Repenting of this has been difficult. I have had to, very intentionally, watch my tone and I try to start every difficult conversation with the prayer that God would guide me to grace and love. That being said I still tend to say what I think and generally most people know where I stand. However, some have found it surprising that I am not more vocal about certain issues.
A couple weeks ago a woman on Q and A got me riled up when she accused a conservative group in Australia of threatening her and her family. I assumed she was lying when she accused the group of some pretty serious crimes. A group called the ADF. Over the past couple weeks I have heard Christian brothers and sisters talking favourably about this group, so the other day I checked it out. I was horrified. Had this been ten years ago I would have probably joined in, but by the grace of God I saw it for what it was. Vitriolic, disgusting, sinful, hatred...plain and simple. Expletive laced anti immigration statements mixed with inappropriate pictures and veiled threats make this group no better than that which they criticize (as per Matthew 5:21+). The part that sickened me most was to see Christians willing to hit the “like” button on the Facebook page.
On the other hand there are Christians who are so concerned with “loving” others that they refuse to acknowledge or call out evil. If they refuse to acknowledge it or call it out then they certainly wont stand up for it. I have seen Christians willing to participate in inter religious talks with Muslims yet unwilling to stand up for the persecuted folk in the middle east for fear of offending.
There has to be a better way of dealing with this. That way, of course, is Jesus’ way. Jesus testified to two things. First is, according to John 3:16, the love God. Jesus loved us so much that while we were still sinners he died for us. Then in John 15 he asked us to do the same. So that we should love even our enemies. That is great, but he is also the same Jesus who drove out the money changers with a whip, called the Pharisees “son’s of the devil”, told us to watch out for false teachers and liars, and was a very honest fellow. In John 19 he said that he came to testify to the truth.
I take from this that when we are dealing with issues like terrorism, diversity, gay rights, immigration, or even things within our own communities or households we, as followers of Jesus Christ, must examine everything and express everything with truth and love.
Ephesians 4:26 says that we should not sin in our anger. So we should get angry, Jesus got angry at injustice and falsehood, so yeah, getting angry is OK, but do not sin in your anger. I look at a group like the ADL. While they are angry they delve into being crude with the images that get posted, with using course joking and lude statements. This is all sin! And when a Christian “likes” such statements they are “liking” sin.
Yet, truth in love means actually reaching out to the people we disagree with. Building a relationship with them such that we have the ability to speak truth into their lives. The kind of closeness where we can actually tell them that they are wrong and they will respect us enough to listen. In doing this we are far more courageous than those who simply spew hatred from behind a computer screen.
No amount of protesting, no amount of poking fun of, holding signs, signing petitions is going to change the heart of a sinner. Only Christ can do that. If we are going to approach those who don’t know Jesus with hatred then we will only serve to put up a wall between us and them and we will never have the opportunity to call them to repentance and into the love of Jesus Christ. We can exclude our neighbourhoods, our communities, and our nations from homosexuals, Muslims, radical atheists, and the like, but this is contrary to Matthew 28 and to the will of God for all men to be saved. If we exclude them from our presence we exclude them from the truth of Jesus Christ. Our job is not to set up a Christian, western, nice society, our job is to make disciples of all nations and to speak into those nations truth and to call them to repent. In order to do that we have to be open to speaking to them, living near them, and walking with them as Jesus did with us.
At the same time we do need to be watchful and we need to stand up vocally, (speaking truth not vitriol) to oppose any group of people who would oppress others in the way that is happening in the Middle East. We also need to protect the persecuted and take action as a nation. We need to be honest about sin and violence. But we need to be honest in love. This is far more effective.
So we do as Ephesians 4 tells us “speak the truth in love”.