Yes, the system is imperfect
as is everything run by fallen humanity but you are trying to mix oil and water
here. Secular Governments with laws that are conducive to moral behavior
are ordained by God and their ministers are ministers of God, (not for
eternity but at least until Jesus returns and takes over). In a Democratic
Republic such as the United States the Government will reflect the common
morality of the people. Paul in the book of Romans Paul refers
to Caesar in Rome during the first century AD who was hardly democratic
but Rome did enforce the Pax Romana for many years and peace (rather than
anarchy) is important because it is impossible to get anyone's attention with
the truth of the gospel of Christ or for them to live godly lives and learn
from Him the midst of chaos (such as what is presently
happening in Sudan).
Why do you want to make things
so complicated? Even the unbeliever has some kind of conscience, they
may not know how to love, but hey - neither do the majority of those who
profess to follow Christ. Morality is a good start, we can go from
there
even though the fear of God is
eroded and continues to erode. judyt
I am writing from my
self-imposed exile. All is well here on the island of
Patmos.
Just a quick note for
this conversation which I have re-titled as I am afraid that the point is
being missed and that there is a lot of talking past one another.
What Lance, Terry and
Izzy are saying are all flying past one another. I
do think that moralism and Christianity are diametrically
opposed. Bill could write all this up much better than
myself. Perhaps he will correct where I am off here. My apologies
for using the Canadian/British spelling of behaviour.
J
Lance is saying that there is no hope, no life, no godliness in
moralism. Moralism is the practice of moral behaviour.
Moral behaviour is taught by society. What we determine to be moral as a
nation may not be what another nation may think (I wrote about how having a
mistress in Malta is considered by many of the populace as normal, whereas
having a mistress in North America is considered adultery). In our
lifetimes we are seeing a wide swing regarding homosexuality; it is moving
from being considered immoral to moral (i.e. acceptable). When my father
was young chewing gum in school was considered immoral.
The problem with moralism (keeping good social morals) is that
it is completely disconnected from God. Morals properly placed in
a subjective manner to God are good. For example, the Torah laws are
good as long as they are placed subservient to the lawgiver God. To just
follow the laws apart from a relationship with God earns one nothing but it
does give the illusion of progress (i.e the
Pharisees followed the laws and were indeed legally righteous; what
they missed was the lawgiver � this is
moralism. It is no more new today than it was then). In
other words, morality (which can be defined as good behaviour, even desired
holy behaviour) divorced from God avails nothing but an illusion. The
illusion itself is powerful. It is this illusion that makes some think
that we live in moral, godly nations. The precepts our countries were
built on have been detached from a relationship with their
Creator.
What the founding
fathers wrote is great stuff, as long as it is placed within the framework of
who God is. Without God, it turns into a legal
matter, a moralistic issue instead of a spiritual issue. In
society it becomes moralism; in the church it becomes
religion.
Let me give another
quick example. Imagine that I behaved completely moral to my wife.
I did everything right, treated her kindly, never cheated on her and was
always polite. It would not take my wife long to see through me;
although I did nothing legally wrong to her, without the love that God has
placed in my heart for her my behaviour is empty. My
behaviour was spot on, my heart was not. Moralism is like
this. My behaviour, while noteworthy (others who saw how well I treated
my wife would be jealous of our marriage) lacked the basis in
relationship.
Legislating moral
behaviour is a whole other post�..
Back to exile with
me!
Jonathan
Izzy
wrote: Lance, I�ve been wanting to ask you this. Would you please
clarify what it is you have against �morality�? Please define
morality. (To me it means making moral choices vs immoral choices, which
means choosing sinless choices over sinful choices.) Izzy
A
great question. And your (Izzy) exchange with Bill was as
interesting to me as was Bill's comments. Did you change the color
of your hair?
;-)
John
