Ever notice the main characters of a lot of television shows are close to insanity? I have. Not that I watch a lot of TV, but I live in a culture which insists that television be virtually inescapable. It's hard to swim in a sea of brain-rotting, decadent media without getting some of the salt water in my mouth. I do my best to spit it out, but it still leaves me with an understanding of the taste.
My Marines love the program Dexter featuring a likeable serial killer. Today, I saw previews for the show Perception starring an eccentric neuroscientist, Dr. Pierce, who assists the FBI in their casework. My roommates watch The Big Bang Theory, featuring (along with others) Sheldon Cooper, a socially inept Spock-like scientist. What's with the aberrant protagonist fad? I think Chesterton was on to something...
"The old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the center is not central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of today discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world." (G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy, Ch 2 The Maniac)
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Sunday, June 17, 2012
The Doctrine of Death: What My Father Taught Me
Fyodor Dostoyevsky begins his capstone novel, The Brothers Karamazov, with this verse from The Gospel of John: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit."
I had read this before, but never understood it entirely. I didn't start to think about it seriously until about two years ago when I first read The Brothers K. I'm sure I still do not understand in full, but I can at least say I now see in a mirror dimly. The reflection in a pool of water recently disturbed by a tossed stone becomes more clear as time passes. This seems to be the case for myself. There may be some who read this and think it to be elementary, so I readily admit my slowness to perceive and also my child like excitement when I discover something new.
From the earliest days of my awakening, I had known that one had to lose their life in order to find it. As is the case for anyone who awakes to find themselves amongst the dead, they leave behind their dwelling of death and start moving towards new life. Like Lazarus resurrected by Jesus, I too, had to leave the tomb behind and obey His call. As I continued to read the Scriptures I found this death-life symbiosis everywhere. What I discovered as of late is this idea is found in more places than I had originally thought. It's found in verses like John 14:24. Jesus speaks in terms that the mostly agrarian society of first century Palestine would understand. They were intimately familiar with the death-life process of the seed turned to wheat. Perhaps this has never been clear to me because I do not come from an agrarian background. For me, this is a new way of understanding how God reveals Himself through creation. (Romans 1:20)
C. S. Lewis provides helpful insight:
"Hence as suicide is the typical expression of the stoic spirit, and battle of the warrior spirit, martyrdom always remains the supreme enacting and perfection of Christianity. This great action has been initiated for us, done on our behalf, exemplified for our imitation, and inconceivably communicated to all believers, by Christ on Calvary. There the degree of accepted Death reaches the utmost bounds of the imaginable and perhaps goes beyond them; not only all natural supports, but the presence of the very Father to whom the sacrifice is made deserts the victim, and surrender to God does not falter though God "forsakes" it. The doctrine of which I describe is not peculiar to Christianity. Nature herself has written it large across the world in the repeated drama of the buried seed and the re-arising corn. From nature, perhaps, the oldest agricultural communities learned it and with animal, or human, sacrifices showed forth for centuries the truth that "without shedding of blood is no remission"; and though at first such conceptions may have concerned only the crops and offspring of the tribe they came later, in the Mysteries, to concern the spiritual death and resurrection of the individual. The Indian ascetic, mortifying his body on a bed of spikes, preaches the same lesson; the Greek philosopher tells us that the life of wisdom is "a practice of death". The sensitive and noble heathen of modern times makes his imagined gods "die into life". Mr. Huxley expounds "nonattachment." We cannot escape the doctrine by ceasing to be Christians." (C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain, Ch. VI Human Pain)
This passage was key for me in connecting Romans 1 with John 14:24. I Corinthians 15:35-44 elucidates the matter even further. God uses things like the drama of the buried seed to minister to us. Our bodies die and will be lowered into the ground and then resurrected unto new life and we will be transformed into a new body. Think of the difference between a seed and an Oak Tree! This is God's ministry to us through nature.
But what of the time between spiritual rebirth and bodily resurrection? The place where we find ourselves currently. The day to day. I submit to you that this intermediate time is our passion. It is our time of daily death. It is our time to bury ourselves like the seed. As Lewis said, Christ on Calvary exemplified this for our imitation. Jesus spoke to the mostly agrarian society in terms they would clearly understand. Similarly, I believe He has spoken to me through terms that I can clearly understand - namely my earthly father. This Father's Day, I write to honor my father, who taught me how to die through his living example, and, as is the theme in the doctrine of death, taught me how to fully live.
