The Grid

Don't Tell Me What I Am; I'll Tell You What I Am

Sometime this morning a commentator on my car radio ushered me across a personal tipping point concerning the semantics of the same-sex marriage issue, and of the whole public debate about homosexuality. I'm mad as you-know-what, and I'm not going to take it anymore. I guess I'd heard the word "homophobic" one time too many, and buzzer of sorts went off inside me.

The left has long pursued the strategy of gaining control of the semantics as early as possible in any public debate.  Pro-abortion is pro-choice.  Pro-life is anti-choice. Conservatives are members of the radical right who vote for fringe candidates.  And so on. 

According to the current media style book (which hasn't been challenged effectively from the right), there are only two positions one may hold concerning homosexuality and its related issues: one is either pro-gay (by the way, "gay" used to be a perfectly good word, and I never use it to describe the sad homosexual life) or homophobic.  

This is where I get off. I'm not homophobic, and neither are most of the others who attempt to resist the runaway freight train known as "gay rights" (a term that ignores the fact that homosexuals have all the same rights as everyone else).  When one is "phobic" about something, that means he is afraid of it. So the only two recognized positions in this debate are (a) I'm in favor of everything homosexuals want; or (b) I am afraid of them.  I would like to stake out a new ground here.  I am neither in favor of things like same-sex marriage nor afraid of homosexuals and their unhappy practices. Nor do I carry personal animus against individual homosexuals or wish them ill (it would be nice to see them return the favor).  What I am is- gasp - opposed to the sin of homosexuality on moral and religious, yes, Biblical grounds. So I am introducing a new term into the discussion, one I dream would someday replace the inaccurate and loaded term "homophobic."  I hereby declare myself homo-averse. 

As a homo-averse man, I decry the practice of homosexuality, and oppose special rights for those who engage in it, including the oxymoronic "same-sex marraige." I do however, affirm the worth and personhood of everyone who is in that lifestyle, recognizing that every homosexual is a man or woman for whom Jesus died.

The President of the United States last week introduced a tortured, confusing and cynically political defense of the proposition that same-sex couples should be allowed to "marry."  He astonishingly cited his Christian faith as a basis for his position, loosely referencing the Lord's Golden Rule, that one should treat others as he himself would want to be treated. I don't know about you, but I would like someone to treat me kindly by telling me the truth about something when the consequence of not knowing it could be a miserable eternity.

So here, my homosexual friend, is what Jesus really said about same-sex marriage: "Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female. For this cause (emphasis mine) shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they twain shall be one flesh?" (Matthew 19:4-5; parallel passage Mark 10:6-7).  For this reason, the reason that He made them male and female, God instituted marriage.  Marriage is God's idea, and while the state has a role in codifying marriage, no man or government has the authority to redefine what God has created. It's all about male and female.

The homosexual may feel then that he has nowhere to go in Biblical Christianity.  But the Lord's mission on earth is nothing if not redemptive.  When I say I am homo-averse, I mean that I am averse to the practice, not to the people.  There is an old Christian saw - "Hate the sin, love the sinner" - that is not explicitly stated in a citable verse, but that is an accurate summation of the Christian's proper stance. In a seminal passage (1 Corinthians 6:9-11), the Apostle Paul begins by writing, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolators..." He then lays out a shopping list of sins, including homosexuality, that will keep one out of heaven.  But then comes the redemptive part: "...And such were some of you: but (emphases mine) ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." Wonderful.  He reminds the Corinthian church folks that they had also been lost, but they had been redeemed.

So take up the homo-averse brother on the offer to come to Christ.  One might say that Jesus is the most homo-averse of all in terms of the practice, but he is the least averse of all to you, the man or woman. His surpassing love for you was demonstrated as His life-blood spilled out on the ground under a violent Roman cross nearly two thousand years ago. A few millenia later, He still awaits your call. Invite Him in. He can take your life and make something amazing out of it.

 

 

 

The Contraception Power Play: It's Bigger Than You Think

Flee fornication.

-1 Corinthians 6:18a 

There is much sound and fury on both sides of the controversy surrounding the Obama administration's edict that even church-related organizations provide their insured with birth control devices and/or pills. The Catholic Church understandably raised vigorous objections at the outset, and they were joined by other churches and groups who value religious freedom.  There was a meaningless concession made on the government end, that the organizations themselves would not be required to provide the means of birth control as long as their insurers would do so. There are at least two problems, of course, with this adjusted position: the first is that many of the Catholic schools, hospitals and other venues are self-insuring; and the second is that, even if a separate insurer would be the designated provider, the Church would still be paying, at least in part,  for the products and related services,and would also be referring employees to provisions that are contrary to Church doctrine. 

