This past weekend the nation commemorated the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks; in Florida a pastor is threatening to burn Qurans to protest Islamic extremism; in lower Manhattan tensions continue to mount over the proposed building of a Mosque two blocks north of the World Trade Center site; and just last month a commentator turned demigod held a rally to restore America on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on the 47th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr's I have a Dream speech.
The country, in the middle of the worst recession since the Great Depression, is deeply polarized and divided like no time since the Civil War. The luster of the election of the first black president has given way to long-standing and latent racial bigotry that is being stoked by scandalous politicians looking to cash in on the base fears and economic frustrations of the electorate.
And, as lines continue to be drawn and hearts continue to harden, the Church, for the most part, seems perfectly content to remain on the sidelines, while its congregants have at each other. Perhaps not wanting to be dragged into an argument it has judged to be a distraction from what Jesus commissioned it to be, the Church has, for lack of a better term, missed the proverbial forest for the trees.
On any level one cares to examine, the lack of an official response from the Church is profoundly wrong. Its reluctance to jump into the turbulent waters of the political quagmire the U.S. is caught up in, under some misbegotten belief that it should somehow remain above worldly conflicts, has not only created a vacuum that the enemy has taken advantage of, it is not even Biblically accurate.
We have been told by well-intentioned and otherwise thoughtful Christians that this debate is nothing more than your run of the mill conservative vs. liberal conflict that is as old as the nation itself and will eventually play itself out, as so many conflicts have a habit of doing. Why get caught up in a dog fight and further exacerbate heated tensions among the flock. Isn’t that the sort of thing the enemy feeds on: dividing us and thus making us ineffectual? Well, I have some bad news. With regards to division and ineffectual Christians, I’m afraid the horse has already left the barn on that one. The Church needn’t worry about exacerbating tensions. The ensuing silence has done more to further the cause of bitterness within its ranks than anything the enemy could possibly do.
I’m sorry, but this isn’t as simple as deciding which flavor ice cream one prefers; or choosing which local baseball team has the best chance of winning the pennant, or even whether one feels the rich aren’t paying their fair share of taxes. The issue before the Church is no mere classic liberal vs. conservative splitting of hairs; it’s as old as civilization itself and it is tearing apart the very fabric of the nation’s soul. Playing the role of the proverbial bartender who dares not offend his patrons, lest they not leave a tip, is a poor substitute for the role the Church was called to play. The Church cannot afford the “lofty” stance of being worried about what its customers think of it, especially with so much at stake. To paraphrase a line out of the movie “The Lord of the Rings,” war is upon the Church, whether it would risk it or not. Not showing up is not on the option list.
I have made no secret of my disdain for the growing trend of social Darwinism that is plaguing and, sadly, taking over Christianity. The incessant belief among many “believers” that one can follow the teachings of Jesus, while at the same time, espousing economic philosophies that are inimical to the very faith they claim to love, has perverted that faith and rendered much, if not all, of its teachings irrelevant. When a single pastor – who obviously has no idea what it means to be a Christian – can threaten an action so thoroughly despicable as burning the holy book of another religion; when a buffoonish, cult-like TV personality can rubber stamp his approval on his brand of Christianity, thus rendering all others blasphemy; when a majority of the population of this country still doesn't understand that freedom of religion is an absolute right, irrespective of what feelings it may elicit, and there is not a unified and unambiguous message of condemnation emanating from every pulpit in the country, one can only wonder what it was that was more important for those pastors to preach about! Another message on God’s grace being sufficient? Perhaps yet another in a series of how our unaided will can get us into trouble? Or maybe just how much Jesus truly loves his children? Sometimes I wonder what those pastors would be preaching about if their sanctuaries were on fire. Perhaps the story of Noah’s Ark?
I have always took it for granted that the Word is not a history lesson; that it is a living, breathing blueprint for how we are to live here in the present. What better way to demonstrate its profound relevance to the world we live in than to unleash its awesome power upon the millions of Christians who every Sunday flock to their respective sanctuaries to be fed? Instead, what many hear are not relevant lessons that they can incorporate into their daily walk, but empty words that drop to the floor dead on arrival.
Now, before I am called to task for ignoring the plethora of sermons, which do in deed have some merit and have on the whole done justice to scripture, let me also point out that the fundamental failure or reluctance to repudiate false doctrines that have seeped into their congregations, and which are an anathema to God’s revelation, end up canceling out whatever good their sermons might accomplish. In other words, preaching on the fact that you cannot serve both God and money, while remaining silent on the inequities of society doesn’t wash. One cannot quote from passages that decry greed and the accumulation of wealth, yet turn a deaf ear to the injustice that surrounds us all. To do so does violence to the very scripture they are quoting from.
And yet many pastors and priests do this every Sunday to the great relief and delight of the majority of their congregants. These people hear just enough “truth” to make them squirm a bit, yet escape the piercing blade of conviction that the scripture was intended to invoke. Somewhere in Heaven Jesus is weeping at the emasculation of the words he so deliberately and painstakingly chose. This was not what he lived his relatively short life to bring about, and it was not what he intended his followers to be doing.
It comes down to this: Is the Church simply content with delivering a message that stirs but never riles up its followers? Is it OK with peddling a kinder, softer, watered down Gospel that gives just enough truth and hope, yet stops short of jumping to the unalterable conclusion that virtually all the history we as a nation have been brought up to believe – that we live in a just world where we can “be all we want” and “God helps those who help themselves” – is just flat out wrong and must be rebuked?
These are not easy questions to ask, for they require of our leaders a determined fearlessness that is in deed Christlike. And no doubt, were the vast majority of churches to employ this tactic and preach the Gospel in such a manner, many within those congregations would flee rather than stand for the conviction they would no doubt receive. But for those who would remain and the millions more who yearn for such a message of true hope and salvation who would march in through the doors, they would find an authentically relevant Gospel, that is as fearless as it is alive.
Such churches might well be treated as pariahs and called all sorts of names from divisive to anti-American to socialist to whatever. Many so-called liberation theology churches bare the stain of unjust branding from a world that simply can’t or won’t deal with its own wickedness, in a country that still can’t look its past in the eye and atone for its transgressions. The only response permissible for any religious body that wishes to represent Christ on Earth should and must be, “So what?” There is only one ultimate criteria that any local church ought to have with respect to preaching the good news. The good news must first and foremost be good! It is not enough to stock food pantries and provide shelter for the homeless if the very institutions that create the need for such charities are themselves left unchallenged. If we are going to refer to this world as "fallen" the very least we can do is discuss why it is that way, and what can be done to change it.
I have been writing this blog for five years now and, while I am certainly no paragon of virtue in that I fall far short of the mark, as many of us do, I have nonetheless been relentless in calling out the flagrant hypocrisy within the Church, and God willing will continue to do so. Chief among my criticisms has been this nagging reluctance to reclaim the mantle that Christ commissioned His followers to hold. For most of the last two thousand years since Jesus ascended to Heaven, the Church has run away from and not toward its founder. It has made peace with corrupt worldly powers and chosen to stand on the sidelines during tumultuous periods in its history. We are living in just such a tumultuous period and time is running out.
The coming war is fast approaching and not only is the Church unprepared; it seems strangely aloof and indifferent. The damage that this is doing is exacting and, I fear, irreversible. If it does not wake up from its slumber soon the war as we know it could be lost, and millions will pay the ultimate price for a Church that was apostate and derelict in its responsibilities. For such a ghastly and reprehensible crime there can be only one final judgment from above, and the Lord, in His infinite wisdom, will dispense it.