I will always be haunted by Thoreau's poignantly stinging remark that "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." This is true only of the man who allows fear to keep him paralyzed and thus his tongue static like a living repetition of Adam's sin in The Garden. But a man who is already dead to the world is not afraid of the things in it, because the things in it can only destroy his body, but never his soul. My father taught me to peel back the thin veneer of everything ephemeral and reach for eternity by dying to the temporary and living for the permanent. So, thank you, Father, for my father. And thank you, Dad, for your example.
I had read this before, but never understood it entirely. I didn't start to think about it seriously until about two years ago when I first read The Brothers K. I'm sure I still do not understand in full, but I can at least say I now see in a mirror dimly. The reflection in a pool of water recently disturbed by a tossed stone becomes more clear as time passes. This seems to be the case for myself. There may be some who read this and think it to be elementary, so I readily admit my slowness to perceive and also my child like excitement when I discover something new.
From the earliest days of my awakening, I had known that one had to lose their life in order to find it. As is the case for anyone who awakes to find themselves amongst the dead, they leave behind their dwelling of death and start moving towards new life. Like Lazarus resurrected by Jesus, I too, had to leave the tomb behind and obey His call. As I continued to read the Scriptures I found this death-life symbiosis everywhere. What I discovered as of late is this idea is found in more places than I had originally thought. It's found in verses like John 14:24. Jesus speaks in terms that the mostly agrarian society of first century Palestine would understand. They were intimately familiar with the death-life process of the seed turned to wheat. Perhaps this has never been clear to me because I do not come from an agrarian background. For me, this is a new way of understanding how God reveals Himself through creation. (Romans 1:20)
C. S. Lewis provides helpful insight:
"Hence as suicide is the typical expression of the stoic spirit, and battle of the warrior spirit, martyrdom always remains the supreme enacting and perfection of Christianity. This great action has been initiated for us, done on our behalf, exemplified for our imitation, and inconceivably communicated to all believers, by Christ on Calvary. There the degree of accepted Death reaches the utmost bounds of the imaginable and perhaps goes beyond them; not only all natural supports, but the presence of the very Father to whom the sacrifice is made deserts the victim, and surrender to God does not falter though God "forsakes" it. The doctrine of which I describe is not peculiar to Christianity. Nature herself has written it large across the world in the repeated drama of the buried seed and the re-arising corn. From nature, perhaps, the oldest agricultural communities learned it and with animal, or human, sacrifices showed forth for centuries the truth that "without shedding of blood is no remission"; and though at first such conceptions may have concerned only the crops and offspring of the tribe they came later, in the Mysteries, to concern the spiritual death and resurrection of the individual. The Indian ascetic, mortifying his body on a bed of spikes, preaches the same lesson; the Greek philosopher tells us that the life of wisdom is "a practice of death". The sensitive and noble heathen of modern times makes his imagined gods "die into life". Mr. Huxley expounds "nonattachment." We cannot escape the doctrine by ceasing to be Christians." (C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain, Ch. VI Human Pain)
This passage was key for me in connecting Romans 1 with John 14:24. I Corinthians 15:35-44 elucidates the matter even further. God uses things like the drama of the buried seed to minister to us. Our bodies die and will be lowered into the ground and then resurrected unto new life and we will be transformed into a new body. Think of the difference between a seed and an Oak Tree! This is God's ministry to us through nature.
But what of the time between spiritual rebirth and bodily resurrection? The place where we find ourselves currently. The day to day. I submit to you that this intermediate time is our passion. It is our time of daily death. It is our time to bury ourselves like the seed. As Lewis said, Christ on Calvary exemplified this for our imitation. Jesus spoke to the mostly agrarian society in terms they would clearly understand. Similarly, I believe He has spoken to me through terms that I can clearly understand - namely my earthly father. This Father's Day, I write to honor my father, who taught me how to die through his living example, and, as is the theme in the doctrine of death, taught me how to fully live.
