Journal: Government Mandates and the Gospel

Yesterday the Supreme Court of the United States upheld the health care mandate known popularly as "Obamacare".  The fact that Obamacare and the Court's decision concerning it divide the people of our nation politically is no surprise.  That this division, fueled by confusion of the two kingdoms, is taking place in the American church is troubling.  But it is also no surprise.  The church is already torn by division over theology, practice, and purpose.  We could not have expected such a fragmented church to come together over such a divisive issue except by a miraculous act of God.  Without that divine intervention, the church remains divided over this issue.  Why?

In the first place, the church is divided because of our sins of neglecting the poor and needy.  In many ways and on many levels, we Christians have abdicated our responsibility -- our calling -- to care for the least among us.  Misguided by our love of capitalism, shaped by the darkness of social Darwinism, and consumed by our pursuit of the American dream, we have blissfully allowed the government to become the advocate of the poor, the widow, and the orphan.  Our chief concern over this alien role for our government has largely been how it affects us economically.  For the most part, God's people have been woefully silent while the government has proven itself to be a poor steward for those in need.  When we do speak up, its in our self-interest.  We rave on about our freedoms while government programs entrap the poor.  We insist on our rights while the government sanctioned the genocide of the unborn.  We demand tax relief while the government reneges on its promises to those depending upon Social Security for retirement.  We have much for which to repent.

Compounding this problem are those Christians who recognize the needs of the least of those in our society and think that supporting government mandates are the faithful response of the church.  Self-righteous condemnations of Christians who oppose government mandates are riddled with references to the Biblical call to care for the poor, the widows, and the orphans.  This too demands repentance.  The call of our Savior to intercede for those in need is a call to the individual and corporate action of His people as an expression of our love for Him and thanksgiving for what He has done for us.  He did not make this call to a loving response a mandate and it cannot be replaced by a government mandate.  Even a casual reading of Matthew 25 will not find the words, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.  For I was hungry and you supported the food stamps program and WIC. I was thirsty and you were an advocate for the Clean Water Act.  I was a stranger and you lobbied for Section 8 housing.  I needed clothes and you showed me how to apply for welfare.  I was sick and you backed Obamacare ..."

It's been rightly observed that the Court's ruling is a wake up call.  Specifically, it has been called  a wake up call for the political right to come together and take a stand against Obamacare.  But do we, the church, see this as a wake up call for us?  Not a call to renewed political action (either on the right or the left), but a wake up call to repent of our dependence on the kingdom of the left (i.e., our government) to care for the least of those in our society and to respond to Christ's call to share the Gospel in deeds as well as words.  There is no place for mandates in answering this call.  It must come from hearts miraculously changed by the Gospel.  May our hearts be so changed.

Devotion: Bothering God

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"Bothering" God

Mark 5:21-24, 35-43

²¹ When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake.  ²² Then one of the synagogue rulers, named Jairus, came there. Seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet  ²³ and pleaded earnestly with him, "My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live."  ²⁴ So Jesus went with him. A large crowd followed and pressed around him. ... some men came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue ruler. "Your daughter is dead," they said. "Why bother the teacher any more?"  ³⁶ Ignoring what they said, Jesus told the synagogue ruler, "Don't be afraid; just believe."  ³⁷ He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James.  ³⁸ When they came to the home of the synagogue ruler, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly.  ³⁹ He went in and said to them, "Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep."  ⁴⁰ But they laughed at him. After he put them all out, he took the child's father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was.  ⁴¹ He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum!" (which means, "Little girl, I say to you, get up!").  ⁴² Immediately the girl stood up and walked around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished.  ⁴³ He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.

After Jesus had calmed the storm of the Sea of Galilee and had reached the other side with His disciples, a crowd gathered around Him.  His notoriety was growing.  People had heard about the miraculous things that He was doing.  One of the people who had heard about Jesus was a synagogue rule named Jairus.  Jairus had a serious problem: his young daughter (who was probably his only child) was very ill and near death.  Knowing what he did about Jesus, Jairus came to request His assistance.  When he arrived at the place where Jesus was and there was a large crowd around Him, Jairus was not dissuaded.  He didn’t think for a moment “Don’t bother trying to get to Jesus, the crowd is too big,”  With so much on the line, Jarius pressed on and made his way through the crowd to Jesus.

Why bother?  Jarius knew that Jesus — and only Jesus — could save his daughter.  He didn’t know how or why, but he knew that He could and he believed that He would.  In faith Jairus pleaded earnestly with Jesus, “Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.”  Jarius loved his daughter so he “bothered” to fight through the crowd and “bother” Jesus with his request.

