"For God and Country...Geronimo, Geronimo, Geronimo!"
~ Unknown U.S. Navy Seal, Announcing in code Osama Bin Laden was deadToday in America, we honor Memorial Day.
At times, there are a few who seem not to realize who Memorial Day is for; it is a time of remembrance of those who have fallen by those who are alive.
To some Veterans, it is odd when someone 'thanks' us for our service on this day; most will say 'thank you' and point to the real reason we honor this day.
What we have is a no harm/no foul situation; the public wants to thank somebody and honor the sacrifice. They know something of Memorial Day, Independence Day and Veteran's Day; but they're not really sure how it all fits together.
The reason - well, upwards of 94% of living Americans have not served in the military.
Veteran's should be proud and the public should honor them appropriately. If I may take a moment to digress and explain the love of country and pride a Veteran feels...
It is not that Veterans could and others could not; it is that we did and others did not.
For God and Country.
Mixing up holidays is mild and forgivable; but for the Christian, we are facing the same problem in not knowing the basics of faith.
In very mild terms, many Christians, even Christian leaders within the local church, have no idea what faith truly is or what the other 'important Biblical stuff' that they should know.
The reason is because many have never been taught and others have never truly experienced faith or grace in a real, vibrant, living way in their lives.
I hate to be the one to inform some modern American Christians of this...but, hey - Jesus Christ did not spend the first century in Palestine and go to a brutal death on a Cross so that you could be prosperous and without needs in the Twenty-First Century.You see, the New Testament begins with a list of names; it begins with a boring genealogy telling us from whence Jesus came.
The New Testament does NOT begin with the phrase, "This book is how you will change your life and live it to the fullest of your potential."
We would do well as modern Christians to learn the names within Jesus' genealogy and their purpose while forgetting about what we expect God to do for us.
For some reason, modern Christians have forgotten that Christianity is all about service and self-giving at its core; us to one another, the Body for the masses and God giving of Himself so that we might be raised with Him.
A sure-fire, simple approach to becoming what we should be as the Body of Christ is to actually learn about the man whom we say we worship - Jesus Himself.
In Scripture, you will find that Jesus was constantly arguing with the Pharisees, the religious elite.
His morality matched theirs more than anyone else's, yet they always clashed.
The fact that the Pharisees expected Him to share their values and act more like them is underscored in the religious discussions.
The truth is that the Pharisees had settled on Godliness as an act of the hand rather than an act of the hand being spurred by the faith in the heart.
In today's world, the modern Church in America has Christians reeling because the Church itself is moving and striving to become more and more like the world instead of less.This has believer's internally rocked and confused; they don't know how to act or behave, what to read or what to declare smut, what to watch in the movies or the movies we should be preaching against.
And why wouldn't they be confused?
Modern Christian thought is all over the place; simply turn on a religious television station and watch for three hours - there will be no continuity or cohesion.
Quite simply, the modern church must learn what faith is, in whom to believe and the value of grace, mercy and forgiveness.
We once knew what these things were in the not-so-distant past.
These truths are the foundation of practice in our faith to glorify our Resurrected Lord; they must be relearned and retaught to this generation.
We as the Church, we must be able to strongly stand for Biblical Truth without withdrawing from culture and without causing the culture to become a theocracy, the authorities ruling with an iron fist and holding a Bible.
We've seen that before in history; with Moses, with Hezekiah, with John Calvin's Geneva and even with the Puritans in our own country.
This is not how God's grace is distributed among the lost; it certainly isn't how grace is given to the hurting.
Martin Luther, the great German theologue, held to a position of 'Two Kingdoms'; we are citizens of heaven and act as such, while remaining citizens of the secular world and in obedience to governing authorities.
While millions of German Christians did not resist the Nazi takeover of Germany, few thought that the would one day awake to having Adolph Hitler appoint new church leaders; leaders who supported the regime.
At that time, as unthinkable as it is today, the Christian motto was, 'The Swastika on our breasts; the Cross in our hearts.'
