A dear friend who works with World Council of Churches shared this article with me. A needed reminder for evangelicals who rooted for Bush.
Even if a brave president wud finally overthrow the abortion holocaust, we can't rely solely on Big Brother to legislate morality. The Church has to go a few steps further, and be a loving community that provides an alternative in the way we care for the weak, disabled, unwanted people in our midst.
Live differently in the way we treat sex, money and human life.
"People are not precious bcos we can get them saved. We save them because they are precious in God's sight... and they should be in ours as well (Greg Koukl)"
Evangelicals bemoaned the ascendancy of gay marriage and abortion
By DAVID W. VIRTUE
The election has come and gone and evangelicals are triumphant that they got their man back in the White House. Four million of them came out to vote in Ohio and the vast Mid-West and South and gave the job back to George W. Bush.
According to surveys of voters leaving the polls, Bush won 79 percent of the 26.5 million evangelical votes and 52 percent of the 31 million Catholic votes.
But a cautionary note needs to be sounded.
Evangelicals have blind spots; they can be very thin theologically and historically forgetful.
When Ronald Reagan ran away with the White House after defeating the evangelical Jimmy Carter a new day was heralded for evangelicals -- they would bring the nation back to God and all would be well. Liberalism in faith and politics would die out, the nation would return to righteousness, revival would break out, and much more.
It never happened. The culture has slid inexorably towards the gutter ever since and many conservative columnists, including Cal Thomas, later had to admit that little had changed and the culture was not profoundly affected by that president or any that succeeded him.
In this last election evangelicals rightly bemoaned the ascendancy of gay marriage, the continued infanticide of abortion, (Roe v Wade), the fear of a Supreme Court getting other than strict constructionists and more.
But evangelicals have also ignored the horror of divorce in America, which claims almost one in two marriages; has decimated families for generations, with they, themselves, being among its biggest offenders, according to recent statistics.
As an aside, in my parish an associate rector recently got divorced when his wife walked out on him because she wanted to marry a rich older man, and a youth leader got blown away when his wife had an affair and left him with the two kids. All this is nothing less than sheer selfishness, a 'me first' mentality, and 'my needs come before all others, and to hell with the cost to anybody else, especially the kids.' And all these people call themselves evangelicals! Gay marriage will never be an issue in my parish, our rector will never solemnize a same-sex couple, and not even Bishop Bennison would dare insist that he perform such rites, however theologically stupid the man is. But divorce IS an issue and it causes havoc to whole families when it occurs.
And evangelicals are silent. And they shouldn't be. Divorce is just as much a "values" and "first tier" issue as gay marriage.
And is not justice for the poor and downtrodden a central tenet of biblical concern, and should it not be so for evangelicals?
Dr. Christopher Hall, New Testament theologian and evangelical Episcopalian noted, "The main words for sexual sin occur about 90 times in the Bible. By a conservative count, the four words for justice (two in Hebrew and two in Greek) appear 1,060 times in the Bible."
Where are evangelical priorities?
Greed is also a major problem for evangelicals, but no one talks about it. It is the sixth deadly Sin. Greed is the desire for material wealth or gain; it is also called Avarice or Covetousness. And when did you last hear a sermon about greed from the pulpit?
Millions of evangelicals have bought into a "health and wealth" gospel that is utterly alien to Holy Scripture, and with those that don't (and most Episcopalians would never overtly subscribe to such a doctrine) there is nonetheless the belief that "my money is mine and I alone decide how to spend it."
"No one is going to tell me what to do," is a motto for many evangelicals.
This writer was extremely troubled to see huge billboards up and down highway I-95 in the state of Pennsylvania, prior to the election, trumpeting "It's Your Money" - Bush Cheney. Really. Would Jesus say that, or would he rip it down and do a repeat of the temple money-changers? No it is not your money. You are simply a steward of what God has given you, nothing more. Your money is not yours. You, like your money have been bought with a price, and you and I will both be accountable for how we spend it "in that day". (An English vicar told me on the phone last week, "The last thing to get converted is the check book." He is absolutely right.)