I will always be haunted by Thoreau's poignantly stinging remark that "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." This is true only of the man who allows fear to keep him paralyzed and thus his tongue static like a living repetition of Adam's sin in The Garden. But a man who is already dead to the world is not afraid of the things in it, because the things in it can only destroy his body, but never his soul. My father taught me to peel back the thin veneer of everything ephemeral and reach for eternity by dying to the temporary and living for the permanent. So, thank you, Father, for my father. And thank you, Dad, for your example.
Monday, May 28, 2012
The Founders Knew We Were Not Exceptional
"When you read through the Constitution of The United States, there is one subtext that goes through the whole thing. That is, the men who wrote our Constitution had one guiding principle - Americans are not to be trusted. That's what they believed. Americans are not to be trusted. It wasn't that Americans are so noble and lovely and wonderful, let's just heap all the power into one big pile so Americans can go out and save the world; that's not what they believed. They thought Americans were skunks, and sneaks, and cowards, just like the rest of the human race. They knew that we weren't exceptional. That's exceptional."
- Douglas Wilson, Sermon on Samuel IX
- Douglas Wilson, Sermon on Samuel IX
Sunday, May 6, 2012
The Authority of James Bond
A few weeks ago, I had a conversation with James Bond. Well, it was a conversation with someone who thinks he's James Bond. He's a military intelligence officer and the conversation revolved around the curriculum of an intelligence course he was attending. Being the only intelligence officer at this course, the younger sergeants were always looking to him for guidance and approval. They knew he was the authority on the subject, and so made sure their own propositions in the class were in line with what he had made known to them.
I told him that he just described the central problem in the history of philosophy - authority. Specifically, epistemological authority. How do we know the things we know? Can we know anything at all? Where does knowledge come from? Where do moral imperatives come from? Who decides what is good? What is bad? There must be an authoritative axiom established to begin answering these questions. And if we can answer these questions at all, it is only because we recognize authority in one of two beings - God or man.
The starting place for all subsequent reasoning must come from one of these. If man is the authority then we all become like little gods reigning in a kingdom of entropy. If God is the authority then we become like students learning from the same Teacher. From which we get a kingdom of order. Anytime the authority is shifted, which only takes place in the mind, not in reality, the result is rebellion against reality and disorder occurs. For example, the first shift in epistemological authority from God to man was in the mind of Eve (I don't think any shift took place in Adam's mind, his sin was entirely different, not an elevation of his own thinking over God's). The result was The Fall. René Descartes, similarly displaced authority from God to man when he famously stated "cogito ergo sum" or "I think, therefore, I am". A more precise statement would have read "I think because of the I Am". I Am that I Am has more authority than I think, therefore I am. This is like the junior sergeants asserting they know more than the trained officer about intelligence because they have the ability to think.
William Lane Craig on authority in philosophy: "Moral obligations or prohibitions arise in response to imperatives from a competent authority. For example, if a policeman tells you to pull over, then because of his authority, who he is, you are legally obligated to pull over, but if some random stranger tells you to pull over you are not legally obligated to do so. Now, in the absence of God, what authority is there to issue moral commands or prohibitions? There is none on atheism. And therefore there are no moral imperatives for us to obey. In the absence of God there just isn't any sort of moral obligation or prohibition that characterizes our lives."
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Louie Giglio: Raising Hands is Not A Denominational Thing; It's A Human One.
New York Giants win the Superbowl.
Coldplay Concert.
New Year's Eve in Times Square.
If the Chicago Cubs ever win the World Series again, I'm sure there will be Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, Charismatics, Lutherans, Catholics, Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Reformers and more in the throng of fans stretching their hands to the heavens in celebration. And I'm also sure none of them are going to be thinking of the other, "I didn't know you were THAT kind of Christian." It's a human thing. Our Savior conquered death. He lives. And we will likewise if we confess with our mouths and believe in our hearts. That's something to celebrate!
The senior demon Screwtape to his apprentice Wormwood: "Humans are amphibians - half spirit and half animal...At the very least, they can be persuaded that the bodily position makes no difference to their prayers; for they constantly forget, what you must always remember, that they are animals and that whatever their bodies do affects their souls. It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out." (C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters, IV & VIII)
"So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands." (Psalm 63:4)
Sunday, March 25, 2012
The Hunger Games: A Short Review and Exhortation
I hear my death sentence announced. My vision blurs and narrows. My skin feels clammy and the crowd around me steps away as if to avoid the impending doom. I am given the chance to fight for my life, but I know I am too unskilled to save myself. Then a voice from behind says, "I'll volunteer! I'll volunteer!" The adjudication is transferred to the volunteer. The volunteer accepts my death sentence, and even triumphs over death. This person, my savior, lives and I live because of this person.
