God's Love That Will Never Let You Go

Carl Sandburg wrote poetry, children’s books, a massive biography of Abraham Lincoln, a novel, and autobiographical works.   With all these varied writings to his credit,  Sandburg was asked by newsman Edward R. Murrow how he wanted to be known.  He replied:

I'd rather be known as a man who says What I need mainly is three things in life, 
         possibly four: to be out of jail, to eat regular, to get what I write printed and then 
a little love at home and a little outside" (Niven 632).

By the time Sandburg cited those four things, his answer reflected a sense of humor.  By then, he didn’t have to worry a lot about any of those four things.  But earlier in his life, he had some concern for all four.
He said he wanted “to be out of jail.”  As a young man in his twenties, Sandburg spent a few nights in jail for hopping a freight train.
He said he wanted “to eat regular.”  As the son of Swedish immigrants, he dropped out of school as a young teenager in order to help support his family.  As a young adult, Sandburg worked at many different jobs.  Later, he was the proverbial starving poet, so there probably were times when  he didn’t “eat regular.”  Like most poets Sandburg didn’t make much money from that.  But when his Lincoln biography was published, he started making lots of money.  The rest of his life, Sandburg was able to provide comfortably for his wife and their three daughters as long as they lived.  So he had to look back a good many years to worry whether he would be able “to eat regular.” 
He said he wanted “to get what I write printed.”  As I mentioned, Sandburg saw a great deal of his work published over the decades of his long life.
But it’s the last of Sandburg’s four needs I want to call attention to:  He wanted “a little love at home and a little outside.”   Carl and Paula Sandburg shared a love through nearly sixty years of marriage and sought to pass that love along to their daughters.  So he knew more than “a little love at home and a little outside" as a greatly admired and loved figure in America for several decades.

        

TRANSITION
        Human love, such as the Sandburgs shared, is a wonderful thing.  At its best, our love for each other reflects the love of God.  It is God’s love we look at this morning.
Each week at the close of the Baraca Radio Sunday School broadcast, I remind people of three promises from God.  Starting today -- and for the next two weeks -- I plan to devote a lesson to each of the three:
God’s love that will never let you go,
God’s grace that is greater than all your sin,
God’s peace that passes all understanding.
Today, the first promise:
God’s love that will never let you go.

BIBLE PASSAGE---ROMANS 8:31-39
Our focal passage is from the eighth chapter of Romans.  The final verses are full of assurance that God’s love is constant, that we can depend on that love in all conditions of life and of death.
The exact expression, “God’s love that will never let you go,” is not in the Bible but in a hymn:

O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be (Mattheson).

But the truth of God’s undying love is found time and again in Scripture.  And no place in the Bible is that truth stated more firmly than in Romans 8.  
St. Paul lists what I call “a catalog of disasters” -- 17 different things that can make us wonder whether God really does love us.  I’m not giving away any great secret to say up front -- not one of those 17 things will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
God’s love will never let you go.
Let’s begin with verses 31-32 of Romans 8:
  What then shall we say to this? If God is for us, who is against us?  He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, will he not also give us all things with him? 
Paul’s reasoning is that God loved us enough to send Jesus to die for us.  With that great gift of love, God surely will not withhold anything we need.   “God Almighty” can be a swear word, but here, it is a testimony to the might and power of God who is with us in everything life may throw at us.
If God is for us, who CAN BE against us?
  A commentary says---

Nothing can happen to us in this universe of God which will prevent us from sharing in the love
  of him who with the gift of is own Son will freely give us all things beside  (Arnold and Ford 213).

It’s Not Always Easy to Believe
When difficulties of one kind and another pile up, it isn’t always easy to believe in God’s love.   
Dr. J. P. McBeth put it this way:

It is difficult for some to feel a consciousness of Christ’s love while they are suffering.  They feel so unworthy of His love that they take afflictions as expressions of His wrath.
God loves, not because we deserve it but because we are in Christ.  The love of God is denoted,
not by the things we suffer but by what Christ suffered for us.  His love is not revealed in material
blessings, nor does affliction denote the absence of His love; but the cross is the eternal exhibition
of His love for us (McBeth 206).