There are millions of evangelical African Anglicans who live in abject poverty. We Americans consume enormous amounts of the world's goods proportionately to other nations. Where is the evangelical outrage about that?
Evangelicals now are in big danger of falling into spiritual pride. As a group we have an exaggerated self importance. But pride comes before a fall, and we as a group have fallen before and we will fall again. Any numbers of TV evangelists and Christian leaders have fallen into sexual sin and their ministries ruined. We should take heed lest we fall.
Yes, we should oppose gay marriage, it is a profound violation of the moral law of God and He will judge us as a nation if we go down that road. But it is no less a moral violation when we break our marriage vows. The abortion mills are horrible. Roe v. Wade was wrong-headed and muddled thinking, but we evangelicals have not succeeded in turning the culture around, and many of us contribute to it.
A hotel manager told me recently that he had two conventions back to back. One was a high level group of evangelical church people the other was a business group. The evangelicals watched more porn movies in their rooms than the business group! Go figure.
On the flip side of the coin there is a lot of hysteria by liberals about evangelicals bonding with Bush and turning this nation into "people who look like Jerry Falwell." It isn't going to happen.
And liberals have it all wrong that evangelicals are a scary lot, says Eastern Baptist Seminary professor and evangelical activist Dr. Ron Sider. "We are not as scary as some people think," he told the Philadelphia INQUIRER.
Sider says that some 55 percent of U.S. evangelicals -- who number nearly 50 million -- favor strict environmental regulations, and 45 percent think homosexuals should have the same civil rights as others. Forty three percent say the middle class should be taxed to fight poverty, and 29 percent support more government spending.
It was George Bush himself who said on TV (and I saw him say it) that same-sex unions should be a state's right issue not a federal issue. By doing so he tacitly supported sex outside of heterosexual marriage! And this is an evangelical president!
Equally, Liberals have no right to go around bashing evangelicals as simpletons. [Episcopal Bishop] Spong is wrong. Many evangelicals are sophisticated people who hold high university positions in nearly all disciplines and they are just as concerned for the environment and the poor as are liberals.
Most of the major American world hunger organizations are evangelically-based and they include the Salvation Army, World Vision, Food for the Hungry, World Relief, Food for the Poor and the newly formed Anglican Relief and Development, to name but a few.
The National Association of Evangelicals adopted a landmark statement last month calling its 30 million members to have "a biblically balanced concern that reflects the full range of God's concerns for the well-being of marriage, the family, and the sanctity of human life, justice for the poor, care for creation, peace, freedom and racial justice."
Every week, many evangelicals and anglo-Catholics pray these words from the Prayer Book: "For all who work for justice, freedom and peace...For the victims of hunger, fear, injustice and oppression..."
Evangelicals and anglo-Catholics believe in the primacy of Christian conversion. It is or should be their first concern. But it doesn't stop there, and it shouldn't. Justification is the first step towards sanctification, redemption, and that involves the whole of life.
We should be holistic Christians concerned for the whole person. Saving the soul is only a part of it. God's redemption is for the whole man (and woman), and creation, and we as evangelicals should admit that we can and do get it wrong from time to time.
Evangelicals may have their man in the White House, but it is not a time for gloating. This nation still needs to be called to repentance for its "manifold sins" for truly we have grievously offended God's holy laws -- and that includes evangelicals....by at least four million.
November 13, 2004
http://www.religionjournal.com/
Even if a brave president wud finally overthrow the abortion holocaust, we can't rely solely on Big Brother to legislate morality. The Church has to go a few steps further, and be a loving community that provides an alternative in the way we care for the weak, disabled, unwanted people in our midst.
Live differently in the way we treat sex, money and human life.
"People are not precious bcos we can get them saved. We save them because they are precious in God's sight... and they should be in ours as well (Greg Koukl)"
Evangelicals bemoaned the ascendancy of gay marriage and abortion
By DAVID W. VIRTUE
The election has come and gone and evangelicals are triumphant that they got their man back in the White House. Four million of them came out to vote in Ohio and the vast Mid-West and South and gave the job back to George W. Bush.
