Daily Verse | Mark 16:6
“You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him.”
Tuesday’s Reading: Luke 1-4
Happy Tuesday, my friends. I had never imagined a hot pink bassoon — until just now.
I recognize that most of what I write about is the latest political or cultural outrage, of which there seems to be an endless supply. I’ve been blogging here five days a week for 18 months and I’m never out of material. I mostly decry the devolution of America, the greatest nation ever to exist on the earth, perpetuated by a degenerate generation of junior commies and their progeny who have trashed our inheritance as unworthy of them. Chief among them is the mentally unfit charlatan in the White House and his despicable entourage.
Saturating ourselves in the world of politics and culture can lead to stress, worry and anxiety if we don’t have a strong faith. That’s why I say that I write about faith, culture and politics, in that order, because politics is downstream of culture, and culture is downstream of faith. As faith goes, so goes culture; as culture goes, so goes politics.
If a society has an abundant population of people who trust God and seek to follow him in their daily lives, the culture will reflect that. If a society has an abundance of people who believe in themselves and the power of the state, the culture will reflect that.
The less faith there is, the less a culture will embrace faith and the less the politics will reflect faith. That’s just logic.
However, it’s true that even in a culture that is outright hostile to the concept of God, there will be people of faith. For them, the diagram is going to look a little different. Instead of their faith influencing the culture at large (which is less likely, but not impossible, in a secular society), they will have to resist the corrosive effects of culture and politics on their faith.
I think this is true in two distinct ways. First, we need to prevent the corrosion of core doctrines.
[An elder] must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it. (Titus 1:9)
For instance, the Bible says that all of human life is made in the image of God. Unfortunately, the world says that babies are expendable, based on the decision of the mother. Some Christians have embraced the definition of a child as a ‘choice,’ not as gift from God.
The creation of man and woman and a marriage joining them together is the example we see in scripture. Some Christians have adopted the world’s belief that ‘marriage’ can be between two or more members of the same sex.
These and other corrosive teachings have found their way into the church and need to be expunged.
The second way we need to resist the corrosive effects of culture and politics on our faith is by fixing our eyes on the author and perfecter of our faith, Jesus Christ (Hebrews 12:2). We see this most vividly in the account of Peter asking Jesus to call him to walk on the water during a storm on the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 14:22-33).
And in the fourth watch of the night [Jesus] came to them, walking on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, “It is a ghost!” and they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.”
And Peter answered him, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” He said, “Come.” So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me.” Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?”
It is so easy to get caught up in the ‘wind and waves’ of the cultural storm we’re living in. If we take this account of Peter’s act of faith as a model, though, I imagine it would look like this:
We can notice the wind and the waves, but they don’t need to cause us fear or to be chastised for “little faith” if we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. Anyway, that’s how I try to manage my way through this season of our country’s history and hope that the blog reflects that.
As I place before you the latest outrage, remember that we live in a secular society that doesn’t know Christ, so we can’t expect something different from them. At the same time, it’s okay to point out the hypocrisy and double-standards and unconstitutional policies and actions we see.
Just keep your eyes locked on that horizon.
