Voting, Christians, & Little Caesars

With a very intense and divisive election just around the corner, there is a lot of talk in Christian circles about how we should vote this year. Unfortunately, much of the discussion displays a lack of understanding when it comes to Scripture’s teaching on government and how it applies today. While I have no desire in this article to tell you who to vote for, I believe biblically thinking through this issue will bring clarity. What does it mean to vote for someone in the American form of government? And how does the Bible guide us in choosing who to vote for?

Any discussion of the Christian’s relationship to government will include reference to Romans 13:1-7. In this passage, Paul instructs Christians to “be subject to the governing authorities” because these authorities get their derived power from God (13:1-2). The fact all governing authority comes from God highlights two equally essential truths. First, we are to respect just authority because it comes from God. Second, no earthly authority is absolute. The government gets its authority from God, and, therefore, it is not ultimate. The government is God’s servant, accountable to him (13:4). God hems in the government’s authority. In other words, there are some things the government has no right to do for it is not God. Therefore, Christians are to give to Caesar what is his and to God what is his (Mark 12:17). There are some things that belong to God alone, and not Caesar. Where the government stays within its delegated authority, we are to submit joyfully. Where it doesn’t, Christians are free to disobey, and sometimes, we are required to disobey (Acts 4:19).

But how should Christians apply the principle of submission to authority in modern America? We must start by acknowledging that the American system is not one-for-one with the Roman Empire. For example, who is the equivalent of Caesar today? Many would point to the President, but such an answer is short-sighted. Every President swears to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. The powers the President possesses are given to him by the Constitution. He is, at least theoretically, under its authority. But the U.S. governing system is more complicated than that, as the people can amend the Constitution through their representatives.

Another important point to consider is that our leaders are representatives who gain their authority through the “consent of the governed.” America is ultimately about self-government. This is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. We elect individuals, and in the process, we delegate them authority. In other words, our senators, governors, representatives, and presidents use the authority we the people give to them. They are us, and we are them. The people govern themselves by electing representatives to stand in our place in the process of governing.

To summarize, the highest authority in the American government system, its Caesar, is the Constitution. Additionally, we govern ourselves by electing representatives. We are all little governors; the only question is whether we are faithful or not in this governing?

What does all of this mean for how we vote? First, part of obeying Romans 13 in the American context is for us to submit to the Constitution in how we vote. Politicians who have no regard for the Constitution violate Romans 13, and if we elect such politicians, we violate it as well. To overturn our government’s system and distort or disobey the Constitution is to rebel not just against it, but to rebel against the God who established this form of government as his servant (Rom 13.1-4). Supporting disregard for the rule of law in our candidates is to sin against God by not submitting to a just authority established by God.

Second, there is a moral connection between who we vote for and their governing actions. We delegate authority to our representatives, and they use that power to govern us. For example, if you vote for candidate John Slaughterhouse who openly supports the slaughter of unborn children, and he then uses that delegated authority to continue the murder of said children, then you are to some degree morally responsible for that. He stands in your place with your authority, and you stand with him as he furthers the genocide. Of course, it is a different situation when politicians say they will do one thing, and then do the exact opposite, but voting is not an amoral action. Christian ethics must form how you vote, when they don’t, we are morally liable before God.

Third, since America is a grand experiment in self-governing, there is a sense in which all of us are little Caesars (not the pizza). Each of us is a governing official who will be judged for the job we do. You possess governing authority, so use it to further righteousness. Christian, if you desire to love your neighbor (which you must), then voting for righteous policies is one way to show that love. Even if your neighbor hates the policy. Just as if you were the governor of your state, you will be held accountable for how you exercise your due authority in the American system of governance. The only difference between you and the governor is a matter of degree, not whether you are a part of the governing process. Self-government is not for the faint of heart.

Finally, Christians need to be involved politically, and they need to be involved as Christians. We need more of a Christian witness in the darkness that is our current political life, not less. We need more truth, not less. And we need more submission to Christ, not less. Therefore, when you vote (not if), do so with the kingdom's ethics and morality. Know there are morally righteous laws and morally wicked ones. The Christian's job in politics is not to convert the nation but to advocate for righteous policies and render unto the Constitution what is its due. God has appointed all authority, including our Constitution. Christians, keep this in mind as you vote this year and aim to honor God and love neighbor in who you vote for.

Levi J. Secord

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On Not Being Tossed To and Fro

We’ve been through a lot these last several months. Between COVID-19, the killing of George Floyd, and the subsequent riots—this world appears to be spinning out of control. As Christians, we know that behind all of this, God is still sovereign. He is working his plan, and he wins in the end.

