So I came across a blog post the other
day, like we all do; someone I know posted it on Facebook. It
sounded good, the title anyway, so I clicked away and started
reading. Unfortunately the article made very few accurate points and
quite a few doctrinal miss-steps. You can find the article here:
First
the good. The author truthfully states that Christians ought to be
aware of 'social issues', that we should be doing what we can to care
for the poor and the needy. It's sadly true that in the modern age
many evangelicals seem to be more interested in staying inside our
castle walls and shouting than actually going out to the battlefield
and lending a hand. We tend to vilify people and forget to love the
sinner we see on the street. We've developed a “we are right and
you are not” mentality that is far from helpful. That's true of
course to an extent; there is only one way to God and we have been
blessed by Him to be able to see it, but we forget that we didn't get
here on our own. It is only the unmerited favor and grace of God
that separates us from the unsaved. We as Christians need to be more
loving and more caring towards those around us, we need to remember
that the people pushing the world's agenda are lost, they need help
and God will see about their eternal destiny.
“Pure
and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit
orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted
from the world.”
(James
1:27)
Unfortunately
that little bit of truth was only the backdrop used to almost vilify
our faith and to promote a skewed view of God, Scripture, and of
Christianity. The very first mistake made is in the second sentence.
From
the Article:
“Through
seminary, I learned to grapple with justice being at the heart of the
Christian Gospel — dignity, equality, and right to life for all...”
While
these are certainly a component of Christian life, they are not the
heart of the Gospel. The Gospel is founded on the idea that we don't
have to receive justice, we can be mercifully freed from the
punishment we deserve! The 'justice' the author promotes throughout
the article is a good thing, seeking to help others around us, but is
not the point of Christianity! The point of the Gospel is to see
people saved, ultimately it matters very little how easy or how hard
your life is here on earth. God cares for our lives, He doesn't want
us to suffer, but if that's what it takes to make us more like Him He
will pour out destruction to the fullest extent necessary. Our
Holiness is what matters, not whether we have a roof over our heads
or shoes on our feet or if we can read or if we can write or if
others beat us down.
From
the Article:
“It
disoriented me because for so long I believed it was only through
Christ that one can walk in righteous paths; that without the Truth
(which had been so narrowly summed up for me in John 3:16),
everything was meaningless. I didn’t have an interpretive lens to
categorize beauty that existed outside of the vessel I was told
contained the only beauty to be found: the evangelical Christian
church.”
The
problem here is this, that beauty that you see in the world, those
nice people who do what they can to help others? It's all fallen and
apart from God. You say that you were taught that apart from the
truth of God everything is meaningless? That's because it is! We
live in a fallen, broken, evil age and nothing that springs up from
inside of it can be ultimately good. It's not all horrible, it's not
all sins and sinners, we see people trying to do good but it's all a
painting on a dirty canvas. We don't need to be saved to “do
good”, but we need to be saved if the good we do is to truly be
good because only when things are done for the glory of God are they
done correctly! What good does it do to teach impoverished children
to read if they never read God's Word? What good is it to fight that
others might be free from slavery if you leave them a slave to sin?
There is no point in purely earthly endeavors, our help is only
helpful if it points them to God who alone can truly save.
“And
the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the
will of God abides forever.”
(1
John 2:17)
(See part two tomorrow)
No comments:
Post a Comment