This difficulty in believing in God’s love comes through on a massive scale with the Jewish Holocaust.  Part of the problem, both wide-scale and individually, comes with the idea that God controls everything which happens.  Something dreadful happens, and we assume God sent that misfortune. If I were a Jew, brought up to believe the Lord sends everything that happens, then I might be ready to cast aside my belief in God.  What sort of God would send six million of my ethnic and religious group to the gas chambers?
Or consider our individual lives:
A young woman carries a baby full-term, only to see it delivered stillborn,  If she believes God controls everything in her life, why would she not be angry at God?
A husband learns that his wife, the mother of his children, has died in a wreck on the Interstate.  If he believes God controls everything, why would he not be bitter?
Parents who were so proud of their son for serving his country in Iraq or Afghanistan get word that his body is being shipped home for burial.  If they believe God controls everything in their lives, how do they feel when the preacher tells them God loves them?
A middle-aged woman, Susan Jacoby, tells of the childhood experience of being puzzled by the illness of another young friend:

[W]hen I was 7 years old, I was taken by my mom to visit a friend who had been
       stricken by polio and was in an iron lung. Polio has basically been eradicated,
        but I grew up when polio was still a real threat to children, before the Salk vaccine.
       This childhood friend had been playing and running only three weeks before,
       and now he was in an iron lung.  And I asked my mom, "Why would God let something
       like that happen?" And to her credit,  instead of giving me some moronic answer,
       my mother said, "I don't know"  (McNally)

Let me add, I think that mother was wise in not attempting to explain the illness of her daughter’s young friend.
The analogy that gives me some measure of comfort and reassurance is the Fatherhood of God.  Any of us who have raised children or grandchildren have been pained in our hearts as we see our children do something which hurts them--physically or morally.  We don’t stop them at every turn to keep bad things from coming their way.  If we tried to do that, the children would remain helpless babies, always directly in our shadows.  It hurts us to see them get hurt.  But we let those things happen.  
        This is a parable for human suffering.  The Heavenly Father leaves His children free.  In our freedom, we do things which hurt ourselves.  We do things that hurt others. Often our wrong deeds have far-reaching impact.  
You may remember the man over in Georgia accused of holding his wife and their children as 
virtual prisoners in their home.  They were there so long, the children suffered malnutrition.  The wife was mortally afraid of this man she is married to.  There is no way on earth we can say God controlled what happened there.
I cannot say the loss of thousands of young American lives in Iraq and Afghanistan is under God’s control.  I cannot say the loss of the lives of more than a million citizens of those nations is pleasing to God.  All those deaths and countless additional permanent injuries must surely wound the loving heart of God.  
As we consider personal problems alongside great national and international calamities, hear again the question:   If God is for us, who is against us?
Verses 33-34 tell us, It is God who justifies.  And Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God .  .  . indeed intercedes for us.
In verse 35, Paul asks, Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Then he offers seven 
different situations that might make us think we have been separated from the love of Christ:
The first two are presented as a pair: tribulation, or distress.
Several times in the letters of Paul  (Romans 2:9; 2 Cor. 4:8), tribulation and distress come in the same breath.  These are two kinds of pressure--tribulation is from outside sources and distress is pressure from within us.  
The black church in America gave us many songs reflecting the pressure they felt in tribulation but also the faith that tribulation would not separate us from the love of Christ:
Here’s one song, from an unknown author, a lament in times of  tribulation: 

I been buked [that is,I been RE-buked] and I been scorned,
I been buked and I been scorned ,
I been talked about sure’s you born  (www.tccgospel.org).

  A song by Kevin Jackson testifies that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ:

When sadness comes your way 
In the wake of sunny days 
Jesus is there to pick you up and turn you around 
When the devil stops you from seeing your goal 
God steps in and takes control (Jackson).

