The questions which I ask are more directed towards the audience of believers. To speak with unbelievers concerning the Holy Spirit, the purpose of the Church and our failures is foolish. These questions may seem irrelevant, but I challenge you to really take to heart what I ask.
What is the difference between the Christians and the rest of America? I know for most the answer may seem quite simple, but allow me to rephrase what I ask so that you may have a better understanding of the question. How is someone able to tell apart a Christian from a non-believer?
Growing up in a generation where love, peace, kindness, happiness, and charity are all sought after as a means for acceptance, I find it disturbing how similar the saved and unsaved really are. You cannot say that Christians are different because they are loving, the very act of love has become redefined to accommodate everyone everywhere.
You cannot say that the difference is happiness because people, especially in our beautiful country, have found ways to spend their entire life fulfilling there every want and desire. It is true that there are people who know not the reality of Christ and are still happy.
Our pastors would like for us to believe that charity is what separates the Church from the rest of the world, and yet this is not the case. Just recently, while attending Tri-City Christian Church, the pastor had said that America viewed the congregation in Florida that was going to burn hundreds of Quran on September 11th of this year. He claimed that that church will have a reputation for hate rather then one whose focus was giving or having a clothing drive (which Tri-City did) for their surrounding neighborhood. It is when the Church cares more about what the world thinks of them that we allow the corruption of doctrine and our love for God. We are no different from the pagans in America if we claim that we are charitable for there are charitable organizations, philanthropists, small businesses, most celebrities, and even Playboy donates to just causes.
What is the difference I ask? If the world stands for what we stand for (peace, love, joy, kindness, and giving) than perhaps there really is no difference? And yet to think that there is no difference between the Christian Church and the World would be blasphemy. Hence truth shall prevail and differences will arise.
The truth of the matter is that there is something terribly wrong with the Church here in America. Where once we stood for absolutes and tradition, tolerance and acceptance has crept in under the guise of love. How did this happen?
J. Gresham Machem
“The industrial world of to-day has been produced not by blind forces of nature, but by the conscious activity of the human spirit; it has been produced by the achievements of science. The outstanding feature of recent history is an enormous widening of human knowledge…
“No department of knowledge can maintain its isolation from the modern lust of scientific conquest; treaties of inviolability, though hallowed by all the sanctions of age long tradition, are being flung ruthlessly to the wind.
“So many convictions have had to be abandoned that men have sometimes come to believe that all convictions must go. If such an attitude be justifiable, then no institution is faced by a stronger hostile presupposition than the institution of the Christian religion, for no institution has based itself more squarely upon the authority of a by-gone age.”
Do you still not see the answer to my question? We have allowed the Church to become like the world because the “imaginations of man’s heart are evil,” and through modern “advancements” in science, philosophy, and logic we have allowed the corruption of the Word of God, our very foundation of truth and light.
For some reason Christians believe or act as though we should be scared of, run away from, or even hide from the world, but “we can no more remove ourselves from [the] world than we can escape from the atmosphere that we breathe.”
Hear the words of a great theologian right before he was put to death for his beliefs:
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
“I have come to some conclusion. During the last year or so I’ve come to know and understand this profound worldliness of Christianity. This is something I am discovering right up to this moment, that it is only by living completely in this world that one learns to live by faith. One must completely abandon any attempt to make something of one’s self. Whether it be a saint, or converted sinner, or churchman, righteous man, or an unrighteous one, a sick man or a healthy one. By this worldliness, I mean living undeservedly in life’s duties, problems, successes and failures, experiences and perplexities. In so doing, we throw ourselves in the arms of God. Taking seriously not our own sufferings, but those of God in the world. Watching with Christ in Gethsemane. That, I think, is faith. That is how one becomes a man and a Christian.”
The enemy has found his way into our flock because we did not know who he was. As we speak, he sends his wolves to rationalize away the authority and importance of the reality of the Bible. And that reality is clear and crisp with a message not to be ignored or redefined. We are not to test the Bible with the knowledge of man; instead, man’s thoughts, philosophies, logic, and science are to be tested by the Word of God.
If the Church of today believes in the authority of the Bible, created by God and inspired by His Spirit, then the difference between the world and Christians should be evident. Though we stand for love, joy, peace, and charity, we are called to oppose, resist, and even hate that which is evil:
“Let those who love the Lord, hate evil” (Psalms 97:10)
“To fear the Lord is to hate evil” (Proverbs 8:13)
“Hate evil, love good, maintain justice in the courts” (Amos 5:14-15)
Micah 3:2
If anyone, be it pastor or elder, friend or father, says that we are not to hate evil…let him be damned.
It is because the church does not hate evil that we have allowed wolves into the midst of the congregation. However, before we can hate evil we must recognize what it truly is as defined by the Word of God. This is not so easy a task for after evil is defined, a name must be given or else that which we resist, fight, and turn away from can deceive even the elect. It is for this reason Christians are to be engulfed by God’s Word, that we may understand what pleases and what displeases our Lord. We must know the Light so we may truly know the darkness and be aware of it.
As soon as we begin to hate evil, as soon as we take seriously our responsibility and duties as followers of Christ, as soon as we get out from under the skirt of the Church and stop running from the world, will the sheep skins fall off the wolves and differences will be revealed to mankind.
Have you forgotten that this is war? God chose Generals to lead His people in the past. In this war, there can be no “ ‘peace without victory;’ one side or the other must win.” Right now, after the apologist has gone out into the world. Swinging the sword of truth and defending the faith with his shield. He seeks rest within the citadel of his church only to find that he hands his armor to an enemy at the door.
If you disagree with what I say then speak. If you agree, then I ask you not only to speak out, but to act. For if you agree with these words of mine, but do not wish to change or fight for what is right, and would rather just send a private message…then get out of my way for you are no better than the rest. Speak out.
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