Thus far those who have publicly sided with the Catholic Church have done so, wisely, on the basis of religious freedom, regardless of their positions on contraception.  Most Protestant denominations do not oppose contraception per se, at least within marriage. While the Catholic Church opposes contraception regardless of the marital status of the sexual partners, most Protestants do not. However, by  failing to distinguish between contraception within marriage and contraception outside marriage, one tacitly condones fornication.  All churches and denominations who base their doctrine on a strict and conservative view of Scripture oppose fornication.

For clarity's sake, I would like to here insert my own definition of fornication: any sexual activity other than that between a man and a woman who are married to each other.  So when Dr. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention proclaims that convention's solidarity with the Catholics on this issue, he is really standing up for more than just a generic offense against the bedrock American foundation stone of religious freedom. He is also fighting back against the notion that Baptist institutions would be required to provide birth control means to unmarried as well as married employees, as well as any students in Baptist schools who are insured through the school or the convention. 

This brings the issue closer to home for Protestant (as well as Jewish and other) folks who do not share Rome's blanket opposition to contraception, but who do oppose sex outside marriage, which is in turn promoted and facilitated by the institutional issuance of birth control means.

This to say nothing of the abortifacients which are included in the government edict, and which violate the consciences of both Catholics and evangelical Protestants.

Saving the Baby Humans: Some Good News

But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty..

-1 Corinthians 1:27

There is good news on the abortion front. Next Tuesday, November 8, voters in Mississippi will determine the fate of Amendment 26, which would protect the civil rights of all "persons." "Persons" is defined in the amendment to include "every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning, or the functional equivalent thereof." Amendment 26 would, in fact, criminalize all abortions on the state of Mississippi.

There appears to be strong support for the amendment, crossing party lines. Both the Republican and Democratic gubernatorial candidates favor it. And there is some stirring in four other states- Arkansas, Montana, Nevada and Oklahoma- to place similar amendments before the voters. It's likely that, should one or more of these proposed amendments pass, the U.S. Supreme Court may soon have to face the dreaded Roe v. Wade music.

The tide seems to have shifted in the decades-long abortion debate.To what do we owe this changing momentum? We have noted in a previous post that both DNA science (a crushing blow to the "It's my body" argument) and improved sonogram technology ("It's really a baby!") have been pivotal in the gradual move towards abortion sanity (which is why the "pro-choice" people have fought so hard against any legislation that would put this information before a woman's eyes prior to an abortion).

But what I'm seeing at a time like this is all the nameless (not to God) soldiers, men and women, who have formed those ragged little bands of protesters pacing back and forth on sidewalks in front of abortion clinics, mostly silent but sometimes praying out loud or singing hymns, trying to get the attention of women who are entering, hoping to persuade them not to abort, informing them of alternatives. Some of them are women who have had abortions and lived through the awful empty pain of no labor, and who would now spare others. They have a story to tell, and sometimes it resonates. Sometimes a baby is saved from the saline furnace, and the troops rejoice over the victory.

I think about a Catholic bishop standing outside a west Florida abortion clinic leading prayer while a local attorney screamed the vilest epithets through a megaphone only inches from the bishop's ear. Bishop Nevin prayed on, Christlike, undaunted. I remember standing on a sidewalk as part of a human protest chain, and seeing upper-middle class and professional people giving us the finger and shouting obscenities while repeatedly honking their horns.

I think of a man I knew who risked his advancing career by getting arrested at a pro-life demonstration. I think of the volunteers in crisis pregnancy centers, who apply all the persuasion they can to save babies from oblivion; and all those faithful unthanked women who staff the homes where expectant mothers can stay and be cared for while bringing their babies to term (and usually to adoption). I think of those who strip away portions of their hard-earned money to help support those centers and homes. I think of the ones who have wept and fasted and prayed at all hours of the night that this awful stain would be removed from America's soul.

The foolish and the weak indeed. Take a bow, brave ones. The tide is turning, and you who have been there during the seemingly hopeless times will someday see your fondest dreams return to you, fulfilled. Paul the Apostle counsels you thus: "And let us not be weary in well-doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." (Galations 6:9)

The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

Isaiah 5:20

 

Two men facing execution have been in the news lately.  One is a man who committed the most vile and heinous of crimes, crimes committed twenty-two years ago.  His name is Oba Chandler.

The other man is Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani of Iran.  He once led a congregation of some four hundred people, but now faces possible execution.  He was originally arrested in 2009.  His crime?  "Apostasy", that is, the crime of being a Christian and not a Muslim.  

In 1989, Chandler bound and gagged Joan Rogers and her two teenage daughters, Michelle and Christe. He tied concrete blocks to their necks.  He raped them and threw them alive into Tampa Bay, where they drowned.  

Chandler was convicted in 1994 and sentenced to death. He just turned 65 in prison.  He has lived a lot longer than the three victims.  Florida Governor Rick Scott has signed the execution warrant, and Oba Chandler's termination is set for November 15 at 4:00 PM.  His death will be considerably less uncomfortable than those of his victims.  Hal Rogers, the victims' husband/father, plans to attend.  He has said that he would like to pull the lever.