In tribulation and distress, we may feel we have no way to escape the things that press in upon us (Arnold and Ford 66n).
Peter Senge distinguishes two kinds of adults: those who have “grown up” and those have “given up” (Senge 147).  Senge says people who learn to cope with problems and changes are “grown up.” By contrast, people overwhelmed by problems have “given up.”  \
We can say:  As we learn to rely on God in tribulation, or distress, we are growing up.  If we become discouraged in the face of  tribulation, or distress, we may be tempted to give up.
Paul’s whole point in today’s passage is, “Don’t give up.” Tribulation, or distress will not separate us from the love of Christ.
What about persecution?
If you are living a godly life but are abused for your dedication, is that a sign God has withdrawn His love?  No, persecution will not separate us from the love of Christ.
The next two examples Paul cites are famine, or nakedness.  Many times, severe persecution will lead to famine, or nakedness.  If we should be left without food and clothing, we might well feel separated from the love of God.  But Paul would say, No, famine or nakedness will not separate us from the love of Christ.
Perhaps we see a downward progression or a heightening of elements.  Dale Moody suggests tribulation, or distress are the basic examples of things we feel are separating from Christ’s love, and the rest in the sevenfold listing are examples of tribulation, or distress  (Moody 224f).
Again, persecution can lead to famine or nakedness, which put us in peril.  The last of these seven is the sword. “the instrument and emblem of the death penalty”  (Arnold and Ford 213). 
From the early years of the Christian church, there have been those who lost their lives because they were faithful.  Death is symbolized here as  the sword.  So does the sword separate us from the love of Christ?  Remember, Paul begins: If God is for us, who is against us?
God sent His Son Jesus to die for us so that, as we identify with Him through faith, we have all the resources of heaven behind us.
Paul has framed this complete, sevenfold list of possible causes of our being separated from the love of Christ.  This list climaxes with execution.  Christ’s all-encompassing love is with us even there.  As he thinks of dying for the faith, Paul thinks back to Psalm 44.   He says, As it is written, "For thy sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."
But he says, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.  
And though Paul has just given seven examples of bad things that will not separate us from God’s love, he now gives ten more. 
He really picks up right where he left off just before he quoted from the psalm.  He asked whether death by the sword will separate us from the love of Christ.  Now, Paul’s second list starts with death.
If we have entrusted our lives to God through Christ, that love is there to sustain us in death.  In the words of that most popular psalm:  Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for thou art with me.
We may go through fearful times if we face a dread disease.  But today’s passage reinforces that psalm: Our Lord Jesus Christ is with us as we pass from this life to the next. [I]n all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 
As Paul mentions death and life together, his point is that nothing in death or in life can separate us.  God’s love will never let us go.  
I have a favorite gospel song about facing death and also the complexities of life:

When I come to the river at the ending of day

When the last winds of sorrow have blown,

There'll be somebody waiting to show me the way 

I won't have to cross Jordan alone.

Though the billows of trouble and sorrow may sweep,

Christ the Saviour will care for his own.

Till the end of my journey my soul he will keep:

I won't have to cross Jordan alone.

I won't have to cross Jordan alone Jesus died all my sins to atone

When the darkness I see he'll be waiting for me 

I won't have to cross Jordan alone (Ramsey and Durham).

Paul groups death and life together as things that cannot separate us from the love of Christ.  Then he gives another group: angels, principalities, and powers.  
In ancient times, folks believed the skies were filled with all sorts of unseen beings, and this groups Paul lists -- angels, principalities, and powers -- probably reflect belief in those beings.
You may be surrounded by whole battalions of unearthly creatures, both good and evil, but they should provoke no fear on your part.   God’s love will never let you go. The 16^th century reformer Martin Luther had these kinds of beings in mind in a line from “A Mighty Fortress is Our God”:

And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us,
We will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us:

[I]n all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
Paul broadens his concepts, thinking in more and more general terms. Next, he assures us, we need not fear things present, nor things to come.
We often fear what we know we have to face today and then what we may have to face tomorrow.
What if I lose my job?
What if my children neglect me?
What if my wife dies?
What if I get a dread disease?
What if I lose what little savings I have?
Those things may come to you or to me, BUT .  .  .
Paul says of the worries of today and of tomorrow:
[I]n all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
God’s love will never let us go.  
         Paul’s next pair of things we may fear:
Height or depth
Like Henny Penny, you may fear things that come tumbling out of the sky, or things that roar up from the depth of the sea.   Paul says, Mark those off the list as well. 
[I]n all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
It’s as if Paul has run out of things to mention that might worry his readers.  So he finally just says, Don’t worry because none of these or anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We began with Carl Sandburg who said one of his four needs was for love at home and a little love outside.  He was speaking of human love.  Here’s another Sandburg statement about love:     

There are explanations of love in all languages

and not one found wiser than this:

There is a place where love begins and a place

where love ends--and love asks nothing (Sandburg 399f).

Sandburg is talking about human love.  But God’s love has neither beginning nor ending.  God has loved us from all eternity and His love will never let us go.  But Sandburg is right in his final statement: love asks nothing.  God’s love is unconditional and everlasting.

GOD’S LOVE THAT WILL NEVER LET YOU GO

Romans 8:31-39

Baraca Radio Sunday School Class

First Baptist Church, Anderson, South Carolina

August 25, 2013

Lawrence Webb

GOD’S LOVE THAT WILL NEVER LET YOU GO---SOURCES

Albert N. Arnold and D. B. Ford, “Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans,” An American Commentary on the New Testament, Volume IV.  Philadelphia: The American Baptist Publication Society, 1889.

Kevin Jackson, “I Love His Blessed Name.” www.tccgospel.org/music/lyricsMMAI.pdf.

George Mattheson, “O Love That Will Not Let Me Go.”  Timeless Truths, Free Online Library.  http://library.timelesstruths.org/music/O_Love_That_Will_Not_Let_Me_Go/

J. P. McBeth, Exegetical and Practical Commentary on Romans.  Shawnee, Okla.: Oklahoma Baptist University Press, 1937.

Terrence McNally, “ How Anti-Intellectualism Is Destroying America,”

http://www.alternet.org/story/95109/ , August 15, 2008.

Dale Moody, “Romans,” The Broadman Bible Commentary, Volume 10.  Nashville: Broadman Press, 1970. 

Penelope Niven, Carl Sandburg, A Biography.  New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1991.

Ramsey and Durham, “I Won’t Have to Cross Jordan Alone.”

http://www.mp3lyrics.org/j/johnny-cash/i-wont/

Carl Sandburg, The Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg.  New York, London, San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Copyright renewed 1978.

Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline.  New York, London, et al: Currency Doubleday, Paperback Edition, 1994.

“Troubled in My Mind” traditional spiritual, Twin Cities Community Gospel Choir site,

www.tccgospel.org/music/lyricsMMAI.pdf.

Curtis Vaughan, General Editor, The New Testament in 26 Translations.  Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1967.

How Should We Relate to People Whose Beliefs Are Different?

As a retired professor at Anderson University, one thing I still do is help plan courses in our Lifelong Learning Institute.  I teach some of these short-term, non-credit classes.  A while back, I was the moderator for a course on Islam.  I was moderator, not the teacher.  If I had tried to teach a course on what Muslims believe, it would have been “the blind leading the blind.”  I enlisted some Muslims to lead the sessions.  Some men from the mosque in Greenville and some students from Clemson University.

In scheduling the student visits, I invited them to dinner one night before the class.  Then the president of the student group called to say we would have to change our plans.   The day we planned to eat together was the first day of Ramadan.  That is their holy season when they aren’t supposed to eat anything between sunup and sundown.  That date had slipped up on the Muslim students, and I wasn’t aware of the Ramadan calendar.  But the president of the group said, “We could eat after class.”  I said that would be fine.

Then,  the students decided to make Ramadan part of the class experience.   Muslims pay strict attention to the official time of sunrise and sunset during Ramadan.  That way, they know when they can break their fast.  Each student brought along a bottle of water to drink just after sunset.  They also brought a bag of dried dates.  Each Muslim took one or two dates, and they invited us non-Muslims in the class to join them as they ceremonially ended their fast.  It was a memorable moment.