Yet, there were a handful who resisted in the name of Christ; Dietrich Bonhoeffer spent two years in a concentration camp before being executed.
Another, Martin Niemoller, defiantly preached, 'Christus ist mein Fuhrer!'
Even the New York Times published nearly 1,000 articles (1933-37) speaking of the German Church struggle.
The truth is that only Christians opposed the Nazis.
When the time came, the Trade Unions, the Scientists, the Medical Doctors, every member of the Reichstag (Parliament), teachers and lawyers; all of them capitulated.
Only the Christian stood in defiance and in resistance.
I mention this to say that any time the Church enters the political arena, the Church will always lose.
While I pray revival might one day reach the Capital; I can promise that revival will not begin in the Halls of Congress.
In the 1950's & 1960's, Mainline Protestant denominations began to give political messages from the pulpit.
They even went to the point of stressing of the dangers of having a Catholic president in the White House.
Today, those pews now set empty; millions went to more Evangelical churches where they preached faith, grace, forgiveness and mercy. This is an eternal message that never goes out of style and always needs repeating.
Yet, many Evangelical churches are on the brink of making the same mistake as our Mainline brothers and sisters did a generation ago.
The message of 'behaving' without the grace and mercy of God is nothing short of Pharisaical Rules.
Too often the agenda of conservative religious groups match the agenda of conservative politicians instead of Biblical priorities.
This should never be.
For the message of Christ to permeate our lives, we do not always have to be an 'All or Nothing' people.
For example, do you realize if the pro-life supporters and the pro-choice advocates would have set down together and hashed out parameters on what they agreed on concerning abortion:
By rough estimated accounting, that's over 500 million Americans that would be living, working, paying taxes, attending church, playing baseball and a thousand other things.
And if Christians could have just sat down and worked with those we disagreed with in grace, all those people would be alive today.
Instead, our fore-bearers went 'all-or-nothing' when it came to the abortion issue and they lost; not just a political issue, but a moral issue as well as a generation of citizens.
Over the centuries, when Christians had power, they used it against people who did not agree with the principals set forth by the Church.
This was wrong then and it would still be wrong if practiced today.
Sadly, in many places and in many people's lives, the name-calling, the hysteria over things or people Christians did not understand or seek to know, they chaos created rather than calm initiated; the sad truth is that if we as teh Body of Christ don't straighten up, the day will come and is fastly approaching, where people will no longer look to the Church or Christians for guidance.
Again, grace, mercy, forgiveness, and love; these come from within and are what should define the Christian.
Think about it: How in the world do you enforce the Great Commandment? You can't physically or practically; we teach it in love, act it out in grace and mercy and hold open the door for any person who wants to know more.
A Christian is nothing more than a recovering sinner trying to help other sinners enter the program.
The Honorable Roy Moore of the Great State of Alabama, was made famous by his conviction and the judicial rulings concerning the erection of a memorial honoring the Decalogue (Ten Commandments.)
With all due respect to Judge Moore, I wish the Ten Commandments were posted in every courthouse in America, but what I would want more than the posting of the Ten
There's no doubt in my mind that if we lived what we believed, not only would we teach others the Ten Commandments but also the fulfilling of the commandments through a life of faith, grace, love and hope.
Many years ago, Billy Graham was allowed by the Communist authorities in the Soviet Union to come to Russia and hold open revival meetings.
It was at the height of the Cold War and Graham was an anti-communist; but he went, staying faithful to his calling and honored the Lord.
When he returned, Graham received a letter from a pastor who stated that Graham had, 'set the church back 50 years,' through how he had ministered.
True to form, with a shaft of light given to his mind, Billy Graham wrote that pastor back and stated that he was, 'deeply ashamed' to have set the church back 50 years.
Graham said he was ashamed because he had been trying to set the church back 2,000 years.
Maybe that's what we need to do in our age; attempt to go forward by going back and learning from the first church of the apostles, disciples and witnesses of our Lord.
We've tried everything else, why not try what Scripture tells us already works?
These are eternal, bring an eternal hope and never go out of style.
Until next time, win one for the good guys.
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