Shining as Lights

For those who grew up in my generation, who were fans of Contemporary Christian music as a teen, I could probably start this quote off and you would be able to finish it,

"The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Him with their lips and walk out the door and deny Him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable." The quote is by Brennan Manning and was placed on D.C. Talk's Jesus Freak album.

I've recently spent a great deal of time in Bible studies and in meetings with individuals talking about how we as Christians stand out as different or holy in this world. I've asked myself and others the question, "Is there any way we can avoid the conclusion that Manning makes that we as hypocritical Christians are the greatest reason people deny the existence of God? And honestly, is there anyway we can avoid being frauds in their eyes?"

Looking at history doesn't encourage my spirit about the possibilities of living holy and blameless in contrast to this world. In the Old Testament the people of Israel seem to live very similarly to the nations around them. The Patriarchs seem no different from their neighbors as they lie about the relationship to their wives (Genesis 12), steal birthrights (Genesis 27), murder a whole village (Genesis 34), or swindle a father-in-law (Genesis 30). Looking at the period of the kings, even under the good kings the nation usually still had the high places where they worshipped false gods (Josiah and Hezekiah appear to be different, but even under Solomon these high places were used by Israel, see I Kings 3). After the captivity Nehemiah pulls his beard out because the people are intermarrying with other nations and raising their children according to the customs of other religions (Nehemiah 13). In the New Testament the Corinthians are an absolute mess doctrinally and morally. The Thessalonians are guilty of sexual impurity (I Thess. 4), the Colossians and residents of Galatia have major doctrinal flaws they are wrestling with, and the churches mentioned in Revelation 2-3 each has major issues.

Even now the church struggles to be salt and light as we are commanded (Matthew 5:13-16). I was confronted with this issue this past week as the story came out about Auburn's quarterback, Cam Newton along with his father seeking $200,000 in exchange for him attending school. The problem is that his father is a pastor and by all indications was the one demanding the money and making the decisions. Sadly, whether this is true or not people will conclude that the father is a greedy fake no different than themselves and as a result will look down upon our Lord and His church.

All this to say, here's my response to Manning's quote and the questions I've been wrestling with the past few weeks.

• In many ways, there are those who are not Christians who are searching and seeking for evidence proving they are correct in their assessment that we are no different and that Christianity is a fraud. I don't think we can do anything to change their minds. So every time they see on the television about the pastor who cheated on his taxes, or the minivan with the Christian bumper sticker who cuts them off, it just provides more fuel to their assertions that we are no different. In that way Manning's quote is correct. As a result...
• We should be people who always have God's grace upon our lips. We are always ready to give an answer (1 Peter 3:15), and quick to declare that we are Christians not because we try to be, or because we agree to live by a set of rules, but simply by His grace. C.S. Lewis asserted that it was quite possible an unbeliever who was a moralist would actually live better than the Christian because the moralist believed his good behavior would someday merit some form of reward or arm-twisting before God whereas the Christian knows they are hopeless and lost if not for God's grace. Therefore they aren't saved because they do good, go to church, give their money to the poor, etc. but these are done expressing appreciation for what God has done for them. Our words have to be communicating that our deeds don't make us better before God than our neighbor, but simply are the revelation of our thanksgiving for what He has done for us. Tim Keller did a wonderful job of conveying this point in The Reason for God.
• Finally, we as Christians have got to see that in order to be salt and light we don't just have to avoid the "big sins." The one time in history that comes to mind when God's people were living transformed lives that made a difference on their culture was shortly after Pentecost. These believers were selling their possessions and sharing the proceeds with the poor, they were sacrificially loving one another. Consider Stephen's martyrdom and the effect it must have had on the Apostle Paul as this man is being stoned unfairly, but in the midst of such unfairness drops to his knees and prays that the Lord would forgive his murderers. The genuine love that these believers had for Jesus spilled over into love for one another and even for their enemies. Don't you know that's why many of the Jewish priests got saved (Acts 6:7)? Rather than focusing on not committing the big sins, I think we would do well to consider are we loving one another as Christ has loved us (John 13:34-35)? Are we speaking words of encouragement that are positive and true (Acts 11:23)? Are we forgiving even those who don't deserve it because Christ has forgiven us even when we didn't deserve it (Matthew 6:14)? Those sins of omission are often overlooked, yet sadly reflect so much the life of a transformed believer.