After the class, I met the students at the Golden Corral.  Now, most people at Golden Corral aren’t bashful about eating.  If that’s true of older people, it’s doubly true of college students.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen young people put away food the way those Islamic students did that night!   Put yourself in their place: You’ve gone since sunup without a bite to eat.  You came to Anderson University and led a class after having nothing to eat all day except a couple of dried dates at sunset.  

These students weren’t like a lot of the huge waistlines you see at a buffet.  But I lost count of the number of times they reloaded their plates at Golden Corral.  Around the table that night, we shared human understanding along with our heaping plates.  There’s just something about sharing food and table fellowship.

TRANSITION

Soon after this experience, I told about it at a state Lions Club convention.  After the message,  a fellow Lion accosted me.  He was upset that I said kind things about Muslims. By the way, the man is a professing Christian and a fellow Baptist.

I’m proud to be a Lion, especially because of the work Lions around the world do with the blind and blindness prevention.  But Lions is not a Christian organization.  Lions is not a religious organization.  Lions is a humanitarian organization with clubs in nearly two hundred countries around the world.  We have Lions who are Jews.  Lions who are Buddhists. We have Lions who are Hindus.    Lions who don’t claim any religion. Lions who are Christians.  We have Lions who are Muslims.

As an international organization, Lions seek to build understanding among people of all nationalities, of all political persuasions, of all religions, including Islam.  That was my purpose in telling the Lions about my experience with the Islamic students from Clemson.

But my brother Christian, brother Baptist, and brother Lion lectured me for being too generous toward Islam.

You may also be wondering why I -- a Baptist minister -- was hobnobbing with these Islamic students from Clemson, unless I was trying to convert them.

I guess you could say Islam literally crashed into our national awareness on September 11th, 

just over twelve years ago.  Until word spread that the men who hijacked the planes were radical Muslims, a lot of Americans couldn’t tell the difference between a Muslim, a Mormon or a Mennonite.  Lots of people still can’t.  

So, against the background of our hazy awareness of one of the largest religious groups in the world, I want to address the question, “What About Other Faiths?”  This is one of those “Questions We Keep Asking.”  At least, I hope we keep asking “What About Other Faiths?” as our nation has become the home of people from all the major religions of the world.

Actually, we need to ask two questions:  “What should be our attitude toward other faiths?” and “What should be our attitude toward people of other faiths?”  Those are really two different questions.  Closely related, but still separate issues.

Short answer to both questions:

Respect them.

But we need longer answers to both.  So here goes:

What should be our attitude toward other faiths?

First, we need strong convictions regarding the main teachings of Christianity.

Baptists don’t do much with The Apostles’ Creed, but this is an ancient statement of belief that most Christians hold to be true.  Listen to what the Creed says about Jesus:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.

And in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.

Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,

Born of the Virgin Mary.

Suffered under Pontius Pilate.  

Was crucified, dead, and buried.

On the third day he rose again from the dead.

He ascended into heaven

And is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, from thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

The Apostles’ Creed puts most of its focus on Jesus Christ as God’s Son whose death and resurrection brings everlasting life.  Belief in Jesus is the center of our Christian religion.  We need to understand that as we are exposed to other faiths.

The book of First Peter, over near the end of the New Testament, challenges those early Christians to be able to explain what they believe:

but in your hearts reverence Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to make a defense to any one who calls you to account for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and reverence;  and keep your conscience clear, so that, when you are abused, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame (1 Peter 3:15-16). 

This was written to people who were under pressure because they believed in Jesus as the Christ.  You notice there is the reference to being abused and reviled for one’s faith.  But it’s just as important when Christians live peaceably that we be able to explain what you believe.

Second, we should try to understand differences between our own faith and that of others.

Again, the central difference between Christianity and other faiths is our belief in Jesus as Christ, the unique Son of God.  That belief separates us from all other religions.   Both Jews and Muslims accuse us of belief in three gods instead of the One True God.  Buddhists and Hindus believe in many gods.

In the case of Islam, it is also important to understand what their religion really teaches, rather than accepting half-truths about Islam.  

