Quote from Forum Archives on May 6, 2002, 2:40 pm

Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>

RENEWAL AS A WAY OF LIFE #4/8
SCHIZOPHRENIA
(THE WORLD)
May 5, 2002

TEXT: 1 Corinthians 3:16-23

Many in the media have recently proclaimed that the Roman Catholic Church
has a crisis. Since Easter, newspapers and newscasts have been filled
with reports of priests who have committed sexual abuse and church
leaders who have covered up the abuse. The attacks, in the guise of
objective reporting, against the Roman Catholic Church have continued to
grow. Without doubt, there are probably investigative reporters looking
to see what abuses they can find among Protestant clergy as well. The
assumption of these findings against some particular priests is that we
are supposed to be shocked and outraged by what they have done. Young
children have been manipulated by men in positions of trust. That trust
and its corresponding innocence have been violated. For the victims, the
innocence of childhood was shattered by this betrayal of trust.

Without a doubt, these are terrible deeds that have been done. They are
horrific. Those that have committed such atrocities should be held
accountable, and the Catholic Church does have some housecleaning to
attend to. But my focus this morning is not upon the Catholic Church and
their priesthood. My focus is on the world. The media leaders reporting
these abuses intend for us to be shocked and angered. I think that they
even hope that their reports cause us to question the validity of the
Christian faith. All so that the world can be so proud of the abusive
evil that has been exposed, and the ways of man put back on a proper
course.

Well, that’s nice, except the world soon exposes itself to its own
self-made hypocrisy even in the midst of this exposure of sexual abuses
in the Catholic Church. For the same world that stands in moral outrage
of what a few priests have done is so in love with its own values-free
open-mindedness that it celebrates the freedom of organizations that
exist which actively push for the legitimization of child pornography and
even sexual relations between adults and children. In fact, one book
recently published indicates that we do our children harm instead of good
by protecting them from sexual relationships until adulthood. The book is
Harmful to Minors by Judith Levine. Chuck Colson comments, “As word about
the book spread, it was attacked for presenting pedophilia as an
‘alternative lifestyle.’ Levine rejects that characterization, calling it
an example of the ‘hysteria’ that prompted her to write the book. While
Levine does not condone pedophilia in its technical sense -- that is,
sexual relations with pre-pubescent children -- there's little else she
rules out of bounds. Levine denies that sex between minors and adults is
always wrong. She writes that teens seek out sex with older people for
what she considers ‘understandable reasons.’ In an interview with
Newhouse Newspapers, Levine demonstrated just how far ‘understandable’
could be stretched. She said, ‘Yes, absolutely,’ when asked if a sexual
relationship between a priest and a boy could be a positive experience
for the boy. She added that ‘some research’ suggests that such
‘experiences’ can be ‘positive’ for ‘even young children.’” (Chuck
Colson, “What's Really ‘Harmful To Minors:’ Sex and Worldview,”
Breakpoint Commentary #020429, 04/29/2002) And, of course, the Boy Scouts
of America has taken all kinds of flack for refusing to allow homosexuals
leadership positions, even though the stated purpose of such a
prohibition is to try to prevent the very sexual abuses of which the
Catholic clergy are accused.

When it comes down to issues that “the world” considers important, it is,
at best, schizophrenic. That is, there are two or more opposite
personalities at play. On the one hand, the world wants the benefits of
personal morality, but on the other hand, it wants none of the faith and
associated discipline it takes to attain such morality. For instance, no
one I know goes around saying, “Take advantage of me. Lie to me and steal
from me the things I have worked so hard to obtain. Cheat me out of my
hard earned money.” I just never hear anyone go around saying that’s what
he or she wants to happen. Yet, we can find surveys that show significant
percentages of employees who feel justified to steal supplies or computer
services or time from their companies. They base their justifications on
low salaries, poor working conditions, bad relationship with a
supervisor, and any number of other complaints. But where in Scripture
are Christians ever justified to do such things to anyone else? Small
wonder Paul writes, “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s
sight.”

