May all who hate Zion be put to shame and turned backward! Let them be like grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up, with which the reaper does not fill his hand nor the binder of sheaves his arms, nor do those who pass by say, "The blessing of the Lord be upon you! We bless you in the name of the Lord!" (Verses 5-8)
Grass grows between the seams of my driveway where the concrete meets the pavement. It sprouts in little clumps of hopefulness there. From its vantage point the grass can see the green lawn spreading like a carpet around my home. Thinking in its nascent glory that it, too, looks like that. But the clump of grass is wrong about its future. It won't last long. The mower will not even notice it. Too insignificant to warrant its attention, the clump of grass is useless in beauty and in function. It will die between the cracks, turned backward to nothing. Never to grace the neighborhood in emerald splendor.
But what if the little clump of unlikely grass creeps into the lovely lawn, spreading its tendrils into the well-established yard, choking it out? I see it happening more and more in these days. Those who hate Christians rising up to shame us. No longer insignificant clumps of grass that wither and die, those against us grow bigger and stronger. We live in a post-Christian America, but it's not just here. Today I read how the Christians in Mosul are leaving their homes to flee fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant because the families live in constant fear for their lives. Mosul is the most important Christian city in Iraq. Jonah is said to be buried there. Hate has run them from their homes. Sprouted and chased them to the hills to the town of Alqosh where Christians live alongside Kurds. The hotbed that is the Middle East is decidedly anti-Christian. Meriam Ibrahim and Saeed Abedini languish in foreign prisons because of their faith in Jesus. And here at home in the United States?
It is becoming more and more difficult to hold our values in a secular society. From the definition of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman to the Christian stance that abortion kills a human being, our understanding of God's laws puts us outside mainstream morality. Businesses must comply with who the government says they must service. Government insurance must cover procedures we see as murder. Bible studies are shut down in neighborhoods because of neighbor complaints. America is being redefined. And it's not Christian.
British cabinet minister Baroness Warsi recently visited the Vatican and expressed her thoughts about how religion is being marginalized in Europe and Great Britain. She was especially concerned about Christianity, though she is a Muslim. She defined "totalitarian regimes" as those that sprout up when signs of religion cannot be displayed or worn in government buildings; when states won't fund faith schools; and where religion is sidelined, marginalized and downgraded in the public sphere. "You cannot and should not extract these Christian foundations from the evolution of our nations any more than you can or should erase the spires from our landscapes," she said. She was excoriated in the British press for these remarks.
So what do we do in a post-Christian world? How do we express our faith in a society that has already decided what we think and how we feel? Pre-empted our ability to love the person though we disagree with his or her morality? For me the challenge isn't political. The tsunami engulfing Christian values can't be pushed back with the waving of my little hand toward it. Many Christians have long stuck the Ten Commandments into the faces of the lost and cried, "Sinner!" Washed in our own self-righteousness, the rules were enough for many of us. They aren't any more. It's time for us to be Christ to others under the weight of the pressing hate that says God is dead and has nothing to do with the real world. To silence those who would argue that their God is okay with the new morality. He winks at our sins; thinks of them as peccadilloes. He is love and we all go to heaven. So we get to live as we want as a Holy God slumbers, addicted to the malaise that has medicated us, too.
This is an arduous path that should wake us up. Do we believe God or not? Has He changed us...birthed us anew into a life that is salt and light to a degenerating world? Because if our faith doesn't define us, not by its rigidity but by its power, we will stumble with the world as it "squeezes us into its mold (Romans 12)." Pressing into the heart of God, praying for increased wisdom to navigate our lives through the maze, accessing His love without fear of Him and growing in faith is our only hope against hate. The only way to have the shame turned on us because we believe turned backward on those who hate our Christianity. Shamed not by our derision, but by the very love of God they eschewed. Repentant and longing for more than the vacuum swirling in their own hearts, may our goal be to bring them to Jesus. Mirror our Lord. "Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life. Philippians 2 It is time to make Christ our life! To ditch Him as religion. To shine as the darkness closes in.
