Modern Society’s Moral Crisis

We may live in a time of deep political polarization, but one thing many people agree on is that modern society is in a moral free fall. They believe people are less trustworthy, honest, civil and ethical than they used to be. Daily news presents seemingly endless reports of murders, mass shootings, school violence, looting, rioting, sex scandals, child exploitation, political corruption and business fraud, to name just some of society’s ills, indicating epidemic levels of immorality.

All is not hopeless, but we need to recognize that something is terribly wrong before we can see the need and means for it to be set right—in the world at large and in our own lives.

The world led astray into rejecting God

So, what exactly is causing this moral meltdown? It stems from the rejection of God and His code of moral conduct as set forth in the Bible—sinking into sin, the transgression of God’s law (1 John 3:4). And this is rooted in choices mankind made long ago and continues to make under the malevolent influence of the unseen ruler of the world, Satan the devil (see “The Depths of Sin—and the Lifeline Out”).

God is the one Source of absolute ethical truth (see Psalms 93:5; 111:7; John 14:6; 17:17), and His laws are perfect (see Psalm 19:7). A number of modern nations at one time looked to biblical laws and principles as the foundational ethical code to help them shape their own legal systems.

But today, people in these nations who truly look to the Bible are becoming the minority. The Bible has largely been pushed out of governments, schools and public life. Many deny God exists and completely dismiss His written Word.

Once people stop believing in God, they no longer feel accountable to Him and feel free to start deciding for themselves what is and isn’t appropriate behavior. Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins epitomized this thinking a few years back when he spearheaded an atheist advertising campaign in England with the slogan: “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

Of course, even those who still profess belief in God might come to the faulty conclusion that they don’t need to adhere to biblical commands. The deceitful human heart—again, under the influence of Satan (see Jeremiah 17:9, Matthew 15:19, Revelation 12:9)—has individuals and entire nations abandoning biblical instruction on a major scale, perhaps to a degree the world hasn’t experienced since the days before the Flood of Noah’s time (see Genesis 6:5).

It’s important to assess what’s happening in our culture, so we don’t get caught up in wrong ways of thinking. Here are six tendencies you may be witnessing in the world around you that lead to terrible outcomes. These may pose real challenges for those striving to live a Christ-like life, but all need to be resisted—and they can be with God’s help.

1. The rise of self-idolatry

When people start abandoning the Bible, often one of the first of God’s mandates to be ditched is the First Commandment: “You shall have no other gods before Me” (Exodus 20:3). Instead, self-idolatry becomes predominant.

Self-idolatry refers to an excessive admiration or devotion to oneself, or prioritizing one’s personal perspectives or desires above considering what God wants or values. He equates stubborn self-will with idolatry (1 Samuel 15:23). And Scripture directly labels covetous people as idolaters (Ephesians 5:5; Colossians 3:5). They will often obsessively seek attention, money, possessions, prestige, positions of influence or control, etc.—to boost their sense of self-importance or preeminence or to make themselves happy. They tend to be “wise in their own eyes” (see Proverbs 3:7) and think they don’t need guidance from God or anyone else, and may be way too confident about what they can achieve all by themselves.

The signs of self-idolatry are everywhere. On social networking sites, people self-promote unashamedly and have heated debates to exalt their own opinions. Hashtags like selflove and loveyourself have become extremely common. Tropes like “Put yourself first” and “Believe in yourself” are echoed all over the media. In terms of lifestyles, self-idolaters often focus their time and energy on attaining wealth and material possessions to satisfy personal wants, while neglecting their relationships with God and other people.

Contrast all this with the healthy view Scripture teaches—that we not think of ourselves more highly than we ought to (Romans 12:3). We need to keep this biblical perspective in our own lives. While it’s okay to have a certain amount of self-confidence, our ultimate confidence should be in God who sustains us (Proverbs 3:5-6). It’s also okay to fulfill personal desires, but Matthew 22:37-39 says doing so should be in the proper placement—after loving God and other people.

When self-idolatry rules, it diverts our attention and allegiance away from our Creator, and we stop thinking about what’s good for the people around us (in the workplace, at church, in the community, etc.). Healthy relationships become impossible to achieve. A society can’t succeed when its citizenry is self-serving. But in following what the Bible says, we will experience blessings.

2. The normalization of deception

Another biblical directive that has been trampled on is Leviticus 19:11: “You shall not steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to one another.” This verse emphasizes the importance of honesty and integrity in our relationships and business dealings.

