:14 which requires people to humble themselves before God, pray to Him, seek His face, and keep away from their evil ways; so that He can hear from heaven, forgive their sins, and heal their land.
Political leaders and HIV/AIDS activists who believe they can successfully influence multitudes of the youth to break free from massive and complex sex networks without Jesus should pay sufficient attention to the following scriptural verses:
God has given Jesus authority over everything including the lives of all people everywhere (Colossians 1:15-18).
Jesus has told us that without him, we can do nothing (John 15:5). And we learn that with God’s help we will do mighty and great things (Proverbs 60:12). Luke 18:27 asserts that what’s impossible with people, is possible with our God of miracles. And Philippians 4:13 says “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”. In addition, God tells us that if we’re unable to tackle situations due to lack of wisdom, we should doubtlessly ask for it and He will liberally supply it (James 1:5).
Interestingly, in Uganda, where HIV/AIDS once decimated the population, the church played a pivotal role in helping society to effect sexual behavioural change. In Botswana the church lacks political and social assertiveness to initiate earth-shattering spiritual revolution. It’s failing to impact society and cause the transformation that Jesus wants it to effect. Our persistent difficulty is that in Botswana the body of Christ prefers to narrowly or marginally function as a peripheral subculture and not counter-culture.
Being a subculture, it apologetically or passively seeks to be accommodated within institutional apparatuses that violate God’s precepts and standards that are vital for creating conditions that could promote peaceful co-existence among His people.
The church in Botswana would only
obediently please God once it strategically situates itself as a positive counter-culture (a potent force that authentically counters structural spiritual damage that’s being wantonly inflicted upon society by the merciless army of the Satanic kingdom).
The major problem with the “break sex network” campaign is that it’s spearheaded by politicians and social activists who lack excellent spiritual wisdom and knowledge that they can freely source from Jesus (Colossians 2:3). Prophet Hosia (4:6) has rightly stated that many people perish due to spiritual illiteracy.
Some have a good understanding of the spiritual dimensions of the HIV/AIDS scourge, but are too shy to approach the problem from the mind of Christ. Some only use spiritual knowledge in church buildings and leave it there when they enter other sites of the community, especially the workplace.
But God has truthfully told them that they should diligently serve Him wherever He has placed them (Joshua 1:3). They prefer to depend hugely on knowledge generated by professionals who’re devoid of spiritual intelligence. Little do they realise that even though God has given us academic and scientific knowledge, He still expects us to faithfully trust Him and not lean on our restrictive human understanding (Proverbs 3:5).
Let me further demonstrate the futility or limitation of depending immensely on carnal human intelligence. Even if we can amass knowledge about everything there’s to learn about HIV/AIDS, our mental assent would not necessarily enable everybody to change their sexual habits.
I guess you know even leaders and HIV/AIDS activists who’ve vast knowledge and experience about the scourge who’re nevertheless failing to practise what they preach. These people are only operating according to the spirit of the world, and not the Spirit of God. But since entrenched and pervasive sexual immorality is bred and propagated by the spirit of the world/Devil, God knows that we badly need Christ as our prototype (genuine and dependable role model) to change and acquire life-saving habits (Ephesians 5:1). And the positive change that comes to us when we embrace Jesus and co-labour with him naturally emanates from the Holy Spirit.
The latter functions as the Executive Agent of God. Genuine transformation of spiritually induced habits like sexual promiscuity occurs smoothly if one humbly subjects himself/herself to the corrective influence of the Holy Spirit. Hence Paul says in Romans 12:2 that we shouldn’t copy the world, but rather let the Spirit of Truth transform us into new people by renewing our corrupted minds.
Paul notes that the attitudes and behaviour that lead us to drunkenness, adultery and other aspects of immoral living are acts of disobedience for they contradict God’s immutable word (Romans 13:13).
And we all know for well that the major force that instigates morally and spiritually broke people to disobey God is the Devil. And when the fallen people try to solve their problems, the Devil dominates and hijacks their thought process so that they can depend and rely on his deleterious (spiritually harmful) solutions, and not those that are crucially inspired by the Holy God.
Asking sexually irresponsible people who’ve been overpowered by the things of the world (materialism) to discard sexual promiscuity without influencing them to completely surrender to Jesus is not a durable solution. Jesus cannot be impressed by a person who loves the world or the things of the world (1 John 2:15). As a matter of fact, the sexually dangerous networks we’re worried about are fuelled and complicated by the youth’s excessive love of the things of the world. They’ve been oriented towards untrammelled consumerism. Hence, they selfishly indulge in “recreational sex” even during the HIV/AIDS crisis.
We should know that even long before God created us, He had foreknowledge that one day HIV/AIDS would strike mankind, and that the only viable way for people to avoid or defeat it is to be sexually faithful to their spouses. Unfortunately, in Botswana freely available condoms and cash have contributed to the liberalisation of sexual wickedness.
Besides, agencies that proudly sponsor the “break sex network” crusade are narrow-minded and conservative. For instance, they’re not focused on the broader issue of character building.
And they’ve no capacity to address our deepening national marital crisis which causes couples to anxiously hop from one marriage to another. They don’t teach people practical strategies for breaking the sex networks, and how to find the right partners that they should stick to. Nor are they properly organised to end sexual abuse in prisons. And when significant people who pretend to be rooting for the abolition of sex networks irresponsibly indulge in sexual corruption and confuse the youth; these agencies, which always want to be politically correct, unethically bury their heads in the sand. As a consequence, many young people no longer take these false role models seriously.
Anti-HIV/AIDS campaigners are also notorious for their insensitivity to a plethora of social, economic and cultural problems that victimise the youth. There’s no immediacy about these campaigns. All they’re preoccupied with are dry exhortations and false assumptions on breaking sex networks. Evidently, Jesus would feel that this activism is devoid of God’s Love. He believes that pastors should not bombard hungry people with sermons without meeting their practical needs (James 2:15-16).
So, what do you think now? Can we possibly dismantle sex networks without Jesus, who is supposed to show us the correct way, courageously teach us the dependable truth, and offer us eternal security? But how can we possibly involve Jesus in this project if most of our professionals and activists have been overwhelmingly programmed to believe that we only require common human wisdom to dissolve sex networks?
