Business Principles Abandoned With Gay Pride

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I was recently in Charlotte NC, went for an afternoon walk and stumbled into an area where a gay pride rally was being held.

It was a multi-layered experience.

City streets were blocked and police were on hand to help manage the mostly young crowd. There was a lively, earthy and good-natured feel to the event. People were enjoying themselves.

At every turn there were people whose dress, chosen companion and behaviour revealed their sexual orientation. I’ve seen this before on a smaller scale and don’t find it especially disturbing.

There were booths from some churches proclaiming endorsement of the GLBT community. These were not just the Metropolitan Community church, but also an Episcopalian and a Presbyterian Church. Other Christians were there with a Cross and proclaimed repentance, faith and forgiveness. I admire their faithfulness and courage but wonder at the effectiveness. Yet other ‘Christians’ stood in front of this group with banners proclaiming GLBT support and citing the text ‘nothing shall separate us from the love of God’, presumably as an endorsement of the gay community. I take it that the church booths reflect knowing intentionality in their apostasy. I guess that that some of the other ‘Christian’ voices were naïve, deluded and ignorant.

For me, the most disturbing memory from the day was the booths set up by businesses. Companies such as the Bank of America and Norton software indicated their support for gay pride. These are not marginal businesses, but corporate America.

Whoa ... what is going on here?

To me it was a sign that the gay community is now mainstream. American business sees profits to be made and perhaps stands intimidated by the gay community. The key business principle seems to be that business is business.

The expected corollary is that Biblical Christianity may be increasingly marginalised and then persecuted through legal action for refusing the gay agenda. On the same day, I read a report that a court in New Mexico ordered a Christian photography business to pay a penalty for refusing to photograph a gay commitment ceremony. I guess that we can expect more of the same.

Earlier on the same day I visited the Billy Graham Museum. The welcome was warm and the exhibits well presented with the latest available multimedia. The crowd was much older and subdued. There was an air of artificiality about The Barn, starting with the fake talking cow and ending with the Graham Brothers Dairy Bar selling the Billy Frank hot dog. I know this is America, but I found the whole scene hard to stomach!

To me there is a huge disconnect between the two scenes that day. The gay pride rally exalts in sin, but seems to represents the future and is on the streets. The Graham Museum exalts in righteousness, reflects the past and in housed in a fake barn amidst manicured surrounds.

For me as a Christian the day leaves many questions.

* How to position a protective perimeter against the expected wave of litigation?

* How to witness effectively at such events?

* How to maintain the rounded balance of 1 Cor 6:9-11:

 ⁹ Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practise homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. ¹¹ And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

That’s a text applicable to every human being and certainly starting with me. However, it also applies to the gay community and to the corporations at the gay pride event.

The Facebook posts I should not make.

I think that Facebook is great.  My family and friends are scattered all over the globe and Fb is a wonderful means to keep track and keep in contact wherever I may be.

However there are appropriate and inappropriate uses of Fb. It's not the place for personal put-downs. Or divisive disputes.  Or the show-off kind of remark: 'thanking God for my new Ferrari' or ' checking in from the titanium lounge before my first class flight'. Or for things best said or seen in private between loved ones.

It's not hard to get it right on Fb.

Just remember that there are people made in God's image at the other end. Ask: 'how can I love the Lord and my neighbour in my post?'.  Or, use the Bible guidelines (here adapted) from the  Puritans: does my post glorify God; does it build others up in the gospel; does it avoid giving unnecessary offence; is it in decent and good order?

I thank God for the tool of Fb.  However, like all tools it's up to the user to use it in a way that reflects who we are and what we stand for.  Let's use it for good and think before we post.

Why I went where I went to church today.

I went to church today in Montreal Canada.

My church of choice was one I visited two weeks ago. Its a different tradition to my own, the congregation meets in an average building, the service is not highly polished, there are no musicians and the sermons are given by lay preachers of varying quality in the pastor's absence.

The alternate was a church I attended last week. It was of my own denomination, in a grand building on a prominent city-centre street. The service was presented with well-oiled precision, the pastor well-schooled, the robed choir was technically good and the thundering organ was magnificent.