Pastor Nadarkhani's plight has captured some international attention, and the Iranian government has apparently  postponed for now what was to be his execution date.  In response to worldwide pressure against killing a man solely for religious purposes, they are now saying that, no, it's not apostasy, but rape and extortion for which he would be punished.  Interesting, since he was first arrested in 2009; the charge has always been apostasy; and the rape and extortion charges never appeared until the last few weeks. It's clear that those charges are fabricated out of whole cloth.

As Chandler's date approaches, count on seeing and hearing from opponents of capital punishment, pontificating about what a barbarian practice execution is, that Chandler should not have to die, and so forth.  I expect we will see no such ardent wailing from these same lefties on behalf of Pastor Nadarkhani.  It is one of the inexpicable moral contradictions of the left that they would become so wrought over the execution of a beastly man who has lived sixty-five years on this earth, the last twenty-two of them in prison, who has been down every possible legal avenue,and who won't admit his guilt; and predictably oblivious to the plight of a man who is simply exercising what we here take for granted: his freedom of conscience and religion.  Many of them are also zealously favorable towards the practice of slaughtering innocent babies in the womb.

I must make a distinction here.  There are many Catholics (and others) who oppose the death penaly, but also oppose abortion.  They are not hypocrites in this matter, as are the loud lefties, and, although I disagree with them about capital punishment, I respect their consistency.

I've been praying for Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, that he will be set free, and I suggest you do the same. And, yes, I've prayed for Oba Chandler, and will do it some more.  I'm not praying he will escape execution, but that before November 15 he will come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, the divine Man from heaven, Who came and died, innocent, for all of mankind, even the Oba Chandlers of this world.

 

 

How God Judges Nations- Part 5

And he said unto me, Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, they words were heard, and I am come for thy words.

But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days: but, lo, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me; and I remained there with the kings of Persia...

Then said he, Knowest thou wherefore I come unto thee? and now will I reutrn to fight with the prince of Persia: and when I am gone forth, lo, the prince of Grecia shall come.

-Daniel 10:12-13, 20

 

These rather startling portions of a conversation between an angel, presumably Gabriel (Gabriel having visited Daniel previously) and the aged prophet Daniel briefly pull back the curtain that conceals the spiritual realm from the natural world.

The angel discloses that, although Daniel had been seeking God for wisdom with fasting for three weeks, and despite the fact that he was dispatched right away, he was delayed because of a battle with the "prince of Persia." Clearly this prince was not a mortal man; no angel of God would need more than a few seconds to defeat a man in battle. This prince was a highly-ranked angel of Satan, whose manipulations are behind the machinations of the world's systems. That is why the Apostle Paul refers to the devil as the "god of this world" in 2 Corinthians 4:4. and the "prince of the power of the air" in Ephesians 2:2. The Apostle takes time in Ephesians 6:10-18 to describe Satan's kingdom as organized and multi-layered, and to warn Christians that they must not try to face the devil in their own strength, but must make use of the spiritual weapons God Himself has provided them.

"Persia" was then the name of an empire whose land mass had previously been known as the Media-Persian Empire, and before that, the Bablylonian Empire (read Daniel 5 for a description of how Babylon went to the Medes overnight). The angel tells Daniel here that he will return to finish his battle with the prince of Persia, and then the prince of Grecia would come.

This is an amazing insight into the entities behind the nations, and into history itself. When the angel left Daniel to complete his conquest of the demon prince of Persia, the demon prince of Grecia would succeed him, opening the door in the natural realm for Alexander's conquest of the Persians.

The application to our study on the judgment of nations is this: God judges nations, not only in and for eternity as in the Matthew 25 scenario (see Part 1 of this series), but He judges nations in time. Many nations that have existed in history will never make it to the Matthew 25 judgment, because they have already been judged in time by the Lord and found wanting (see Daniel 5:25-31).

Closer to our time, we witnessed the demise of the Soviet Union. The USSR was a great oppressor and persecutor of Christian believers, and we saw in Part 1 that those governments who suppress the Gospel are outlaw systems in the eyes of God. There was much sustained prayer sent up to the Throne of God by Christians the world over, and one day, the Lord had had enough, and the Soviet Union was no more.

This is not to discount the human agencies involved in solidifying the national changes effected first in the spiritual realm. Alexander was a brilliant military commander; and with regard to the Soviet demise, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul and others had large roles to play. But God's in-time judgment was at the bottom of it.

We may bring more on this subject in the future, but this is the end for now of the series, How God Judges Nations.

