Mark Adcock is pastor of New Life Christian Fellowship in Fortville.
In case you haven’t noticed, we are living through a season of culture wars. These battles rage all around us.
No longer is the world tolerant of Christians and our point of view. We are often painted as being bigoted, rude and oppressive to people who live differently from how we live.
If you are like me, you want to be obedient to the call of Scripture to “make disciples.” But often when we speak of our God and our faith, people in the world become aggressive toward us and want to battle. What are we to do? How are we as Christians to act?
For me, I have settled for fighting these culture wars using similar tactics as the world uses against me. But what if we as Christians are called to something different?
Listen for a moment to what the Apostle Paul says: “For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ…”
Perhaps it is time for us to rethink the way we are battling with the world. Paul says that our weaponry is different from the weapons that the world uses. The world uses a wide assortment of tactics to try to win its battles.
Ray Steadman writes, “What does the world use to try to solve the problems it recognizes in society? Well, you know what it uses: Coercion, manipulation, pressure groups, compromises, demonstrations that ultimately result in raised voices, in clenched fists and outbreaks of conflict, boycotts, pickets and strikes, in attempts to pressure people into doing what others want. These are the weapons of the world. It does not have any others. So it is understandable why those who are governed by the flesh would seek to employ fleshly weapons to get things done. But the universal testimony of history is, these do not work.”
Our weapons are different from the world’s weapons. So what are we to rely upon?
The greatest weapon we have is Truth. The world’s truth is far from THE TRUTH. As we seek to influence the culture, we must know the truth and we must present it to a world that doesn’t understand it.
When people walk in darkness they have no understanding of the light. But when we present it, it has power to bring about change.
Remember, though, that how we present truth is important. Ephesians 4:15 calls us to “speak truth in love.” My prayer in writing this is that we might winsomely insert the truth of the gospel into our communications with those who need Jesus. He is the truth.
And let us do so not to win an argument or debate, but because we love like Christ loves. And always remember, Jesus said, “the truth shall set you free!”
Mark Adcock is pastor of New Life Christian Fellowship in Fortville. This weekly column is written by local clergy members.
