peace

After the Storm

November 12, 2020 by Dan Olinger 1 Comment

In the American West, where I grew up, the sky is big. The land in Eastern Washington is flat, and the horizons are long and low. As a result, you can see a thunderstorm a-comin’ for a long ways. You can see the sheets of rain falling from the thunderhead long before it reaches you, and in the summer I used to enjoy sitting out in the pasture and just waiting for it. Then it would arrive, the warm rain, and you could get completely soaked and not care—indeed, you could relish it as a delightful experience.

The aftermath was enjoyable too. There was the decrescendo of the storm, the petering out of the patter of the rain; the petrichor; and the calm silence, all the quieter in contrast with the recent rage.

If we learn anything from the life of Jesus, we learn that he is sovereign and active in the storm as well as in the peaceful, pastoral scene we think of when we hear him called “the Good Shepherd.” We learn that he accomplishes his will as certainly and easily in the storm; we might even say, if I can do so reverently, that he does some of his best work precisely at those times.

We’ve been through a storm, haven’t we? We’ve been surrounded by chaos, much of it intentionally designed; we’ve been told by people we trust that we need to be angry, agitated, active, desperate; that Those People are evil incarnate, and irremediably dangerous, and if we don’t stop them, It’s All Over.

God has graciously designed us humans so that when the situation turns desperate, we’re able to cope with it in surprising ways. There’s adrenaline, which can empower a man of average build to lift a car off someone. There’s the flight response, which enables us to get outta here faster than we ever thought possible.

But adrenaline’s a dangerous drug (so to speak), and we don’t do well as drug addicts; we don’t thrive under constant chaos and ongoing pumped-up responses to perceived threats—real or exaggerated.

We’re made for peace—peace with ourselves, peace with one another, peace with God.

The storm can be exciting—the adrenaline rush can be stimulating and energizing—but we’re not designed to live there.

In the face of the greatest storm in cosmic history—that day when the heavens were darkened, the Godhead was rent, the sins of the world crushed the Creator himself—Jesus had a surprising message for his friends.

Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful (Jn 14.27).

Peace in the storm, with a view to long-lasting peace after the storm.

So how shall we, as disciples of Christ, live after the storm? Paul writes to Jesus’ disciples in Thessalonica,

⁹Now as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; ¹⁰for indeed you do practice it toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, to excel still more, ¹¹and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands, just as we commanded you, ¹²so that you will behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need (1Th 4).

After the storm, peace. Excel at loving one another. Get all stirred up about leading a quiet life. Mind your own business. Make something. Be a wholesome, productive, contributing part of the community.

Especially given that much of the recent storm was of our own making, how about if we just live quietly, peaceably, faithfully for a while?

You know what Paul talks about right after this? Jesus’ return (1Th 4.13-18). It’s coming. What say we focus on how the Good Shepherd will deliver us, rather than on fighting transient earthly opponents with carnal weapons?

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How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 10: Peace

October 29, 2020 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful (Col 3.15).

From love (Col 3.14), Paul turns his attention to peace.

We all say we want peace, but very few people actively behave in ways that make peace more likely.

There are reasons for that.

In the first place, there are people who pursue peace in all the wrong ways. They think we’ll have peace if we just refuse to fight—but because they don’t take into account the presence of evil in the world, their actions end up increasing the potential for violence rather than lowering it. “If wishes were fishes … .”

In other cases we see people who talk about peace but don’t live by their own rules. Those of us of a certain age well remember the “peace movement” of the 1960s, and the violence wrought in the streets of Chicago during the 1968 Democratic Convention by “anti-war” protestors. And the protestations of “peace” by the leaders of the USSR, which was, as one pundit put it, “the peace of the graveyard.”

This sort of thing can lead to cynicism. An acquaintance of mine, visiting Greenville, questioned the name of our “Peace Center for the Performing Arts.” “Peace?” he said, with a hint of a sneer. I explained to him that it was named for Roger C. Peace, a Greenville newspaper publisher and philanthropist. That seemed to settle him down.

So now we have to make excuses for naming things for peace. Stinkin’ pinko commie freaks.

