There are reasons for classifications and labels. I realize that. They help us with making one thing analogous with another. The problem is sometimes we mislabel. Sometimes we get it wrong. And sometimes labels are wrongly appropriated.

I have seen this problem occur repeatedly over the years in many ways, but mostly when it comes to Christianity. Those who know me well, know that I draw a distinction between Christians and professing Christians. And the reason I do this is quite simple. It has to do with whether or not the person/people taking the label bear any resemblance to the identifying marks described in the scriptures.

Where am I going with this? The other day, I was channel surfing and there was a documentary on regarding Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church. His church uses as its domain name, “godhatesfags.com”. The church and its members hold protests outside of military funerals where they hold signs that read things from “Thank God for 9-11″ to “AIDS is the Cure for Homosexuality”. Phelp’s example for his and his church’s tactics is actually Jonah. When Jonah went to Nineveh, he proclaimed “In forty days Nineveh shall be destroyed.” He did not tell them, “God loves you”. He didn’t beg them to repent. He proclaimed destruction for their sin and the end result was nationwide repentance.

There are so many problems with this eisegesis. To begin with, Christians have their commandments; and we’re to obey them. We are commanded to love. We’re to love our God. We’re to love our neighbors. We’re to love our fellow brothers in Christ. And we’re to love our enemies. We’re also not to conform to this world, but to be conformed to the image of Christ. We’re also to be compassionate. There are those who believe condemnation and warning are the sincerest form of love that can be expressed. But it’s hog wash.

The bible has many safe guards in it to keep God’s people in check, to keep them from trampling over people in the name of God. This church’s eisegesis takes a saying here and an example there to draw its key message. And it’s a message of self-righteous hate and judgment.

On the other extreme, there are those who will say, “God is love”. Or they will declare that we’re to hate the sin and love the sinner. How one can separate the two is still a mystery to me.

The bible makes it quite clear that God’s wrath does in fact abide upon the wicked. It even uses words such as hate in describing the unconverted. To deny this is to declare ignorance of God’s word. But the key is that this is God talking. God is capable of loving his creation for the simple fact that they are his handiwork, while at the same time hating the same creation because they live in wanton disobedience to him. He can do this without any violation of his moral and righteous character. He is God and creator.

We, on the other hand, are sinners. We are tainted, though we might be in the process of being conformed to the image of Christ. And as a result, we are incapable of loving and hating individuals with any form of righteous consistency. It is an absolute impossibility for us and the apostle Paul deals with the attainment of this type of righteousness in Philippians. For this reason, we are to live a particular way and in a consistent fashion with the commandments given to us. The attainment and keeping of these commands is not what solely distinguishes us as his people. It is the keeping of them with love that marks us. And it’s the love part that uplifts us and keeps us going when we, ourselves, fall short.

Phelps and his followers not only associate themselves as Baptists, but also as Calvinists. For me, this is a double slam as I too consider myself to be both a Baptist as well as a Calvinist. While we may claim the same labels, and possibly tenets, we appear to be very dissimilar. Our messages are different.

Am I suggesting that we are to adopt a homosexual in order to show how loving we are? No way! That is not what I am suggesting at all. However, I can say that while Jesus maintained his earthly ministry, he continually reached out to tax collectors, prostitutes, and other sinners. He did not “hang” with the Sanhedrin. And as a result, the self-righteous accused him of loving and befriending every known group in the day. The end result is that people responded to his message. They wanted to hear him.

It is difficult to draw a lot of conclusions here, except to say we are not to draw a lot of them. We’re to let the scriptures do that for us. We’re to help and befriend those who are different than us. We are never to alienate them. We are never to drive a wedge between us and them. The bible and our faith may be wedge enough. We are also commanded to be the phos, the light source of truth in this world. If we are not the phos, then the world will have no light source. This does not place God in a box or limit him. This is what God has declared in the bible. This is his plan for us. We are to be the light and the salt. He uses the Holy Spirit to draw men unto him. In being drawn unto him, they are drawn to those who proclaim and live his word.

This mechanism is very simple when we do our part and allow God to do his. Invariably, it is the most difficult thing for all men. We may like to proclaim God’s sovereignty. But to allow him to be sovereign in our lives is at enmity with our human nature. This is where we do so much of our battling. We try to execute the will of God in lives via force, as opposed to allowing God to reveal his will through our active and passive obedience.

