Sunday, June 26, 2005

Should People Have The Power To Shake Your Faith?

(Note: On June 22, 2005, I answered the doorbell and was shocked to be served divorce papers. Neither my wife nor I had ever mentioned the possibility of divorce to the other. Later that day my wife informed me that she was no longer a Christian and that she was going to leave me and divorce me against my will. The next several Pastor's Pages reflect upon the tragedy.)

Should People Have The Power To Shake Your Faith? (June 26, 2005)

I received an email from a friend urging me to say nothing about an apostate former missionary who had embarked on a course of wickedness. In requesting my silence she wrote, "This will be a devastating blow to the faith of many people and will cause them to question themselves and their beliefs."

That may be right. We all have a habit of looking to others and adjusting our behavior in light of their example and our beliefs in light of their doctrine.

I can almost pinpoint the moment when I first began to think about the way that our faith affects other people. I was 15 and meeting with the deacon board of my home church after completing a catechism class with the pastor in preparation for baptism. I was knowledgeable (for my age) about the Bible and earnest in my faith. I had read C. S. Lewis' Mere Christianity and Josh McDowell's Evidence That Demands a Verdict, had memorized scores of Bible verses, had gone to church all my life. I had no trouble expressing my faith to the board.

One of the deacons very graciously said that my testimony had strengthened his own faith. It was a humble and kind thing to say to an immature teenager, but I in my foolishness cringed inwardly and thought, "What in the world does your faith have to do with mine? Isn't your faith strong enough on its own? It should be. What I say or don't say, believe or don't believe, should have nothing to do with your personal trust in the Lord or your acknowledgment of the truth." Of course I did not mentally verbalize my feelings with those words at the time, but that is more or less what I felt.

Since then I have seen many times how our example can indeed "strengthen" or "weaken" the faith of others, and I now acknowledge the legitimate power of that influence. If you see a man whom you regard as wise and kind and right and firm and rational and good, then you are inclined to respect his moral philosophy, and maybe even adopt the doctrines that make him what he is. And if you already share his beliefs, then you delight and feel reassured in them.

But a bad example can have the same salutary effect, though by repulsion rather than attraction. You see the evil and say, "Oh no, no - whatever I do I must not become like that." My mother was the daughter of an alcoholic “rare-do-well” who died of cirrhosis; she responded by resolving never to drink at all. Thank God.

Receiving news of a formerly godly person who has turned away from the Lord and gone the way of the world is like getting hit in the face with a baseball bat. It is painful and stunning and awful and nothing else. But a faith-shaker? Why should it be? Just look at the terrible facts and see how cruel, how mean-spirited, how dishonest, how irrational is the one who "having tasted of the heavenly gift" (Hebrews 6:4 ) now spits it out. That example may shake your faith in people's permanency (a faith you were unwise to hold and should have discarded by now), but it should not hurt your faith in God at all. It should do the opposite. It should pound into your soul the eternal urgency of clinging to Jesus, and terrify you lest you take the smallest step away from him.

Sunday, June 19, 2005

Evangelism Isn’t A Niceness Contest (June 19, 2005)

I heard a sermon where the pastor talked about a new member who became a Christian after she met some people from the church who were nice to her. Impressed with their kindness (they even helped her move into a new home), she trusted Christ and was baptized. Their kindness won her over.

Which is a great thing. We can be thankful for sincere believers whose faith is manifested in loving deeds that bring people to Christ. It is a biblical principle that sometimes our good works can have this effect. For example, St. Peter tells women who are married to non-Christians to submit to their husbands so that "they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives" (1 Peter 3:1-2).

Even so, we must be careful about leaning on niceness as our main means of evangelism. Other people can be nice too. If niceness determines the playing field for religious conversion, then Mormons, Buddhists, Wiccans and Zoroastrians can compete like champions and may even beat us. If we have sent the message, "Follow our faith because we're so nice," we risk being overtaken by even nicer atheists.