All of this is just distraction.

The fact is that God is a God of peace (Rom 15.33; 16.20; Php 4.9; 1Th 5.23; Heb 13.20). It’s the essence of his character. (And yes, he’s a God of war as well [Is 59.17-20]; as “The Greatest Generation” has shown us, often those who have seen combat are the most eager for and delighted in peace.)

It should be no surprise, then, that God has brought peace between himself and us (Ro 5.1) and that he brings peace to his people (Ro 1.7; 8.6; 15.13). But interestingly, he has not promised us external peace; in fact, Jesus told his disciples that they would have tribulation (Jn 16.33; cf Mt 10.34) and even persecution (Lk 21.12), and that as history progressed there would be troublous times (Mt 24.6).

So where is the peace?

It’s on the inside, not the outside. Jesus leaves his peace with us (Jn 14.27), and it rules in our hearts (Co 3.15; Ro 8.6; 15.13; Ga 5.22; Php 4.7). We’re empowered to be an oasis of peace in the midst of swirling chaos.

That means that we can “follow peace with all” (Heb 12.14). We can be de-escalators of conflict, sources of resolution in disputes.

Let me tell you something I’m ashamed of.

I was in Ghana, on a long overnight public bus trip from Accra to Wa, where my team was going to minister for 3 weeks. The driver stopped for a restroom break, and I saw that someone was trying to get a couple of my female team members to pay to use the restroom. I knew that we had never had to pay at this location before, and I jumped to the conclusion that they were trying to take advantage of “rich Westerners.” It was 2 or 3 am, and I was really tired, and I just decided to refuse to cooperate. I said we weren’t going to pay. (The girls had already used the restroom.) The man followed me back to the bus, arguing all the way, protesting that he had to collect the money. (It amounted to about 50 cents.) I steadfastly refused. The principle of the thing, you know.

A Ghanaian man, also riding on my bus, stepped between us and began to de-escalate the confrontation. He and his wife paid the fee and refused to let me reimburse them.

I was deeply, deeply ashamed.

People with peace in their hearts simply don’t act the way I had.

My brethren, let us “follow after the things which make for peace.”

Part 11: Encouragement | Part 12: Gratitude

Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash

How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 3: “Great Is Diana!”

October 5, 2020 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide

In contrasting the two ways of life, Paul begins with the one that inevitably yields division and fragmentation, characterized by “what is earthly” (ESV):

⁵Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. ⁶On account of these the wrath of God is coming. ⁷In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. ⁸But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. ⁹Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices (Col 3.5-9).

For efficiency’s sake, I’m going to discuss these characteristics in three groups: 1) unrestrained sexual thinking and behavior (immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry); 2) unrestrained hatred (anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk); and 3) untruthfulness (Do not lie to one another). One post for each group.

The characteristics Paul lists in verse 5 center in misdirected sexual passion.

“Sexual immorality” is a general term for any illicit sexual activity; it’s the root of our word pornography. It includes fornication, adultery, prostitution, and other disallowed sexual intercourse. The ancient Jewish writing Sirach, or Ecclesiasticus, speaks of such a person as one to whom “any bread tastes good”—he is so driven by his desires that “he will not leave off until he dies” (Sir 23.17).
“Impurity” speaks of defilement in general, and in the context of sexual sin it is the defilement that results from sexual immorality, which renders one excluded from followship with God and even with society.
“Passion” is the word more commonly translated “lust”; it’s a driving desire, and the term is almost always used of an evil desire.
“Evil desire” is lust on steroids (Rom 1.24, 26)—uncontrollable, a defining habit that takes over a person’s thinking and consequently his behavior. It’s what our society might call “sex addiction.”

The inclusion of “covetousness” here might surprise us, in that we don’t use the word solely of sexual sin. But it perfectly encapsulates the sexual sins that Paul has just listed. The person in question is driven by his desire for something he doesn’t have, something that doesn’t belong to him. He disregards his marriage vows—the most important promises he has ever made—and the resulting social disengagement in his relationship with his Creator and with his social circle. He counts it all as worthless in comparison to the driving madness of his lust, which grows more dominating and controlling every time he feeds it. He has turned the most significant social act imaginable into a completely self-focused one.

