“From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.” (Acts 17:26)
This verse that set the context for these series of blogs and is wrought with a confirmation of the value that God places on diversity. It was penned so easily by Paul because he was a man that lived in such a diverse and multi-cultural community. The city of Rome had a population between 750,000 and 1,000,000 in his time. He worked in a highly urbanized environment in which ideas circulated in many different way. Robert Linthicum contends “one of Paul’s primary concerns was to enable these urban churches to act rather than react to their city, province, and empire. If they could not be assertive to undertaking ministry in their city and as part of the Roman Empire, they would eventually die. To be effective in ministry, it was necessary for Paul’s churches to understand their urban and international context.” I have tried to do that with this work by making historic and contemporary applications that can be drawn from and used for ministry application. If there is not a practical value for what I have written I would think the work a failure. The thesis was written in order to provoke thinking. Doctrine always follows Theology. What we do has its root in what we think.
The western church is the prevailing influence on the universal church and the western church has been incredibly influenced by the sins of the western world and it exports them. In the chapter Abraham Conqueror of Idolatry I believe I capture the prevailing sins of the last few generations. Patriotic Idolatry lead to two World Wars in the last century, Materialist Idolatry has become so pervasive that the local mall is a better barometer for understanding the culture than the local church. This is manifested in our churches increased selling of coffee and books clothing apparel, and health products in the local assembly and various Christian mediums. These are all substitutes for simply giving to the church because we love God and we desire to follow his commands. Religious Idolatry is seen in an attitude of hedonism and selfishness that is lived out in our most basic institutions. Instead of approaching family life and church life from the perspective of how can my life benefit the world and how can I serve God? We ask the question, what can the church do for me, and how can I live life without being inconvenienced by the prospect of trusting God with the size of my family, or having the burden of taking care of the widow the orphan or the poor? The typical medial class family American family vacation could provide a water well in most third world countries that would radically improve the quality of life for and entire village, and pave the way for the preaching of the Gospel. Many of us have a Starbucks or Dunking Donut budget that would pay a full time salary to an Apostle in India. The eternal consequence of our sin makes me fear for myself and my generation. I am guilty, we are guilty. I believe the solution is a return to basic structures and first commands.
The church must return to an understanding of the vows taken in marriage. This will never happen unless local churches become community oriented and not local assembly oriented and this can not happen until pastors pray together and befriend one another. We have to begin to get some history on saints that are transferring from on church to another, especially if the transfer is in the local community. We have to start to ask the question, why are you leaving Pastor Steve’s church to come to my church, instead of delighting in transfer church growth. It may simply be that Pastor Steve is holding a couple or a man accountable for their sin. 1 Corinthians 5:11 “But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.” The key word here is ‘brother’ and the admonishment is to not even eat with the brother who is in sin. Sexually immoral, greedy, idolatrous brothers, end up divorced and not meeting the needs of their families. Dr. James Dobson apply described them. Instead of enforcing the disciple of the church we allow the brother to marry his mistress and return to another church, often in the same community. Would this occur if Pastor Steve and Pastor Don saw themselves as elders of the church of Newport, RI and not One New Man Community and Crosspoint Church respectively? Would it happen if we were hungrier for souls than for church members?
If we could enforce church discipline we would have stronger families. If we had stronger families those families would desire children and the command to be fruitful and multiple might not fall on deaf ears. If we had more children we might relate better to the man overseas whose child is starving for food and the Word of God. We would have living examples of the glory of God’s creation running around our homes and who would be taught the principles of sharing and reciprocity and not selfishness and materialism. Our consciences are tenderized by children because we see our negative and positive behaviors reflected in them. The former should lead to repentance and later to the glory of God. When those children became adults they may assist us in living righteous lives like Isaac did with Abraham, they may cause us to forgo sin the way the Gideon did with Joash, they may simply live out a supernatural love and devotion to us despite our sin as Jonathan did for Saul.