Knowing all of this, I am still concerned about what I have seen in our culture and the church’s response. Why? To understand, let’s start with Ephesians 4:14-15, “so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ.” Paul instructs Christians not to be tossed to and fro by the winds of doctrine. That term, doctrine, just means teaching. Christians should be rooted in the core teachings of the faith, and this should produce a steadfastness. While Paul is primarily addressing religious teachings here, any form of teaching could toss us to and fro. Lately, Christians have been tossed to and fro by many things.

As I consider how Christians responded to both COVID-19 and the George Floyd situation, it is clear we are being steered. By that, I mean the world sets our agenda. Instead of us calling the world to leave everything to follow Christ, we are constantly following the lead of those in the world. I fear many Christians have forgotten the media is not in the business of telling the unfiltered truth.

Media Bias

In my undergrad, part of my coursework was on media bias. It’s not hard to find bias and spin in today’s world. This happens in both political directions. Yet, it is also fair to point out that the majority of traditional media is biased in favor of progressive leftism. Take this piece from Van Gordon Sauter, who served as the president of CBS News on two separate occasions. Sauter argues that back in the 1980s, he recognized a “liberal tilt” in the media, but he believed it could be corrected. He rightly believed that journalists should attempt to be impartial and objective. That is no longer the case in today’s media.

Sauter recognizes that the bias is so bad in the media today that it can no longer be corrected. As he explains, the liberal bias has it has only intensified. He writes, “The highly influential daily newspapers in New York, Washington, Los Angeles, and Boston are now decidedly liberal. On the home screen, the three broadcast network divisions still have their liberal tilt. Two of the three leading cable news sources are unrelentingly liberal in their fear and loathing of President Trump.” Sauter argues the media should just openly acknowledge their bias.

Anyone attempting to pay attention with any sense of honesty knows what Sauter says is true. There is little attempt to hide the agendas on our screens today. The media, with a few exceptions, is decidedly leftist, and this impacts how they report the news. To put it plainly, the media is pushing an agenda.

Why is this important? Bias happens in many ways, but two deserve our attention, first, by gatekeeping. That is, not every newsworthy story receives coverage, and not all stories receive equal coverage. Those who report the news show their bias on what they report on and what they refuse to cover. Second, how stories are reported on or spun, also shows bias. As Sauter points out, the “loathing” of President Trump is evident in many forms of our media. This is not to deny that conservative media also spins things; they do. But that the “mainstream media” has an agenda. This agenda has tossed us to and fro. Sadly, this includes Christians. Whether you like Trump or not, it doesn’t matter. He is an image-bearer, and much of the reporting about him has been slanderous and sinful. He is not the only president this has happened to, but such sinful slander has reached a new low in our day. Whether you vote for and like the president, whether the President is Trump or Obama, Christians should never support slander because it’s sinful. As Christians, we should never partake in slander, even if we don’t like the person.

COVID-19 and Racial Injustice

If we recognize that just about every media channel is offering us spin, it will help us cut through the fog. I admit, it is hard knowing what is true in today’s world, and it can be hard to distinguish truth from bias. If we start with the knowledge, that in our hyper-politicized age, most news reports are biased and are meant to adavance a certain agenda, then we will be less likely to be tossed to and fro by the headlines. Moreover, Christians will be less likely to used as pawns to advance wicked ideologies. Christians need to start setting the agenda, and stare down the angry mobs and refuse to give in to their demands.

A couple of recent examples demonstrate this bias. From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, a group of reputable scientists has spoken with more caution than the headlines of CNN, MSNBC, or NPR. They predicated, based on real-world data, that the death rate would likely be well below 1%, even though the WHO was predicting a death rate of over 3%. Those predicting millions upon millions of deaths in this country received all the headlines, but as more and more data has come in, it is clear the worst-case scenarios were dramatically wrong. Yet, for some reason, we still trust the media.

We were steered not by science, but by politics. The media emphasized some scientists over and against others. It silenced the very debate and critiquing which is central to the scientific process. Fast forward to today, for over a week now, the daily death totals in the US from COVID have been on a steady decline, despite reopenings. Can you find this fact in the major headlines? No, instead, we are being told about spiking case numbers and the threat of a ‘second wave.’ As Christians, we must recognize that our media, and our politicians, are often not motivated by the truth. They will selectively report things to fit their preferred narrative. The truth is often more complicated than news headlines.

