Don’t Shut Up - Show Up
“And so dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice-the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.”
Romans 12:2 NLT
“…the beautiful young things of the reformed renaissance have a hard choice to make in the next decade. You really do kid only yourselves if you think you can be an orthodox Christian and be at the same time cool enough and hip enough to cut it in the wider world. Frankly, in a couple of years it will not matter how much urban ink you sport, how much fair trade coffee you drink, how many craft brews you can name, how much urban gibberish you spout, how many art house movies you can find that redeemer figure in, and how much money you divert from gospel preaching to social justice: maintaining biblical sexual ethics will be the equivalent in our culture of being a white supremacist.”
Carl Trueman in 2010 [1]
Carl Trueman’s prophetic claim is now open to examination; the ten years are up. Was he right or was he wrong about the Christian impulse to identify and assimilate into the secular culture? Have those who tried it stayed orthodox? Have they remained on course? Have they made you more likeable or acceptable to the general culture? Or, has staying true to your orthodox views on homosexuality, abortion, gender, and race made you persona non gratia? Have you been declared a racist, a homophobe, an anti-science, climate change denying Philistine? Only a very tiny percentage of you really know the answer, because the vast majority of Christians have not spoken up or stood up, so you just won’t be able to answer the question. And that might be alright in that not all of us have been called to be on the front lines, but all of us have a lot on the line. There are a minority who have spoken up and stood their ground, and have ventured into conversations, written articles, submitted to interviews, authored books, spoken out on social media, and can answer the question clearly. Yes, you have been called these names; white supremacist might be one of the kinder names you have been called.
The big surprise is not that secular culture has spit you back out like used gum; it is who has chewed you up first. Would you be surprised if I told you it was probably members of BigEva? BigEva is shorthand for the new woke elite of neo-evangelicalism. What makes them less threatening is they are true Christians who have adopted a leftist worldview. Like Christianity Today, Inc. and their magazine, they have decided that Donald Trump is immoral and to vote for him is immoral. They seriously question the minds and critical thinking capacity of Christian Trump supporters. They don’t come right out and call Trump supporters bad names; no, that is below their station. They have compassion on their weaker friends if only they could be enlightened in the halls of the academy. If only they could see some of the new research and the great strides in social justice. If they could adopt our more integrated and compassionate world view. They would see how giving up the fight and allowing the secular left to run our country unabated, in the long run, would bring greater harmony, peace, and civil conversation. They remind me of the dreamy utopians of the 1930s who thought the social experiment in the Soviet Union would bring equality and harmony to the world. For those who think equality of result is utopia, I would recommend Malcolm Muggeridge’s Winter in Moscow, a marvelous exposé of a malevolent and evil force.
Let’s follow Paul’s line of thought through the book of Romans for a moment. Walking through the cultural sludge is difficult, but Paul’s document provides clarity. The root of the problem facing society is its refusal to worship God as he is. This is what God is angry about and eventually he will unleash his wrath upon it and destroy all that opposes him. He is angry because of the damage it has and continues to do to what he loves the most, his creation. His anger is what a parent feels when his child is being attacked. When danger lurks, his natural impulse is to protect. There are some telling phrases in the Roman letter’s introductory thesis:
“Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks.”
“As a result, their minds became dark and confused.
“And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols.”
“As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies.” [2]
Paul pivots in Chapter 12 and begins to explain the practical everyday response:
“And so dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice-the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.”
Romans 12:2 NLT
Worship and bodies are connected throughout the extended argument that Paul makes. He says that the unbeliever refused to worship him and therefore, abused their bodies and many associated with them. The antidote, the counter-cultural action, now is to worship God with your body. Your body is your personal delivery system to the world. When it comes down to it, worship is living practically every day for the purpose of Christ. All other forms or functions named worship by Christians through the ages is worship accoutrements. The entire complex of the human personality and body work together to form behaviors that reveal either abuse of the body or the body flourishing.
It used to be that if you wanted to confront the culture you would need to make a sign and march in a protest. This is no longer necessary. All you need to do is worship God, don’t conform to the world around you, and you will be confronted. To extract a phrase from the aforementioned Carl Truemann statement, “maintaining biblical sexual ethics will be the equivalent in our culture of being a white supremacist.”
If you choose to conform to the present culture [to become woke to lament, confess your white privilege, work to not be the racist you are and be fully in on being anti-racist] then you will be accepted into the new church of the enlightened ones who will craft your future for you. They will let you know what your future sins will be. You might recall somewhere you were taught that Christ died for all your sins, past, present, and future. I know you thought you knew what your sins were [breaking the Ten Commandments, not following the Sermon on the Mount, you know the routine], but now, at the first church of woke theology you will be introduced to a new set of sins that begin with your ancestry or your past and present sins of being white and privileged, and your future sins concerning reparations to aggrieved groups of oppressed peoples. They will teach you to loathe yourself, your country, and your church. Their teachers will disciple the young in our society who will reject the church. They will tell you they don’t want to be associated with the church because it is racist, homophobic, and misogynistic.
Anyone who attempts to be honest about the matter would admit that there is racism in society and in the church. Yes, there is homophobia as well, but the fear of homosexuality, or even prejudice against it, is a separate issue from what the Bible teaches concerning its practice. It is important to understand that I can believe that homosexual practice is a sin and hurts the people involved, yet at the same time respect gay individuals and believe as a matter of public policy that they deserve the same rights as any citizen of the United States. I can care for them, live next to them, do business with them, be a friend or even colleague. This is not only possible; it is what I normally experience among Christians in churches today. And of course, misogynistic is a term that smears anyone who happens to believe that there is a divine order in the family and the church. By divine order I mean that the husband is the leader of the family and that elders should be exclusively men. There is not wide agreement on this issue in the church; it remains unresolved. Misogynistic means to hate women, which I believe is extremely rare in the church. Ever since the birth of the church one of its great appeals has been its elevated treatment of women. Women are loved, honored, and fully active in churches around the world. There is certainly disagreement, but to use the word misogynistic is to horribly miss the mark.
Love God with Your Body
The most obvious way you can be all in with God is to put your body on the altar because it carries you and presents you to the world. Everyone can see it, touch it, and tell an awful lot about you by observing it. It makes seen what is unseen. Your spirit and the condition of your soul emit from your body via your posture, facial expressions, sound of your voice, and the look in your eyes. God doesn’t divide you into spiritual and physical, this is proven by the way he asks so much of our body. He demonstrated the same commitment in his body via the crucifixion. And the resurrection would have been superfluous without a physical body with wounds still intact. For those who regard the physical world as crude and unspiritual, C.S. Lewis said, “There is no good trying to be more spiritual than God. God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature… He likes matter. He invented it.” [3]
Your body is the ultimate in personal presence and in what we call “showing up.” Showing up will cost you! It will cost you friends, make you enemies, and could threaten your career. But be of good cheer! You will find yourself filled with satisfaction and a sense of well-being knowing that you are a transformed being in sync with your God.
[1] Carl Trueman, Reformation21.org
[2] Selected from Romans 1:21-24 NLT
[3] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, page 64
