What goes around, comes around.

Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. Galatians 6:7

While walking the dog, just the other day, I met a new neighbor who happened to be in a conversational mood. I greeted him enthusiastically, but I could tell something was bothering him. He immediately volunteered more information than I asked for. He was so flabbergasted at how rude people were to each other…especially young people being rude toward adults. He mentioned an incident he saw in the grocery store when a young boy about the age of 9 or 10 back-talked his mother using 4 letter words. The mother seemed to just ignore it. My neighbor couldn’t understand how America had fallen so far.
He soon calmed down, and seemed glad to have it off his chest, and I asked some questions in order to get better acquainted. Now, a preacher can’t help but ask the obvious questions about spiritual matters. Of course, as most people living in the buckle of the Bible belt, he believed in Jesus. And when asked where he attended church, he came back with an answer we’ve all heard more times than we can count…“I don’t go to church. The church is full of hypocrites, and I don’t want to be a hypocrite! Why, I can take my Bible and go down to the river bank and read my Bible while I’m fishin’ and be a better Christian without going to church!” After the conversation finished I was walking back home, it struck me that this man had managed to answer his own question. He had wondered how America could have fallen so far. Then he boldly testified that the authority of the church was irrelevant to him.
The Bible, even God Himself, promises that those who disobey His Word would have their sins visited upon their children to the third and forth generation (Deuteronomy 5:9). Is it possible that the lack of respect Christians have given to the church and her authority is manifested in this present generation in more visible disrespect to all authority? The Bible says that Jesus gave His Church the keys of authority to bind things and loose things on earth in such a way that they are recognized in the courts of heaven (Matthew 16:19). We have lost the meaning and implication to that authority. Church has become more of a social outlet. We may profess that the Bible is true, but we really don’t believe every word and that is manifested in the way we respond to what is taught or preached at church. Our children have watched the leaders of the church mishandle the authority, and they’ve watched mom & dad disrespect the authority of the church and the Bible. It may appear that we are getting away with it, but we are not. Why shouldn’t this generation express their disrespect similarly?
I would be among the first to agree that the church has problems. The church has been hypocritical because the church has been very lax in holding her people accountable to spiritual authority. If scripture is correct, and I certainly believe it is, the trouble we have been experiencing with our rebellious “generation gap” is the result of our own refusal to submit to authority, particularly God’s authority.