my burg

In the early years of the publication of Christianity Today , Carl Henry, serving then as editor, delineated five tenets on Christian social and political action.  I think this is a sound and balanced approach: 1.  The Bible is critically relevant to the whole of modern life and culture -- the socio-political arena included. 2. The institutional church has no mandate, jurisdiction or competence to endorse political legislation or military tactics or economic specifics in the name of Christ. 3. The institutional church is divinely obliged to proclaim God's entire revelation, including the standards or commandments by which men and nations are to be finally judged, and by which they ought now to live and maintain social stability. 4. The political achievement of a better society is the task of all citizens, and individual Christians ought to be politically engaged to the limit of their competence and opportunity.  5. The Bible limits the proper act...

The following paragraphs are taken from the conclusion of an article by J. Gresham Machen, originally published in 1933 in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science .  Machen is addressing the relevance of the Christian message to American education early in the 20th century.  He answers the question of what responsibility the church has in working for the betterment of society...  "The message will not be enforced by human authority or the pomp of numbers.  Yet some of you may hear it.  If you do hear it and heed it, you will possess riches greater than the riches of all the world. "Do you think that if you heed the message you will be less successful students of political and social science; do you think that by becoming citizens of another world you will be come less fitted to solve this world's problems; do you think that acceptance of the Christian message will hinder political or social advance?  No, my friends, I will pre...

On the morning after our national elections, this is what I’m thinking: the work of the church is far more important than the work of the government. Why is this? Jesus said his church would prevail against the gates of hell (Matt 16:18).  His kingdom is an eternal kingdom that outlasts and supersedes all governments (Dan 7:14).  The church is God’s own possession, purchased by the blood of Christ (Acts 20:28).  It is the church that can care for souls as well as bodies (Acts 2:42-47).  Wherever the church has gone, orphanages and hospitals have been established, and the outcast, the lonely and the dispossessed find a home.   It is the church that has gifted teachers who proclaim eternal truth (1 Cor 12:28ff).   The church is the pillar and buttress of truth (1 Tim 3:15).   God has given many special gifts to the church whereby people can be restored and built up.  It is through the church that God’s manifold wisdom is made known to hea...

R. C. Sproul writes,  About thirty years ago, I shared a taxi cab in St. Louis with Francis Schaeffer. I had known Dr. Schaeffer for many years, and  he had been instrumental in helping us begin our ministry in Ligonier, Pennsylvania, in 1971. Since our time together in St.  Louis was during the twilight of Schaeffer’s career, I posed this question to him: “Dr. Schaeffer, what is your biggest  concern for the future of the church in America?” Without hesitation, Dr. Schaeffer turned to me and spoke one word:  “Statism.” Schaeffer’s biggest concern at that point in his life was that the citizens of the United States were beginning to  invest their country with supreme authority, such that the free nation of America would become one that would be dominated by  a philosophy of the supremacy of the state. (From "Statism" by R. C. Sproul, 2008) I think Dr. Schaeffer was prescient to see our path to statism.  When truth, and the quest for truth,...

Excellent article, thought-provoking, by  Charles Chaput, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Philadelphia.  Highlights... Democracy is not an end in itself. Majority opinion does not determine what is good and true. Like every other form of social organization and power, democracy can become a form of repression and idolatry. The right to pursue happiness does not include a right to excuse or ignore evil in ourselves or anyone else. When we divorce our politics from a grounding in virtue and truth, we transform our country from a living moral organism into a kind of Golem of legal machinery without a soul. Critics often accuse faithful Christians of pursuing a “culture war” on issues such as abortion, sexuality, marriage and the family, and religious liberty. And in a sense, they’re right. We are fighting for what we believe. But of course, so are advocates on the other side of all these issues—and neither they nor we should feel uneasy about it. Democracy thrives on t...

Joseph Bottum explains well the American experiment, namely, an ongoing and needed tension between a secular government and a moral populace informed by religious principle.  He writes this in his recent article for First Things ... "The United States as it naturally wants to be—what we might call the platonic ideal of America—contains a tension we must be careful not to resolve. From its founding, the nation has always been something like a school of Enlightenment rationalists aswim in an ocean of Christian faith. And how shall the fish hate the water wherein they live? Or the water hate the fish?"  Read the full article here .