Suggested Scriptures on which to build prayer for nations:

• Psalm 2:7 (as a member of the Lord's Body, you are authorized to request nations be given Him by the Father on the Head's (Son's) behalf).
• 2 Chronicles 7:14 (if my people- believers- will do all these things, then I will heal their land).
• Psalm 33:10-12 (powerful basis for national prayer, especially regarding the machinations of those who would move a nation away from God).
• 1 Timothy 2:1-8 (covers a lot of ground, much basis for national prayer).

 

 

 

 

How God Judges Nations- Part 4

Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.

-Proverbs 14:34

 

I was born in 1947, and grew up in the America of the 1950's and early 1960's.  It is a real challenge to explain to a younger person how greatly the moral climate of the nation has changed between then and now.

I suppose the best way to describe the difference would be to posit that then there was a unified moral consensus in the land, and now there is not.  That moral consensus was based on the Judeo-Christian standard as set forth in the Bible.  It didn't matter if you had never read the Bible (I hadn't), you moved in and were influenced by a kind of synthesis of Biblical moral teaching that was pervasive in the culture.  

In an ironic kind of way, the best evidence of that consensus may have been found among those who were violating its tenets.  And many were.  But among them, in moments of reflection or honesty, there was a common confession, and it started something like this: "I know that what I'm doing is wrong, but..."  Today, by comparison, one will seldom hear this.  Increasingly what is said, even trumpeted, is something along these lines: "Wrong by whose standards?  This is 2011, man.  I do what seems right to me, and I don't answer to anyone." (At this point I can't resist throwing in a little Bible reference, Proverbs14:12.)

I grew up in Massachusetts, among the bluest of the so-called "blue" states, yet in public school we said the Lord's Prayer out loud every morning, all of us, led by the teacher, at the beginning of the school day, just before or after reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.  The Protestant version, based on Matthew Chapter 6, was longer than the one the Catholic kids said, closer to the more compact version of Luke 11.  The Catholics stopped after "deliver us from evil", but waited with heads bowed while the others continued on with, "For Thine is the kingdom", etc., then we all said "Amen" in unison.  And, yes, there were Jewish kids, and others, I'm sure, whose parents didn't believe in anything.  Nobody was forced to say the prayer or corrected for not doing so, but I don't remember anyone not doing it.  I guess you could say it was part of the consensus. Of course the U.S. Supreme Court ended all that in 1962, and in the following year kicked the Ten Commandments out of the schools, stating, among other things, that the "danger" of posting them was that the students might meditate on the commandments.  I guess meditating on "Thou shalt not kill; Thou shalt not steal; Thous shalt not bear false witness" was damaging to the children's psyche.  Things surely have gotten better in our schools since then, have they not?

Bible-based morality has been replaced by moral relativism.  Children are taught that there are no absolutes, except that we must accept all lifestyles as equally legitimate, and that we must recycle. Additionally, morality has been replaced by safety concerns, as radio host Dennis Prager has aptly noted. Fifty years ago, if one were to ask a typical father of teenage daughters if he were more concerned about his daughters (a) smoking cigarettes, or (b) having sex, he would likely have answered "having sex", not the least because he wanted his daughters to be "good girls." Not that he would be thrilled about the smoking, but that behavior did not typically "grade out" as serious as fornication. Female virginity was highly valued in those days (and yes, there often was a double standard.  Girls and women were more protected under the old standards. Or some would say "oppressed."). Today one might get an entirely different answer, the dad being okay with the sex as long as it is "protected", rather than the health dangers of smoking.

I can hear the derisive hoots now, but I'll say it anyway: the teaching of evolution has had a huge deleterious effect on modern morality.  Life looks very different if one is an accident of nature rather than a creation of God. They used to teach a little section on it, but we were told that it was a theory, and that we needed to talk to our parents and clergy about origins.

We have gone to great lengths to expunge from our public life every reference to God.  And, as they say today, "How's that workin' out for ya?" Terrifying violence in schools; huge increases in out-of-wedlock births and STD's (what we used to call "venereal disease"); an alarming increase in what used to be nearly non-existent, drug addiction; spousal abuse, child abuse, pedophilia, etc. etc.  God seems less interested in blessing and defending a nation that no longer has time or respect for Him.

We are told that a man can marry a man, and a woman a woman. States have been codifying these "marriages" and licensing them. Setting aside for a moment the moral issue of homosexuality (yes, there IS something wrong with that!), there is still the oxymoronic component of the phrase "same-sex marriage."  Call it anything else, but don't call it marriage.  Marriage is God's idea, not man's.  The family is the first unit he put together.  Mark 10:6-7 quotes Jesus thusly: "But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female.  For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife..." (emphasis mine).  "For this cause": the male/female dichotomy and the institution of marriage were created one for the other; one cannot exist without the other.  You can't have a marriage unless you have a man and a woman.  There are other contractual agreements that people can make with each other.  Just don't call it marriage, because it isn't, and by the Creator's definition, can't be.