In the Bible there are many examples of people who faced desperate situations and were left without hope in any earthly solution.  Faced with the facts that there were no other options, many of these people turned to God and earnestly pleaded to Him for deliverance.  Some “bothered” God in repentance, recognizing that they had put their trust in the things that had failed them rather than in God.  Some “bothered” God in desperation, calling on Him because they had no hope left.  Whatever moved people to “bother” God, the ones that called out to Him in faith were never disappointed.

Do you find yourself unwilling to “bother” God with your concerns?  Are you still fighting hard to find solutions to your challenges using your own strength, intellect, and earthly resources?  At what point will you stop doubting His love for you and start believing His gracious promises?  Be careful, God is willing to bring you to that point if that’s what it takes for you to discover that bringing your needs, concerns, problems, and challenges is no bother to Him at all.  And be hopeful, God is gracious to those who, in faith, are bold enough to "bother" Him.

Reflection: The Answer's In the Storm (June 24, 2012)

The 4th Sunday After Pentecost
Job 38:1-11; 2 Cor. 6:1-13; Mark 4:35-41

Storms are inevitable. Some storms are fairly predictable, coming in a season during which we expect them. Others come up suddenly and catch us by surprise. There are storms that pass quickly and do little damage, but there are also storms that linger and cause terrible destruction. Despite our great technology, we have no way of controlling these storms. In fact, we can't even predict them with accuracy. Even when we've prepared ourselves as best as we can, these storms often devastate us. That's because these storms aren't tornados, hurricanes, or other natural forces, they are the storms of life.

Although we know that the storms of life are inevitable, they can be troubling to the point of rocking our faith. In the confusing and confounding turbulence of these storms, we may call God's love for us and His promises to us into question. The Old Testament figure Job is often held up as an example for us when we are in the midst of our own storms, but even Job struggled with his circumstances and questioned God. Like us, Job did not give up on God or abandon his faith in God because of the terrible storm in his life, but he did falter as he flailed about trying to gain a foothold of understanding. He couldn't make sense of things. It didn't seem right or fair. He was confused. He wanted to know why things were as they were. So God answered Job in the storm. In summary, God's answer to Job was simple and straightforward: "I am God."

We may not be satisfied with God's "who" answer to our "why" questions, but it's the answer we're most likely to receive when we cry out in the midst of our storms. When we can't make sense of things, they don't seem right or fair, and we are confused, we ask God why things are they way that they are. Like the disciples in their storm-tossed boat, we want to make sure that God knows about our situation and that He cares about us. "Don't you care if we perish?" was their ridiculous question that takes a thousand different forms in the storms of our lives. God sizes up our little faith and our big questions and meets us where we are. He answers in the storm, "I am God." Though it isn't the answer we thought we that wanted, it is the perfect answer to calm either the storms of our lives or to calm us in the midst of those storms. 

Audio file of the sermon "The Answer's in the Storm"

Reflection: Made for this Very Purpose (June 17, 2012)

The 3rd Sunday after Pentecost
Genesis 3:8-15;2 Cor. 4:13-15:1; Mark 3:20-35

As technology continues to advance, more and more of the devices that we use have moved from the specific purpose for which they were created to multiple purposes. The best example of this integration has to be mobile phones. Originally designed to bring portability to voice communication, they evolved to include text messaging and email and now have full internet connectivity with a host of applications. Today's smart phone has far more computing power than the PCs of a decade ago. It seems that among the features of a smart phone, voice communication ranks fairly low both in importance and use. Never mind that the mobile phone was originally created for this very purpose.

While we have gown comfortable with technology advancing to the point that devices lose their original purpose, losing sense of our purpose has proven to be disastrous to us as a people. While it has had a role in this problem, it's simplistic and naïve to blame technology for our lost sense of purpose. Despite the mind boggling changes in technology in our lifetime, it continues to be a tool subject to our use and under our control. Forces other than technology are behind our loss of identity and purpose.

If not technology, what's behind our loss of the purpose for which we've been created? The answer is found in our culture's ever increasing acceptance of the thinking that we have evolved from lower life forms and, along with it, our rejection of the idea that we were created by God for a purpose. We've embraced Darwinism as a world view because it frees us to do, think, and be whatever we desire, but it has stripped us of real and lasting purpose by insisting that we understand of ourselves as products of randomness rather than design and impressing upon us that our lives are governed by accidents instead of divine intent. We are, according to this view of man, simple and finite creatures. In its quest to understand what we cannot know, science has dismissed us as unique in God's creation and robbed us of the very purpose for which we were created: eternal life with Christ. But God insists on making His intent for us known. He will not sit idle while we perish. To this end He has given us His Son, who joyfully reveals the Kingdom and the very purpose for which we've been made.