We’ve gotten the impression that Islam is primarily a religion of war.  But Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all three have violence in their histories.  The Jews slaughtered women and children along with the armies of their enemies in the name of the God of Israel as they claimed their Promised Land.  The Christian church during the Crusades led bloody battles against both Jews and Muslims to reclaim what all three religions call the Holy Land.

Militant Muslims get the most news coverage.  But there are people in our land who call themselves Christians who are eager to slaughter any Muslim or any Arab anywhere in the world.

Another mistaken impression:  We equate Muslims with Arabs.  Many Arabs are Muslims.  But there are also Arab Christians.   Also, there are millions of Muslims who are not Arabs.  The nation with the largest Muslim population is Indonesia, whose native population is Asian and not Arabic.  So it is a major mistake to equate Muslims with Arabs and Arabs with Muslims.

Let me briefly mention the main beliefs of Muslims.

First, they believe in one God and that Muhammed is God’s greatest and true prophet.  They look at Jesus as a prophet along with Adam, Abraham,  Moses and others, but, to them, Muhammed is the greatest prophet through whom God revealed their holy book, the Qu’ran.  

The faithful Muslim must pray daily, fast during the month of Ramadan, give a portion of his income, and make a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca if physically and financially able to make the journey.

In summary, then, as to what should be the Christian’s attitude toward other faiths:

We should respect all faiths, recognizing the positives of those faiths and being aware of major differences between those faiths and ours.

Now, the second and closely related question:

What should be our attitude toward people of other faiths?

If we respect all religions, it should follow that we respect the people who hold beliefs which are different from our own.

That right has not always been respected within Christianity.  John Calvin and Martin Luther were the greatest names in the Protestant Reformation, but both Luther and Calvin consented to the death of Christian people whom they considered to be heretics.  

I said a while ago that we should have strong convictions concerning what we believe.

The Apostle Paul emphasizes that in Romans, chapter 14, verse 5, as he says,

Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind.

Paul says we need to have carefully thought out our beliefs.  But Paul also says we should not judge people who see things differently.  We must leave judgment to the Lord.  Listen again to some of the verses from Romans 14 which were read earlier in the broadcast:

Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of God;  for it is written, "As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall give praise to God." So each of us shall give account of himself to God.   Then let us no more pass judgment on one another, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother.  

There are two matters of personal conduct Paul has in mind when he tells us not to judge one another:  one concerning dietary issues and the other concerning observance of the Sabbath.  

Controversy over what to eat also had two different aspects.  Historically, Jews have had strict regulations forbidding the eating of certain foods.  That is true today, as it was in the long ago.   Traditional Jews today do not eat pork.  They don’t eat shell fish such as shrimp or crab.  So, Jewish Christians in Rome raised issues about things they believed should not be eaten (Moody 264).  

In Corinth, pagans offered meat as sacrifices at their temples in the Roman Empire.  Then the meat which was not used in the sacrifice was sold in the public markets.  Some Christians felt they would sin if they ate meat which had been sacrificed in the pagan temples.  

Earlier, in our passage, Paul says these questions of what to eat or what not to eat are matters of individual conscience and that neither side should judge the other:

One believes he may eat anything, while the weak man eats only vegetables.  Let not him who eats despise him who abstains, and let not him who abstains pass judgment on him who eats; for God has welcomed him.  Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Master is able to make him stand. 

Although the disagreement in Romans 14 is between two groups of Christians, can we apply the same principle between Christians and Muslims or between Christians and Jews?  Can we say God is the judge between religions and not set ourselves up to judges people with whom we disagree?

In addition to the question of what is proper to eat, Paul also discusses observance of certain days dedicated to God.  He applies the same principle both to food and to days of rest or sabbath in verses 5-6:

One man esteems one day as better than another, while another man esteems all days alike. Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind.   He who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. He also who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God; while he who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. 

Again, it’s fine to have strong convictions in these matters.  The key is one we’ve already noted:

Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind.

Just because I have a strong conviction, just because I’m fully convinced, that does NOT give me the right to force my conviction on you.