Paul concludes that what he has been describing is simply idolatry: the worship of—the giving of oneself completely to—an illegitimate power that will demand all one has and, like every other false god, will never be able to satisfy a divine creation. All because, in essence, he worships himself and denies the significance of the rest of humanity.

It’s a perfect example of what Paul describes elsewhere as “worshiping the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever” (Ro 1.25).

Any society thus dominated by its lust will do whatever it takes to satisfy it. It will break long-standing and deep relationships; it will act with violence; it will find deference to social and political bonds impossible.

Can you think of a society like that?

Our political and religious landscape is littered with leaders who exemplify this kind of thinking and action—so densely so that there’s no need to name any examples. And we have chosen to follow them. We have elected them, or we have joined their churches. We have rejected evidence that a problem exists, because this leader or that one is just too effective, too important, too necessary. We have made idols of our self-centered political and religious desires, and they have treated us the way false gods always do.

What other outcome of our complete social disregard should we expect, than the disintegration and fragmentation that we see all around us?

What other outcome could there possibly be?

We sow, and we reap.

We have no one to blame but ourselves.

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How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide

October 1, 2020 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1: Introduction

Paul writes a letter to the Christians in Colossae because he’s heard things that trouble him. There’s false teaching there, and some in the church are at least thinking about going that way—elevating the role of angels, embracing various restrictions in order to feel more godly. Paul, knowing that falsehood always brings division, writes to straighten things out with the truth.

He begins with the simple fact that Christ is all—he created all (Co 1.16); he maintains all (Co 1.17); he is the King (Co 1.13); and he is the source of our spiritual life (Co 1.14). He has first place in everything (Co 1.18). He is the one in whom all things are reconciled to God (Co 1.20ff)—and by logical extension, to one another as well. Christ’s cross is the basis for whatever peace there is in the universe.

As a result, all the world is divided into two groups: those who are “in Christ,” and those who are not; those who live for eternal goals, and those who are consumed with the present. It should be no surprise that the latter group will be in perpetual conflict, since temporal goals—power, wealth, prestige, resources—are in finite supply. Someone’s going to have the power—the privilege, if you will—and others aren’t—and those others are going to want it badly enough to fight for it.

But those living for eternity, and not merely for the next election—and the power and resources it will bring—are not inclined to live as combatants for those temporal things; they have other desires, and the fulfillment of those desires is guaranteed by divine omnipotence.

Given their different goals, desires, and levels of confidence, these two groups live in very different ways. While many passages of Scripture (e.g. Ga 5.19-23; Ep 4.17-32; 1Th 4.3-10; 1P 2.1-3) contrast these two lifestyles, Paul’s discussion in Colossians benefits from being based directly on the Christology he’s presented earlier in the letter. When he moves from the doctrinal disquisition to the application of those truths to lifestyle, he sharply contrasts these two ways of life.

In Colossians 3.5-9 Paul summarizes the old way of life, which is the standard lifestyle for what he elsewhere calls “the natural man” (1Co 2.14)—which is all of us, from birth. This is the default lifestyle in the US and everywhere else. It’s a lifestyle that naturally eventuates in division, and in certain circumstances, all the way to civil war.

But that’s not the way people with eternal priorities live. Those who are “in Christ”—through no merit of their own—live, or ought to live, in ways that not only avoid those disastrous divisions but often help to heal them even in the broader societies in which they reside. Paul lays those characteristics out in the next paragraph, Colossians 3.10-17.

On this passage one commentator remarks,

The outstanding feature of this part of the letter is the sharp contrast between the old life and the new … . It is salutary to ponder the characteristics of the one for a while, to sense its whole mood and style of life, and then to switch suddenly to the other. They are indeed worlds apart. In the one we find attitudes and behaviour that cause inevitable fragmentation in human society and even within individuals: in the other, a way of life which integrates both individual persons and groups of people. The former, in other words, steadily obliterates genuinely human existence: the latter enhances it (Wright, Colossians, Tyndale NT Commentary, 133-34).