This substitutionary atonement imagery is part of The Hunger Games movie. It is one of its redeeming qualities. A good story cannot be told without Christian thematic undergirding. The movie also has elements of Orwellian dystopia, Marxist manifesto and gladiatorial voyeurism, which are all interesting topics to explore in themselves, but they alone cannot make a great story. The Hunger Games is not a great story. It is a decent story with some goodness in it. The main character, Katniss, gives the story goodness because she is a Christ figure.
I'm sure a lot more can be said, but the movie can serve as a Gospel centered conversation starter. The film is breaking box office records indicating a cultural craving for some goodness. Presently, this movie is a big deal. People are going to say, "it's a good movie" and "I liked it." So Christians should press into this conversation. "Why is it a good movie? Why did you like it?" The conversation can easily lead to sharing the Gospel. All of us are sentenced to death. We cannot change it. Christ saves us. Christ lives. We live. We get married. This is the greatest story ever and it's true. It, too, is a big deal, so let's share it!
This substitutionary atonement imagery is part of The Hunger Games movie. It is one of its redeeming qualities. A good story cannot be told without Christian thematic undergirding. The movie also has elements of Orwellian dystopia, Marxist manifesto and gladiatorial voyeurism, which are all interesting topics to explore in themselves, but they alone cannot make a great story. The Hunger Games is not a great story. It is a decent story with some goodness in it. The main character, Katniss, gives the story goodness because she is a Christ figure.
I'm sure a lot more can be said, but the movie can serve as a Gospel centered conversation starter. The film is breaking box office records indicating a cultural craving for some goodness. Presently, this movie is a big deal. People are going to say, "it's a good movie" and "I liked it." So Christians should press into this conversation. "Why is it a good movie? Why did you like it?" The conversation can easily lead to sharing the Gospel. All of us are sentenced to death. We cannot change it. Christ saves us. Christ lives. We live. We get married. This is the greatest story ever and it's true. It, too, is a big deal, so let's share it!
Thursday, March 22, 2012
They Have Rejected Me, That I Should Not Reign Over Them: Lasting Liberty Through Repentance
The Puritans, that society of early Americans, considered themselves to be a New Israel. They believed their exodus from Europe was a type of Israelite exodus from Egypt and the New England colonies were something like a Promised Land. This Promised Land came to be The United States of America. For purposes here, I will approach the task of describing an American narrative in the same typological hermeneutic. However, one important distinction must be made at the outset. America, as a nation-state, is not to be considered the New Israel, rather the Church, those who confess Jesus Christ as Lord and believe God raised Him from the dead are the new Chosen People. This qualification transcends the geographic boundaries of The United States, but since the Church constitutes much of America, she inevitably is molded by a believing demographic. The following puts forth Christ as King and the only hope for salvation contra America the nation-state. The intent is to illuminate the cross-section of Christ, His people, culture, and politics in America.
In a message to officers of the Militia of Massachusetts, John Adams stated, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." In his Farewell Address, George Washington said that religion was the indispensable support of political prosperity. In an interview with Ladies Home Journal, Teddy Roosevelt said that a churchless community is a society on the rapid downgrade. In The History of the United States, Noah Webster writes, "the religion that has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His Apostles. This is genuine Christianity and to this we owe our free constitutions of government."
Every Founder and subsequent patriot made it clear that the success of the American experiment was rooted in a religious people, which at the time were mostly Protestant, and some Catholic and Jewish. America at large was a group of God-fearing penitents. This was America's cultural solidarity. Because fear of God bestows wisdom, Americans confessed themselves to be sinners. They repented and walked by the Spirit, not carrying out the desires of the flesh. Incidentally a tyrannical government was not needed. A penitent people will live in a community where the Church steeple is taller than town hall. This is part of the vision that Douglas Wilson gives in Angels in the Architecture, and part of a broader truth that sharp minds have known since antiquity. “When a land transgresses, it has many rulers, but with a man of understanding and knowledge, its stability will long continue.” (Proverbs 28:2) The Founders were statesmen and honorable, in part, because they acknowledged this and framed the government accordingly. They did not need to create a despotic government out of necessity because the people could govern themselves and they did not choose to create a despotic government out of megalomania for the same reason.
