The Other Cheek, and the Other Foot

We are all quick to take offense, and all rather blind to the offenses we cause. That’s because we think we are the center of the universe, and all others orbit around us. Consider Roy Costner IV, a young hero in South Carolina, the valedictorian of Liberty High, who, several years ago, when giving his speech at graduation, tore up his school-approved speech and proceeded to recite the Lord’s Prayer. I joined the thousands of others who commended the young man for his courage. Good on him for being willing to face an angry world who doesn’t want to hear about the true and living God. There is much to be commended in the young man’s earnest heart.

We Christians are, I suspect, all tired of getting kicked around by our increasingly militant secular culture. A baker in Colorado has, multiple times, faced the wrath of the state for his refusal to make a cake for two homosexual men who wanted to celebrate what they mistakenly call their marriage. As even the mainstream media now admits, conservatives have been targeted by the IRS. With each passing day the targets on our backs grow.

The Apostle Paul, as we know, was not averse to claiming his legal rights when the state abused him. He refused to be released quietly after a wrongful arrest and later insisted on a full trial, as was his right as a Roman citizen. He knew the law better than the state’s lawyers. We ought not to be ashamed to do the same, to insist on our God-given rights. What we ought not to do, however, is trample on the rights of others in the name of Jesus. Which is, however unintentionally, what this young man did.

To help us grasp this admittedly counter-intuitive truth, all we need do is imagine the shoe on the other foot. Suppose that the valedictorian of Liberty High had been a Muslim. Suppose he had had his speech approved by the authorities, went forward, tore that speech up, and recited a Muslim prayer. Suppose he simply chanted over and over for his allotted time, “Allah Akbar.” How would we feel then? I suspect some of you, already unhappy with me, are thinking now, “Had that happened the mainstream press would not have said a word.” You may be right. But I’m not writing for the mainstream media, but for Christians. The question is not what would they have done, but what would we have done? I suspect we would have been upset, and rightly so.

The problem in both instances is that the public schools are financed by taxes, money taken against the will of those from whom it is taken. We don’t like, indeed we find it morally reprehensible for the state to take our money and use it in any way that gives the impression of endorsing Islam. As we should. It was Thomas Jefferson who said, “To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.” That our opinions are true, that is, that the Christian faith is true and Islam (or the militant secularism of the state’s schools) false does not change the principle. Indeed it makes our sins that much the worse. We of all people should know better. We are indwelt by the Spirit of the living God. We have a true Word that calls us to turn the other cheek and to do unto others. Yet we applaud doing to the Muslim what we would protest the Muslim doing to us. We are called to a boldness that will proclaim the Lordship of Christ over all things. We are called to a humility that would insist that we must treat others as we would like to be treated. And we are called not to celebrate when we fail, but to repent.