Pax Romana

What Paul is saying in Romans 13 is that Christians have a distinct responsibility as well as a definite advantage in the area of good citizenship.  The christian citizen's first question is not:  "What are my rights? Am I getting justice?" His first concern is: "Am I living by the law of love?"

By concerning yourself with the positive "do's" of love, you automatically avoid entanglement with a long list of "don'ts" that is necessary to insure justice for all.  Obeying the law of love throws a completely different light on good citizenship.  You obey institutional rules and regulations not because you primarily want to avoid trouble, but because you seek the common good of all.  You obey traffic laws not to stay out of jail or traffic court, but because you respect the lives and property of others  You pay your taxes and fees not because you fear a possible chat with the IRS, but because you believe in government and financing its operation. 

The Christian who lives by the law of love does not see authority as a threat.  Nor does he see imperfections or even gross errors in government as reason to riot or demonstrate unlawfully.  The Christian is not a bystander in his society.  Actually he should be in the thick of the battle for justice, morality and the right.  But the Christian operates with a different motive.  He seeks justice for all, yes, but justice is primarily a negative concept, based on avoiding or preventing the doing of wrongs to others.  The law of love goes beyond justice.  The law of love seeks the positive doing of good to others.  It is the only law a Christian needs.

But perhaps Paul's most important reason for advising support of the Roman government was because he saw Rome as God's tool for keeping the lid on an otherwise hopelessly explosive situation.

Paul believed in using the "pax Romana" (the Roman peace that prevailed during his time) to the advantage of the gospel.  As long as there was peace, even a rigidly (sometimes cruelly) enforced one, Paul saw greater opportunity to spread the gospel.  Whether Rome knew it or not, in Paul's mind Rome was helping him do his missionary work.  And for this reason, the wise Christian would always try to help, not hinder the state.

Fritz Ridenour, How To Be A Christian Without Being Religious

Living Sacrifice

To live as Paul suggests in Romans 12 is humanly impossible.  It is, however, supernaturally possible, as he clearly pointed out back in chapters 6, 7 and 8 of Romans.  Walking in the Spirit is not some quaint religious exercise.  It is for the street, where you live.

Paul is getting painfully practical now.  You say you are crucified with Christ?  You say you have "died to sin and risen again with Christ?"  What better way, then, to test all your new powers than to see if you actually can live and love unselfishly.  To try to love others unselfishly and at the same time be concerned with standing up for your rights is a contradiction in terms.  You cannot serve God and self.  You cannot go around with the Bible in one hand and waving your personal Bill of Rights in the other.

There are all kinds of excuses "to not get carried away" with the list of good deeds in Romans 12.  But the excuses don't make the standard any less valid.  Paul is not nailing up a list of laws that the Christian has to obey without a slip.  He is setting up goals to aim at, to set your sights on.

Of course you won't do a perfect job of unselfish loving.  Of course you may be criticized, even laughed at.  But when Paul talks in Romans 12 of honoring others, of never being lax in Christian zeal, of being glad and patient in trouble, of helping others in need, of praying for those who harm you . . . he is simply putting muscle on the idea of presenting your body as a "living sacrifice" (Rom 12:1).

This business of being a living sacrifice was well put by a missionary who had this advice for a young fellow who was thinking about the mission field:

"Instead of going to the refrigerator for a bite before going to bed, or to the corner drugstore for a coke, try going to bed without it.  You won't die and you won't miss it when you can't get it out here."

"Try cutting the chatter in order to get home earlier or to give more time to studies or devotions.  Out here you may have to go for months at a time without friendly chinfests with others of your own language.  Discipline yourself to eat things you don't like, without choking and without griping."

"Kick yourself out of bed before the heat comes on in order to spend time with the Lord.  Next camp you go to, try sleeping for two weeks on the floor. Find out if your call and Christian joy vary in inverse proportion to the comforts and conveniences."

"I'm not dreaming these things up.  I'm thinking of people who so missed ice cream and candy, who couldn't get along without the fellowship of others, who were always complaining of the cold, or who couldn't settle down to serious work unless they had eight hours on an inner spring mattress, that they made excuses for not getting the work done.  In some cases these were definitely contributing factors to their leaving the field, quitting."

"But I'm not going to the mission field," you say.  Aren't you?  Where do you think you are right now?  Is your home, or school, or place of work really any less a mission field than the streets of Bombay or the Auca country of Peru?

Every Christian is a missionary, because a missionary is one who is sent to bring and to be the Good News to others.  Every Christian is called to present his body as a living sacrifice.  Don't just pretend to love others.  Really love them - by going out of your way to help them, by taking their guff, by overlooking their faults, by refusing to retaliate, especially in the sophisticated game of repartee and cutting conversation that so many of us play so well.

