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A Not-So Radical Notion: Contra Mundum

Posted by Rob Ayers in Bible & Theology, Church & Missions, IMPACT Features, News & Culture

This article was inspired by Chuck Colson and his work(s) Loving God. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1983 and The Body: Being Light in Darkness. Dallas: Word Publishing, 1992.  It is mitigated by the moral problems of a certain New York congressman who will remain unnamed here.

William Wilberforce, the late great English slavery abolitionist, wrote in his diary the following (popularized by the movie, Amazing Grace (2007)):

“God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the slave trade and the reformation of manners.”

“Reformation of manners” did not refer to table etiquette. It referred instead to the moral biblical standards of professing Christians. Wilberforce believed that the avocation and advancement of holy living, i.e. “the reformation of manners” would foster a greater knowledge of Truth, and as a result would end the injustice of slavery; indeed, that the end of slavery would uplift the moral character of the British nation and compel many to seek the truthfulness of Christ and His Scriptures.

One of Wilberforce’s mentors was one of the great evangelical minds of the eighteenth century John Wesley. Wesley was branded a radical following his great sermon, “The Almost-Christian”, a scathing and angry denunciation of his Oxford colleagues for their week kneed faith in the face of the moral chasm then found current in the British nation. He captured his consternation with the mainstream of religious inaction and in support of radical holiness when he wrote the following: “Making an open stand against all ungodliness and unrighteousness, which overspreads our land like a flood, is one of the noblest ways of confessing Christ in the face of His enemies.”

Wesley wrote Wilberforce to encourage him in his life quest. By this time Wilberforce had secured his riding, and had concluded that he could do much more in his mission as a Member of Parliament (MP) rather than a Christian merely praying in seclusion. In fact, the letter that Wesley wrote Wilberforce was a commission of sorts – Wesley died only a few days after it was written. Here is a pertinent excerpt from that letter:

“Unless God has raised you up for this very thing, you will be worn out by the opposition of men and devils, but if God be for you, who can be against you?  Are all of them stronger than God? Oh, be not weary in well doing. Go on, in the name of God and in the power of His might, till even American slavery, the vilest that ever saw the sun, shall vanish away before it.”

At first Wilberforce stood alone.  Slavery was a business which was very lucrative. It employed approximately 5,500 sailors in 160 ships all worth approximately 6 million pounds sterling to its masters, and as a result for the tax collectors a sizable income (this figure has not been time adjusted). For twenty years Wilberforce (later joined by a small group of Christian friends (Quakers) known as the “Clapham” sect) fought against the forces that supported the evil of human slavery whose allies were the economic and political might of the British Empire. He was vilified, cursed, burned in effigy, threatened, investigated, scorned, and often ignored even by the churchmen of his day. Even some of his closest of friends considered him “mad.” In the end the righteous ideas of Christianity which Wilberforce championed prevailed over the darkness of the world that was set against him. As a result of Wilberforce and his political victory, a spiritual Revival took place that swept both England and the Western world for the next fifty years.  This happened because of a belief that the application of Biblical morality on the body politic would, as a result of the holy force of its ideals, fundamentally change the ethos of culture toward the search for Truth.

Jesus stated to the purpose of all seekers of truth this salient morsel: “But seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all of these things will be added unto you.” – Matthew 6:33 ESV.  How can one seek the fulfillment and expansion of the Kingdom without part and parcel seek the need for His righteousness to prevail “…on earth as it is in heaven”? And how will righteousness prevail unless one is willing to seek the inclusion of righteousness in the public square by both political activity and the righteous work of seeing to it that moral good expands itself among depraved humanity?  For many a truncated gospel of only “sharing Jesus” is what is optimal and preferred in a depraved world who seeks its own way.  Many in Christendom seek not to offend with “morality” or “political activism” because it is not “our primary mission”. Yet Jesus shared that both the expansion of the Kingdom AND His righteousness are like hand in glove, equal and inseparable. One mission is not above the other – they are both equal and simultaneous to the betterment of the whole – they indeed together they are the ONE mission.

The father of the post-communistic Republic of Czechoslovakia was a man named Vaclav Havel, who for a short time served as President of his newly freed country.  For forty years his nation had endured the legacy of Communism. Havel himself had been persecuted and jailed because of his beliefs; his public admonitions and the fervor of his intellectual drive were dangerous to the previous communist rulers.  Now in 1990, his first New Years Day address to his people as president, he will repeat his admonition which won him jail just a scant 13 years previously:

“…we are living in a decayed moral environment…all of us are responsible, each to a different degree, for keeping the totalitarian machine running. None of us is merely a victim of it, because all of us helped create it together. Our first president said, ‘Jesus and not Caesar.’…This idea has once again been reawakened in us.”

Indeed Brother Havel, we each and every one of us have contributed to our culture’s morally depraved environment. The individual IS the culture in which they are a part. Our inactivity and attention to detail as believers in Christ has resulted in our current moral climate (which includes but is not limited to) exclusion of God from the public square, the death to millions as the result of abortion, the raising of the banner of militant homosexuality which seeks the elimination of all Christian belief and virtue, and the total moral depravity of when a sitting President of the United States is unable and unwilling to call for the resignation of a congressman of his own party because of public moral indifference.  May God forgive us for not taking a stand, and for miss-understanding that without advocating biblical morality with the message of Jesus we cannot win and the Kingdom cannot expand – they are both part and parcel the same message and both will lead to the other for they are ONE.  Without advancing both, we will fall and fail to the uttermost. Contra mundum. Where do you stand?