The biggest of all the moral taints in my view, and the one over which we are in real danger of losing out entirely with God, is abortion. The 1973 Supreme Court decision known as Roe v. Wade ushered in an era of unfettered and barbaric slaughter of innocents in the womb.  There are many of us who feel that America's future hinges on what we do about it.  For decades the nation's conscience was numbed. Interestingly enough, it is science that has helped to convince some of the pure evil of abortion.  DNA science helps us understand that a child in the womb is not just "the woman's body", towards which she may act with impunity in any way she chooses, but a separate living human. And ultra-sound technology has developed to the point where a woman viewing her growing child will have serious second thoughts about terminating it. This is no doubt why the pro-aborts are screaming such bloody murder (ironically) over any attempts to force abortuaries to at least offer to show the woman a pre-abortion sonogram of her baby in the womb.

Consider this Scriptural passage concerning ancient Israel:

But (they) were mingled among the heathen, and learned their works.

And they served their idols: which were a snare to them.

Yeah, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto devils,

And shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan: and the land was polluted with blood.

Thus were they defiled with their works, and went a whoring with their own inventions.

Therefore was the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people, insomuch that he abhorred his own inheritance.

And he gave them into the hand of the heathen; and they that hated them ruled over them.

-Psalm 106:35-41

Interestingly, God does have something to say about the environment. It's not about recycling, or planting trees, or saving the rain forest or some endangered cockroach. He says that the great environmental disaster of our day is the execution of innocent preborn children, which pollutes the land with blood. We may not offer them unto idols like Molech in the way that the Canaanites and Israelites did, but we have our own child-devouring idols: convenience, money, education, career- anything that would be "hindered or hampered" by the birth of a child. Our own President, the most ghoulishly pro-abort in our history,  has said that he wouldn't want his daughters "punished" with a child for a mistake.

Verses 40-41 are a stern warning by example of what happens to a nation which blithely executes its children. Let us pray.  

 

How God Judges Nations- Part 3

I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men;

For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we made lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.

For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour;

Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus;

Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time..

Whereunto I am appointed a preacher, and an apostle (I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity.

I will therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.

-1 Timothy 2:1-8

 

This passage addresses head-on what type of culture and institutions are to be fostered by good government, and why. The Apostle Paul here lays out a clear picture of government's role in the furtherance of the Gospel (mainly to get out of its way and leave it alone), a picture that is devastating to those who argue that every semblance of the Christianity of our forefathers must be removed from public life.

First the Apostle urges believers to engage in the following:

• supplications: Greek de-esis: supplication, that is, praying for one's need to be met.  In this context, one could take this as asking the Lord that He would install the right men and women in publice office, because that is certainly a local or national need which should be met.
• prayers: Greek pro-seuch-e; a general word for prayer, which may also include the aspect of praise to God, as in Mark 11:17, "house of prayer".
• intercessions: Greek en-teux-is: intercessions, that is, prayer on behalf of others, that their needs be met. In this context, it connotes praying for the leaders themselves, for their health and families, for their moral uprightness, etc.  
• giving of thanks: Greek eu-char-is-ti-a: simply, thanksgiving.

The supplications, prayers and intercessions all work together in a complete way in the interest of seeing to it that the nation (and local governments) will have the proper officials in place, and that those officials will be healthy and blessed, stay on the right track, avoid moral failures, etc.  The "giving of thanks" proved a little more difficult for me, as the following anecdote will show:

Several years ago I was praying for the President of the United States based on this passage.  The President at the time was someone of whom I deeply disapproved, but that day I had some liberty in prayer and was actually doing rather well (I thought), until I came to the "giving of thanks" part.  I stumbled and kind of broke down at that point.  I said, "Lord, I don't see any way for me to thank You for this man." The gracious Lord was quick to reply:

"The President you have at any given time is not a cause, but a symptom.  The country always has the President it deserves.  For one thing, the people of the country elect him. More importantly, the President is a reflection of the condition of the culture.  And the condition of the culture is a reflection of the condition of the church in that nation.

"Every President is either a blessing to the nation or a wake-up call to the church. Either way, he is someone for whom to give Me thanks."

I thought immediately of 2 Chronicles 7:14, the verse so often quoted in connection with the healing of the nation.  It struck me that, if we are to apply this Scripture to our political situation, we must allow it to speak to the church first.  God isn't holding the crooks and hookers and druggies and skeptics responsible for the nation's well-being.  He says that if His people who are called by His name (Christ-ians) shall humble themselves and pray and seek His face and turn from their wicked ways, then He will hear from heaven and forgive their sin, and heal their land. It's not on "them", it's on us.

Later He would take me a little further into it, and let me know that the condition of the church is, to a great extent, a reflection of the condition of the called ministry- the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastor-teachers of Ephesians 4:11- whose job it is to perfect or equip the church for the work of the ministry and the edifying of the Body of Christ (Ephesians 4:12). It is absolutely vital that we feed our people with the Word of God, and not according to trendiness or lightness.  Verse 14 of that same passage tells us what happens with a church that has not been built up in the Word: that it remains immature, and vulnerable to any kind of doctrinal or philosophical sleight-of-hand, of which there is plenty in our time.

