Christians are now more unpopular than ever.
Good.
No matter how you view Donald Trump or if you voted for him, or whether you see him as a savior-of-sorts or a demagogue, what emerges is this: his presidential failures will be laid at the feet of Christians, who at least in popular imagination, helped him win. We are the new Jews. Thus are we in good compan
This is a great opportunity we don’t want to miss. I’m serious. Our words matter much less now. If we don’t live the truth, we will be made to go away.
Some say that the willingness of major Christian personalities to openly endorse a thrice-married, unrepentant man who sexually degraded women, noticeably low on financial integrity, a man who could not find anything he needed forgiveness for…that we appeared to excuse these things has set back the cause of Christ a generation or more.
Our moral authority has been compromised.
That makes me want to weep, but I do see there’s great opportunity here. We will have to live the gospel loudly. It’s all we’ve got. Our witness will be less with words—more with concrete actions. As in, faithful acts of service, expressed locally, lived out in community.
That’s not a bad thing.
There is a sort of suffering you experience in living amongst a culture that’s in steep decline. WSJ’s Peggy Noonan says the word for this low point is “kakistocracy” meaning that a society has sunk so far that the least qualified people rise to the top. Sounds like a pretty accurate description of the election season you lived through, right?
I wonder if it’s God’s way of putting right in front of us the darkness of our own hearts, and our complete inability to save ourselves. When a people choose two candidates mired in corruption and lying, this is an x-ray of our national soul. Do we need any more proof of our need for a Savior than this?
The good part is that our survival depends on grabbing hold of God even more tightly.
What is true about sex and marriage, for example, is not one whit less true because a political leader hasn’t lived it. We actually have the chance to stand out as the peculiar people we’re called to be, where not even a whiff of greed or immorality “should be named among us.” Greed and immorality. Are these not the chief idols of the glorified Self worshipped in our day?
Now more than ever, our witness must not be sullied by the gods around us.
I feel my back straightening, my resolve deepening as I move into this new year. I want to get my hands on tangible stuff—like helping with this dinner for homeless families through my church. It’s a big drive in crazy traffic to get there. I don’t know much about homelessness.
But I sense the need to have my body in a place with other Christians serving in Christ’s name.
Instead of just regretting my thoughtlessness with a friend over Christmas, I am going to pick up the phone and call her. It is time to do. I’m celebrating the small moments that call me to a bit more sacrifice and generosity. I want to grab every chance that comes my way to take a stand for a Christian sexual apologetic. Bring it on.
Christ offers us life—real life—and it always entails a walk down a narrow path.
This is our time. Really, can’t you sense it? I don’t mean it’s our time to win a majority on the Supreme Court or build a wall in Mexico or roll back the regulatory state. This is our time to live the love of Christ in some quiet, concrete manner as a testimony to a kingdom that cannot be shaken.
I am done with political allegiances and parties. Republican or Democrat—they use us, soliciting the votes of Christians. Then they go do what they wanted to all along.
Lots of people fear the church will coast along in false security because we think some man in a white house will give us a break for four years. God forbid.
As the New Year rolls around, I’m taking my place and putting my shoulder to the wheel amongst that motley band of tattered saints that stretches back through the ages, whose ears were—and are—listening for a trumpet call.