When juvenile offenders appear in the court of Judge Tony Polumbo in Baytown, Texas, and plead guilty or no contest, they face a number of consequences. Judge Polumbo may give them a stiff fine of $500 or grant them the option to attend a Right Choices course offered by several local churches. Juveniles receive community service hours for attending and participating in the course.

"Most kids in trouble don't have a belief system," says Judge Polumbo. "It started bothering me, and I said, 'What can we do to help them?' The [Right From Wrong material] makes sense, doesn't threaten, and gives them some wonderful information about what to do."

It's not just kids in Baytown, Texas, who need a belief system upon which to base their values. Take, for example, the matter of truth. "Most Americans believe that all truth is relative," states researcher George Barna in his 1995 book Generation Next. Or take lying: Barna found that 57 percent of teenagers believe lying is sometimes necessary--not simply understandable or acceptable, but necessary.

The lines between right and wrong have blurred. And not just in "the world," but oftentimes in the church as well. When Campus Crusade for Christ staff member Josh McDowell surveyed evangelical youth in 1994, he found their understanding of truth little different from that of their non-believing peers.

Youth pastors across the country were sensing the same problem. "In working with young people," says Gary Fewless, president of the Youth Emphasis Project in Cincinnati, "you see the effects of moral relativism, tolerance and cultural diversity. Josh provided a lightning rod that helped put words on what we'd been feeling and gave us a frame of reference for all that was going on."

"This is one of the first times that almost simultaneously across the spectrum people sense we have a problem," says Josh, who for 30 years has been challenging youth to follow Christ and to stay morally pure. "From charismatic to Baptist, everyone is saying that we have lost the ability to discern right from wrong, and that we have to deal with it."

As a result, Josh launched the "Right From Wrong" campaign, which challenges churches, parents and teens to learn what makes things right and wrong, and that includes numerous resources people can use to teach how to make moral choices (see the resource box on page 24).

The body of Christ is uniting around the Right From Wrong message. Take the publishing end of it, where six different companies publish Right From Wrong materials. "[Publishing the Right From Wrong workbooks] marked a big departure for us," says Jimmy Draper, president of the Southern Baptist Sunday school board. "We not only partnered with Josh in this, but also with some of our competitors. We found ourselves in the unique position of advertising our competitors' products and they advertising ours. But we did it because of a deep belief that what Josh said about the need for absolute standards was absolutely on target."

The unity in publishing is matched by the unity in the campaign itself. Some 42 denominations and parachurch organizations have been involved over the last three years. Right From Wrong campaigns have been held in more than 40 cities (another 20 are scheduled for fall 1997), with an estimated 30,000 churches taking advantage of campaign resources. (See "Houston, We Have a Problem," for a look at how Right From Wrong plays out in an ordinary church.)

During the campaign, Josh teaches that one can determine what is true by measuring a possible action against the character and nature of God. Lying is wrong, for example, because God is true. Killing is wrong because God is the creator of life. Chastity is right because God is pure.

Right From Wrong gives adults the words to communicate such moral precepts to teens, and often helps parents and their children begin talking about issues of right and wrong. If you have children, we'd encourage you to talk about these issues with them. Read "From the Mouths of Teens" on page 14 with your children, then discuss it together. Do your kids know anybody who thinks this way? Or do they themselves think this way?

After hearing Josh speak on Right From Wrong myself, I went home and asked my first-grade daughter if anybody in her class cheated. It turned out that she herself did, even though she more or less knew it was wrong. We talked about it awhile, then she asked, "Daddy, don't you know that a lot of kids in this school do that?" Soon she stopped "sharing answers," as the kids call it, but at a cost. The boy at the next desk said he would no longer be her friend if she didn't share answers with him.

We might lose some friends if we stand up for truth, but it's worth the cost. As Josh puts it, Western society is facing what may be the greatest cultural shift since the time of Christ. [see "Wake Up and Smell the Tolerance," page 9]. We must try to change the tide.

In Cincinnati, teenagers involved with the Youth Emphasis Project formed a group that speaks in local high schools about right and wrong. In San Francisco, Redwood Chapel taught the Right From Wrong material to every age group in their church. And in Baytown, Texas, where one judge decided to try and turn the tide, hundreds of teens in trouble are learning right from wrong.

"Judge Polumbo liked what he was seeing," says Stan Sullinger, youth pastor of Memorial Baptist Church, which first offered the classes in Baytown. "He actually saw results, or he would have just dumped [the program]."

"The only way we will be able to turn our country around is by enhancing our spiritual beliefs," says Judge Polumbo. "I don't think it can be solved by government; I really don't. Government can be our partner, but as citizens we must do it; we must stand up."

If enough citizens stand up, perhaps God will turn the tide, and a future Barna survey will find that teenagers think behavior such as lying is neither necessary nor acceptable, but just plain wrong.