Grass grows between the seams of my driveway where the concrete meets the pavement. It sprouts in little clumps of hopefulness there. From its vantage point the grass can see the green lawn spreading like a carpet around my home. Thinking in its nascent glory that it, too, looks like that. But the clump of grass is wrong about its future. It won't last long. The mower will not even notice it. Too insignificant to warrant its attention, the clump of grass is useless in beauty and in function. It will die between the cracks, turned backward to nothing. Never to grace the neighborhood in emerald splendor.
But what if the little clump of unlikely grass creeps into the lovely lawn, spreading its tendrils into the well-established yard, choking it out? I see it happening more and more in these days. Those who hate Christians rising up to shame us. No longer insignificant clumps of grass that wither and die, those against us grow bigger and stronger. We live in a post-Christian America, but it's not just here. Today I read how the Christians in Mosul are leaving their homes to flee fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant because the families live in constant fear for their lives. Mosul is the most important Christian city in Iraq. Jonah is said to be buried there. Hate has run them from their homes. Sprouted and chased them to the hills to the town of Alqosh where Christians live alongside Kurds. The hotbed that is the Middle East is decidedly anti-Christian. Meriam Ibrahim and Saeed Abedini languish in foreign prisons because of their faith in Jesus. And here at home in the United States?
It is becoming more and more difficult to hold our values in a secular society. From the definition of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman to the Christian stance that abortion kills a human being, our understanding of God's laws puts us outside mainstream morality. Businesses must comply with who the government says they must service. Government insurance must cover procedures we see as murder. Bible studies are shut down in neighborhoods because of neighbor complaints. America is being redefined. And it's not Christian.
British cabinet minister Baroness Warsi recently visited the Vatican and expressed her thoughts about how religion is being marginalized in Europe and Great Britain. She was especially concerned about Christianity, though she is a Muslim. She defined "totalitarian regimes" as those that sprout up when signs of religion cannot be displayed or worn in government buildings; when states won't fund faith schools; and where religion is sidelined, marginalized and downgraded in the public sphere. "You cannot and should not extract these Christian foundations from the evolution of our nations any more than you can or should erase the spires from our landscapes," she said. She was excoriated in the British press for these remarks.
So what do we do in a post-Christian world? How do we express our faith in a society that has already decided what we think and how we feel? Pre-empted our ability to love the person though we disagree with his or her morality? For me the challenge isn't political. The tsunami engulfing Christian values can't be pushed back with the waving of my little hand toward it. Many Christians have long stuck the Ten Commandments into the faces of the lost and cried, "Sinner!" Washed in our own self-righteousness, the rules were enough for many of us. They aren't any more. It's time for us to be Christ to others under the weight of the pressing hate that says God is dead and has nothing to do with the real world. To silence those who would argue that their God is okay with the new morality. He winks at our sins; thinks of them as peccadilloes. He is love and we all go to heaven. So we get to live as we want as a Holy God slumbers, addicted to the malaise that has medicated us, too.
This is an arduous path that should wake us up. Do we believe God or not? Has He changed us...birthed us anew into a life that is salt and light to a degenerating world? Because if our faith doesn't define us, not by its rigidity but by its power, we will stumble with the world as it "squeezes us into its mold (Romans 12)." Pressing into the heart of God, praying for increased wisdom to navigate our lives through the maze, accessing His love without fear of Him and growing in faith is our only hope against hate. The only way to have the shame turned on us because we believe turned backward on those who hate our Christianity. Shamed not by our derision, but by the very love of God they eschewed. Repentant and longing for more than the vacuum swirling in their own hearts, may our goal be to bring them to Jesus. Mirror our Lord. "Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life. Philippians 2 It is time to make Christ our life! To ditch Him as religion. To shine as the darkness closes in.
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