“Genuinely human existence”—as designed by the human’s Creator, in his image (Gn 1.26-27), for a redeemed and righted world. That’s where our heads should be, even when the world we live in is still broken and fundamentally unsatisfying—in the most significant ways, still “unformed and unfilled” (Gn 1.2) but headed toward a glorious and certain future.

This is where we find ourselves. What remains is for God’s people to define, examine, and contrast the two lifestyles and to adopt the one appropriate to our spiritual state.

We’ll start on that in the next post.

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How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 1: Introduction

September 28, 2020 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

It’s not news to anybody that US culture is highly polarized and has been for some time. This polarization shows up most readily in political disputes, and especially in presidential election years, when all the disputes come to a head and when the consequences of victory and defeat are most clearly obvious.

Presidential elections have always been rowdy affairs in this country, at least since Adams v Jefferson in 1796. Some are rowdier than others, of course—Adams/Jackson (1824), Hayes/Tilden (1876), and Nixon/Humphrey (1968) come immediately to mind. Anybody currently over the age of 40 knows that every election since 1992 has been “the most important election of our lifetime.”

Even so, it feels like this year is extraordinary. There’s been fighting in the streets that reminds us old-timers of 1968, combined with a general sense of being on edge due to all the coronavirus issues. Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that with social media, now every nitwit can be a publisher, with no editorial constraints—and we all know nitwits who are taking advantage of the opportunity. And now there’s a third vacancy on the Supreme Court in just 4 years.

Polarization. Tribalism. And lots of fuel to pour on that fire. Historians know that a key cause of the Civil War was sectionalism, and to them all this is looking pretty familiar. Here the divide is not as clearly geographical as it was 160 years ago—which in some ways makes the situation even worse—but it’s still eerily familiar.

And so there’s open talk about civil war. Red vs blue. Urban vs rural. Liberal vs conservative. And unsurprisingly, the joke about one side having all the guns doesn’t ease the tension.

I’d suggest that the solutions most commonly bandied about aren’t solutions at all.

Force—and the unconditional surrender of one of the parties—isn’t a long-term solution, as World Wars 1 and 2 so clearly taught us. The simmering rage of humiliation eventually breaks out again, and the second time is often worse than the first.

Appeasement doesn’t work either—again, as the World Wars demonstrated. (Think Neville Chamberlain.) When two sides each see the other as the enemy of their aspirations, eventually they’re going to resort to force.

In our situation the problem is compounded by the sheer number of things that divide us. We’re divided by race; by economic status; by political philosophy; by sex. These divisions go to the very core of our perceived identity; we’re not going to compromise them.

We can avoid civil war only by finding some part of our identity that is more powerful than the things that divide us. For many years, our shared identity as Americans was enough to do that. Often it’s the existence of a common threat, as in World War 2 and again for a few months after 9/11. For much of my lifetime there have been those arguing for unity on the basis of our shared humanity—who usually are dismissed as dreamers in the image of John Lennon.

I’d like to suggest that the Scripture speaks repeatedly of something that breaks down the racial and sexual and political and economic barriers that persistently divide us—and, perhaps surprisingly, it is based, in a specific way, in our shared humanity. The Bible doesn’t just dangle this idea out there as a carrot to get the kids fighting in the back seat to finally get along (and, I suppose, to stop mixing their metaphors); on the contrary, it presents the unity of peoples across significant barriers as a central part of the plan of God—something that he not only desires but is applying his divine power to accomplish with absolute certainty: that “God [is] in Christ reconciling the world unto himself” (2Co 5.19), so that “there is neither Jew nor Greek, … slave nor free man, … male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Ga 3.28), toward the goal of “a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes” (Re 7.9)—a unity so spectacular, so unimaginable, and so unbelievable even by those witnessing it, “that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places” (Ep 3.10); that is, that even supernatural beings are taken by surprise.

Wow.

There are lots of places in the Scripture where we can read about these ideas. I’ve chosen a section of Paul’s letter to the Colossian church, where I’ve been studying this month. We’ll embark on that study in the next post.