The Apostle then goes on to describe the kind of society that would result from the right leaders doing the right things: that is, wherein one is able to live a "quiet and peacable life in all godliness and honesty." This is clearly a worthy end in itself, but it is additionally followed by Paul's statement that such a public atmosphere is approved by God, "who would have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth." In other words, an atmosphere that is conducive to the preaching of the Gospel. And the next few verses (5-7) make it clear that he is talking very specifically about the Christian Gospel in particular.  He caps this off with his expressed desire that people be able to pray anywhere, openly, with hands lifted, without fear of governmental wrath, or doubting what may happen if one were to so pray publicly.

From this passage we can draw a clear conclusion about one of the primary purposes of good government: that it promotes a peaceful and godly atmosphere that is conducive to the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and that in no way hinders the free expression of the Christian faith. Any governmental system, be it atheistic communist or Christ-denying Islamist, or any other, that prohibits or inhibits the free flow of the Christian Gospel is an outlaw system in the eyes of God, and will be judged by Him accordingly.

When Moses was sent back into Egypt as the deliverer of his people, the first thing the Lord told him to ask Pharoah (Exodus 5:1) was that he allow the enslaved Israelis to go into the desert and hold a feast unto the Lord. Pharoah would lose virtually everything for himself and his nation for the next words that came out of his mouth: "Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." A short time later, judgment had been executed on Pharoah, for this very offense, and the great nation was ruined. All because the people of God were prevented from worshipping Him according to His commandment.

Nations are sometimes judged in time, before the final judgment (see Daniel 10:13,20).  Where is the Soviet Union, that awful persecutor of Christians, these days?  The cries of the oppressed believers, and the prayers of the saints worldwide for their horribly persecuted brothers and sisters (Please! Always remember the persecuted church in your prayers!) came up before God, and tipped that whole thing over.

We are to pray for our leaders because God judges nations.  And he is against governments that hinder the freedom to preach and receive the Gospel, and to openly express our devotion to our God. 

Next: Proverbs 14:34: Righteousness Exalts a Nation

 

 

How God Judges Nations- Part 2

Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?

The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying,

Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.

He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.

Then shall he speak to them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.

Yet have I set me king upon my holy hill of Zion.

I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.

Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel.

Be wise, therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. 

Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.

Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

-Psalm 2:1-12

 

This three-thousand-year-old psalm has the sound and feel of a Twenty-First Century United Nations meeting.  The assembled nations are raging, and taking counsel together against the Lord (Hebrew Jehovah or Yahweh) and his anointed (Hebrew Meshiyach, Messiah).  In other words, they are clamoring and scheming against the nations known by the Islamists as the Great Satan (the United States, traditionally seen in a national sense as representative of the Messiah, Christ), and the Little Satan (Israel, traditionally seen in a national sense as representative of Jehovah, the Judeo-Christian God). Any observer of present-day events possessing a modicum of objectivity would have to say that Israel and the U.S. are the two most hated nations in that assembly.

The sheer irrationality of both anti-semitism and violent persecution of Christians testifies across history that there is a dark hidden component in these evils.  God's enemy is the enemy of mankind,and he has long hated and persecuted the ancient people God chose as His covenant nation, and through which, He determined, would come the Christ Who would be Savior of multitudes from all nations. Would anyone argue that Hitler's holocaust was not driven by demonic entities?  What about the decades of brutal assaults on Christians in the communist nations, and even worse if possible in the Islamic world?

As we observed in the previous post, the Bible's great pumbline of nations is the relationship between any nation and the brethren of Jesus: national Israel, and Jews and Christians worldwide. Where the descendants of Ishmael insist on the continued troubling of Isaac (see Genesis 21:9ff), they run the risk of banishment into eternal torment (Matthew 25:41-46). That principle applies whether the "Isaac" involved is national Israel or Jews anywhere, not to mention Christians. The national judgment of these heinous ills applies wherever a government is complicit with them either proactively or passively in a condoning sense.  The government of a nation is responsible for how Jews and Christians are treated within that nation.  It will not purchase any leniency in judgment say that such persecutions were carried out by civilians and not be government.

As the Psalm progresses, its author, moved by the Holy Spirit, presents  an ironclad promise, a platform for prayer, and a solemn warning.

The promise is found in vs. 4-6, wherein it states that one day the Lord will laugh derisively at the enemies of His people, and, for all the plotting and scheming against them, will indeed set His King upon HIs holy hill of Zion in Jerusalem (a reference to the Matthew 25 passage that is the basis of the previous post).

