I'm not normally this charged about politics, but I just can't get past what has gone on during this campaign. A friend of mine wrote a nice little piece on how Barak Obama plans to create jobs and help our economy, and it fired me up enough to write some stuff I've been agitated about for a while now.
He wrote about how poor Obama's plan was, but I had heard Obama tell the American people just the other day that he is going to lower capital gains taxes for small business. How exciting! There's just one small problem: small businesses don't pay capital gains taxes. He doesn't even know what they are...exactly the kind of man I want leading our country.
My friend also mentioned that Obama is "eloquently convincing you to accept the initial stages of socialism." May I go so far as to say Marxism? He uses words and phrases like, "brother's keeper," "fairness," and "everyone should have health insurance," among other platitudes that sound so good, but in reality, it's Marxism with make-up on. He wants to make wealthier people, most who have worked hard and earned every penny, do what Joe Biden said the other day was the "patriotic" thing to do, pay more in taxes so they can reallocate it to poor people, many of whom have chosen their lifestyle (school dropouts, don't try to work more than they have to in order to still qualify for government handouts, etc.) and would simply continue to live off of their expectation that the government is obligated to provide for them instead of getting off their butts and earning an income.
And I'm so tired of watching the media drool over the man. I have lost all respect for our media. The media sent droves of people to Wasilla, AK to drudge up any dirt they could find on Sarah Palin. All they can come up with is the media-created "Troopergate." They air people who just a few months ago stood up with fellow feminists who fight for working women, who now bash Palin because she is everything they wanted to be a couldn't become (which ultimately backfired, thankfully, as it exposed the hypocrisy within the feminist movement). She's bashed as 'unqualified,' when in fact, she alone has far more experience than Obama. No one in the media cares to mention that he has only spent 140-some days working in the Senate, and most of the time he voted "present" so that people couldn't bash his voting record.
How many people have investigated Obama? How many people know who Saul Alinsky is? Or how about William Ayers? Father Flager? Franklin Raines? Why is no one investigating Obama and his relationship with all of these people? What about his relationship to the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac meltdown? The only reason anyone knows about Jeremiah Wright is because he opened his big mouth, and the media did everything they could to put that fire out. Or what about his support of infanticide while an Illinois Senator? And you don't hear much mention of his plan to reduce the number of abortions in this county (which also sounds like a noble goal, until you realize he wants to teach sex ed to kindergartners and help fund Planned Parenthood.) Shame on the media for spending more time and asking harder questions about a pregnant 17-year-old than Barak Obama, who only happens to be running for President of the United States. Oh yeah, they do know all that...they just don't want us to.
And I just have to say that he dug himself a real hole, in my eyes, with the mocking of McCain in the commercial where he makes fun of the fact that McCain doesn't know how to use e-mail. Is he so out of touch that he doesn't even know that McCain's arms and hands don't function correctly because he served our country in the most honorable of ways, or does he know and just has the audacity to mock him, anyway? I don't care what side of the aisle you're on, that was just wrong.
The man does tug at the heartstrings of believers because he talks of helping the poor and looking out for each other. The problem is that as Christians, we too often want the government to do those things for us. But it's not the responsibility of the government...it's the responsibility of the church. It's our responsibility. It's also our responsibility to love our Lord with our minds, but far too often we disengage and believe whatever is told to us instead of investigating for ourselves and knowing what's at stake.
One of the objections leveled most often at those who hold to the doctrines of grace is that if God has chosen who He's going to save, then why do we bother evangelizing? On the surface, this seems to make some sense, but not only does it not make sense, it's as if they haven't really taken the time to think through the consequences of their own position, and this is where I want to place my attention.
As for the objection itself, God tells us to preach the gospel to every creature, so that should be good enough for us (simply doing it because He told us to). In addition, to paraphrase Spurgeon, if the elect were marked with a yellow stripe on their backs, we'd quit the ministry and go around pulling up shirt tails. Since we don't know who they are, we have to tell everyone. Forgive me for not going into further reasoning or expounding on these, as there is plenty more that can be said. I just want to spend more of my time turning the tables, so to speak.
If I believe that each person has libertarian free will to choose or not choose God (notice, I'm not suggestion people don't make a choice, just not a libertarian one), then isn't my role to convince people who haven't chosen Christ why they need to? And in order to convince others, it means I have to be smarter than they are, so I'll need to have lots of biblical education. If I can't quote the Romans Road by heart, then I shouldn't be evangelizing until I can (and even then I may not know enough, especially if I'm talking to educated scientists or New Atheists, or the like).
And you know, it's really hard to get people to not only acknowledge God exists, but for them to acknowledge Christ died for them. Beyond that, it's harder to get them to understand their need for Christ to die in their place, which means admitting wrong-doing. And even if I get them this far, getting them to repent is nearly impossible! It's just so hard, even for the well-education Christian to do all this, so maybe we will just leave some of that out. In fact, I'll dress it all up so that it looks really good and won't be so hard. It says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved." That's all there is to it. It's that easy. We don't need to mention wrath or judgment, just Love.