A second example is in the apparent unjust killing of George Floyd. This was hailed as an example of systemic racism, yet deaths similar to this happen regularly, to white people. A few years ago, Tony Timpa, a white man, was killed in the exact same way by police. Yet, through the gatekeeping of the media, Timpa’s unjust killing did not receive the same coverage. Why? It is hard not to see the disparity as resulting from to the media’s bias.

Sadly, many within the church seem oblivious to this gatekeeping bias. I received a statement in response to Floyd’s death from some Christian leaders which read in part, “This news comes after a seemingly regular cycle of reports of unarmed Black people dying at the hands of police.” To an extent, it is true, there are regular reports from the media on such deaths, but that is largely shaped by the gatekeeping principle listed above. For the last year we have stats, nine unarmed African Americans were killed by the police in our country. Unarmed does not mean not dangerous. Of those nine, several who were “unarmed” used their vehicles as weapons against police. Several other of the cases, it appears the police were in the wrong, and they charged. The kicker is, every year, nearly twice as many white people are killed by cops than African Americans. These deaths of white people do not receive the same amount of coverage. This is media gatekeeping, and it is done in part to push an ideology and an agenda. By saying all of this, I am not suggesting there are not real problems we need to address, but before we do that, we need a balanced view of the facts, not the spin of an openly biased media pushing a wicked agenda. Christians, we must for justice, but if we want to do that, then we need to do so as Christians who gather all the relevant information first, not just follow the narrative set by talking heads on our screens.

Standing Firm

What’s my point? This is not a call to dismiss some real issues in our society. It is not a call to vote for certain people. Rather, it is a call for Christians to practice discernment in how they engage the news, politics, and cultural issues. We must stop letting the world dictate our responses. We must stop following their lead. The world does not get to demand of the church who and what we speak on. The job of the church is to call everyone, everywhere to repent. We cannot do that if we are being tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine spewed out by the media. What I want is for Christians to lead by speaking as Christians, not as partisan hacks. Scripture should shape how we think and speak more than what cable news channels we watch.

Levi J. Secord

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Are Online Worship Services Bad?

In this time of pandemic and social distancing, most churches have moved to online worship services. As with any such change, this move is not without controversy. Should churches be streaming their services? In order to think through this issue carefully, which we should, we need to understand what a local church is and what it isn’t. For example, I saw one comment stating the church is not a building, so this is a good thing our services are canceled. While it’s true the church isn’t a building, the church certainly isn’t a Facebook Live video either. Nonetheless, should churches do online services?

I believe churches should, but we need to be clear—there is no such thing as “online church.” Riverview has offered our messages online for a long time, but this is not meant to replace the gathering of our church. Instead, it is both a supplement to the main course (Sunday Morning corporate worship) and a help to those who cannot be with us on any given Sunday. Online messages/services can never replace the physical gathering of a local church.

It is here the epistles of the New Testament help us. Paul wrote these letters to local churches because he couldn’t personally be with them. Because he did write, they and we have been blessed with more books in Scripture. Nonetheless, Paul preferred to be in person when teaching. His letters did not replace the physical gathering of a church, rather the letters were read when the local church gathered. In the absence of gathering together, Paul used the technology of his day to help shepherd and encourage the flock. Today, we are doing the same thing.

Perhaps the best example of this is Peter’s first epistle. He opens with these words:

“To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you.”

Like then, we are now dispersed and separated from one another, but this time it is because of a viral pandemic. Our dispersion does not dissolve our unity as a local church or the unity of the universal church, but it is a real hindrance to the Christian walk. Until we can gather together again, the leaders of local churches must leverage modern technology to encourage, equip, and shepherd their flocks. Shepherding cannot stop just because we cannot gather together.

How then should we think and talk about our online services? Here are two suggestions.

First, a church is not a building, but it is a physical gathering. The word used for church in the New Testament means a congregation or a called-out assembly. At the very core of a local church is the act of gathering together in the name of Jesus Christ. Long before this pandemic, many churches went away from this biblical prerequisite as they weekly beamed in preachers from different locations. Moreover, they met at many campuses separated by miles and some even promoted “going to online church” as a replacement for real church. It’s not, and never can be. Such a way of doing “church” is just a fast-food variety of Christianity, and it is making us sick and weak. Our spiritual health is linked to living in community with other Christians.

When the apostles wrote to these local churches, they longed to be with them, but couldn’t be. So they took up a pen and paper. Likewise, we broadcast our service right now because we long to be with our congregation, but can’t. The digital service helps, but it can never replace the real deal.