The other day I picked up a Jehovah's Witness publication and noticed how much that cult is now trumpeting niceness. Years ago JW literature emphasized doctrinal distinctions (Jesus is not divine, the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force, Jesus returned to earth invisibly in 1914 to usher in the last generation, etc.) Now they don't say a word about doctrine. Instead they talk about being kind and good and how this behavior leads others into their group. I’m sure it does. But it leaves me wondering, "Does truth even matter to you guys any more? Do you want it to matter to your converts?" I'm happy to debate every JW belief that differs from orthodox Christianity, but their literature suggests that they no longer have the heart for that kind of confrontation.

But confrontations between truth and error are exactly what Christian evangelizers must seek out and press with rigor. A soul's eternal choices must not be allowed to rest on the pleasant but mushy ground of niceness - they must be moved onto the hard, unyielding ground of truth, and the sooner the better. Otherwise it won't be long before those converted through our niceness are asking themselves, "What if it had been a Hindu who had been nice to me - or a Mormon? Would I have adopted their religion instead? Have I been suckered into a lie by a smiling face and a helping hand?"

Niceness is good and very pleasing to God - but it should never be made to bear the weight of a man's faith. Our faith rests on no other ground than truth. Falsehoods remain falsehoods when taught by the sweetest souls on earth, and the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ remains true even when championed by the meanest bastard on the block.

Sunday, June 5, 2005

“Affair-Proofing” A Marriage (June 5, 2005)

I visited a church and saw that the pastor is preaching a series of messages on questions submitted by his congregation. On July 17 (Lord willing) he'll preach on "How can I 'affair-proof' my marriage?"

The question seems to assume that a marriage can be "affair-proofed." I deny that it can. If someone were to ask me "Can I affair-proof my marriage?" I would answer no - not any more than you can murder-proof your life. There are two ways you could be directly involved in a murder: (1) you commit it or (2) you are the victim of it. It is very easy to murder-proof your life in the first sense: just don't kill anybody. It is the second part that is tricky. How do you keep other people from killing you? Certainly you can work to make your victimization less likely. Don't tick off violent people, don't loiter by yourself late at night in bad neighborhoods, don't be a cop, don’t be a third world missionary. These measures better your odds, but there is no way to guarantee that someone won't kill you. Jesus, St. Paul, and 10 of the 11 apostles were executed. Of all of them, only St. John really succeeded in "murder-proofing" his life.

It is the same with adulterous affairs. You can certainly control your own behavior: just don't cheat on your spouse. I think we pastors have done our flocks a terrible disservice by suggesting that this is difficult and fraught with hazards and we're wonderful people if we remain faithful. If we do fall, well so did King David and he was forgiven, etc etc. Now wait just a minute. In the Old Testament adulterers were supposed to be stoned to death, and in the New Testament it's even worse! They go to hell. Read 1 Corinthians 6:9-10; Galatians 5:19-21 and Revelation 21:8 concerning the damnation of unrepentant adulterers. It is not heroic to be faithful - it is soul-damning not to be. The truth that we can repent and be forgiven for any sin has been amplified in our day into a shout that drowns out God's commands concerning chastity and faithfulness, and prevents us from hearing that sexual misconduct invites his wrath. Do not commit adultery. Don't. Fear God. If you really want to be immoral, then convert to Buddhism or some permissive religion like that - and take your chances on judgment day that the Bible is wrong and Jesus Christ is not King of kings and Lord of lords.

So half of "affair-proofing" your marriage is under your complete control. It is really a matter of whether or not you love and fear God. But what about the other half? How do you keep your spouse from cheating on you?

Good luck with that. Sorry to be so cynical, but I'm afraid my cynicism is the product of real (though thankfully not personal) experience. I have known several adulterers, and every last one of them was a devious lying self-centered creep, and I am fully convinced that nothing their spouses could have done would have prevented them from wandering. They cheated on wives who were bright, beautiful, kind, godly and submissive; they cheated on husbands who were gentle, godly, loving and responsible. It is a revolting cruelty to say of the victims, Uh oh - I guess they didn't affair-proof their marriages! Please. The victims of adultery have suffered enough. Do not add to their burden.

Here is what you can do. Love God, obey his commands, do what is right concerning your spouse. Husbands, love your wives; wives, submit to your husbands. (Colossians 3:18-19). Maybe your goodness will influence them and you will rejoice; maybe it won't and you will grieve. But don't buy the lie that you can "affair-proof" your marriage. You can only "affair-proof" a person, and the only person you can do that to is yourself.