Brad Alles

As we examine the kingdoms of the left hand (state) and the right hand (church), there are Christians today calling believers to be involved in their society rather than withdrawing from it. As we saw in the last post, God has done this in the past. Christians are to be informed and involved citizens, seeking the good of the community in which they live. God instructs Jeremiah to tell the people of Judah who were taken as slaves to Babylon to work for the good of the city, because when it does well, it will benefit them also. Jeremiah 29:7 says, “Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile.   Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”

Here are Christians who also believe we must be informed and involved in our communities: “Young people are not going to survive in this increasingly secular society if we don’t find a way to permeate every field with apologetics”—not just in religious classes, but in everything.  “You have to teach young people how to defend a Christian perspective in their fields. Young people’s questions are going to be different from the questions faced by earlier generations.” (Nancy Pearcey, Houston Baptist University)   

It is vital for mature believers to be “training up a new generation of children to know what it is like to live among a people who will see Christianity as very strange.” (Russell Moore, Southern Baptist Convention)

“Increasingly, we’re likely to be a counter-culture. As that happens, we will be the last great defenders of reason, of truth, of human dignity…So many different positions now, and we need to know them, what the consequences are likely to be, and how to argue with them persuasively…Today, almost nothing can be taken for granted. The foundations have to be put back into everything.”  (Os Guiness, Christian apologist)

“Religious liberty is paramount. There’s a real, growing push to eliminate what to-date have been fairly unanimously accepted religious-liberty exemptions from otherwise acceptable laws.”  Recognizing this, he said, makes “inspiring the next generation… incredibly important and extremely difficult.” Still, he believes, Christians are up to the long-term challenge: “We understand ourselves to be salt and light…”  We should want “the absolute best thing for one another, and then allow our facts, figures and arguments to buttress that position,” all with the goal of pointing fellow Americans “to the cross.”  (Eric Teetsel, Manhattan Declaration)   

“The day of the casual Christian are over.  No longer is it possible to drift along, hoping no tough choices will have to be made.” (Erwin Lutzer, Moody Church)

“There will be no place to hide, and there will be no way to remain silent.  To be silent will answer the question.  The question is whether evangelicals will remain true to the teaching of Scripture.” (Albert Mohler, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary)

“It is likely that I will die in my bed.  My successor will die in prison.  His successor will die executed in the public square.  His successor will pick up the shards of a ruined society and slowly rebuild civilization, as the church has done so often in human history.” (Francis George, Cardinal of Chicago)