Cedarville Magazine, Fall 2014

Cedarville Magazine | 9 In difficult times, Christians express anger at the mission field that God has given us, or we respond with a siege mentality in which we lament and bemoan culture. The Apostle Paul does not respond that way. The Lord Jesus did not respond that way. We are not playing for the approval of American culture. We are pointing to something more permanent than American culture. We are part of the kingdom of God that is a goal of the redeemed of every tribe, tongue, nation, and language. That gives us a steeled spine and a confident tranquility as we move forward. InActs 26:19–29, Paul is not afraid tomake themost controversial claims he could possibly speak in this context. He understands no matter what happens in Agrippa’s court or the Roman Empire, he is not a loser. He knows he is part of the body of Christ. He knows he is seated with Christ at the right hand of the throne of the Most High (Colossians 3:1–3). Paul is standing before Agrippa with confidence because the worst thing that can possibly happen to Paul has already happened. He has already been crucified under the curse of God, hidden in Jesus Christ. The best thing that could happen is not his freedom or an audience with Caesar; the best thing that can happen to Paul is to be raised from the dead and crowned with glory and honor. That has happened in Jesus Christ. If you and I believe that, why are we fearful and frantic? Transcendent Motivation Some secular people object to our claims of religious liberty, but not because they’re plotting our destruction like super villains. They don’t really understand the motivation of someone who would say, “I will stand one day before the judgment seat of Christ and I will give an account.”They assume there must be some other motivation. It must be about money or political power. It can’t really be about honoring the Lord. We must fight in the courtroom, advocate in public opinion, and work in the culture, but the most important thing we can do to safeguard religious liberty is raise up a new generation of Christians motivated by the fear of the Lord and the advance of the Gospel. They will not be vulnerable to the sort of discount store-prosperity gospel that we see so often in American culture. If you have been called to speak what Jesus has given to you to say and to speak in the way Jesus speaks, then venting outrage is not enough. Paul is seeking to persuade. Agrippa notices this: “Are you trying to persuade me to be a Christian?” He’s not only trying to persuade in terms of evangelism, he’s also trying to persuade in terms of his own freedom. That is exactly the sort of posture that we are going to have to have as we seek to engage with people who disagree with us about our theological claims. We have to persuade Kingdom of God citizenship should increase our resolve Excerpted from remarks made by Russell Moore at the Religious Freedom Summit on October 10, 2014 people why religious liberty matters to everybody, even to those who don’t agree with us. The Authority of Christ An attitude can emerge within the Church that says we should hand over our religious liberty rights. That sounds really spiritual and pious. It sounds almost as though we’re doing what Jesus did when He stands before Pilate and He doesn’t offer a word in His own defense. In a democratic republic, we’re not standing where Jesus stood. We’re standing where Pilate stood. And in a democratic republic, we’re not standing where Paul stood, we’re standing where Agrippa stood, because the ultimate accountability, the Caesar of Romans chapter 13, rests with the people of the United States of America. We have to be the people who are constantly saying that the conscience is not an abandoned building that can just be moved out of the way of the government. If we do not speak for liberty of conscience, religious liberty, and the freedom of the church, we are handing over a new generation to government power setting itself up as a god. Culture is going to be more and more alarmed by the things we believe. We’re seeing that nowwith human sexuality. There are many who would say, “We can make our way in the culture much easier if we just throw overboard what we believe about human sexuality and about marriage.” We don’t have the authority to rewrite a Christian sexual ethic because we didn’t make it up. It was given to us by a resurrected King Jesus. We have to stand and articulate the Gospel with which we’ve been entrusted. But we don’t do that as those who are angry and outraged. We don’t do that as those who somehow think we are entitled to be in charge. We do that as those who are bearing witness to a truth that has found us on our way to whatever Damascus we were headed toward. Russell D. Moore is the President of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, the moral concerns and public policy entity of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.