When families are intact communities are intact and you begin to lend ‘honor to whom honor is due’. You build a culture in which holidays and festivals have specific meaning to your own people, Thanksgiving and Independence Day are the best American examples of this truth. When you have families that are appropriately patriotic these holidays and other like Veterans Day and Memorial Day mean something. We begin to live out seasons of rejoicing and mourning that help us honor past generations and teach future generations. The alternative is to drink another beer and throw another steak on the barbeque grill because we are simply glad we don’t have to work. Wouldn’t it be better to work hard six days a week and honor God on the Sabbath. It was not so long ago when every store in my community of 100,000 people closed at 6 pm on weekdays and every Sunday. It was less than a generation ago when the only athletes that played on Sunday were professionals, now I pass field after field full of families practicing football on Sunday morning that should be practicing their faith. My point is that God established both work and the Sabbath for our good, when we ignore one the other suffers and to our peril. Doing it the right way helps us to see the right way it is being done by others. I am concerned that the Western Church will do more damage to the African and Asian Church than Planned Parenthood will. These churches are often imitating us as we imitate Christ Jesus. Unfortunately we are often failing to imitate Christ Jesus. The result is they become materialistic, they stop honoring family and elders in a manner that is Biblical and they become like us, seeking a Gospel of pleasure and not a Gospel of service. If missionaries both short term and long term would enter these cultures with eyes for what is Biblical we may take away more of the Gospel than we bring. I hope I have to some measure made that case in body of these. My discussion about the Cherokee and the Chinese I believe emphasized the value of indigenous cultures that have redemptive aspects to them and from which we can learn and grow.
I have attempted to promote the value of the individual soul and the redemptive nature of children above everything else. I have tried to demonstrate that where that this is embraced communities prosper. It is a very difficult message to communicate to a western audience. Even with Europe’s diminishing population. This is in large measure because of the three types of idolatry the Abraham gained ascendency over; patriotic, religious, and materialistic have prevailed in modern times. These sins we have seen were primarily in developed nations and not animistic ones as I would have expected. I considered extending the section of the redemptive gift of marriage several times but thought the topic was covered in the discussion on Eve. The saddest part of the work for me was meditating on the lost opportunities provided to the pre-flood generation. The most difficult section to write was on the contraception because it is so far removed from the understanding of the modern western Christian. My greatest surprise was seeing the parallels between the pre flood generation and early colonial America. My greatest hope was recognized in the growing understanding of relationships between fathers and sons.
It tried to caste a wide net historically and culturally within the work. It was my hope that this approach would add to the universal application of the truths contained within the work. Discovering John Murray’s work after writing most of the thesis was confirming and humorous for me. If I had viewed it earlier it may have deflected my commitment to the topic for fear that this work would only have been a reflection of his. I think they are very complementary however. The key Biblical foundation of the work begins and ends with is the pattern that the Paul the Apostle set for us in Acts 17. When Paul met with Jews who had knowledge of the scriptures he reasoned from the scriptures. Many non-believers have knowledge of the scriptures but don’t know Jesus. Many of them go to church every Sunday.
“When they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue. As his custom was, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that the Christhad to suffer and rise from the dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ the said. Some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a large number of God-fearing Greeks and not a few prominent women” (Acts 17:1-2)
For those that did not know the scriptures Paul used the cultural norms that were around him. This work has sited truth literally from around the world and from many generations using well known and obscure sources. I have done so in an effort to model the precept of becoming “all thing to all men so that some might be saved.” 1 Corinthians 9:22 ) just like the Paul the Apostle
“Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.” (Acts 17: 22-23)
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-20586744.html
Robert C. Linthicum, City of God, City of Satan a biblical theology of the Urban Church, (Zondervan Publishing House), 1991, pg 66
http://www.nickmaine.info/Documents/Christianity%20in%20China.htm
John Murray, Principles of Conduct: Aspects of Biblical Ethics (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1991) 1, Questia, Web, 19 Oct. 2010.
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