Does your Christianity reveal a bogus brand of counterfeit love?  Genuine Christian love means first that you sincerely, unselfishly offer your daily life to God.  He then proves, tests, and tempers your sincerity and unselfishness by sending you out to live among your fellow men.

We all fail, some of us many times, to show perfect Christian love.  But faith begins where failure leaves off.  We are not only saved from the penalty of sin by faith.  We not only conquer sin and temptation by faith.  We serve and love by faith as well.

It is in this living and loving and serving . . .it is in the daily routine - the "rat race" of life - that you have countless opportunities to be a living sacrifice . . . or just a burnt offering.

Fritz Ridenour,  How To Be A Christian Without Being Religious

Maria Von Trapp

An excerpt from Mark Roberts blog.................

In my last post, I suggested that God’s guidance is not only for our personal benefit, though we are surely helped when God guides us. But divine guidance is often for the sake of others, and ultimately for the sake of God and His purposes.
This truth about God reminds me of a wonderful scene from The Sound of Music. Maria had set her heart upon becoming a nun and was in the midst of her candidacy to join a religious order. But her ability to accept the disciplines of convent life was in question. So, the leader of the abbey, who exercised complete authority over Maria’s life, sent her away to serve as the governess for the incorrigible Von Trapp children. To Maria’s surprise and horror, she unintentionally fell in love with their father, Captain Von Trapp. Fleeing back to the safety of the abbey, Maria tried to bury her love for the captain, a love which would surely compromise her commitment to becoming a nun.

Julie Andrews as Maria van Trapp in The Sound of Music

When the abbess finally gets Maria to talk about what happened at the Von Trapp home, the confused girl confesses her love for Captain Von Trapp. She begs the Reverend Mother for the opportunity to make her religious vows immediately, thereby removing forever the possibility of marrying the captain. But the abbess does a most surprising thing. Rather than accepting Maria into the holy order and protecting her from a marriage that would preclude her becoming a nun, the Reverend Mother orders Maria to return to the Von Trapp home. Disregarding Maria’s urgent pleas for admission to holy orders, she insists that Maria must test her love for the captain and thereby discover God’s will for her life.
Unhappily, Maria submits to the Reverend Mother’s command because she has no other choice. As a candidate for the abbey, Maria has submitted her life to the authority of the abbess. But we can see that this wise woman exercises her authority, not only for the good for her order, but for Maria’s good as well. Her guidance, however authoritative, is supremely wise and gracious, even though Maria cannot see it at the time.
So it with God’s guidance and our response. We obey God’s directions because we should. It’s the only right thing to do. But even when we can’t see how God’s ways are the best for us, they always are. Like the Reverend Mother, the Lord deserves our complete obedience. And, like the Reverend Mother, our gracious Heavenly Father guides us into the life of greatest fulfillment. When God directs us for his own purposes, we discover that his purposes include our blessing and joy.
This illustration from The Sound of Music helps us to see how obeying God can lead, not only to God’s good, but to our good as well. What it doesn’t capture is the miraculous and peculiar way God actually worked in the real life of the real Maria von Trapp. I’ll explain what I mean in my next post.

Spiritual Guidance: For Whose Benefit? Part 3

In my last post, I used an example from the movie The Sound of Music to illustrate how God’s directions for us are best, even when we can see this in the moment. Like the Reverend Mother who sent Maria back to the von Trapp family, God oftens “sends” us to places that don’t seem best to us. But, in fact, they are the best.