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For My Angry Friends, Part 8: Concluding Thoughts

July 25, 2019 by Dan Olinger 2 Comments

Paul has certainly made his point in his letter to Titus. Believers ought to be different from the general population in specific ways—soberness, gentleness, kindness, humility, subjection—and for specific reasons—God’s undeserved gentleness and kindness to us, the presence of his Spirit in our minds, and our confidence in his faithful deliverance.

He ends the letter with something of a charge:

⁸This is a trustworthy statement; and concerning these things I want you to speak confidently, so that those who have believed God will be careful to engage in good deeds. These things are good and profitable for men. ⁹But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and strife and disputes about the Law, for they are unprofitable and worthless. ¹⁰Reject a factious man after a first and second warning, ¹¹knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, being self-condemned (Ti 3.8-11).

This charge has both a positive and a negative element. Positively, he says, pass these thoughts along (v 8). Encourage others to do the same. Make the concept go viral.

In a very small way, that’s what I’m doing, and I would encourage you to add your voice.

On the negative side, he says, don’t get into stupid arguments. Specifically he names “genealogies” and “disputes about the Law” (v 9)—that is, the Mosaic Law. That may seem a little odd to us; those aren’t typically things we fight about. It’s here we need to remind ourselves that Paul’s epistles were “occasional”—that is, they were written to address specific situations in specific local churches. On Crete, where Titus was overseeing a network of churches (Ti 1.5), these two things were apparently causing a lot of contention.

But clearly his larger principle is that we shouldn’t be fighting about anything that is “unprofitable and worthless” (v 9). That requires some judgment on our part, some soberness, of which Paul spoke back in chapter 2. In our current culture, it’s clear that many people careen from controversy to controversy, herded like sheep by the Arbiters of The Outrage of the Day.

Here’s an observation. We don’t have to care about the Outrage of the Day. Unless it’s an outrage by biblical standards. And even when we care, we engage in the public conversation with gentleness, kindness, and grace, remembering the pit from which we have been digged [sic], the undeserved kindness of our good and great God, and our responsibility to represent him well in a world that would much prefer to blaspheme him at any provocation.

Avoid foolish controversies. You don’t have to comment, like, or share.

Paul takes it a step further. When someone you know does that, he says, warn him, and then reject him (Ti 3.10). The word translated “reject” begins with begging someone to stop what he’s doing, then expressing disapproval and withdrawing your support. In the ancient world it’s used of declining an invitation and even of divorcing a wife.

Reject him. Paul says he’s “self-condemned.”

Yikes.

If more people took the current polarizing nonsense seriously enough to act this way on it, I wonder how long it would drive the public conversation. Social consequences bring changed behavior.

But as is always the case with biblical admonitions, we need to get the beam out of our own eye before we lecture our brothers. Back to self-assessment and repentance.

And then, certainly, spread the message. Pass the word. “Speak confidently” (Ti 3.8). Make this kind of evil have consequences.

Shalom, my friends.

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For My Angry Friends, Part 7: Foundation II

July 22, 2019 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

As I’ve noted already, Paul is driving a point home in Titus chapters 2 and 3: believers should be different from unbelievers in specific ways, and there’s a solid theological reason for that. In chapter 2 he speaks to specific groups of Christians; in chapter 3 he speaks to Christians in general. We’ve looked at two ways all believers should be different from the general population: in the way they treat the government, and in the way they treat all people, specifically including unbelievers.

He spends most of the rest of the chapter explaining why we should act this way. The core of his explanation is verses 3 through 7:

³For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. ⁴But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, ⁵He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, ⁶whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, ⁷so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life (Ti 3.3-7).

There’s a lot to digest here, but let me see if I can boil it down.

We used to be just like everybody else: sinful, depraved, hateful.
But now there’s a significant difference—a divine, infinite one. God himself loved us, and because he loved us, he showed kindness to us and in fact saved us, rescued us from all that nonsense, and gave us a new and different kind of life.
He did this despite the fact that we didn’t deserve it. After all, we were just like everybody else.
He has poured out his Spirit on us. We have God himself living in us, changing the very nature of who and what we are and the way we think.
As a result, we have standing with God—we are his heirs, his sons and daughters—and we have a completely different outlook, being focused not on the here and now but on eternal life.