Manning may be correct in his assertions about the life of the believer, and that's why its essential that I speak of God's grace often as the only means by which I can come to God, and that I focus on loving others in the way I speak to them, as I forgive them, and interact with them because someone may make conclusions about Christ based on my behavior and I want my behavior to testify of His grace and the power of His Spirit working inside of me...

Tiling Observations on Sin

Tomorrow I will begin a home improvement project that I've put off for way too long. I'm going to tile the walls around the bathtub in our hallway bathroom. This is the third tiling project I've done and I must confess I actually enjoy the work! I've had dreams of tiling our entry way and doing a renovation of our other bathroom, but I know neither of those projects will happen in the immediate future. In my last project (the kitchen backsplash) I had some observations as I finished the project.

You see as I got to the end I noticed that one of the tiles that I had set moved slightly. It was just one corner that slid down just a hair. If you looked at it today you wouldn't notice, nor would you think it was a big deal, but it caused some problems as I set the other tiles around it. You see once that tile moves even slightly it effects every other tile around it. Its essential that these tiles remain square and if one of them moves and is no longer square the other tiles around it have difficulty being square as well.

I couldn't help but think about the effects of sin as I finished up the project. Our sin always has consequences and we're foolish if we don't see that we are not the only one's who feel or experience those consequences. Those close to us are effected by the consequences of our sin. Going all the way back to Adam, his sin effected every individual who has come after him. Abraham chose not to trust God's promise and to listen to Sarah and have a son through Hagar, for all time the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac will fight as a consequence of that bad decision. David is another example, where the sins mentioned within Scripture effected the lives of others (think of the lives that were lost because of David's sin of adultery with Bathsheba or when David was tempted to number Israel and the 70,000 who died from pestilence).

Here are some specific ways that others feel the consequences of our sin;

• They are led to commit the same sin. A good example would come from Galatians 2 where Peter shows racial partiality by refusing to sit with Gentile Christians when Jewish leaders were around. Barnabas saw Peter's example and rather than seeing it as sin, likely because of his respect for Peter, instead followed Peter into the sin himself. This is why Paul warns in Galatians 6:1 that only those who are spiritual should go to restore a person who is caught in sin because of the temptation they will experience to fall into that sin as well.
• They are treated differently because of your sin. Using the same story of Galatians 2, those Gentile Christians in Antioch were treated as 2nd class citizens by Peter and Barnabas. The text said that these men, who were leaders of the church, even apostles of Jesus, were refusing to sit next to a Gentile brother in Christ because they valued the favor of the Jew more than being impartial as God is. Often times I have teens ask why lust or anger is all that bad, saying, "Its not like it would hurt anyone if its just in my heart." Jesus' equates the two in Matthew 5 because the feelings in one's heart effect our perspectives, our words, and our deeds (Jesus later expounds on this point in Matt. 15:18-20). Anger is sin and when we engage in it the effects can harm other people as it will effect the way I treat those individuals and others as well.
• They experience a break in fellowship and unity. Sin always causes a breakdown in fellowship, not only between us and the Lord, but also between ourselves and fellow believers. In this case, Peter's partiality caused a major split within the church upon racial lines. It was an issue the church repeatedly dealt with in its infancy. Sadly, his sin caused division rather than promoting unity that Christ had prayed for (John 17). The Christian teen who gossips about a fellow believer breaks unity and loses fellowship with their brother or sister in Christ. The Christian husband who has an affair not only has a breakdown in fellowship with the Lord, but also with their wife, their children, and those brothers who have walked alongside them. The Christian who decides to forsake the assembling of the church not only loses fellowship with God, but with those that the Lord has placed in his/her life to exhort and encourage them.

Like those tiles that each relied and were effected upon one another so is the Christian. When one brother or sister sins we each feel the effects. Hopefully this causes us to consider just how essential it is for us to strive for holiness, knowing others are hurt when we reject the Spirit's leading to forsake temptation. Seeing sin for what it is should also cause us to realize just how far reaching our sin truly is and when we do we can't help but have a high view of sin and of the darkness, desperation, and hopelessness we were and are in. This correct view of our depravity should cause us to see God's grace as much more grand and live as expectant and longing children for the day when sin no longer will be in our presence and we will exist in perfect peace and holiness with the Lord forever.