The Bible instructs us to follow through on commitments, be respectful of other people’s property, and not intentionally take advantage of others or mislead people (through deceit, half-truths, exaggeration, etc.). We won’t have good relationships if others can’t rely on us to deal fairly with them (and vice versa, if we can’t trust others). Truthfulness and integrity build community, whereas deception destroys it.

Additional verses that underscore the importance of honesty include these: “Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord, but those who deal truthfully are His delight” (Proverbs 12:22); “Speak each man the truth to his neighbor” (Zechariah 8:16); “Do not lie to one another” (Colossians 3:9); “You shall not cheat your neighbor, nor rob him” (Leviticus 19:13); and “Dishonest scales are an abomination to the Lord, but a just weight is His delight” (Proverbs 11:1). Learn more about these principles in our resource offered at the end of the article.

Sadly, society is again doing the opposite of what God commands. People lie on their tax returns and on job applications, cheat on examinations, and pilfer from their employers or call in sick when they aren’t—and think nothing of it. Scam artists trick the public as a routine way of doing business. Politicians and their proxies look people in the eyes and speak words they know aren’t true. Numerous surveys report that many Westerners believe there are situations where it’s acceptable to lie. All of these infractions relate to point 1—when fulfilling our personal desires is our top priority, the human mind can reason that it’s okay to cheat or deceive if that’s what it takes to get what we want.

Instead, we all need to strive to be trustworthy. (See also “Grow in Faithfulness—to Be Like God”)

3. The decline of civility

In every corner of modern life, we’re seeing less civility, the quality of being polite, respectful and courteous. Instead, rudeness, bullying, road rage and coarse insults are rampant in our age. We see lack of self-control everywhere—especially in public debate or in anonymous comments on the Internet. So many these days feel they have the right to publicly bash those they clash with.

On the surface, this may seem innocuous. But even relatively minor infractions matter. Bad-mannered attitudes can intensify and brew if we allow them to, and turn into the more disruptive episodes we hear about in the news—when people become violent at airports, malls, schools, office buildings, etc., because they’re angry about something. Civility is essential to stable, strong and harmonious communities.

Historians point out that incivility has played a role in the decline of nearly every great civilization. In his classic work Reflections on the Rise and Fall of the Ancient Republicks, 18th-century author Edward Wortley Montagu observed that with the plummeting of civic virtues in the Greek and Roman empires came a “degeneracy of manners, which reduced those once brave and free people into the most abject slavery” (1759).

When civility breaks down, civilization begins to fracture.

Most importantly, incivility is in stark contrast with biblical morality, where our focus must be. Scripture instructs us to “lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence” (1 Timothy 2:2), to “show proper respect to everyone” (1 Peter 2:17, NIV), and “to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men” (Titus 3:2). When we show concern and respect to others, our relationships improve and society functions better.

4. The disregard for the sanctity of life

While homicide rates have dropped some in recent years through much of the West, the sanctity of human life remains woefully undervalued. The Sixth Commandment explicitly states, “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13). Proverbs 6:16–17 warns us that shedding innocent blood is an abomination to God. So many do not seem to hear this message, or care.

Globally, there are about six deaths from homicide per 100,000 inhabitants each year, according to United Nations statistics.

On top of that are all the innocent lives lost to abortion. The World Health Organization reports that around 73 million babies are aborted worldwide every year—or about 200,000 a day. This reflects a profound disdain for the sanctity of life that God wants us to cherish. God expects us to honor and protect the human life He created.

“To terminate a pregnancy is not only to commit an act of violence but also to assume responsibility for destroying a work of God,” writes Richard Hays in The Moral Vision of the New Testament. “We are God’s creatures. We neither create ourselves nor belong to ourselves . . . [Abortion] presumptuously assumes authority to dispose of life that does not belong to us” (1996, p. 450). He stresses that human life is a gift from God and that abortion or any form of murder is clearly an affront to God and obviously not good for society.

It’s important to see the wrong in all this and to “sigh and cry over all the abominations” done within society (compare Ezekiel 9:4). And we should speak out against the wrongs as we have opportunity (see Isaiah 58:1).

5. The redefining of marriage, family and gender

The family has often been called the “building block of society.” That’s exactly what God intended it to be. Genesis 2:24 describes a “one flesh” union between a man and a woman. It is within this context that children are to be welcomed and brought up to be moral and upright (Malachi 2:15).

In Invitation to Christian Ethics, Ken Magnuson explains that “marriage provides for the right ordering of sex, and prevents the breakdown of relationships and order caused by promiscuity” (2020, p. 188). He stresses that the family is the primary means by which moral truths are transmitted from one generation to the next. Families that function according to biblical principles create stable homes, in turn fostering stable societies. Conversely, when families break down, the ripple effects are felt throughout society in the form of increased crime, poverty and moral decay.

