“He said to another man,” ‘Follow me.’ “But the man replied,” ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’ “Jesus said to him,” ‘Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God’ Luke 9:59-60.
Society has many spiritually-deprived or dead, people. They care for nothing relating to God, but avidly volunteer for community projects. Such tasks care for physical, economic, political issues, but lack the immediacy of God’s Kingdom even in a secular culture. Remember, Alexander Campbell had it right when saying the only Christian nation in society is the Church. Always has been that way. Always will be. Biblical Christianity needs NO support from culture to survive and thrive. In fact, uniting Christianity with any political party weakens the Gospel while failing to strengthen politics. Remember that Biblical Christianity waged a spiritual campaign against Satan for the first two decades of the first century. Then, with Constantine’s conversion, found an ally of a once-hostile Roman government. Through the contamination of politics and economics, Christianity became Christendom. And while in this day Christendom is in crisis, Biblical Christianity ISN’T, WON’T BE and succeeds whatever support or opposition comes from secular sources. That’s the point of Christ’s reply to the mañana sentiment when facing his call to discipleship: tomorrow or sometime, when other issues are resolved or problems solved. Most people won’t sacrifice their self-interest issues for spiritual obedience. But Jesus calls us to do exactly that, whatever our self-interest. Nothing can be more important than obedience to him. Lesser duties for lesser people. Immediate commitment to Jesus for anyone with spiritual values. If any collision occurs between our allegiance to Christ, and our duty to our relatives, nation, business associates, or employer, all take a secondary place. Christ receives our attention first, before anyone or anything. If we must offend someone, it must be anyone but Christ. We must never be so concerned about offending men that we shred Christ’s gracious invitation to bits.
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