It has become more apparent to me that there are not just a few Christian patriots who insist that a Christian cannot "ally" themselves with unbelievers against tyranny. As a Christian, I do understand the sentiment to not be "unequally yoked" , but I can't help but see the lack of understanding of this Biblical principle by these Christian patriots, as well as their confusion between loyalty to God and loving one's neighbor, both of which are also Biblical principles. I am no theologian, and neither am I a scholar of the world. However, it only takes the humility of a little child, as per the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, to understand obedience and loyalty. Who is my neighbor? Is he/she only to be a Christian? Who am I commanded to give water to when they are thirsty? Is the recipient of my Christian charity only to be those of the household of Faith? Of course not. And I'm sure my zealous Christian patriot brothers and sisters would agree. So who am I fighting for in this age old battle against the evil forces that would enslave the minds of men?
I hope you can see where I'm going with this. If I give water to the thirsty, out of loyalty to my Lord and love for my neighbor, then the question of whether or not my neighbor is a Christian is irrelevant. Likewise, if my neighbor is willing and able to help me draw water from the well to quench his thirst, or perhaps all he needs is directions to the nearest well to do the same, then am I being "unequally yoked" to my unbelieving neighbor as I demonstrate my charity to him or her?
What if there were an entire village of unbelievers destined for draught, and I came along as a Christian with the engineering knowledge and the irrigation blueprints to remedy the imminent death of this village and was able to organize them around this knowledge so that they could begin to work with me to protect their lives from perpetual thirst and failed crops? Would I be loving my neighbor, or would I be complicit in compromising my faith? The answer is obvious. Not only would my actions here not be confused with being unequally yoked, but they would demonstrate the power of the faith that I proclaim and a loyalty to the God that I proclaim in a way that would be literally impossible if I were to confuse charity with a fear of being unequally yoked to an unbeliever.
This notion that it is a compromise of one's Christian Faith to side with freedom-loving unbelievers to fight evil makes about as much sense as re-writing the parable of the Good Samaritan. A Jew, (a believer), left for dead on the side of the road. A Samaritan, (an unbeliever), is the one who Jesus points out in this parable, who is the only one out of three who has enough moral courage to do what has to be done in order to save the "believer's" life! What of the Priest and the Levite in this parable? They were believers! They left their brother for dead! So it is with us my fellow Christian patriots. We all know far too many so-called brethren who behave as the Priest and the Levite "brothers" in this parable of the Good Samaritan. Not only do they ignore freedom as it lies half dead on the side of the road, but they feel good about it. They feel more righteous as they walk on by ignoring any responsibility to take action, beacause they have more "spiritual" matters to tend to and have shunned and scorned us as we try desperately to revive this victim of tyranny. Likewise, we have witnessed the moral bravery and self sacrifice of many many many Good Samaritans, who know not our Lord, but who would not waist one second of hesitation to defend not only our rights, but our very life and the lives of our families.
We who are Christians do not need to fear compromise as we side with genuine morally courageous unbelievers against tyrants. Our Lord calls us to do the right thing, not to determine who is "worthy" of the right thing. We do not make those judgements, we cannot. Our call is simply to do the right thing, and whoever helps us do that, is also doing the right thing. As the moral courage of the believer matches or excels that of the unbeliever fighting alongside us, the Spirit of our God has ample opportunity to convict and to convert the heart of our unbelieving comrades in arms. Should we abandon these fearless unbelievers based on a presumption that "the right thing" can somehow be unequally-yoked with …"the right thing", then the only thing we've stood up for is foolishness and an extremely un-Christian self-righteous evil that smacks of hypocrisy.
-Sermonwriter
No comments:
Post a Comment