Audio file of the sermon "Made for this Very Purpose"

Reflection: Binding the Strong Man (June 10, 2012)

The 2nd Sunday after Pentecost
Genesis 3:8-15; 2 Cor. 4:13-5:1; Mark 3:20-35

One might think that Satan is having some real PR problems. For some time now, the idea that there is actually a personal being that is wholly evil and destructively opposed to God has been dismissed as myth, superstition, or ignorance. Now, through books like Love Wins by Rob Bell, even popular Christian leaders are saying that there is no such a thing as hell. Yes, it seems that Satan has lost his power, influence, and notoriety in our culture. But rather than being a point of weakness for him, it is precisely the way in which he has worked to become stronger.

When Jesus encountered the power of Satan during His earthly ministry, Satan was so strong that he was attacking people directly. We see the various ways that Satan harassed, hindered, and controlled people in the ways that Jesus attended to their needs, including driving out the demons that possessed some people. But the religious leaders of the Jews accused Jesus of being allied with Satan. They knew how strong Satan was. They also knew that no mere man could overpower Satan in the ways that Jesus was doing. Unwilling to consider that Jesus was from God, the leaders were left with only one other explanation. But Jesus set them straight and He explained what He was doing: binding the strong man.

We can see the effects in our world of ignoring, explaining away, and dismissing the power of Satan rather than binding him and robbing him of his influence. While there's little we can do to change this situation for our world, we can effectively deal with this same issue in our homes, families, and individual lives. Unfortunately, we have failed to do this in many ways. We have embraced the media influences, entertainments, values, attitudes, and priorities of our culture without recognizing that much of it is used by Satan as his means to harass, hinder, and control people in our age. Even us. Rather than rooting out this stealthy enemy to bind him, we ignore, explain away, and dismiss his power and influence in our lives. We tend to forget that Satan has been defeated, crushed by the Savior who came to set us free from the tyranny of the strong man, and that we have been rescued from the grasp of the strong man bent on our destruction by the power of God. By that power, we too can bind the strong man in our lives.

Audio file of the sermon "Binding the Strong Man"

Reflection: This Is the Catholic Faith (June 3, 2012)

Holy Trinity Sunday
Isaiah 6:1-8; Acts 2:14, 22-36; John 3:1-17

Use the world "catholic" today and most people will automatically associate it with the Roman Catholic Church. While the church of Rome may see no problem with this, it is unfortunate. The word catholic has a rich meaning and encompasses far more than a single church body, no matter how large it may be. The catholic church is more historic, more universal, and more scriptural than the Roman Catholic Church. It includes all who believe the good news of Jesus Christ and put their trust in Him — everyone who holds the catholic faith.

While the original wording of all three ecumenical creeds use the word catholic, it's the Athanasian Creed that explicitly refers to and defines the catholic faith. "This is the catholic faith" the creed boldly proclaims — and we boldly confess — as it lays out the definitive teachings of the Christian faith. While most of the creed is a detailed confession of the Trinity, it also includes other critical and necessary teachings, including the atoning work of Jesus, the resurrection of all flesh, and the Judgment. While its statements about the nature of the Trinity are wonderfully confounding, its assertions about what it takes to be saved can be very troubling.

The Athanasian Creed pulls no punches about the Judgment. It begins and ends with definite declarations about what it takes to be saved and makes it very clear that those who are not will "without doubt perish eternally." "This is the catholic faith," it concludes, "whoever does not believe it faithfully and firmly cannot be saved." These are strong words, maybe stronger than we'd like them to be. They mean what they say. If someone claims to be a Christian but doesn't hold to the catholic faith — the Trinity, the Incarnation, the atoning work of Jesus, and the reality of eternal punishment — he is not saved. Can we say this creed with sincere hearts? Do we believe what we are confessing in this creed? What about the statement that "those who have done good will enter into eternal life"? Can we really keep the catholic faith "whole and undefiled"? Yes, with the help of God, who puts everything in perspective when He pronounces that "God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." Thanks be to the Triune God that this is the catholic faith.

Audio file of the sermon "This Is the Catholic Faith"