Citizenship

The culture Motrin recall 2010 war is Vardenafil reviews in full swing.  There are Buy Ranitidine Online at least Flagyl 400 mg two sides that both want their views to dominate the way our nation goes about it’s daily activities. One of those sides, the one I am addressing, is the Christian side (please note I am not talking to a political party).

Before I continue I want everyone to understand that I am not advocating that we stop trying to influence society or our nations politics.  We are called to be in this world and to affect it for good.  I am just taking a different angle than what you would normally hear.  Please hear me out.

Are you a citizen of your nation or of heaven first?

There are many Christians involved in the political and social processes who are fighting to ban gay marriage, keep the name Christmas on the calendar, and make sure that babies have the same right to life that everyone else is afforded.  All of these things are admirable and should be fought for.  Ultimately, though when we pursue these things alone the only thing we can succeed in is holding society to a moral standard.  A moral standard will not save them.  Only Christ can do that.

But what happens when we lose these fights?  What happens when our nation departs from its foundations and moves in a more humanistic way?  We are seeing this happen as I write.

I know that when the things that I believe in take a blow in the political or social realms I can feel pretty down.  Is the whole world turning against me?  The answer is a resounding yes.  In the United States we have experienced, what I would consider, an anomaly in history.  We enjoy religious freedoms that few in history have. But more and more we are seeing a departure from God.

Should we really expect that it would be different?  God created the world founded in righteousness and when sin entered the world, it, and everything with it, began it’s plunge into darkness.  The only reason it is not totally lost is because of the light of Christ.  But even that is a double edged sword.  We are promised life and joy in Christ right along with sufferings of Christ.  As Americans we have experienced little of the latter.

How will believers in Christ respond when we cannot meet in our churches except in secret?  The current political or social atmosphere should not define who we are as believers, Christ should.  It should not matter if our nation falls apart because it is not our rock, Christ is.  We should not put our faith in a nation or world that is fallen, hoping that it will somehow, apart from it’s nature, choose God.

When hard times like this come it is easy to remind ourselves of where our citizenship lies first: heaven.  But when times are good we can be easily distracted from this truth. At all times we must maintain our focus on why we are here by remembering where we will ultimately end up.  When we fret about all of the things falling apart around us we show that we have too much of ourselves tied to this world.  Let us not be distracted from our main calling (making disciples of Christ) by all of the good things we can fight for.  By all means, fight for a baby’s right to life, but do it with the gospel in the forefront.  People might be able to make the choice not to kill their baby but, apart from Christ, this means little in light of eternity.

We do not live in a Christian nation.  We live in a nation founded on Christian principles but governed and occupied by sinful people.  The relative comfort we experience in America as followers in Christ can’t last on this earth.  Don’t expect it to.  We need to put our faith in God and not in our nation.  We need to remember that we are just passing through this world (and nation) and that our true citizenship is in heaven.

Brian