I think it is fair to posit without lengthy elucidation that this is not the case anymore. The American collective has impregnated itself in an unholy conception of rebellion and given birth to the Leviathan state. “Those who will not be ruled by God will be ruled by tyrants.” (William Penn, The Sandy Foundation Shaken). This is not to say there exists only two tyrants in which to choose, but that that there are two rulers in which to choose. Both are necessary at this point in redemptive history, but one is perfect and one is not. And the more a people incline their hearts to the Perfect Ruler, the closer they get to perfect liberty.
T. S. Eliot in Christianity and Culture defines the culture as the cult, or the common worship. American worship is becoming less common because of indignation towards the one true God and a love of many false gods, therefore incurring an amercement of judgment. “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. (John 3:19) The common worship of old America was weaved with the strands of God-fearing and righteousness. Now the country is comprised of God-mockers and decadents. The post-modern wants to thread different strands, but it does not work. “He who sets to work on a different strand destroys the whole fabric.”(Confucius, Analects II. 16) These innovators may give us their tapestry, but it will look something like a pile of shredded rags. The final work is the annihilation of a cohesive and functioning society.
But the unbelieving are not the first cause of deterioration. Though one might think they were since evangelicals clamour for state control in a panicked frenzy. While this is an important battle, it is only one battle and only a battle. The war is won in the sanctuary of the Church. Here is where the cause is found. Everything else is ancillary. The spiritual and thereby cultural suicide of the unbeliever is a result of the church failing to be Holy because "without Holiness, no one will see God.” (Hebrews 12:14) This does not excuse the unbeliever of his unbelief, but it contributes. If we are to admit this is where to find the first cause, then I would contend that willful unrepentantance in the places of worship is why it is the first cause. Like Gideon removing the Baals and the Asherahs at night because he feared reproach, the new Israel is also frightened to restore proper worship. Though she is given authority to do this by edict of the King, she has refused to obey and thereby has been an irresponsible steward. And so Legion is released because her transgressions are many. “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in the heavens and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in the heavens.” (Matthew 18:18) America has gone from righteous to unrighteous, not because of the foolish pagan, but because of the witless believer.
So what is the Christian's response in this unrighteous America? In the City of God, Saint Augustine argues that the best citizens in the City of God become the best citizens in the City of Man. America is a group of people given for Christians to serve, whether they are saints or pagans. Whether they are ravenously tearing it to tatters or quietly building it to the glory of God, does not, in my estimation, affect a Christian's faith in a God who commands His followers to love their neighbor - even if their neighbor is crucifying them. Jesus did not defiantly throw down His cross and say, "Hey, I have my rights!" But He did die so that men could be free, even while they were still sinners. (Romans 5:18)
"American society, our lives in common as Americans, is only possible to the extent we share and seek to live up to a common, orverarching story rooted in memory, custom, and current practice." (Bruce Frohen, American Culture) I agree with Frohen's thesis. Notice he had to qualify the term "American society". I do not think the term is going to go away, but it definitely does not mean the same thing it once did. There are remnants of the old, common American culture, but it is being turned over to a multiculturalism which is really a common worship of something else and something ugly, certainly not Christ. But this is what earthly kingdoms do. They ebb and flow by the moon. Thankfully the Kingdom of Heaven is nothing like this, and in the King of Heaven and Earth I place my hope and faith. This does not mean I no longer love this passing kingdom. It is because I love my heavenly home first that I love my earthly dwelling better. There is nearness of the Eternal King and His words are "the time is fulfilled." If Americans would repent and believe then there will be lasting liberty.
In a message to officers of the Militia of Massachusetts, John Adams stated, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." In his Farewell Address, George Washington said that religion was the indispensable support of political prosperity. In an interview with Ladies Home Journal, Teddy Roosevelt said that a churchless community is a society on the rapid downgrade. In The History of the United States, Noah Webster writes, "the religion that has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His Apostles. This is genuine Christianity and to this we owe our free constitutions of government."