So why go to the first church? Jesus is central, the Bible was taken seriously and there was a warmth between the people there and towards me, even though I had a taken a conscious choice to remain low profile. That's the kind of church to be.

Why I will go to church today.

Its Sunday morning. I am a stranger in a city distant from home and tired despite a night's sleep. Family activities are planned for the day and there are many things to do.

But it is Sunday and I shall go to church.

I have visited this church before. It is small, has no music and the preacher was faithful but struggling when last I visited. Its more a little company of God's people than a triumphant gathering of the heavenly assembly.

So why go? I have already read my Bible and prayed at home. Isn't that enough?

I will go because of Heb 10:25. Its part of me to meet with God's people and all the more important when other routines of my life are disrupted by travel. Its because my attendance may be an encouragement to those who attend ... that a stranger should bother to attend. Its a quiet witness to the unbelievers around me that I make church a priority today. And its an encouragement to me as prayers, songs, sermon and fellowship reinforce who I am and what I stand for.

In short, I go because Jesus has come and is coming again and my attending is a response to what he has done and an anticipation of what he will do.

Postscript (written after the service).
I'm glad I went. Its now my second time at Ville Emard L’église du Christ. Some people remembered me and engaged with me. The pastor is on holidays and an older Afro-American man preached from the passage quoted above about the importance of being in church and what we should do when there. It was a good word and I spoke with the preacher afterwards about the link to my personal text that morning and how his words were a good encouragement.

Space-time and the presence of God

Space and time are fundamental categories of humanity. We live in space-time locations and also think in them as mental categories.

IT enables a certain transcendence over space-time boundaries, but they persist as underlying realities. Its possible to wriggle around time zones for calls, but still frustrating to be at differing ends of the day and, of course, to be outside of the possibility of physical contact. Digital messages can be posted and received at times convenient to each.. That’s great but not as good as it could be.

All that presently strikes me as I am half a world away from loved ones for an extended period.

What a contrast then with access to God through Jesus and in prayerful fellowship. Space-time are irrelevant categories, for there is always and everywhere the same level of access to him. It’s a comforting thought for a traveller, but also a wondrous truth about God and our relationship with him.

Casting my vote (away)

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My country of  citizenship (Australia) has a national election on 7^th September. The election decides who will govern the country for following three years.

Australian elections are genuine contests and governments often change as a result. Present predictions are that government will change this time.

I am glad for the institutions of government in my country, for the comparative integrity of the election process, and for the vote I have. I have lived in a country with a far less developed democratic processes and this makes me appreciate those in my own place.

As a Christian of reformed theological outlook I believe that government is a blessing given by God, for which we are to be thankful and for which we should pray. I believe that no one constitutional arrangement ideally fits with Christian truth, but that almost all can be used by God, whether democracy or dictatorship. I also believe that Christian people are to engage with public life and its institutions as part of loving our neighbour and fulfilling our call to be salt and light.

I normally vote when elections are called. I try to do so as a thoughtful Christian and have voted for various parties over the years. I think that a ‘Christian vote’ is not just a case of voting for Christian candidates or voting for the party with Christian values on selected issues … rather it is a more complex process of weighting issues, comparing policies and leadership and asking what a Christian vote looks like in a post-Christian multicultural society. It’s complex rather than simple.

However, I will not vote in this year’s election.

But, first a side-issue. It is often said that Australia has compulsory voting. This is not quite so. What is compulsory is to register, attend a polling place (or make arrangements such as a postal vote), identify yourself to the official with the roll, take a ballot paper, not deface it, and return the paper to the ballot box. There is no compulsion to actually vote.

I will be overseas on polling day, so voting is more difficult, although not impossible. My reason for not voting lies deeper and is explained below.

Issues

Several issues appear on the election radar. The economy, education, disability policy, asylum seekers, environment and telecommunications are all trending as hot topics.

On some of these issues the two major parties can be differentiated (eg telecommunications). On others they have converged, whether from shared centre-right values or a shrewd tactic of neutralising potentially vote-losing views on matter not considered important.

