Following Christ in the Future

The rapid advance of social liberalism, both in its social acceptability and the legal requirement of conformity to it, has left Christians disoriented and reacting, and for not a few, seriously considering alternatives which are clearly outside of what Scripture and Christian tradition allows. Since it is through Scripture that we hear the voice of Christ that we are to obey, we need to again orient and anchor ourselves in its unchanging truth in order to be obedient to Christ. In particular, we need to remember that the truth we believe in objectively corresponds to reality; it is not a human construction that we find we are comfortable with.

The first move of the Christian is to respond in obedience to the voice of God. This continues throughout life and into eternity. There should never be deviation from it, whatever the reason. The Bible particularly emphasizes this is to be faithfully followed regardless of the pain that such obedience may cause. We have the examples of Abraham, willing to sacrifice his favored son (Gen 22), Daniel’s three friends risking horrific death as the price of obedience (Dan. 3), and the call to turn away from the world and toward Christ at the beginning of the Gospels (Matt. 4:17). This immediately sets us at odds with the contemporary West, which insists on quality of life as a final criterion of morality.

Faithful Christians must therefore have a clear confession of faith in a world which has become much more hostile than we have known it in the West for generations. The Christian orthodoxy that this entails is not difficult to identify or support from Scripture – it consists of faith in a supreme personal being, identical with the God of Israel, incarnate in Jesus Christ, who died a bloody death for sin, and rose giving us eternal life. For the individual Christian, orthodoxy means dependence on Jesus Christ for salvation, and repentance from every known sin (knowing that God will deliver us from hidden faults, Ps. 19:12), identified from the commands of Christ and the apostles, and the moral commands (as opposed to ceremonial or national commands) of the Old Testament which they incorporate.

Although our faith is given to us by God, important in reinforcing that faith, evangelizing, and maintaining a legal and social environment favorable to freedom for the Christian faith will be apologetics. Both philosophical apologetics, arguing to God from pure reason, and evidential apologetics, pointing to the Christian faith from available scientific, historical, and archeological evidence, will be important. Nevertheless, it is the sincere conviction of the heart, soul, mind and strength, (Mk. 12:30) given by the Holy Spirit, which is truly necessary and sufficient for saving faith.

The point at which Christian discipleship conflicts with the contemporary world is in the area of sexual morality. It is here that not only does the world tell us that the requirements of discipleship are wrong, but we may not live our lives in accordance with them, making “no provision for the flesh” (Rom 13:14), and causing no one to stumble (Matt. 18:7). Our life in business and the professions, and in Christian educational institutions, is increasingly subject to laws and regulations that require compromise to contribute to sin in this area, yet it cannot be given while remaining faithful to Christ. Since this is the area in which faithfulness is being proved in our day, we need to remember that it involves more than just what we believe, say, and do in the area of homosexuality, but covers the full range of human sexuality in areas that anyone unavoidably encounters, namely one’s own personal chastity, and avoidance of things contrary to it such as abortion, pornography, and immoral thoughts or conversation. Not only are we responsible for ourselves, but we must be careful, according to Christ’s own command (Matt. 18:7), not to contribute to such sin on the part of our neighbors.

But beyond sexual morality, and staying within the bounds of orthodoxy noted above, the committed Christian should be part of a church with a clear confessional position. It may believe that core Christian belief includes more than this basic orthodoxy, but not less. To be a church which is genuinely Biblical, church discipline must be enforced with members who depart from Christian faith and morals (I Cor. 5:12-13). In the contemporary world, actual church discipline may involve penalties to the church (lawsuits are a possibility), yet the church cannot compromise with the state in the area of church discipline if it is to remain faithful to Christ.

Likewise parents must enforce Biblical standards within the family. Possible conflicts with the law include such areas as religious education (contrary to possible state doctrine of universal salvation) or the prohibition of corporal punishment.

The state may claim supreme authority in all things, yet God should never be disobeyed. In fact, the Christian conscience can be easily accommodated by the state if the state is not attempting to impose its own understanding of the meaning and value of life on its subjects. But even quite apart from this, everyone owes a duty of absolute obedience to God.

The form discipleship takes may indeed be different at different times and places, and yet it cannot deviate from this general outline if it is to remain within the gospel given in Scripture. Orthodox Christians once had major Christian churches, their associated or parachurch evangelistic, educational, and charitable institutions, and even rightist political parties in many western countries, along with the fellowship, literature, and general culture these institutions provided, as inspiration and support in a world which had in some measure abandoned Christian faith. The hope of the conservative resurgence that followed the 1960s was to recover America and the West for Christianity, and see Christian civilization spread as far as possible. It is now clear that this will not happen in the foreseeable future. This leaves us with a Christian past which was glorious but is seemingly beyond recovery, and a future in which, humanly speaking, it seems that Biblical faith will be significantly suppressed and dwindle in scattered groups. But we must regard nothing “from a human point of view” (II Cor. 5:16). If our faith is objectively true, God cannot be finally defeated, and true faith will not disappear from the earth (I Thes. 4:17). As churches and Christian institutions succumb to the intense intellectual, social and legal attacks of our day, it may be necessary for us to understand, as we always should, that our faith is not dependent on any particular human association of Christians, but on God’s revelation in Scripture, confirmed to our hearts by the Holy Spirit.