Well, that ought to make a difference in how we behave, shouldn’t it?

It ought to keep us from being uppity toward those who are where we used to be.
It ought to keep us from being proud of our wisdom or understanding or position, because he didn’t save us because of who we were or what we thought or did.
It ought to make us mouthpieces for the Spirit of God himself.
It ought to keep us from freaking out about present short-term controversies. Our words and actions should demonstrate the calmness and peace of long-term assured victory.

In the next paragraph Paul is going to make some final application; we’ll get to that next time. But in preparation for that, it’s time for each of us to take inventory and do some self-assessment.

In what ways does my daily thinking, my view of the world and my life in it, reflect grace, mercy, and peace?
What things make me angry and/or frustrated? Are they things of eternal significance or short-term irritations?
If they’re of eternal significance, what is my frustration saying about the goodness, wisdom, and faithfulness of God, and my understanding and application of them?
What people do I think I’m better or smarter than? What does that thinking say about me?
Undoubtedly there are people I know who are troubled and looking for help. Will my public discourse make it likely that they will seek me out for that help? Will they expect grace, mercy, and peace from me?

Next time we’ll wrap this discussion up with a look at Paul’s closing comments in this epistle.

Part 8

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For My Angry Friends, Part 6: Demonstration II

July 18, 2019 by Dan Olinger 2 Comments

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

So the first way we demonstrate that we’re Christians, according to Paul in Titus 3, is the way we interact with the government. What’s the second?

It’s the way we interact with unbelievers. Take a look at verse 2:

to malign no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing every consideration for all men (Ti 3.2).

One observation immediately. The word men here is the Greek anthropos, which is not gender-specific. (There’s a different word, andros, that refers to men as males.) So believers should show every consideration for all humans, including non-believers, and including women.

Hmm. Seems like that might include The Squad as well.

Now. What does Paul say specifically that “every consideration” should include?

First, “malign no one.” You might be surprised to hear that the Greek word translated “malign” is blasphemeo, to blaspheme. That simply means to say something about someone that isn’t true. We usually think of this word in relation to God—we wouldn’t tell a liar that he has “blasphemed” Mr. So-and-So—but in the New Testament culture it was used of any false speaking about anyone. These days we’d call that “slander.”

Don’t lie about people.

I’ve written on that before, but here I’d like to come down a little harder on the concept.

We all have a responsibility for our own words: we need to ensure that they’re truthful. That means doing some research before we say (or write) stuff. Sure, you’re free to pass on that meme; but before you do, you’d better go to the trouble of making sure it’s true, because the minute you hit the “Share” button, those words become your words, and if they’re not true, then you, my friend, have become a liar. You can’t avoid responsibility by saying, “I’m not sure if this is true or not; I just wanted to pass it along for what it’s worth.” They’re your words now; you’re responsible for them. If they’re false, you’re a liar.

You want to talk about the importance of personal responsibility? Then exercise some.

Don’t lie about anybody. “Malign no one.” God said that.

Next, Paul says, “be peaceable.” That’s amachos, or “not [given to] battle,” the way atheist means “not [believing in] God.” (And no, it doesn’t have any relation to the Spanish word macho, which comes from the Latin root behind masculine.)

Be more inclined to make peace than to fight. Jesus talked about that, didn’t he? “Blessed are the peacemakers,” he said, “for they shall be called offspring of God” (Mt 5.9). Which is precisely what Paul is saying here. People will know you’re a believer because, unlike them, you move situations toward peace rather than conflict.

Ouch.

I’m often not like that. Especially around lousy customer service. Or slow drivers in the left lane.

But peaceableness is a characteristic of God’s people, who have God’s Spirit living in them. They walk into tense situations and calm everybody down rather than riling them up.

Be peaceable. In your posts.

Can I confess something?

