This is an elaboration of my eight points from the previous post.  But the broader purpose of this short series is to identify why I think we should not seek solace that there is some middle ground that reasonable people are ultimately going to arrive at.  I believe that there is a broader underlying spiritual conflict behind many (if not all) of the conflicts that we see in this world. Especially over those contesting morality and truth. And what I believe are Biblical observations below are why I don’t see us reaching some common ground. As I often say, neither God nor Satan are interested in a truce.

The Bible records only two broad categories of people–those that bow the knee to God, and those that do not.

In the Bible, from its earliest pages in Genesis, we see a division of humanity—the seed of the serpent, and the seed of the woman.  In Gen 3:15, the proto-evangel (first proclamation of the Gospel), we see “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her seed.  He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.”  The early chapters of Genesis detail the outworking of what the seed of the woman looks like (the line of Seth), vs the seed of the serpent (the line of Cain), and the growing conflict between these two groups.  God’s choice in always “setting apart” a people for himself continues with his call of Abram, and his promises through Isaac (not Ishmael!) and Jacob (not Esau!).  Now it wasn’t due to particular problems of Ishmael or Esau that caused them not to be chosen, nor was it any inherent worth of Isaac or Jacob, but rather God’s sovereign choice (Romans 9:6-13).  And what was true of individuals was true of the broader collective, as God set apart the nation of Israel from the rest of the world.  As God says in Deut 7:6-8

For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. “The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the Lord  brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

God continued with his “setting apart” of a people to himself in the New Testament, when God fulfilled the promise to Abram that all the nations would be blessed through him.  Rather than Jew vs. Gentile as the contrast, the distinction is now those that are “in Christ” and those that are not (Romans 8:1-11).  The new and better covenant is for all peoples, if they will believe.

Within the category of God followers, there are some that are true followers, and some that are self-deceived.

This falls out of both OT and NT scripture passages.  Some OT Jewish covenant members had a false view that simply being a child of Abraham meant that one was automatically a child of God.  John the Baptist rebuked that idea (Matt 3:9); warning the Jews that they should not trust their Jewish lineage, “for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham.” When Elijah complained to God that he alone was left, God said that he had preserved a remnant, “7,000 in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal (1 Kings 19:18).  Jesus said that in the judgment “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”  Paul makes very clear that it was only the children of the promise, not the children of the flesh that were truly God’s chosen.  Those in opposition to Jesus message of grace were serving Satan, but they didn’t even know it–they were self-deceived.  And in the Parable of the Tares, we see that false Christians will grow up in the church alongside true Christians, but in the end, the angels will gather the tares for the fire.  These verses should convince us (and there are many more that we could quote) that we will have people claim to be following God, and even speaking for God, but they are deceived servants of our enemy.

The God followers see complete truth dimly, as in a mirror, but their minds more accurately learn and understand God’s will for all of life the more they immerse themselves in God’s word with God’s people.

Just as the disciples were under Jesus’ teaching for three years, and yet Thomas could still say to Jesus “show us the Father,” and earn Jesus’ rebuke, so too is the process of having our minds conformed to Christ a process.  Paul says we see now in a mirror dimly, but one day we will see face to face.  Lengthy time in a church is insufficient in and of itself for knowledge; the Holy Spirit must work in us we study God’s word.  Jesus rebuked Nicodemus, a teacher of Israel, for failing to recognize the truth.  Nor are you ever really “there” in your knowledge; Paul had to rebuke Peter, the leader of the early church, as his actions belied his stated faith.  Yet sound doctrine is accessible and should be pursued–we are commanded to rightly handle the word of truth.   Psalm 1 and 119 (et. Al.) help us see the benefits of meditating on God’s word; verse 99 of Psalm 119 tells us that diligent study will make us wiser than our teachers.  Hebrews 4:12 reminds us of the power of the word of God as the Holy Spirit gives us minds of revelation to transform us.  Our call is to stay in community and seek and promote sound doctrine.  This suggests that while we may not have all the answers today, growth in Christ will give us the wisdom we need to address the issues of our lives.

Those that do not follow God, will increasingly rebel and be resentful of anybody that claims that there is a higher authority that binds us.

Romans 1:18-32 describes the vicious spiral downward of those that reject God.  And careful study of this passage will reveal the root problem as not being the wickedness that flows out of their rejection of God, but rather unbelief itself.  “Although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but became futile in their speculations and their foolish hearts were darkened.  Professing to be wise, they became fools…and exchanged the truth of God for a lie.”  This rejection of God gets worse and worse, culminating in “Although they know the ordinance of God that those that practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same but also give hearty approval to those that practice such things.”  Those that despise God will increasingly rejoice as others join them in their wickedness.  Further, we should note that this is the rejection of God’s authority and human exultation of our own claimed autonomy from our creator.  This is the Spirit of Sodom–not homosexuality per se–when the Sodomites said,  “This fellow came to sojourn, and he has become the judge! Now we will deal worse with you than with them.”  The idea that there was a moral authority above their own was what so angered the Sodomites, and Lot’s pointing to their wickedness angered them greatly.  They declared their human autonomy over any external authority claims and threatened violence against any who would say otherwise.  Jesus warned us that just as the world hated him, so it would hate his followers. 

As an implication of the preceding, there is no neutrality–you are either on God’s side or you are not.

The Bible shows no middle ground; you are either a child of God or a child of the devil.  And if you do not love your Christian brother, you do not love God (1 John 4:20). 

If you are on God’s side, it is by His sheer grace, so there is no room for boasting. Further, your earnest desire must be that God in His mercy might enlighten those that are hostile toward God.

Ephesians 2 reminds us that we were children of wrath, just like the rest.  But God! Our salvation is solely due to his mercy and not by “our own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”  Jesus call to Paul was that he would “open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God.”  We should likewise seek to serve unbelievers to turn them away from darkness to light.

Those that are not followers of God can often be morally correct on an issue, even though they are personally hostile to God, to the extent that their thinking aligns with a Biblical worldview.

God’s common grace provides blessings to those that will submit to His external standards.  If you follow the moral law of God, your life will generally be pretty good.  If you are honest, hardworking, kind to others (even while refusing to submit to God), life is just better.  As an example of this, the success sequence is clear.  Graduate from high school, get a job, get married, then have kids (in that order), and then stay married, and stay working, and you are far less likely to enter into poverty.  If you apply the wisdom of Proverbs to your life, even if you do not trust in Jesus, your life circumstances will be better.  In Acts 5, Rabbi Gamaliel provided sound counsel to the Jews on how to treat Christians, even though he was not of the faith.  Many pious cult members and members of other faiths are often morally correct on issues, even while being lost.  So we should carefully consider the arguments of others, testing whether they are in conformity with the Bible.

Conversely, those that are followers of God can be morally wrong on an issue, even though they personally love Jesus Christ, to the extent that their thinking is not consistent with a Biblical worldview. 

Simon the magician may or may not have been a convert, but if he was, he was seriously mistaken on what that meant, and rebuked by Peter for his missing what the gospel was about in Acts 9.  Many of the early Jewish Christians did not fully understand what grace meant, and continued to bring Jewish customs into the mix, until the issue was clarified at the Council at Jerusalem in Acts 15.  How many failures do we see of the disciples that Jesus had to rebuke?  To be a Christian is not to be perfect, or to necessarily be right, it is to be forgiven and reconciled to a Holy God.  For the Christian as well as the non-Christian, the question about truth (on any issue) is always “how does this position square with the sound doctrine of Scripture?”

In the next post I will provide some further implications from these realities.