The real Maria von Trapp

We can see this illustrated in the fictional version of the life of Maria von Trapp. But, in fact, her real life contained some striking examples of God’s unexpected guidance. Here’s an excerpt from the family history on the von Trapp website:
The movie strongly portrays Maria as the epitome of religious devotion in and out of convent life. Most people are unaware that she was raised as a socialist and atheist and became actively cynical towards all religions. Those beliefs quickly and dramatically changed by the chance meeting of a visiting Jesuit priest to Maria’s college.
Maria had entered a crowded church assuming she was about to enjoy a concert by Bach. Instead, a well known priest, Father Kronseder had just begun preaching. Caught in the middle of a standing-room-only crowd, Maria soon found herself caught up in the words of this preacher.
In Maria’s words, “Now I had heard from my uncle that all of these Bible stories were inventions and old legends, and that there wasn’t a word of truth in them. But the way this man talked just swept me off my feet. I was completely overwhelmed by it . . . .” When he finished his sermon and came down the pulpit stairs Maria grabbed his elbow and loudly asked, “Do you believe all this?”
A meeting between the priest and Maria changed her beliefs and the course of her life.
Though Maria was intensely devoted to her convent, she was taken away from the outdoor activities she once thrived on. Her doctor was concerned her health was failing due to a lack of fresh air and exercise. This was when the decision was made to send Maria to the home of retired naval captain Georg von Trapp. Her position was not governess to all the children, as the movie portrayed, but specifically to the captain’s daughter who was bedridden with rheumatic fever. The rest is truly history. Maria never returned to the convent and married the Captain on November 26, 1927. This is the story that has been made immortalized by The Sound of Music.
The von Trapp family began singing publicly, not because it was part of their escape from Austria to Switzerland, as in the movie, but as a result of what must have seemed like terrible misfortune to the von Trapps. When the family lost its wealth in the worldwide depression of the 1930s, they considered singing as a way of making money. At first the father was reticent, but according to one of his daughters, in the end he “accepted it as God’s will that they sing for others.” The family did indeed win first place at the Salzburg Music Festival in 1936, as depicted in the movie. And their singing was part of what helped them leave Austria, though without hiking over the mountains to Switzerland.
In the story of the real Maria von Trapp, we see how God uses circumstances, even apparently negative ones, to guide and bless and use his people. First, God led her to faith through her attendance at an evangelistic event that she mistakenly thought was going to be a concert. Second, her poor health in the convent was what led to her being assigned to the von Trapp family. And that which ended up bringing her family much acclaim, namely their professional singing, was something they did out of necessity when they lost their fortune.
Maria, by the way, remained a faithful Christian all of her life. In the 1950s she, along with her own children, Johannes and Rosmarie, and her stepdaughter Maria, went to New Guinea to do mission work there. Although Maria (senior) contracted malaria and didn’t remain in New Guinea for a long time, her children stayed on for several years, with Maria (junior) doing mission work in New Guinea for thirty years.
So the story of the real Maria von Trapp reminds us that God’s ways are not our ways, and that God’s guidance often comes packaged in unexpected forms. Yet he can use even the unexpected and the apparently negative both for our good and for his purposes.

Jesus Set Us Free

So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: "Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law. Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because "the righteous will live by faith." Gal 3:9-11

So if you still claim that God's blessings go to those who are "good enough," then you are saying that God's promises to those who have faith are meaningless, and faith is foolish.  But the fact of the matter is this: when we try to gain God's blessing and salvation by keeping his laws we always end up under His anger, for we always fail to keep them.  The only way we can keep from breaking laws is not to have any to break!

So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don't get tied up again in slavery to the law. Gal 5:1


So God's blessings are given to us by faith, as a free gift; we are certain to get them whether or not we follow Jewish customs if we have faith like Abraham's, for Abraham is the father of us all when it comes to these matters of faith.  That is what the Scriptures mean when they say that God made Abraham the father of many nations.  God will accept all people in every nation who trust God as Abraham did.  And this promise is from God himself, who makes the dead live again and speaks of future events with as much certainty as though they were already past.

How to Be A Christian Without Being Religious
Fritz Ridenour



 

Dr. Jim Garrow

Connecting Dots - A Pastime:

A recent conversation that I was on the periphery of, and listening to, was about the Gods that folks have and believe in and it was mentioned that at the end of a speech today, Obama said , God bless. Which raises for me the specter of who and what the God that Obama references is. As a young man in Indonesia Obama was a devoted muslim and learned to bow to allah and... to obey the teachings of Muhammad. Later as a young lecturer at the University of Chicago Obama sang the praises of a new mentor in Saul Alinsky and his guidebook for community organizers and those that would understand the Constitution and how to go under, over and around it. The book that was known as " The Bible" of the movement is one that many have heard of " Rules for Radicals", a book studied with religious fervor and quoted chapter and verse by the radicals of a previous era but of all its students one has shone as he who rose to the pinnacle of opportunity in the dreamland of marxist heaven. He is now the President of the United States - The Great Satan of his youth at his feet. He can now fulfill the hopes and aspirations of the Saudis who planted him and funded him, along with George Soros whose desire to supplant the democratic republic has kept him awake for decades. And Lucifer himself, to whom the book, "Rules for Radicals" was dedicated, he must be overjoyed at the sheer magnitude of the opportunity to put a stick into the eye of God in stripping away the foundations built on the God breathed Scriptures of the Bible and the great Republic which was dedicated by its founders to the service of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Lucifers devotee having been inspired and empowered and emboldened by the knowledge dedicated to he as the "original radical" must be in "seventh heaven" as it were. We mere mortals are seeing the edge of hell itself. God help us. - Dr. Jim Garrow -