According to surveys of voters leaving the polls, Bush won 79 percent of the 26.5 million evangelical votes and 52 percent of the 31 million Catholic votes.
But a cautionary note needs to be sounded.
Evangelicals have blind spots; they can be very thin theologically and historically forgetful.
When Ronald Reagan ran away with the White House after defeating the evangelical Jimmy Carter a new day was heralded for evangelicals -- they would bring the nation back to God and all would be well. Liberalism in faith and politics would die out, the nation would return to righteousness, revival would break out, and much more.
It never happened. The culture has slid inexorably towards the gutter ever since and many conservative columnists, including Cal Thomas, later had to admit that little had changed and the culture was not profoundly affected by that president or any that succeeded him.
In this last election evangelicals rightly bemoaned the ascendancy of gay marriage, the continued infanticide of abortion, (Roe v Wade), the fear of a Supreme Court getting other than strict constructionists and more.
But evangelicals have also ignored the horror of divorce in America, which claims almost one in two marriages; has decimated families for generations, with they, themselves, being among its biggest offenders, according to recent statistics.
As an aside, in my parish an associate rector recently got divorced when his wife walked out on him because she wanted to marry a rich older man, and a youth leader got blown away when his wife had an affair and left him with the two kids. All this is nothing less than sheer selfishness, a 'me first' mentality, and 'my needs come before all others, and to hell with the cost to anybody else, especially the kids.' And all these people call themselves evangelicals! Gay marriage will never be an issue in my parish, our rector will never solemnize a same-sex couple, and not even Bishop Bennison would dare insist that he perform such rites, however theologically stupid the man is. But divorce IS an issue and it causes havoc to whole families when it occurs.
And evangelicals are silent. And they shouldn't be. Divorce is just as much a "values" and "first tier" issue as gay marriage.
And is not justice for the poor and downtrodden a central tenet of biblical concern, and should it not be so for evangelicals?
Dr. Christopher Hall, New Testament theologian and evangelical Episcopalian noted, "The main words for sexual sin occur about 90 times in the Bible. By a conservative count, the four words for justice (two in Hebrew and two in Greek) appear 1,060 times in the Bible."
Where are evangelical priorities?
Greed is also a major problem for evangelicals, but no one talks about it. It is the sixth deadly Sin. Greed is the desire for material wealth or gain; it is also called Avarice or Covetousness. And when did you last hear a sermon about greed from the pulpit?
Millions of evangelicals have bought into a "health and wealth" gospel that is utterly alien to Holy Scripture, and with those that don't (and most Episcopalians would never overtly subscribe to such a doctrine) there is nonetheless the belief that "my money is mine and I alone decide how to spend it."
"No one is going to tell me what to do," is a motto for many evangelicals.
This writer was extremely troubled to see huge billboards up and down highway I-95 in the state of Pennsylvania, prior to the election, trumpeting "It's Your Money" - Bush Cheney. Really. Would Jesus say that, or would he rip it down and do a repeat of the temple money-changers? No it is not your money. You are simply a steward of what God has given you, nothing more. Your money is not yours. You, like your money have been bought with a price, and you and I will both be accountable for how we spend it "in that day". (An English vicar told me on the phone last week, "The last thing to get converted is the check book." He is absolutely right.)
There are millions of evangelical African Anglicans who live in abject poverty. We Americans consume enormous amounts of the world's goods proportionately to other nations. Where is the evangelical outrage about that?
Evangelicals now are in big danger of falling into spiritual pride. As a group we have an exaggerated self importance. But pride comes before a fall, and we as a group have fallen before and we will fall again. Any numbers of TV evangelists and Christian leaders have fallen into sexual sin and their ministries ruined. We should take heed lest we fall.
Yes, we should oppose gay marriage, it is a profound violation of the moral law of God and He will judge us as a nation if we go down that road. But it is no less a moral violation when we break our marriage vows. The abortion mills are horrible. Roe v. Wade was wrong-headed and muddled thinking, but we evangelicals have not succeeded in turning the culture around, and many of us contribute to it.