The prayer platform is found in v. 8: "Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession".  This is the Father speaking to the Son, as clearly indicated in v. 7.  The word "heathen" is from the Hebrew goyim, which is also translated elsewhere as "nations". As members of the Body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:12; Ephesians 4:16), we have the authority and responsibility to pray to the Father for the nations on behalf of the Son, Who is Head over the Body of which we are part. We are to pray that they will be enlightened by the salt and light of the Gospel (Matthew 5:13-16), and relate positively to Jesus' brethren.

The solemn warning of vs.10-12 is that these nations need to get right with the Son now, or else they will have great trouble later.  In the upcoming segment, we will consider other criteria by which God jusges nations.

Next: 1 Timothy 2:1-8: What Kind of Conditions Are You Promoting?

 

 

 

 

 

How God Judges Nations- Part 1

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:

And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats;

And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in;

Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

The shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?

When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?

Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels;

For I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink;

I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.

The shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or maked, or sick, or in prison, and di not minister unto thee?

The shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous unto life eternal.

-Matthew 25:31-46

 

Much has been written and said in our time about this passage. Most of what I have read recently has been built on a wrong premise. To posit that these verses touch on individual salvation is off the mark, because the New Testament is plain that personal salvation is based on faith in the finished work of Christ on the cross, not on good works (see Ephesians 2:8-9; Romans 3:28; 1 Peter 1:9). I am convinced that this scenario is in fact, as it states, a judgment of nations.

The Greek word translated "nations" here is ethne, the singular form of which, ethnos, translates as both "nation" and "people group" or "multitude". It is helpful that some nations include more than one ethne (the now defunct Yugoslavia was a good example).

Another reason to believe that this discourse does not deal with the salvation of individuals is that by the tme this scene is set, that is, Jesus having returned in glory and sitting on the throne of David, the believers in Christ will already have been resurrected and glorified (1 Corinthians 15:51-52). This is true whether one is pre-, mid- or post-trib in his eschatology. So born-again believers will not be in either of the two groups rpresented above.

Additionally, it is clear that, if believers are to rule and reign with Christ (Revelation 5:10; 20:6), then it stands to reason that there would be people other than they over whom they might rule. There will be natural people on earth during Christ's millenial reign. These are the people who will be tempted by the Satan again when he is loosed from the pit for a short time at the end of the millenial period (Revelation 20:3, 7-8). These natural folks are those who have escaped the terrifying destructions that immediately precede the Lord's triumphant return.

Not a saved one among them, so when the goats are consigned to hell, they are getting what they signed up for by rejecting Christ. The sheep, on the other hand, get an amazing mulligan because they were part of nations that did right by the criteria set forth by Jesus Himself in Matthew 25. They get to come into the millenial reign of Christ, even thought they are not "saved" in the personal sense, but they come in as groups. Their conduct will be pretty circumspect because, after all, Jesus is visibly ruling from Jerusalem, aided by those of us who received His amazingly gracious offer of eternal salvation.

So how do these nations qualify? What is it that Jesus is either rewarding or punishing in this passage? It all seems to come down to how nations deal with His brethren. So before we go any further we need to determine who Jesus' "brethren" are.

First there are His natural brethren. Jesus was a Jew, and so the Jews of that time, and forward, are His natural "brethren." So we might say, first of all, that a nation will be judged in terms of how it relates to the Jews within its borders. If the Matthew 25 scenario had taken place in, say, Nazi Germany, "goat" would be the determination. On the other hand, the U.S. (despite individual pockets of anit-semitism- remember we're talking about nations here) has done very well. I think any fair-minded American Jew with a sense of history would have to say that the U.S. has been the most accepting and affirming of the sons of Isaac of any nation. Obviously, Islamic nations are way behind the eight-ball with this criterion. But that is not to say that things could not change before the final curtain.

This criterion could be expanded to the treatment of Jews in other nations as well. I know the U.S. was somewhat late to the struggle in World War II, and that its motives were not necessarily that altruistic; but what a sense of historic destiny must have struck the Allied soldiers who liberated concentration camps: "I was in prison and you visited me; I was naked and you clothed me; I was hungry and you fed me")!

Then there is the larger construction: the nation of Israel itself. Many a nation will find itself burned up in the Matthew 25 judgment because it kicked national Israel to the curb. Again, the Islamic nations stand closest to the fire on this, but there have been exceptions: post-Sadat Egypt has honored the long-standing non-aggression pact with Israel (although Mubarek's successor may not). When Britain, who had the mandate in Palestine, began to get cold feet and back away due to Arab pressure, it was left to Harry Truman and the U.S. to recognize the fledgling Zionist nation. Coincidentally or not, there is this: before that time, it was said that "the set never sets on the British Empire." Now, sixty-plus years later, it could be said that the sun never rises on the British Empire.