And small wonder that Richard Lovelace, in Renewal as a Way of Life,
calls “the world” one of the dynamics of spiritual death. If you recall,
last week I spoke on “the flesh” being our sinful nature; our desire to
disobey God. It is our attitude of disobedience which is sinful - even
evil - in God’s sight. From this, Lovelace writes, “…these desires [of
the flesh] create patterns or structures of behavior which make up the
corporate life of fallen humanity; together, they shape the structures of
the society in which we live… The world can be defined as corporate flesh
- a pattern of drives and actions resulting from the interrelationship of
all the individual flesh in the bulk of humanity. As human beings design
economic systems, governments, businesses, and many other lesser
structures of civilization, they are influenced partly by reason and
God’s “common grace” (the grace and wisdom even nonbelievers are
granted), and partly by their own selfish interests and carnal natures.
The resulting structures are always in some measure crooked.” (Richard
Lovelace, Renewal As a Way of Life, Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity
Press, 1985, pp. 85-86).

The biggest problem with what the Bible calls “the world” is that it
seeps into the Church. As it does, the Church becomes disabled to be the
salt and light witness it is called to be. This is a worldwide problem,
but I want to point out what this has meant to the church we know best:
the church in America. Probably the infiltration of the world into the
church we most readily recognize is that of theological liberalism and
relativism. For about a century, liberal academics have sought to deny
the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, and even the bodily resurrection
of Jesus. These are just a few of the theological shifts they have
attempted. Alongside side these challenges to orthodox Christian theology
have come a type of Christian relativism which reduces God’s love to
those things that bring us cultural happiness. Thus, we have major
segments of Christianity - not a majority but still significant numbers -
who actively support abortion, homosexuality, and other religious beliefs
as purely personal decisions. In fact, to deny others of these choices,
even on Biblical grounds, is to try to deny God’s boundless love for
others. At least, that is the typical line of argument that erupts from
that side.

Unfortunately, those who have been on the “conservative” side have not
fared any better in keeping “the world” out of the Church. Like the
Pharisees of Jesus’ day, the zeal to project theological orthodoxies are
frequently tainted by legalisms and disguised idolatries of fame and
power. When we realize that a truth of God’s revelation is to establish
His kingdom, and that His kingdom is an outreach of sacrificial love to
all sinners, particularly the downtrodden and disenfranchised, then we
see how short even the conservative church in America has fallen. During
the social and political turmoil of the 1960s and 1970s, how many
churches closed their eyes and ears of witness to a new generation
seeking to live out the faith they had been taught in different,
challenging ways? How many churches instead of reaching out in Christian
love and discipleship told younger members, in effect, conform to our
pattern of church rules or leave. They left. How much of an impact today
would the world see if the young adults of three to four decades ago had
been allowed to express themselves through the Christian faith instead of
finding their only ways of expression through the many subcultures that
sprang up?

The church in Corinth, to which Paul wrote this letter, was no different
than the churches we have known in our own time. Patterns of worldliness
had crept in. They faced power struggles and cliques. They argued over
which leader they should follow. They didn’t share with their hungry
neighbors, even at potlucks! Paul must have been pulling his hair out in
frustration as he wrote them. Can’t you hear his anguish and frustration
as he wrote in 3:1-3? “Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but
as worldly - mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for
you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. You are
still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are
you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men?” When not even God’s
Church can be salt and light, small wonder that the world is so
schizophrenic. Small wonder that the world wants the fruits of the Spirit
without having anything to do with the people God has commissioned to
bring His love to a lost and dying world. And small wonder that the world
has no idea how to pull off getting people to love each other and get
along while rejecting the love of God our Creator and Redeemer. “The
foolishness of God,” Paul writes, “is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the
weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.” (1:25)

Richard Lovelace writes, “The antithesis of worldly behavior, and the
cure for conformity to the world, is set forth particularly in the
‘upside-down kingdom’ of the Sermon on the Mount. The lifestyle of the
kingdom is not proud but poor in spirit, not self-confident but meek and
sensitive to conviction of sin, not self-righteous but repentant, not
praise-seeking but God-obeying even to the point of suffering
persecution, not vengeful but forgiving, not ostentatious or laborious in
piety but secretive and simple, not anxious or acquisitive but content in
serving God, not judgmental but merciful. If these patterns can be
nurtured in the church, they will affect the moral structure of the rest
of humanity.” (Richard Lovelace, Renewal As a Way of Life, Downers Grove,
IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985, p. 97).

And as Paul concludes in chapter three, “So then, no more boasting about
men! All things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world
or life or death or the present or the future - all are yours, and you
are of Christ, and Christ is of God.”

Rev. Charles A. Layne, pastor, First Baptist Church, Bunker Hill, IN

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