As I am writing this very article for the blog, I am writing on the platform, Microsoft Word, that I will be writing about! Several weeks ago, I saw an article regarding Microsoft Word that I initially thought must be a satirical piece written. And then I realized it was not, as I Googled it, and that it was covered extensively by several albeit smaller news sources. I did some digging in my own copy of Word, and discovered the truth…
You know when you are typing in Word and you spell something wrong, or use abysmal grammar, and you get those squiggly lines that warn you of your mistake? Well, as of a few weeks ago, you can add a purple dotted line for under words that fall into these categories: Age Bias, Cultural Bias, Gender Bias, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Gender-Specific Language, Racial Bias, Sexual Orientation Bias, and Socioeconomic Bias. You can see the list in the two screenshots here:
I am not sure about on Windows versions of Microsoft Word, but on macOS, the settings are off as default (or at least they were/are on my computer).
Initially, I see things like this as completely ridiculous, something that I got a good laugh out of, and I am sure others have as well. But what we need to be watching out for is the influence this may have on people around the world, especially school aged children. When I was growing up as an impressionable teenager in south Florida, my school used Word almost exclusively for writing papers and everything, and even back in the late 1990’s, we had to run spellcheck and everything. Fast forward just a few years from that, and we had the advent of the red underlining that told us we cannot spell! It was glorious and made typing so much easier to edit! But now, in 2022, we have Word warning us that we should call “a mailman” a “mail carrier” instead. That is just one example of how this works, and how the influence can creep in.
We, as believers, must be careful as to not let things like Word begin not just to influence our writing, but to not influence our thinking. With children, just a few suggestions given by a computer to change language or word usage can cause one to begin to do that on their own, making “gender neutral” language, even when not appropriate, become the norm. And this is something that would go against God’s created order. There is just too much going on to try not only steer the narrative of culture in our country, but to direct us, and especially our children, on how to think.
With that being said, one of my favorite passages in Scripture comes from Psalm 78:1-8:
“Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth! I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord, and his might, and the wonders that he has done. He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments; and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God.” (Psalm 78:1–8, ESV)
I have preached on this passage several times, including when I was called in view of a call to the church I currently pastor. I am not going to rehash the entirely of my sermon on this passage except to say this: We must disciple our children. We must train our children in the ways of the Lord, lest they become overcome by the worldly indoctrinations that we see all over the place. Too many Christian parents feel that the worldliness of thirty-five to forty hours of schooling can be counteracted by two to three hours at church each week. It cannot. I remember not who said this, but we can’t send our children to school for a week and then expect “Noah’s arky arky was made from barky barky” to keep them on the straight and narrow.
Parents, the culture war must be fought with the Truth, the Truth that is the Gospel, the person and work of Jesus Christ. This Truth must not just be relied upon to be taught at church. We must teach this in our homes to our families. Through prayer, the reading of Scripture, the singing of spiritual songs and hymns, and spending time together doing all of this on a regular basis, i.e. daily (or almost daily) should be a non-negotiable for the Christian family.
I leave you with my favorite quote from Jonathan Edwards, “We have had great disputes how the church ought to be regulated; and indeed the subject of these disputes was of great importance: but the due regulation of your families is of no less, and, in some respects, of much greater importance. Every Christian family ought to be as it were a little church, consecrated to Christ, and wholly influenced and governed by his rules. And family education and order are some of the chief of the means of grace. If these fail, all other means are likely to prove ineffectual. If these are duly maintained, all the means of grace will be likely to prosper and be successful.”[1]
[1] Jonathan Edwards, The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 1 (Banner of Truth Trust, 1974), ccxlviii.
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