Anyone separated from a loved by a long-distance knows that while letters and online communication help to mitigate the pain of separation, they cannot replace actually being with a loved one. The same is true for the church—we cannot replace the local church with glowing screens. And when we try, we short-circuit God’s good design for the church. Can we use technology to fill the gap when we can’t meet? Of course. But this is never a replacement for physically gathering with the saints.

Second, church is more than singing songs and hearing a message. Of course, corporate singing and listening to a sermon are vital to a faithful worship service, but they are not the totality of it. Because the local church is a physical gathering, there is nourishment, empowerment, encouragement, and accountability that come from gathering together. No man is an island, and there are no lone ranger Christians. We must never forsake gathering together (Heb. 10:25) because each local church is a body of believers who need one another (1 Cor. 12). The different parts of the body need each other. To an extent, we can encourage and help one another over a distance, but we cannot do this fully if we never see each other, commune with one another, and praise God together. The Christian life is meant to be lived in community, and a digital substitute can never that.

We should be very thankful for the technology that we have. It is a tremendous blessing to be able to have limited, digital communion during this isolation. This helps us not lose sight of the world beyond our own four walls and the God who is there. Nonetheless, we must not let this extreme become the new normal. Instead, our limited communion must grow our desire to be with one another yet again. Let us look forward to the day when we will gather back together, realizing the joy of that day is a faint echo of the reunion of the universal church when Christ returns. Then we will live in perfect community with the eternal church and her bridegroom, Jesus Christ. Maranatha!

A Moral vs. Therapeutic World

Relativism marks our day, with its rejection of absolute truth. Francis Schaeffer in Escape from Reason, traced the trajectory of Western thought, specifically as man turned inward in two distinct ways. First, man turned away from God and to himself by declaring human reason, or rationality, as the foundation of knowledge. This was the dogma of the Enlightenment—that human reason was the universal standard of truth. Not surprisingly, human reason could not support such a weight because humans cannot agree on what is reasonable and rational. Enlightenment thinking led to another inward turn as if argued that each person constructs his own understanding of reality. We can thank Immanuel Kant for this reasoning, and thus truth became subjective, a mere interpretation of the individual. Consequently, the self became absolute. By making the self the arbiter of truth, modern man has redefined all of reality. As God is replaced with man, people began to view life through the lens of an extreme subjectivism. Consequently, it is not just the area of knowledge that has been affected, but also how we determine right from wrong.

Without a proper foundation for truth, morality becomes a personal preference. As the self becomes the center of the universe, we determine right and wrong by what makes us feel good. Or, as David Wells observes, we no longer live in a moral world, but in a therapeutic one. What is good and right, is whatever makes someone feel good. Conversely, to offend or hurt someone’s feelings, becomes the cardinal sin. This is obvious in much of cultural discussions, as many argue it is detrimental and harmful to tell LGBTQ individuals their behavior is wrong. Why? Because such words hurt their feelings and prevent them from their own self-determined truth and morality. To disapprove in this way violates the highest laws of the therapeutic worldview.

Christianity stands opposed to such thinking. We believe the Creator God is there and that he has spoken. There is a universal moral code that everyone, no matter their feelings, must keep. Christianity puts forward a moral view of the world because it has a universal standard for both truth and morality—God himself. This puts Christianity on a collision course with our modern, therapeutic world. Sadly, the therapeutic view of life is impacting the church in at least five ways.

1. Many Christians care more about personal experience than truth and substance. Churches aim at bringing people in, not by the faithfulness of their teaching, but by offering light-shows, entertainment, and a non-threatening experience. Moreover, it is no coincidence that movements within the church that stress emotionalism and experientialism are growing in popularity, like the charismatic movement. In a lot of ways, such movements are just mirrors of our modern therapeutic desires. The foundation of Christianity is not personal experience, but truth. While we must have a personal encounter with God, such an encounter must include the truth of who he is. Without such truth, there is no way to experience the God who is there. Humans can manufacture lots of experiences that will draw crowds, but these are mere trifles in comparison to the power of God. To counteract the experientialism of our day, Christians need to stress substance over feelings, by focusing on God and not ourselves.

2. As we rely on experience over truth, many Christians fall into the trap of seeing feelings as the source of truth. With no truth, morality goes out of the window and is replaced with subjectivism. Is it any wonder so many Christian leaders and churches are embracing new doctrines concerning sexual morality? Such Christians follow the example of the world as by determining morality according to subjective feelings and cultural trends, instead of the immutable character of God.