Today many of us are very concerned with the mindless nonsense of trying to force tiny Israel into more land concessions in the interest of negotiating"peace" with a bunch of ethne who have never abandoned their hateful ambition of driving the Jews into the sea. How does one negotiate peace with an entity who denies your right to exist? I think that the U.S., despite many flaws, had always been a sheep nation, but we are in danger of losing that status over this and other issues, which we will treat in upcoming installments.

Finally, with regard to Jesus' brethren, there are His spiritual brothers, the Christians (see Matthew 12:49-50; Luke 8:21; Romans 8:29; Hebrews 2:11). The first question is, how does the nation treat its own Christians? Again, most of the Islamist nations are in real trouble here. The communist states used to be considered the worst institutional persecutors of Christians (and they were inhumanly brutal). You'll note that the Soviet Union no longer exists (there are forces within that would like to see it reform). God sometimes judges nations in time as well as in eternity, as we will explain in a subsequent post.

Freedom to worship is an extremely important criterion here. The issue that led to the ultimate destruction of Pharoah's Egypt was his refusal to let the Israelites go and hold a religious feast unto the Lord in the desert (Exodus 5:1-4). A government that infringes on the God-given right of the people freely to worship is an outlaw system in the eyes of God.

In the U.S., we have a Christian history that begins with the Founders. Many of us view with alarm the crumbling of the national moral consensus that was based on the Bible, and the incomprehensible willingness of irresponsible judges to agree with the offended few, that Christian symbols and statements do not belong in the public eye. We need be watchful and prayerful here.

There is also the issue of Jesus' Christian brethren in other nations. How have nations reacted, for example, when atrocities such as the murderous institutional persecutions of black Christians in southern Sudan were perpetrated by the Arab Muslim government seated in the north? How has a nation represented Christ by encouraging and sending mssionary efforts abroad (not sent by the government, but not impeded by it either)?

You see that there is an urgent call to and basis for prayer for our nation and other countries with regard to these Scriptural issues.

Next: Psalm 2: going after the Great Satan and the Little Satan

 

Too Many Camels' Noses Under the Big Tent

And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. -Ephesians 5:11

 

Reading about the GOPROUD-related kerfuffle at the CPAC convention rubs against a sore spot of mine.  I have watched with dismay as the "conservative" agenda moves almost exclusively into the realm of economics and almost entirely away from the social issues.  So much so that even a formerly reliable socon like Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana said during the last election cycle that "we need to put the social issues on the back burner."  And he continues to say so.

As a firm believer in Ronald Reagan's three-legged stool of conservatism: fiscal responsibility, virile foreign policy backed by a strong miliary, and adherence to the Judeo-Christian values that made this country great, I now see a bunch of pretenders bandying Reagan's name about.  I've read with concern the virulent slamming of socons on some tea-party oriented blogs.  The vitriole isn't coming generally fromt the blogs' authors, but from posters who basically seem to want to know what business we socons have in even expressing our concerns. 

I've had some worries in this regard from the beginning of the movement.  With many of the Tea Partiers, it's all about economics, and many seem offended that pro-lifers, for example, want to be heard.  I think a little historical reference is in order here.  One of today's econo-only Tea Partiers would have a hard time making a case for excluding a consideration of morality with the real, original Tea Party gang.  Samuel Adams was not only the driving force behind the jettisoning of the bales of tea into Boston Harbor, but also has been crediting with coining one of the slogans of the American Revolution: "No king but Jesus."

I have no essential quarrel with the great emphasis on economics in this time.  And, to take it a step further, there are serious moral issues involved in excessive taxation and in the dishonest way in which elected and appointed officials handle the people's money.  But here is how many of us socons see it: no amount of economic adjusting and tinkering will ever begin to approach the value of seeking God's blessing on our land.  As an amazed Tocqueville observed, "America is great because America is good."  He attributed the moral power of the nation to the flame that emanated from pulpits across the land.  He went on to opine that when America ceased to be good, she would no longer be great. And, well, here we are.  At a crossroads.

GOPROUD is an organization of homosexuals ("gay" was once a perfectly good word, and I'm averse to using it in the trendy manner of today) advocating for conservative economic positions (great), and for social-policy initiatives like same-sex marriage (not so great).  The problem with the general embrace (with certain notable exceptions) of GOPROUD by CPAC attendees is that it takes a chain saw to one of the legs of the Reagan stool.

One young fellow (I'm sorry, but the word "twit" kept coming to mind) was happy to say for the cameras how great it was to be at the convention, but regretted that there were certain "attention seekers" who didn't extend to GOPROUD the level of acceptance he thought appropriate.  Attention seekers.  That's what he thinks drives the concerned socons who raise their objections.

People with a weak or inactive moral compass have trouble grasping the concept that there are others who put the moral issues on top.  CPAC needs to take heed lest they develop a myopia of the same kind.  And "conservatives" who belittle or undervalue the socons now may search in vain for the third leg of the stool when they begin to totter come election time next.