Once again, people are sadly lost, having been misled into turning from God’s instructions. Many people no longer believe marriage has to be between a man and a woman. Neither do most people think a marital commitment is necessary for couples to live together. Those who do marry are having fewer children or none at all. Divorce rates remain high. The number of single-parent households (usually headed by mothers) has doubled since the 1960s, and 40 percent of children live apart from their natural fathers.

Amid the confusion, our culture has even redefined gender. Rather than just the two genders, male and female, as we’re told in Genesis 1:27, we’re expected to accept a whole spectrum of genders and “fluid” shifting between them. Sadly, parents are actually praised for not “imposing” gender or sexual preferences on their kids.

The danger is, when we don’t follow our Creator’s blueprint for us and try to somehow change our genders, we are, as Andrew Walker writes in God and the Transgender Debate, “both rebelling against the natural order of how things objectively are, and we are rejecting the life that is going to be the highest good for us” (2017, pp. 54-55). God ultimately desires the best for us, so it’s vital that we conform to His design and laws. Those who have veered need to turn to Him for mercy and help to live on the right path.

6. The acceptance of sexual immorality

Related to the last section is the whole topic of sexual intimacy. The Bible teaches that sex is to be practiced only within the bond of marriage, between one man and one woman (Ephesians 5:31). Sexual activity outside of a husband-and-wife marital union or between people of the same gender is prohibited (Exodus 20:14; Leviticus 18:20, 22; 20:13). God created sexual intimacy for human reproduction as well as to be a shared pleasurable experience to bond husbands and wives more closely. Lamentably, society has steered away from these divinely ordained purposes for sex.

For many decades, there has been little or no shame attached to premarital or extramarital sexual relations, which was formerly more of a deterrent. “Casual” sex without long-term commitment has become increasingly accepted. This creates new problems, as sex outside of marriage can lead to unplanned pregnancies, which very often result in abortions.

Another development is that more people are becoming involved in same-sex sexual encounters. A 2025 Gallup poll reports that the number of Americans who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or as other than heterosexual has doubled in the last five years. In big part, this is certainly due to the entertainment industry promoting “alternative” lifestyles in its programming.

Pornography is also widespread, estimated to be a $100-billion-dollar global industry. Studies report that two-thirds of American men view pornography at least once monthly, often on the Internet, which has made it very accessible.

The ramifications are very troubling. When people steer away from God’s design for sexual intimacy, they’re almost always focusing on fulfilling their own selfish desires—in line with point 1. And in doing so, they devalue or hurt other people, leading to relationship breakups and leaving children without stable homes or good role models. Ultimately, the family unit weakens, which, as was noted in point 5, is the basic building block of a stable and strong society.

Yet so many avoid any thought that all of this is destructive

—because they are trapped in a wrong way of thinking. For those of us stuck in wrong ways, we need to pray to God for the help to be free. And those of us mourning for the waywardness of the world should be praying to God for the day when things will be set right—and even now offering help and encouragement as we are able.

A warning and our one true hope

As long as today’s nations continue to walk contrary to God’s moral laws, social ills will only intensify. No civilization can survive long-term when its citizens do not live by absolute moral standards and instead do whatever feels right in their own eyes. Scripture says, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death” (Proverbs 14:12; 16:25).

The apostle Paul warns us that the last days will be “perilous times” (2 Timothy 3:1), because people will have become “lovers of themselves” and “despisers of good” (verses 2-3). Another way of putting that might be to say human beings will have become so full of themselves that they don’t think they need God. That sure sounds like contemporary culture.

But you don’t have to go with the flow of the surrounding crowd. God reveals a different way to withstand the prevailing culture and live as He desires—the way that is best for you and everyone. Be sure to read the accompanying lead article “The Depths of Sin—and the Lifeline Out”.

Amid the darkness of this age, take a stand for God, and He will give you the help you need.

Moreover, beyond today’s troubled world, there is good news on the horizon. The Bible tells us that at some point Jesus Christ will return to earth to establish the Kingdom of God. God’s perfect moral laws, which help us understand right and wrong and show us how to live in harmony with other people, will become the prescribed code of conduct for the entire world. At last, people will experience freedom from the destructive ways of sin and the true joy and benefits of living God’s way of life!

That is mankind’s one true hope, and the only way societal immorality will ever end. God speed that day! Begin living in the surety of that hope today—with the help God wants to give you.