House of Cards

You’ve probably seen a house of cards. Some people can make amazing structures out of simple playing cards, leaning them together by fours until they have used a whole deck or more. However, no matter how fantastic the finished work is, we all know that nothing holds it together; the whole “building” is fragile and will eventually fall. Such is the nature of any edifice that lacks cohesive power: without a binding force, it will come apart, often with disastrous results. Thus we get our cliché: “It will fall like a house of cards!”

We can apply this line of reasoning to Western society today. We are seeing problems in government, marriage, business, and so on. People are becoming more and more disillusioned, and everyone suffers because our culture is losing cohesion. Society is becoming increasingly divided and more chaotic.

On both the personal and national levels, we need cohesion—a common purpose, a shared goal, a mutual set of values. The sad fact is, the very things that lead to social cohesion are under attack, marginalized and mocked by so-called “progressive” changes taking place around us. Traditional family values, marriage as a commitment between one man and one woman, and true values of education, purity, honesty, and outgoing love are seen as neither universal nor absolute—and many have forgotten the roles that each of these key factors plays in the formation and sustenance of loving family relationships.

Instead, in today’s confused society, it is emotional infatuation, roses, candy, and wanton sexual pleasure that people associate with love. Like a house of cards, these superficial and physical pleasures have been built up around the modern concept of love—and, like flimsy cards, they all too easily come crashing down.

The Bible describes the true meaning of Godly love. In John 3:16, when we read that God loved the world enough to sacrifice His only Son, the word translated as “loved” comes from the Greek agape—a type of love that is supremely outgoing, not merely romantic or familial. In 1 Corinthians 13, the Apostle Paul describes in shining detail just what this love entails, and he makes an interesting statement: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal” (v. 1).

The same could be said of any society that is not built on the solid foundation of love for our fellow human beings. The prosperity with which God blesses a nation for obeying His laws and statutes disappears like a flash in a pan when people “exchange the truth of God for a lie” and give themselves over to a way of life that defies God (Romans 1:18–31). It blows away like a house of cards—with no part left standing.

Jesus Christ said a time would come when attitudes would worsen and society would weaken: people’s love for one another would “grow cold” because of lawlessness. The unity and cohesion that following God’s law brings would be lost (Matthew 24:12). Paul echoed this warning (1 Timothy 3:1–3).

Ultimately, the whole world will sink into this state, and a time will come when God will humble all people and governments on the Earth for their lawlessness and lack of humility before the Second Coming of Jesus Christ (Revelation 6:16; Isaiah 2:10–12). Before that time, however, we will increasingly see the foundations of our own shaky house of cards tremble and finally fall—under financial distress, social unrest, and worse.

Only repentance and a return to God’s laws and a moral way of life will turn things around, whether for all Western nations, or for concerned individuals who respond to God’s “watchman warning” (Ezekiel 33).

Do you hear that warning when you read these scriptures? Do you wonder what is ahead for you? Where your life is going, and how the collapse of this paper mansion will affect you and your loved ones? Order our free booklet Fourteen Signs Announcing Christ’s Return and read our powerful Tomorrow’s World article “Too Big to Fail?”