Christian Philosophy Makes Strange Bedfellows

In explaining the reasoning of why the congregation of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Atlanta plans to retain their homosexual pastor in defiance of an order by Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to dismiss him, a worship assistant said: “He exemplifies the kind of love and empathy I envision Christ to have had.”[i] In this small statement there is something very revealing about the peculiar stance of professing Christians who are at odds with the Bible. Christ is spoken of here in the past tense, or as a dead man.

To these “social justice” congregants Christ is revered as a historical figure who had egalitarian ideas,[ii] gave eloquent speeches, did good deeds, and died to bring attention to his cause of social service. This contrasts worshiping Christ as a risen, living savior whose subjects obey Him as King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. Adherents to a social justice Christ claim his endorsement for practicing what society at large desires as just treatment. Consequently, there are many passages of scripture they redact from their studies, such as: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil”(Mat 5:17). 

To fulfill, Jesus Christ came to pay the perfect price for every trespass of every law, for every one who ever lived; and the price was His life. That is God’s justice. Because He knew no sin, death could not rightfully hold Him; so He lives, and because He lives we can live too. That is God’s mercy. The grave, with its passageway leading to Hell, cannot be victorious over those who accept the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ by faith, and follow Him.

In all this, God did not repudiate His laws as the standard for perfection; instead, He made a way to escape the penalty of the law by imputing perfection into those who by faith would receive it. In this acceptance, their must be the acknowledgement that the law is just, and all have fallen short of it. The law remains as the standard which must be met for those who would achieve perfection on their own; a testament of what the fruit of righteousness would look like by the absence of sin, and a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ for justification by faith. If we willingly deny the law, we deny Christ; and we remain under the schoolmaster subject to the penalty of the law.[iii]

In light of clear Christian doctrine, how can there be such a dichotomy between those who preach God’s justice in order to extend God’s mercy, and those who preach social justice in order to extend society’s lasciviousness? The latter are actually Christian philosophers, and as such they deliberate in the court of the philosophers; joining that eclectic group who embrace such ideas as suit them in exchange for those which no longer serve their interests for the present time. It is a court wherein nothing can be proved against you for a certainty, as therein is no certainty. This is how they have come to reject the certainty of the law, and the certainty that Christ lives.

Notes:

[i] Giovanna Dell\’Orto “Lutheran Flock Stands Up for Defrocked Pastor,” The Christian Post, February 16, 2007.

http://www.christianpost.com/article/20070216

/25847_Lutheran_Flock_Stands_Up_for_Defrocked_Pastor.htm

[ii] Giovanna “Lutheran Flock Stands Up for Defrocked Pastor”.

[iii] Gal 3:24-25 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. (25) But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.