I guess we’ve moved beyond the Blue Laws hassle over which stores could be open on Sunday, but how would the principle of self-determination apply in that controversy? 

How far are we willing to apply this same principle in other moral questions?  What about abortion?  What about stem-cell research?  What about other religious convictions?  

Are we willing to say, Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind and then truly let each person follow his own mind rather than impose our own religious convictions on others?

To review:

Paul says everyone should have his [or her] own convictions.

Paul says we should not judge people who do not share our strong convictions.

Then he says a third thing we have not yet noted:

We should apply principles of love and peace in our relationships with those who see things differently.  Listen again to verses 14-19:

I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but it is unclean for any one who thinks it unclean..  .  .  For the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit;  he who thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. Let us then pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. 

We Christians would like to see everyone accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, but you aren’t likely to win anyone to Christ unless or until you first win that person to yourself.

J. P. McBeth said we should be conscientious but not be contentious (242).  Have your strong convictions, but leave the other person -- fellow Christian, Jew, Muslim, or atheist -- the freedom of his or her strong convictions as well.

Someone said of a man of strong conviction, “He would walk off a six-story building on a principle.”    But I’ve also known people who were of such strong convictions, they would push you off a six-story building if you disagreed with them on a principle.

There’s one final principle in verse 22 we need to notice:

The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. 

That is a  summary of Paul’s entire thought in chapter 14:  Have strong convictions.  Share your convictions.  Seek to win others to believe in Jesus.  But respect the convictions of others--whether other Christians or of other faiths beyond Christianity.

Your faith is your own.  Don’t try to force your faith on someone else.

RABBI’S STORY

There’s a parable the rabbis tell of the deliverance of the Israelites from captivity in Egypt.  As the story goes, God told His angels to work out a plan for bringing the Israelites out of Egypt safely.  The angels led the Israelites to the sea and parted the water.  Moses and the people walked through on dry land with the Egyptians in hot pursuit.  When  Pharaoh’s army was in the midst of the sea, the angels closed the waters, and Israel’s enemies died.  The angels filled heaven with the sounds of their dancing and loud shouts of joy.  When God heard the noise, He asked what this was all about.  The angels told what they had done, and the Lord began to weep.  The angels asked the Lord what the problem was.  He said, “I am distressed that you have killed my children”  (Craddock).

FACEBOOK VIDEO 

A short video on the Internet follows the format of the old Candid Camera TV show.  There’s a tall, young white guy, probably about twenty years old who plays the part of a customer in a deli.  The other actor is behind the counter. He is a small, dark-complexioned man dressed as a Muslim.

The young actor comes into the deli and complains about “a Muslim” working there.  He says, “Why don’t you go home to Pakistan where you make bombs?”  And he says, “I don’t want a terrorist touching my food or taking my order.”

When real-life customers go to the counter, the young actor interrupts: “You aren’t going to let that guy wait on you, are you?”  

The customer says, “Well, yeah.  Why not?’

The young actor says, “He’s a Muslim.  He’s out to destroy our country.” and so on.

One man says to the young man, “Not everybody’s like that. you know what I mean?”

Another man gets very angry and says, “You don’t have to carry on like that.”  When he learns  he was on camera, he says,  “Everybody was afraid to stand up to him, but I wouldn’t have minded decking him.”

A woman customer says, “I can’t believe you.  I feel like I’m in a dream right now.”

The boy says, “Did you forget 9/11?”

She says, “I’m sure that man wasn’t involved in 9/11.  Are you gonna make that judgment of everybody you see who looks like a Muslim?”

The boy says, “I know what an American looks like.”

The woman says, “You know what an American looks like and they’re all white?”

The actor says, “You and I are alike. I’m your brother.”

She says, “I hope my brother never acts the way you’re acting right now.

The video does catch one middle-aged man who agrees with the young guy.  After he learns he’s been recorded, the man continues his hostility toward Muslims.

But the clincher comes when a uniformed soldier goes to the counter and the supposedly prejudiced young man confronts him.  The young man supposedly is going to buy some potato chips.

