Absolutes And Their Cost

Ponder these thoughts by Francis Schaeffer and consider the cultural make-up of our Christian community as world-wide governments become more and more dominant over the citizens that are under their charge:

"Will we resist authoritarian government in all its forms regardless of the label it carries and regardless of its origin?  The danger in regard to the rise of authoritarian government is that Christians will be still as long
as their own religious activities, evangelism, and life-styles are not disturbed.

We are not excused from speaking, just because the culture and society no longer rest as much as they once did on Christian thinking.  Moreover, Christians do not need to be in the majority in order to influence society. 

But we must be realistic.  John the Baptist raised his voice, on the basis of the biblical absolutes, against the personification of power in the person of Herod, and it cost him his head.  In the Roman Empire the Christians refused to worship Caesar along with Christ, and this was seen by those in power as disrupting the unity of the Empire; for many this was costly. 

But let us be realistic in another way, too.  If we as Christians do not speak out as authoritarian governments grow from within or come from outside, eventually we or our children will be the enemy of society and the state.  No truly authoritarian government can tolerate those who have a real absolute by which to judge its arbitrary absolutes and who speak out and act upon that absolute.  This was the issue with the early church in regard to the Roman Empire and though the specific issue will in all probability take a different form than Caesar-worship, the basic issue of having an absolute by which to judge the state and society will be the same.

Here is a sentence to memorize:  To make no decision in regard to the growth of authoritarian government is already a decision for it."  (How Should We Then Live?  Crossway, 1983 - pp 256,7  -  Italics are the author's;  bold are mine.)

Some Observations: 

In observing the current ethos of the Christian community in the Western World, it seems as though we are not doing all that well in resisting the rise of authoritarianism.  To whatever degree our life-styles are not being disturbed, to that degree we are being passive.  The good news is that those life-styles are now under a proactive, deliberate and well thought-out assault by a godless community that has declared the Church of Jesus Christ (and the absolutes that attend to that Church)  to be its enemy.  Such an assault demands an ever-increasing response by the remnant community that is resident within that Church.  The assault is not the good news; the response is.

Observations sometimes engender questions.  Considering the sobering times in which we live one might be tempted to consider if his, or her absolutes are substantive enough that he, or she might be in danger of becoming "an enemy of society and of the state."  Are the Rock Jesus Christ and the Word of God absolutes that will not tolerate any other religion or belief-system in your life? Jesus Christ and Him crucified is the absolute of the entire universe.  That absolute makes all other cultural systems that deny it to be the enemy of the true Church.  It also makes that Church enemy of those systems.  Are we ready to become an enemy of society and of the state?  It's that important.  Our religious comfort-zone may be in need of being disturbed.

If I may disagree slightly with the author, I would suggest to us that Caesar-worship might very well be the  issue that we will all have to face.  Society and technology have advanced so far in the approximately forty years since he wrote that we might experientially see what Mr. Schaeffer did not.  That Caesar-like beast described to us in Rev. 13 may be looming not so very far away and not so long in waiting.

It is my belief that we currently live in a time when authoritarianism has won the day.  Godless stateism is unstoppable;  we have crossed that Rubicon.  Details will follow.  We are not here to heal the world; we are here to call out our community.  Healing the wounds of the world is what Christians do, but there will come a day when that modern-day Caesar will tolerate such activities no longer.  We will become enemies of society and of the state.  May our life-styles be disturbed!

We have been bought with a price; we are His slaves  -  NO APOLOGIES!