3. In a therapeutic world, as feelings become ultimate and truth takes a backseat, the church starts minimizing doctrines that offend. This is natural as feelings trump truth in a therapeutic world. Some Christian leaders now argue for things like pronoun hospitality, using someone’s preferred pronoun even when it’s not true, precisely because we value feelings over truth. We would rather not offend than not tell the truth. In a moral world, truth is always more important. This doesn’t give us the right to be jerks, but Christians must know that truth liberates. Truth frees those enslaved by their subjective feelings and experiences. Feelings cannot determine truth, but the truth should inform how and what we feel.

4. Similarly, in the therapeutic worldview, our primary problems in life are external. If life is about me feeling good, then things like society, institutions, and even biology are the culprits that cause my bad feelings. The solution is that the world must conform to my feelings. But again, in a moral world, our primary problem is internal. We are sinners, and this sin is our responsibility as individuals. We stand before God naked, ashamed, and guilty. In a moral world, we need a moral solution, and so Christ came to die for our sins. Therapeutic preaching treats God as a way to cope with life, to feel better, to improve our self-perception, and to overcome our victimhood. As these two different worldviews identify different core problems, they inevitably preach different gospels.

5. In a therapeutic world, we lose the ability to disagree with others and still love them. If someone disagrees with my subjective truth, they are attacking me personally because my truth is tied to my identity. In such a world, there is no way to overcome our differences. This of course, silences all debate and any mutual pursuit of truth. Conversely, in a moral world, reasoned debate is encouraged because the truth matters, not just for me, but also for my neighbor. So we approach each other as equal by seeking the truth together through reasoned debate and dialogue. In other words, truth is worth being uncomfortable over and if my beliefs do not align with reality, it is my beliefs that must change, not reality.

The Bible identifies this world as a moral one, and it addresses us as moral agents under the law of God. As such, all attempts to make life to be about therapy come from our failed attempts to deal with our real moral guilt. As a guilty people, we intrinsically don’t feel so good. We know of our guilt, and it unnerves us. Therefore, many seek to assuage their bad feelings through therapy and denying the core problem--our guilt before a holy God. Instead of going to God through Christ, we try to massage away our bad feelings by turning inward. It does not work and never will. This is why, as we press into our feelings more and more, we come away feeling worse and worse. The therapeutic worldview leaves us both guilty and enslaved to our feelings. The church must realize this tension point, for if we acquiesce to the therapeutic view of life, we will neuter the gospel and leave this world without any offer of hope.

Levi J. Secord

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Pursuing Truth in a Truthless Age

Image courtesy of pixabay

I’ve addressed the issue of truth in many of my recent posts. The reason for this is obvious—our society attempts to reject truth. Ours is a day of personal truths, all relative and subjective. Ours is a truthless age in that it denies universal truth, and it does so because it has rejected the God of Scripture. Of course, such reasoning doesn’t work as eventually everyone must absolutize something. This is our reality, but how should Christians respond?

It is here we must be careful as there are two responses Christians must avoid. First, some try to accommodate the relativism of our day. This happens as we soften objective truth claims and instead turn to emotions and experiences. There is a myriad of ways Christian imbibe the spirit of our day like worrying how unpopular doctrines will alienate people from God. Inevitably, what gets changed is the message in an attempt to draw people in. In the long run, all this does is change the message of the gospel. If the gospel must submit to the desires of the unregenerate, then it won’t be long until we lose the entire gospel. We cannot serve two masters. Sadly, this option is very popular in evangelical circles. Many have tried cultural accommodation, but it always leads to culture over Christ. Therefore, this trajectory must be rejected.

The second false trajectory is to make every issue a matter of life or death. Every truth claim, no matter how small, becomes the measure of orthodoxy. This trajectory is not as popular today, but it appears to be growing as an (over)reaction to our rejection of truth. The reality is, we will never find someone we totally agree with. Arguing that every issue is life or death flattens out theology and in the end, waters down the vital important issues. If everything is life or death, then nothing is.

Moreover, this trajectory often leads to smug self-righteousness which places us at the center of truth just like subjectivism does, albeit in a different way. Truth becomes about me being proved right over and against everyone else. Truth serves to advance me. In the end, those who go down this path are right to reject relativism, but wrong in how they do it.

Understanding all of this, how should Christians seek truth today? Below are ten theses on pursuing truth in our truthless age.