The main alternate party to the two major ones is the Greens. I like their environmental activism and social compassion, but struggle with their aggressive endorsement of same-sex marriage and can never support their open-go on abortion. I especially like their humanitarianism towards asylum seekers. The Greens are economically naïve, but have a positive role as a party of balance to restrain a government of one of the other main parties.

So who to vote for? Christian conscience keeps me from the Greens on issues like abortion and same sex marriage. Of the two major parties, instinct pulls me marginally towards one party rather than the other. However, I abhor the race to the right in both these parties on asylum seekers. My weighting of this issue is so strong that I really could not vote for either.

Leaders

So what about leadership? One major party is led by a professed Roman Catholic who espouses traditional Catholic morality on some issues of interest to me. However, he appears to be an extremist I personality and I wonder if he has the nuance of views and actions to be a good leader in government. The other major party is led by a professed Anglican who shows a greater awareness of nuance, but who supports same sex marriage and whose personal style was a problem when he was previously Prime Minister. Both these leaders are hungry for power. That is no surprise in a party leader and is not necessarily a problem. However, both have displayed ruthlessness in that hunger, such that it seems to have become an idol for both.

Summary

So here is the problem that keeps me from voting. One some issues I could vote for any of the significant parties. On others, I have deal-breakers with each major party. I don’t have high confidence in each of the potential Prime Ministers, although I do prefer one to the other.

And so I choose not to vote. I will pray for the election to go smoothly, confident in the sovereignty of God, and I will pray for the new government to govern well. I will try to be a good citizen who cooperates with the government and obeys its laws. However, my Christian vote is too important a thing to be cast for policies and leaders that I cannot endorse. And so I will cast my vote away.

'The gates of hell shall not prevail' - a re-reading of in the light of Rev 12

As I write three Christian workers known to me are in trouble.

One has been removed from a faithful pastorate by unprincipled and worldly actions from within the church.

Another is threatened with removal from a cross-cultural ministry situation. This is not an intemperate street evangelist, but someone who quietly serves a community through a ministry of helps in the name of Jesus.

In the third case another cross-cultural worker sees a local friend suffer because of the friend's contact with Christian people and literature.

These three stories can be multiplied many times over. Persecution from without and difficulty from within are normal not exceptional.

At one level this should not surprise for the Lord warned that 'if they persecuted me they will persecuted you also'  (Jn 15:19-20) and Paul warned of wolves arising even from within God's church (Acts 20:29-30).

Yet Jesus also spoke of how he would build his church and that the gates of hell would not prevail against it (Matt 16:18-19).

How can the reality of persecution from within and without and Jesus' word about hell not prevailing be reconciled?

My daily Bible reading recently turned to Rev 12.  John writes the book against a background of terrible persecution and the book pulls no punches in describing the troubles of the earthly church. God seems to be absent and the mad and bad have been left in charge.

A key literary feature of Revelation is the way it switches between earthly and heavenly perspectives - if you like, the view from the control tower (heaven) is set against the view from the earthly ground. This is the same reality in different perspectives.

The heavenly scene gives a different view from the earthly. God rules in heaven. He also rules earthly events from heaven. It is his scrolls and trumpet blasts that act like stage directions for human history. The earthly church suffers because God is strong and because Satan has been defeated (Rev 12:7-11). Satan's desperate lunges against the earthly church are because he is evicted from heaven and knows that his time is short (Rev 12:12).

This is a dramatic re-framing of the church's struggles and suffering. When Satan is strong he does not need to trouble the church but can let leave it in complacent slumber. When he is week he attacks like a cornered beast.

The people known to me above, and others like them, will continue to suffer and evil will appear to gain the supper hand from time to time and place to place. The great encouragement is that evil can reach no further than God allows (Rev 13:7) and that its power is temporal and bounded. Christ has conquered in his cross and resurrection. He is building his church and hell shall not prevail against it.

The message?

1. Expect difficulty and persecution, but rejoice that it is a sign of God's triumph over evil in Jesus.
2. Give ourselves to faith and endurance (Rev 13:10b) knowing that God's day is at hand and that the battle is already his.
3. Persist in living and serving for the Lord, for that is our share in his sufferings and the means by which his kingdom is extended on earth and that of Satan rolled back.