“Much of today’s world is dominated by ideologies which, if not totally false, are alien to the gospel of Christ. We may talk of “conquering” the world for Christ, but what sort of “conquest” do we mean? Not a victory of force by arms. Our Christian crusade is far different from the shameful crusades of the Middle Ages. Listen to Paul’s description of the battle. “Our war is not fought with the weapons of flesh, yet they are strong enough, in God’s cause, to demolish fortresses. We demolish sophistries, and the arrogance that tries to resist the knowledge of God; every thought is our prisoner, captured to be brought into obedience to Christ.” This is a battle of ideas, God’s truth overpowering the lies of men.” (John R.W.Stott: Your Mind Matters)
This quote made me think of a piece I wrote just about 2 years ago now and thought it would be a good time to post it.
Defend or Defensive
Being in the sun-control business, Mid-March through October keeps me pretty busy (economy co-operating). The frustrating part of this schedule is that it allows me just enough time to read the paper or browse articles on line, but not enough time to really respond to them. Today was another reminder of that when I picked up the Sunday paper. I decided to dig deep and spend some time doing what I would do more often during the other 5 months of the year.
There were several things that caught my attention in the paper. First of all, I didn’t know Justin Verlander was from Virginia. Then there was the excerpt from the Kwame Kilpatrick book that blames the rich white man and the Jews for all his woes. Not worth a comment. One was, “Same-sex marriage happiness after traditional Marriage”. Getting closer. Again if this was January, I would put a few paragraphs together for that last one at least.
“Atheists right to advertise? Believe it”. Now this one got me thinking. Let’s take the easy question first. Do atheists have the right to advertise? Duh! Of course they do. That’s not what caught my interest. It was reading the comments that readers posted that started the ball rolling. Now, it would be easy to spend time picking apart some of the “facts” that were presented by the 80% of respondents that supported the atheist position, but that’s not where my thoughts took me this time. I got to thinking about how we as “Christians” respond to stuff like this. More often than not the response from the “Christian” community is basically, “How dare you not believe in God!” Or, like we did when we were kids, “OH YEA!”
One thing that’s clear in the Scriptures is that there will be those who don’t believe. The other thing that’s clear is how we are supposed to respond to them. Far too often we take offense to this. I believe that this occurs primarily because we are more often than not taken off guard by these positions. “Always be ready to make a defense ……for the hope that’s in you, yet with gentleness and reverence” (I Peter 3:15). How is this possible when they are “attacking” that which is most precious to us? I would suggest that when we respond defensively, we show exactly the opposite. There is a big difference between defending your position and responding defensively.
The next time you read through the Gospels, note that Jesus never responds defensively. The disciples did, the Pharisees did, and the average person on the street did. Jesus never did. The way that Jesus responded to His detractors comments and questions elicited such reactions as, Mark 1:22. They were amazed at the confidence with which Jesus spoke. It was as if He really knew what He was talking about.
In order to respond in this way to those who would take a position different than ours (of course this is true in any debate, on any subject); we must know what we believe and why we believe it. Further, specific to Christianity, we must do as Jesus did. Besides the fact that Jesus was the son of God, therefore deity Himself, He was a man, subject to all that we are subjected to. How He was able to respond as He did in every situation (for that matter, how He was able to live a sinless life? But that’s a whole ‘nother subject), was directly linked to 3 things that He practiced.
First of all, in John 4:34, Jesus says that His life is fueled by doing the will of God, suggesting that His connection to God is all consuming. Each step He takes and each word He speaks is at the direction of the Father. Secondly, I Thess. 5:17 says to “pray without ceasing”. Jesus was the originator of this practice (and the only one to do it literally). Jesus was never caught off guard or distracted because He was always connected with the Father. Thirdly, Col. 3:2 “Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.”
It is a difficult thing to practice this life-style, especially in this day that we live with its myriad of distractions. However, if we are to do justice to the defense of the Faith that we profess, it is incumbent upon us to be prepared, not so that we can “win” an argument, but to honor the Father in the way we defend.
Brother Lawrence (in The Practice of the Presence of God), when asked what he thought of all the terrible things that went on in the world, responded, “Frankly, I’m surprised that things are not much worse. How desperate people must be without God”. If we truly believe what Christianity teaches and what it is in its essence, we will have the same, almost casual, most definitely unshakeable view of the world that Jesus and Brother Lawrence exhibited.
Pause to Think.
(P.S. If you haven’t read The Practice of the Presence of God, I highly recommend it.)