Every Founder and subsequent patriot made it clear that the success of the American experiment was rooted in a religious people, which at the time were mostly Protestant, and some Catholic and Jewish. America at large was a group of God-fearing penitents. This was America's cultural solidarity. Because fear of God bestows wisdom, Americans confessed themselves to be sinners. They repented and walked by the Spirit, not carrying out the desires of the flesh. Incidentally a tyrannical government was not needed. A penitent people will live in a community where the Church steeple is taller than town hall. This is part of the vision that Douglas Wilson gives in Angels in the Architecture, and part of a broader truth that sharp minds have known since antiquity. “When a land transgresses, it has many rulers, but with a man of understanding and knowledge, its stability will long continue.” (Proverbs 28:2) The Founders were statesmen and honorable, in part, because they acknowledged this and framed the government accordingly. They did not need to create a despotic government out of necessity because the people could govern themselves and they did not choose to create a despotic government out of megalomania for the same reason.
I think it is fair to posit without lengthy elucidation that this is not the case anymore. The American collective has impregnated itself in an unholy conception of rebellion and given birth to the Leviathan state. “Those who will not be ruled by God will be ruled by tyrants.” (William Penn, The Sandy Foundation Shaken). This is not to say there exists only two tyrants in which to choose, but that that there are two rulers in which to choose. Both are necessary at this point in redemptive history, but one is perfect and one is not. And the more a people incline their hearts to the Perfect Ruler, the closer they get to perfect liberty.
T. S. Eliot in Christianity and Culture defines the culture as the cult, or the common worship. American worship is becoming less common because of indignation towards the one true God and a love of many false gods, therefore incurring an amercement of judgment. “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. (John 3:19) The common worship of old America was weaved with the strands of God-fearing and righteousness. Now the country is comprised of God-mockers and decadents. The post-modern wants to thread different strands, but it does not work. “He who sets to work on a different strand destroys the whole fabric.”(Confucius, Analects II. 16) These innovators may give us their tapestry, but it will look something like a pile of shredded rags. The final work is the annihilation of a cohesive and functioning society.
But the unbelieving are not the first cause of deterioration. Though one might think they were since evangelicals clamour for state control in a panicked frenzy. While this is an important battle, it is only one battle and only a battle. The war is won in the sanctuary of the Church. Here is where the cause is found. Everything else is ancillary. The spiritual and thereby cultural suicide of the unbeliever is a result of the church failing to be Holy because "without Holiness, no one will see God.” (Hebrews 12:14) This does not excuse the unbeliever of his unbelief, but it contributes. If we are to admit this is where to find the first cause, then I would contend that willful unrepentantance in the places of worship is why it is the first cause. Like Gideon removing the Baals and the Asherahs at night because he feared reproach, the new Israel is also frightened to restore proper worship. Though she is given authority to do this by edict of the King, she has refused to obey and thereby has been an irresponsible steward. And so Legion is released because her transgressions are many. “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in the heavens and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in the heavens.” (Matthew 18:18) America has gone from righteous to unrighteous, not because of the foolish pagan, but because of the witless believer.
So what is the Christian's response in this unrighteous America? In the City of God, Saint Augustine argues that the best citizens in the City of God become the best citizens in the City of Man. America is a group of people given for Christians to serve, whether they are saints or pagans. Whether they are ravenously tearing it to tatters or quietly building it to the glory of God, does not, in my estimation, affect a Christian's faith in a God who commands His followers to love their neighbor - even if their neighbor is crucifying them. Jesus did not defiantly throw down His cross and say, "Hey, I have my rights!" But He did die so that men could be free, even while they were still sinners. (Romans 5:18)
"American society, our lives in common as Americans, is only possible to the extent we share and seek to live up to a common, orverarching story rooted in memory, custom, and current practice." (Bruce Frohen, American Culture) I agree with Frohen's thesis. Notice he had to qualify the term "American society". I do not think the term is going to go away, but it definitely does not mean the same thing it once did. There are remnants of the old, common American culture, but it is being turned over to a multiculturalism which is really a common worship of something else and something ugly, certainly not Christ. But this is what earthly kingdoms do. They ebb and flow by the moon. Thankfully the Kingdom of Heaven is nothing like this, and in the King of Heaven and Earth I place my hope and faith. This does not mean I no longer love this passing kingdom. It is because I love my heavenly home first that I love my earthly dwelling better. There is nearness of the Eternal King and His words are "the time is fulfilled." If Americans would repent and believe then there will be lasting liberty.
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