The soldier says about the Muslim clerk, “He lives in America.  He can do whatever he likes.”

When the boy continues to argue, the soldier tells him, “Buy your chips and move out.”  

The boy keeps on, and the soldier says, “Put the chips down and go buy them somewhere else. You have a choice to shop anywhere.  Just like he has his choice to practice his religion and work anywhere.  That’s the reason I wear this uniform: so anyone can live free in this country.”

CONCLUSION

I’m not a Muslim.

I don’t think I could ever become a Muslim.

I’m a Christian.

I believe Jesus is the unique revelation of God’s sacrificial love and forgiveness.

That revelation leaves no room for suspicion and hatred.

God created every human being in His image.

God loves every one of us.

Wherever that person was born.

Whatever the color of that person’s skin.

Whatever that person’s native language.

Whatever that person’s political persuasion.

Whatever religion that person has grown up in.

I cannot stand in judgment of those who do not believe as I do.

I must commend every person to the love and mercy of Almighty God.

From the Baraca Radio Sunday School Class, First Baptist Church, Anderson, South Carolina, September 15, 2013.

WHAT ABOUT OTHER FAITHS?---SOURCES

Revised from Baraca and Garden House  June 3, 2007

J. P. McBeth, Exegetical and Practical Commentary on Romans.  Shawnee, Okla.: 

Oklahoma Baptist University Press, 1937.

Dale Moody, “Romans,” Broadman Bible Commentary, Volume 10.   Nashville, Tenn.: Broadman Press, 1970.

A Multi-layered Response to a Song

A song in church this morning reminded me of the potential for one piece of music to affect me in a variety of ways.

The hymn in question, “All Hail the Power of Jesus Name,” was the very first song in the old green Broadman Hymnal, probably the first song book I held in church from the time I was big enough to clutch one in my own two hands.  

This often was the very first song we sang on Sunday mornings in my childhood and youthful years.  So, chronologically, my earliest associations with “All Hail the Power” take me to a string of small country Baptist churches as Daddy moved us from farm job to farm job in Nolan County, Texas, around Sweetwater, the county seat.

In one of those churches, I made my profession of faith in Jesus Christ and was baptized.  In a later church, I came to love and appreciate the first pastor who called me by name.  In a third, this one in Sweetwater itself, I made my public declaration that I felt “called to preach.”

“All Hail the Power” is sung to at least three different tunes.  All three were in that green Broadman.  But until I started to college, it didn't really dawn on me that one set of words could be set to completely different music.  This point of discovery added another dimension to my musical awareness.

In church in the college town and in a campus choir -- while I was sort of learning to follow the bass line -- I learned to sing the fanciest setting.  That version goes crazy with the six words at the end of every stanza: “And crown Him Lord of all.” I could pretty well keep up with my fellow basses as we sang bunches of “crown Hims” under the other voice parts and then sang one almost endless “crown Him” on descending notes toward the end.  I felt I had arrived, musically!  Another landmark associated with those words.

When I first started trying to sing that song in church, I had no idea what some of the words meant.  I didn’t know how angels would “prostrate fall” or that “diadem” was another word for a crown. On “let every kindred, every tribe,” I figured “kindred” was something like kinfolks, and I knew Indians lived in tribes.  It didn’t dawn on me that “this terrestrial ball” meant the planet earth.  Even so, through frequent repetition, the words and music were ingrained in my mind.  Then, as I began to understand the implications of all those words, the song opened new depths of theological meaning, and the lyrics spoke to my soul as well as my mind: We are related spiritually to every group of people -- "every kindred, every tribe" -- on earth.

The hope of life beyond this one comes into focus in the last stanza, looking to that moment when, “with yonder sacred throng,” we fall down before Jesus and “join the everlasting song and crown Him Lord of all.”  

I didn’t have time to process all these different dimensions, intellectually, this morning  in church.  Still, I think all those elements mingled in a high emotional and spiritual moment as I stood in the congregation and did my best with the tricky bass part on that high falutin’ version of a wonder-full hymn.