I have a lot of FB friends—again, on both sides—who pass on garbage. I don’t want to block them, because they’re friends, and not everything they pass on is garbage, and I want to know how they’re doing. But when the garbage has a distinct source—some political FB page, for example—I click on it and block that source. Forever. And that means that when that friend passes on that source’s material in the future, I won’t see it. But I’ll still see their posts about their kids. That makes me calmer. And that in turn helps make me more peaceable.

Third, be “gentle.” At the root of this Greek word is the idea of fairness, even-handedness, and thus reasonableness, kindness, gentleness, tolerance.

How about that. Tolerance isn’t just the byword of our admittedly troubled culture; it’s a biblical command.

Of course we’re not supposed to let sin go unchallenged, and we’re not supposed to call evil good (Isa 5.20). But we can treat those who disagree with us as if they’re actual human beings, in the image of God and thus of infinite value. We can acknowledge our disagreements with dignity and gentleness.

But we don’t, do we? Not often. That doesn’t get likes or shares.

Wouldn’t it be great if people who claim to be Christians routinely acted like it? Wouldn’t it be great if these 2 short verses by Paul didn’t condemn most of what we say in our most public forums?

Yeah, it sure would.

Part 7 | Part 8

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For My Angry Friends, Part 5: Demonstration I

July 15, 2019 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

In chapter 2 of his letter to Titus, Paul gave some instructions to specific groups within the churches—older men, older women, younger women, younger men, slaves—as to how they should live out the gospel, how they should distinguish themselves from the world around them, and he gave a theological basis for that lifestyle.

In chapter 3 he does the same thing again, but this time giving general instructions for everybody. In general, how do Christians live so as to stand out from the world around them? He focuses on two specific areas of outworking: how we treat the government (v 1), and how we treat non-Christians (v 2).

Seems to me that we might find a little help in these two brief verses about how we should conduct ourselves in the current polarized political climate.

So how do we position ourselves with reference to the government?

Remind them to be subject to rulers, to authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good deed (Ti 3.1).

Subjection. Obedience. Eager obedience. Seems to me that the passage strongly implies respect. It’s a posture, a mindset, as well as simple grudging adherence to the law.

This shouldn’t be a surprise to us. We’re all familiar with Romans 13, where Paul says the same thing at greater length. And most of us know about 1Peter 2.13-17, where Peter writes in agreement with Paul.

Of course there are limits to this subjection. The same Peter faced down the Jewish supreme court, the Sanhedrin, when to obey them would have been to disobey a direct order from Jesus himself (Ac 4.18-20; Mt 28.19-20). Sometimes we must disobey the political power in order to obey God.

But it seems to me that many Christians are much quicker to pull that trigger than they ought to be. If the government told me not to evangelize, I’d have to disobey them. But if they told me not to hold a Bible study in my home because the neighbors were complaining about all the cars parking on the street, I’d be able to figure out some other way to obey the Scripture.

Sure, we live in a democratic republic, not under the kind of authoritarian state that was common in biblical times, and we have options open to us that the New Testament believers—and pretty much any believers before 1776—simply didn’t have. We can vote the rascals out. And we can publish our arguments for voting the rascals out. And we can take the rascals to court. And so on.

But we can’t violate the law—or encourage others to violate the law—unless a clear biblical command is at stake. We can’t ignore laws just because we think they’re unwise or inefficient.

I see a lot of people who hate anything the Trump administration does or advocates, just because they think Trump is a scoundrel. (I suppose this year’s Independence Day event in Washington is the clearest recent example of this.) OK, you’re free to disagree with the man and to oppose his policies in any legal ways, but you need “to be ready for every good deed,” and in a context of submission to authoritative government mandates. “Not my president” is simply not biblical (or legal, really).

And the pro-Trump folks don’t get off the hook just because their guy’s in office. I see them advocate that citizens who don’t like this country should be kicked out.

Um, you can’t do that. They’re citizens. The law says they have a right to stay, even if they’re disagreeable. In fact, even if they’re felons. You don’t kick lawbreakers out of the country; this country doesn’t have a legal mechanism for withdrawing citizenship if the citizen wants to stay.