When we live and proclaim God’s word, people will be brought unto us. Some will listen and some will not. Those who listen provide us with an opportunity to expound. And they may continue to listen until God regenerates their hearts and minds. Or they may leave. Then there are those who want nothing to do with our message. Are we to attack them? Make them feel bad? Warn them if they don’t listen to us, they’re going to burn? No, we’re not. We are not to wastefully cast God’s precious word upon them for them to trample it. We’re to move on.

In declaring such hatred and in alienating people who are different, Phelps and his followers have set themselves up to take the place of God the Father and the Holy Spirit. And at the end of the day, they provide one more obstacle, one more excuse, why people should have nothing to do with Christianity.

They are not the only ones who act this way. Through the years I have encountered many others who employ similar self-righteous tactics. We should refrain from such behavior and truly glean from the scriptures how we are to treat all those we come into contact with.

Bear in mind that there will come a day when many will stand before God and will declare all the good works they’ve performed and all the messages they’ve preached. In the end, God will proclaim to them that he never ever knew them. Not even for a moment.

As we end this year, ask yourself a couple of questions. Does your salt have flavor? Do you bear light? Do you love those who hate and persecute you? Or do you simply do good to those who do good back to you, who believe as you do? What kind of Christian are you? Does the world even consider you to be a decent person?

Technorati Tags: fred phelps, westboro baptist church, wbc, baptist, calvinist, homosexuality

Christmas time is causing me to do a lot of thinking regarding Christianity. Here are some observations I have made:

1.  The church in downtown Berthoud caters to those who have been “burnt out” on Christianity or who have been burned by their former churches.
2. The reformed church in Fort Collins claims to be historically Baptist and refrains from any focus on <s>music</s> entertainment that caters to the flesh.
3. Most of the blogs, which I no longer read, are simply re-printing materials from men of old.
4. Piety is still confused with holiness.
5. Holiness is still mistaken as something we do.

I am really not qualified to debate all of these observations. They’re simply observations and there is much similarity between them and what goes on outside of Christianity. For example, is it wrong to cater to those who have burned by other churches? After all, some of us have certainly seen the ill effects of what goes on in the name of God.But to market to such folks seems somehow very worldly. What about just quietly doing the same deeds?

Is it wrong to refrain from contemporary music in our worship services? I have heard this argued to the nth degree over the years. But to dwell on how you’re not focusing on the music is to in fact focus. It’s rather ironic. Ever wonder at what point Victory in Jesus was considered contemporary? Better yet, look inside a Baptist Hymnal and read about how at the turn of the last century the piano was considered a contemporary instrument that should not be used within the worship service. At my last church in CA, I was originally put off by the music service. But I had been determined not to allow music to interfere with doctrine. The end result is I found a very loving, yet strong church that has lived out the scriptures better than any other church I have seen.

Somehow good Calvinism is often confused with quoting or reciting various authors. Apologetics has nothing to do with quoting books about the scriptures– that is if we’re concerned about defending the faith. Our faith derives from the scriptures. When we defend them, we’re defending the doctrine contained therein. When we lean to other works, we rely on other men and their interpretations to help us form ours. In reality, we’re to depend on the scriptures and upon the Holy Spirit’s witness within us. Anyone who knows me well, knows how irritated I get when people just re-hash stuff.

Piety may be a good thing.  Most of the time, I really never see it, just false piety. Many cults practice the art of self-denial. There’s nothing new there. But somehow I expect true piety to be refreshing and a magnet. It ought to be charitable and loving in nature, not judgmental. It should never look down upon those who do not live likewise. 

As we live this life, we are continually conformed to the image of Christ. It is God who brings various events into our lives that break us down and mold us, just like when he originally drew us unto him for regeneration and salvation. This was not our work. It was his. Yet somehow we get mistaken. We somehow think that holiness, or separation, is an active behavior or manifestation– like clothes we wear. It has little to do with our clothes or appearance, but more to do with our heart and mind. What do we think about everyday events? What are our initial reactions?

As I stated in the beginning, I simply wanted to make some observations. We’re going into a time of year that is identified as belonging to Christians. Yet we all know that most of the behavior we’ll actually see will be anything but Christian in nature. Will we strive to be different? Or will we strive to be consistent with the scriptures? There is a distinction to be made.