Thesis 18 -We must practice true and undefiled religion.
Christians are notorious retreatists. We would, in all the wrong circumstances, rather switch than fight. In the early part of the twentieth century those inside the church who had jettisoned the evangel, the good news, took up instead what came to be known as the “social gospel.” Mainline denominations determined that the kingdom would come only as the church set about the business of righting social wrongs. What we needed was not repentance and faith in Christ but more soup kitchens and job training programs. Those who believed the Bible stood on the fundamentals, arguing that the church is called to gospel ministry. They left caring for the poor to the theological liberals, who later handed this calling over to the state.
It’s a good thing to believe the Bible. It’s a great thing to understand that the Bible calls all men everywhere to repent. It is wisdom to recognize that social programs are not the key to building the kingdom. It is a bad thing, however, to lose sight of true religion. James tells us, “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world” (1:27). Care for the poor within our midst isn’t something for liberal churches to do. It’s something for believers to do.
The evangelical church is that church which believes the whole of the Bible. We do not give up on God’s promises because prosperity hucksters promise what God has not. We do not give up honoring Mary because Rome idolizes her. We don’t give up the Holy Spirit because some say He’s making them bark in the aisles. And we certainly don’t give up caring for widows and orphans because mainline “believers” claim to care about them. Only those who actually are known by Jesus are able to give in His name. And all those who are known by Jesus are called to do just that.
James, you may remember, for a time was a burr under the saddle of Luther. He found James’ insistence that faith without works is dead troubling until, happily, he didn’t find it troubling any more. He, eventually, by God’s grace, bowed before James’ wisdom. Do we do the same? Do we turn up our noses at caring for widows and orphans as a social justice driven downgrade, a distraction? Do we think true religion is caring for the uninitiated and uneducated in their ignorance? Do we think that true religion is attracting the millennial and the upwardly mobile?
Or worse, is our religion, as Francis Schaeffer suggested, the worship of personal peace and affluence? We may soon find out. As our economic house of cards meets its reckoning, will evangelicals risk their lives to care for others, or will we risk others’ lives to care for ourselves?
Reformation comes when we reform our lives in submission to God’s world. Not reflecting the world, not reacting against our enemies, not regurgitating the media, but reforming our lives.