Someday, Mr. Trump won’t be president anymore. Someday the president will be at the other end of the political spectrum (whatever that means). And then the situation will be reversed, and again Christians on both sides are going to need to suppress their fleshly impulses and obey the law.

Work to change it, sure. But obey it in the meantime, if at all possible.

What does “if at all possible” mean?

It means that when a bad law comes along, you obey as long as it’s in force and as long as you can obey the Scripture at the same time. And if the two are in conflict, you get reeeaaaalllly creative and try to figure out a way to obey both the law and the Scripture simultaneously, and you try to get the law changed through any available legal means.

And if there’s just simply no way to obey both, only then do you break the law.

Only then.

My friends, the contemporary American church has some work to do.

And some repenting.

For disobedience, sure.

But also for words. And for attitudes.

Think on these things.

Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

Photo by Wes Grant on Unsplash

For My Angry Friends, Part 4: Proclamation

July 11, 2019 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

There’s a reason we’re supposed to stand out from the way the rest of the world thinks and behaves.

There’s something going on that’s much bigger than just your rights and wishes, your desires, or even your whole life—or mine. It’s bigger than politics, even bigger than who’s the president of the United States—“the most powerful man in the world.”

God is telling a story, a big one, that involves everyone who has ever lived, and that includes you and me, on the streets where we live, and on the social media pages where we hang out.

After Paul has laid out some guidelines about how specific groups of people are supposed to act (Titus 2.2-10), he takes a deep breath and starts a new paragraph.

And he starts it with a tiny little word, but a powerful one: it’s the little word “for”:

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people (Ti 2.11).

God is telling a story, you see; he has a plan. He is bringing salvation to all people.

To all people? To everybody? Nobody goes to hell?

Well, if that’s what Paul means, then he’s contradicting what he himself has already said in 2Thessalonians 2.12 and Romans 13.2. We can tell by reading Paul that he’s not that stupid.

No, he doesn’t mean that everyone will be saved.

So what does he mean?

Check the context. He’s been talking about different groups or kinds of people—old men, old women, young women, young men, slaves. Paul writes more than once about the fact that God is bringing together all different kinds of people into one body, the church:

In one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free (1Co 12.13).

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3.28).

For a much lengthier exposition of that idea, see Ephesians 2.11-3.21.

So back to our passage. God is bringing salvation to all different kinds of people—people who should by all natural tendencies be enemies—and bringing them together in Christ.

In Christ, not in a political party or a tribe or a nation or a league of nations.

In Christ.

There’s no other person or idea or movement that could do that. If world history teaches us anything at all, it teaches us that bloody divisions come to all people, for all sorts of reasons, including the most trivial imaginable.

But in Christ, people who ought to be enemies—who have significant and reasonable reasons for hating one another—become one in Christ.

Only God could do that.

So how do we live that salvation out? How do we live in a way that convinces onlookers that something unusual, other-worldly, is going on?

Paul tells us:

¹²training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, ¹³waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, ¹⁴who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works (Ti 2.12-14).

This is what “Christian soldiers” look like.

How much of this do you see on social media? How much of this do you put out there?

Note that he’s not talking to specific groups anymore. This isn’t just for the old men, or the old women, or whomever. This is for everybody.

Renounce any kind of thinking, speaking, or acting that God himself wouldn’t engage in.
Don’t have the kind of emotional lack of control that typifies the unbeliever.
Live in a way that’s self-controlled, upright, and godly.
Be oriented toward the long future, the eternal future, rather than the immediate.
- Look for Christ, not anybody else, to deliver you.
- Follow him away from lawlessness and toward purity.
- Be eager for good works.

I don’t see much of that from Christians these days. I see people who have heroes, champions, of one kind or another, and who ignore their champion’s faults while delighting over the flaws of The Enemy.

Interestingly, as I write it looks like the Jeffrey Epstein investigation is going to provide quite a list of pedophiles for public examination. Some will be Republicans, and some will be Democrats.

What do you think will happen then?

And how seamlessly is your online behavior going to blend in with that nonsense?

Or will it stand out?

Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

Photo by Wes Grant on Unsplash