Some of you were born for bold declaration of unapologetic truth. You are, maybe, one in a thousand; you are a rare breed, designed by God with that precise ability to care so deeply that you cannot be silent while, at the same time, caring so very little about what your hearers may think or say in their response to your message. You can’t bear with wrongs being left unaddressed anymore. There is no hint of complacency in your bones and it is nearly impossible for you to quench the urge to make wrong things right. Some people think you are arrogant and opinionated. Sometimes you yourself wonder if you are because you live in the world of the silent, indulgent and tolerant. Why is it that you see what others will not? You seem to churn on the inside while everyone else is relaxing. They are sipping lemonade while you are ingesting rocket fuel and always looking for launch. Why are you the way you are? If this description doesn’t sound anything like you, then maybe you can ask if it is legitimate for you to assume that the person in your life who DOES fit this description needs to change his or her ways. Is there anyone out there who actually “gets it” anymore? The words of an ancient teenager who would one day become king over a staggering people ring in your mind as you hear David ask, “Is there not a cause?” Friend, you are not imagining things. You are a modern-day prophet and God has put His mark upon you among a thousand of your contemporaries who are not called by Him to make this same stand that drives you within. By the way, fellow-prophet, what are you doing lately with that voice of yours?
“And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before Me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.” – Ezekiel 22:30
God was looking for a prophet and could not locate even one. Little may have changed since Ezekiel’s lifetime. I am convinced that there are many people among the followers of Christ who have been somehow stunned into stupefying silence when God has equipped and commissioned them to speak out. This cutthroat culture has told them to carry their faith in a briefcase or to encrypt it in a secret file-folder on their hard-drive. Christians will be patronizingly tolerated in the modern world but those pesky, naive followers of Jesus need to understand that this is a brand new generation which has little time to slow down and lend an ear to an archaic message out of step with the times. We are to keep our political views silent. Go ahead and gather on Sundays in your churches but recognize that moral issues should be decided upon in our private educational institutes and among the elitists who populate the system of law. Bible preaching hillbillies had their day but it is clear that the sun has set on those years and Christians need to drop their end of the rope and cross the line onto the team that has the trending tug in their favor. Sadly, I cannot place legitimate blame with the culture because this hardness to biblical Christianity is nothing new. Our system has never been favorable to the Gospel of Jesus Christ though there was a time when the voices of the committed believers expressed majority rule here. Truth suppressed deceit in those days. Love exterminated selfishness. Sacrifice was enthroned above entitlement because Christians used their voices then. What has happened is not so much a change in the foundation of the system but, instead, the accepted silence by the Church which has given much more opportunity for that world system and its flaws to be accepted. Good men have done little to nothing for long enough so that there is now a puzzling question about what good even means anymore. While prophets held their tongues, a shift occurred.
The prophets have fallen silent. This is where culpability rests. Stop blaming Washington DC, Hollywood or the liberal media for what is happening around us. Blame the pantomiming prophets. Point a finger in their collective face. Maybe that will motivate them to start speaking up again.
Evangelists and preachers want to pack their houses of worship. Ministry leaders want to ride the wave of the latest cool thing to do in the name of Jesus. Church attenders want to be attached to a pastor who is well-known, culturally relevant, acceptable in his diplomacy and deferential in his personality (that ugly sound you just heard was me retching in my trash can). There is an elusive spirit in our day that wants to place a tightly sewn, satin-lined, diamond studded muzzle on that man or woman of God who was framed by his or her maker to be vocal dynamite. Sadly, many love the feel of that muzzle on their heads and have taken comfort that, although they have lost their freedom to roar, there is still the ability to engage in a pleasant whistle of some quaint tune that brings a sentimental smile to those who hear. This is partly what is wrong with our generation: prophets whistle while the heathen rage and few are asking what David could not keep silent:
“Is there not a cause?” There certainly is. There are simply not enough of us willing to speak on it anymore.
Why are so many Christians scared to share the Gospel with others? Is it because they are fearful of the opinion of others? Who cares what others think!!! If you are fearful, ask God for courage. Carry a pocket or pocketbook full of tracts with you all the time. If you eat out, wrap up the tip around a tract and ask the waiter or waitress to read it when they get home because it has the most important message they will ever read. Start a conversation in a long line at the store. Going by their response, begin to tell them how much Jesus loves them and that we are all sinners.
Do I hear a valiant call to arms? : )
I think yes and it is good!
I have been accused, more than once, of arrogance and intolerance. Through that experience, I did learn to listen to others’ positions more, but I confess it is more tactical than tolerance. I figure if I listen to them, I will eventually get the floor.
I’m one of 12 Christians who regularly meet in a group of folks who believe in “something”. We respect the house we are in and hear them out during the official meet, but each of us meet individually with a “something” person afterwards and cross that line to unapologetically share Christ. He saved our very lives; we must be a part of him saving another.
My pulpit tends to be a motorcycle or a Waffle House, but the mission is the same.
In this country I do not face beheading for my faith. I’d like to think I have the frame to bear rejection or at least their awkward silence and offense.
Yea Jeff! Now…I must go and watch Braveheart for the millionth time! : )
Yet another part of the message required for that “one last chance for repentance”. The Lord is priming the pump.