A hotel manager told me recently that he had two conventions back to back. One was a high level group of evangelical church people the other was a business group. The evangelicals watched more porn movies in their rooms than the business group! Go figure.
On the flip side of the coin there is a lot of hysteria by liberals about evangelicals bonding with Bush and turning this nation into "people who look like Jerry Falwell." It isn't going to happen.
And liberals have it all wrong that evangelicals are a scary lot, says Eastern Baptist Seminary professor and evangelical activist Dr. Ron Sider. "We are not as scary as some people think," he told the Philadelphia INQUIRER.
Sider says that some 55 percent of U.S. evangelicals -- who number nearly 50 million -- favor strict environmental regulations, and 45 percent think homosexuals should have the same civil rights as others. Forty three percent say the middle class should be taxed to fight poverty, and 29 percent support more government spending.
It was George Bush himself who said on TV (and I saw him say it) that same-sex unions should be a state's right issue not a federal issue. By doing so he tacitly supported sex outside of heterosexual marriage! And this is an evangelical president!
Equally, Liberals have no right to go around bashing evangelicals as simpletons. [Episcopal Bishop] Spong is wrong. Many evangelicals are sophisticated people who hold high university positions in nearly all disciplines and they are just as concerned for the environment and the poor as are liberals.
Most of the major American world hunger organizations are evangelically-based and they include the Salvation Army, World Vision, Food for the Hungry, World Relief, Food for the Poor and the newly formed Anglican Relief and Development, to name but a few.
The National Association of Evangelicals adopted a landmark statement last month calling its 30 million members to have "a biblically balanced concern that reflects the full range of God's concerns for the well-being of marriage, the family, and the sanctity of human life, justice for the poor, care for creation, peace, freedom and racial justice."
Every week, many evangelicals and anglo-Catholics pray these words from the Prayer Book: "For all who work for justice, freedom and peace...For the victims of hunger, fear, injustice and oppression..."
Evangelicals and anglo-Catholics believe in the primacy of Christian conversion. It is or should be their first concern. But it doesn't stop there, and it shouldn't. Justification is the first step towards sanctification, redemption, and that involves the whole of life.
We should be holistic Christians concerned for the whole person. Saving the soul is only a part of it. God's redemption is for the whole man (and woman), and creation, and we as evangelicals should admit that we can and do get it wrong from time to time.
Evangelicals may have their man in the White House, but it is not a time for gloating. This nation still needs to be called to repentance for its "manifold sins" for truly we have grievously offended God's holy laws -- and that includes evangelicals....by at least four million.
November 13, 2004
http://www.religionjournal.com/
Comments
I'm not afraid of anything in this world
There's nothing you can throw at me that I haven't already heard
I'm just trying to find a decent melody
A song that I can sing in my own company
I never thought you were a fool
But darling, look at you
You gotta stand up straight, carry your own weight
These tears are going nowhere, baby*
You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
Don't say that later will be better now you're stuck in a moment
And you can't get out of it
I will not forsake, the colours that you bring
But the nights you filled with fireworks
They left you with nothing I am still enchanted by the light you brought to me
I still listen through your ears, and through your eyes I can see**
And you are such a fool
To worry like you do I know it's tough, and you can never get enough
Of what you don't really need now... my oh my***
You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
Oh love look at you now
You've got yourself stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
I was unconscious, half asleep
The water is warm till you discover how deep...
I wasn't jumping... for me it was a fall
It's a long way down to nothing at all
You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
Don't say that later will be better now
You're stuck in a moment and you can't get out of it
And if the night runs over
And if the day won't last
And if our way should falter
Along the stony pass
And if the night runs over
And if the day won't last
And if your way should falter
Along the stony pass It's just a moment
This time will pass
Leon's use of the song;
*the church
**through whom did I get salvation and spiritual things - the church!
***she can't enough of all the pop theology that's not helping her