The church's response to a national tragedy

Yesterday's post addressed the tragedy that occurred in Tucson and the incivility that exists in our nation that I believe was largely responsible for it.  If you have not read that post I encourage you to do so now before continuing this one because I want to follow up my thoughts from yesterday.

My words could have been understood to be words of compromise, that we are to accept all ideas and beliefs as equally valid.  That is not what I meant to convey.  I believe in absolute truth and believe that two contradicting statements cannot both be true.   As a Christian I believe the Christian faith is true, and any belief system that contradicts the teachings of Christianity cannot be true.  I do not believe that every lifestyle choice is equally valid.  I further believe that the church has a responsibility to proclaim its beliefs and to challenge those who make choices that are in opposition to the clear teachings of Scripture.

What I am advocating for is that the church do so with humility and grace.  As I said yesterday, every person ever born was created in the image of God.  Each person is part of the world that God so loved that He gave His only begotten Son.  Every person you meet is a person of inherent worth because Jesus died for that individual.  At the least this means that every person we meet are to be treated with dignity and respect.  They may not believe as you wish they did; they may have made moral choices with which you disagree; but as the recipients of God's grace ourselves we cannot do less than offer them that same grace.

There is great incivility in our society today, but such incivility exists as well in the church.  As Ravi Zacharias argues in his book, God hasn't failed us, but the church often does.  A person stumbles and instead of helping that person up too many in the church want to kick him while he's down.  A pastor is terminated by his church because of a moral failure by one of his children.  Kick.  A wife is divorced by her husband for another woman and the church shuns her.  Kick.  A single mother with four children begin attending a church and within a few weeks a "helpful" member tells her the mistakes she is making in raising her children.  Kick.  I've seen each of these, and more, occur within churches.  We proclaim the love of God for all mankind and speak often of grace, but too often we seem to find it hard to demonstrate either one through our actions.

How loving is it when a church pickets the burial of a serviceman because they believe his death is God's judgment on a nation for its sins?  Is this not part of what Zacharias said was the tendency in our world today for ideology to be more important than people?  What is the image of the church, and, more importantly, of God that is broadcast to the world when they see such events in the media?  Until the church's walk matches its talk our message of the grace of God will be meaningless.

To restore civility to our nation will take more than new laws and changes in political rhetoric.  It will take no less than a change of human hearts, and no law or political leader can bring about such a change.  It is only when men and women are introduced to the person of Jesus Christ and allow Him entrance into their lives can such change occur.  Yes, the church must stand for truth, but in a way that honors the dignity of each person.  We cannot compromise our values and beliefs, but we must also not try to force those values and beliefs on others.  We lovingly discuss and debate these values and beliefs with others and then trust God to use the seeds we've planted to change hearts.  The church must confront wrong behavior, but we must also remember that each of us are the recipients of God's grace that forgave our own wrong behavior, and still does, and not refuse to extend such grace to others.  And we must always proclaim Jesus Christ and Him crucified as the only hope for all mankind because that message alone will change the hearts of men and women.