Does anyone see the slippery slope? There are some real problems that can creep in with this kind of mindset. There are also some biblical issues of evangelism that one would have to work through. How would this person react to reading that Christ would have his true disciples (not just His apostles, but the 70) shake the dust of their feet in protest against a town that didn't return peace to them (Luke 10) or shortly before that where Jesus doesn't get all that excited when a man tells Him that he wants to follow Him. In fact, Jesus let's the man know that's it's not going to be easy, as He doesn't even have a place to lay His head. That doesn't sound like great recruitment technique.
And you realize this plays itself out in real life, don't you? What about that guy who's been asking about spiritual things, and instead of answering him, you don't because you feel inadequate, so you invite him to church with you (that sounds good, right?). But then he asks, "do you sing those boring old songs?" and since you know you do but you're afraid he won't come if you tell him the truth, you're at a loss for words and actually considering lying to the guy just so he won't turn your invitation down. Or what about when you have taken the time to share the gospel with someone and they still reject Him, but you go home and beat yourself up because you think you must have said something wrong or forgot to mention something as if, by having said things better, you would have convinced them. Now they may be on their way to an eternity separated from Him because you screwed up.
This is unbiblical. The doctrines of grace allow us to freely share with whomever without fear or reservation. We need to realize that God is in complete control. We don't have to water down the gospel, or spice it up, or take out the 'offensive' stuff, or worry about being inadequate or having said anything wrong. We can't scare someone off by telling them that it's going to cost them everything, unless of course what they would have professed wasn't really a saving faith anyway. We simply need to go and make disciples, trusting that God will do what He has said He will do, and that is use us (what a privilege!) to bring His chosen to Himself.
As for the objection itself, God tells us to preach the gospel to every creature, so that should be good enough for us (simply doing it because He told us to). In addition, to paraphrase Spurgeon, if the elect were marked with a yellow stripe on their backs, we'd quit the ministry and go around pulling up shirt tails. Since we don't know who they are, we have to tell everyone. Forgive me for not going into further reasoning or expounding on these, as there is plenty more that can be said. I just want to spend more of my time turning the tables, so to speak.
If I believe that each person has libertarian free will to choose or not choose God (notice, I'm not suggestion people don't make a choice, just not a libertarian one), then isn't my role to convince people who haven't chosen Christ why they need to? And in order to convince others, it means I have to be smarter than they are, so I'll need to have lots of biblical education. If I can't quote the Romans Road by heart, then I shouldn't be evangelizing until I can (and even then I may not know enough, especially if I'm talking to educated scientists or New Atheists, or the like).
And you know, it's really hard to get people to not only acknowledge God exists, but for them to acknowledge Christ died for them. Beyond that, it's harder to get them to understand their need for Christ to die in their place, which means admitting wrong-doing. And even if I get them this far, getting them to repent is nearly impossible! It's just so hard, even for the well-education Christian to do all this, so maybe we will just leave some of that out. In fact, I'll dress it all up so that it looks really good and won't be so hard. It says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved." That's all there is to it. It's that easy. We don't need to mention wrath or judgment, just Love.
Does anyone see the slippery slope? There are some real problems that can creep in with this kind of mindset. There are also some biblical issues of evangelism that one would have to work through. How would this person react to reading that Christ would have his true disciples (not just His apostles, but the 70) shake the dust of their feet in protest against a town that didn't return peace to them (Luke 10) or shortly before that where Jesus doesn't get all that excited when a man tells Him that he wants to follow Him. In fact, Jesus let's the man know that's it's not going to be easy, as He doesn't even have a place to lay His head. That doesn't sound like great recruitment technique.
And you realize this plays itself out in real life, don't you? What about that guy who's been asking about spiritual things, and instead of answering him, you don't because you feel inadequate, so you invite him to church with you (that sounds good, right?). But then he asks, "do you sing those boring old songs?" and since you know you do but you're afraid he won't come if you tell him the truth, you're at a loss for words and actually considering lying to the guy just so he won't turn your invitation down. Or what about when you have taken the time to share the gospel with someone and they still reject Him, but you go home and beat yourself up because you think you must have said something wrong or forgot to mention something as if, by having said things better, you would have convinced them. Now they may be on their way to an eternity separated from Him because you screwed up.
This is unbiblical. The doctrines of grace allow us to freely share with whomever without fear or reservation. We need to realize that God is in complete control. We don't have to water down the gospel, or spice it up, or take out the 'offensive' stuff, or worry about being inadequate or having said anything wrong. We can't scare someone off by telling them that it's going to cost them everything, unless of course what they would have professed wasn't really a saving faith anyway. We simply need to go and make disciples, trusting that God will do what He has said He will do, and that is use us (what a privilege!) to bring His chosen to Himself.