1. Truth is objective and knowable

God created everything, including mankind. Humans, being made in God’s image, can know truth as God reveals it to us. God does this through both natural and special revelation. Two plus two equals four; this is natural revelation. Jesus Christ is God the Son; this is special revelation as found in Scripture. But note both of these truths are revealed to us by God. He is the source of truth and that is why it is objective and universal. Man can know truth, because God made us to be like him and he reveals his truth to us.

2. The truth is important

This should go without saying, but knowing the truth impacts your life for good or ill. How you view the world shapes the choices you make. If someone grows up thinking two plus two equals three, this will severely hamper their lives, especially financially. Moreover, if God really exist (he does), then if we deny he exists it will have a devastating impact on our lives. If this God’s world (it is), then knowing him matters. Similarly, it matters if we build an idolatrous view of Him as it will warp our understanding of everything else. On a more practical level, it really does matter if an accused person actually committed a crime. To achieve justice, the verdict must align with the truth. This thinking is contrary to how justice is warped today to be about power struggles and political narratives. Truth is necessary for justice. Christians must acknowledge that truth, and knowing it, is vital to life to all of life.

3. The Bible is the final earthly authority of truth

Every system has some final authority; for Christians that authority is Scripture. The church confesses this truth precisely because the Bible claims to be the very words of God. As such, the Bible gives us God’s perspective, and his perspective is the one true and ultimate perspective. The final appeals court of truth in this life is God’s word, and Christians must actively seek to submit to it.

4. Our knowledge of truth is finite and fallible

Despite being like God, humans are not infinite. God is all-knowing; we are not. Moreover, because of the influence of sin, we are often deceived, mistaken, and wrong. Sometimes we think we know the truth when in fact, we don’t. Sin infects every part of us, including our ability to know things. While we can know things rightly, this is limited both by our finite nature as creatures and our sinfulness.

5. Truth can overcome the limitations of our sin, perspectives, and prejudices

Despite our limitations and the reality that we approach issues with prejudices and cultural perspectives, the universal nature of truth can overcome our preconceptions, and can turn hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. This is especially true as the Holy Spirit applies God’s word to our lives. While our fallenness often messes things up, the good news is that God’s power is greater than our weaknesses, and by grace, he changes us. The universal nature of truth is greater than our brokenness.

6. There are various levels of importance when it comes to truth

Some issues are more important than others. For example, the truth of whether or not Jesus rose from the dead (1 Cor. 15) is far more important than if he cleansed the temple more than once. All Christians must affirm Christ’s resurrection, but there is plenty of room for disagreement on how many times he cleansed the temple. Good Christians can and do disagree on this issue. Of course, many issues fall somewhere between these two examples on the spectrum of importance. For example, some issues like the proper mode of baptism, the relationship between God’s sovereignty and human freedom, etc. are important to our understanding of God and life, but there is still room for some disagreement. It is often very difficult to determine how important certain issues should be, but here is a helpful article that offers guidance.

7. Christians should always want to know the truth and align themselves with it

Even though some issues are more important than others, Christians should be obsessed with finding the truth and then submitting to it. We must never deny the importance of truth. Therefore we must humbly seek it in everything we do. One of our roles as image-bearers is to know God and his creation rightly. When the Bible speaks, even on less important issues, we should wrestle with what it says seeking to know it truly. Then we are settled on what the Bible teaches, must submit to it. Why? Because truth exists and is important.

8. As we pursue truth, we must have vigorous debates

One way we pursue truth is through the exchange of ideas. We learn and grow as we interact with other limited humans who are also wrestling with God’s revelation. We must never presume that we know it all, but we should have some settled, core convictions.

9. Disagreeing with someone does not equal hating them

One of the ironic side-effects of our age of tolerance is that we don’t know how to debate without becoming intolerant of those with whom we disagree. This isn’t surprising, because if truth is determined within the self, then disagreeing with someone equals hating that person. To be sure, we need to avoid personally attacking those we disagree with, but if we want to be a people who pursue truth, then we need to be able to have vigorous and passionate debates. All this should be done without hating our opponents or accusing them of hating us just because we happen to disagree.

10. Truth should shape our feelings, not vice versa

As relativism is lived out, we turn inward to determine truth. The natural consequence is that our feelings become the arbiter of truth. How else can we explain the absurdity of males claiming they are females simply because of how they feel? In reality, Feelings and experience cannot be the grounds for truth. Conversely, the biblical worldview points us in the exact opposite direction—our feelings must conform to the truth. Our feelings are unreliable and ever-shifting; this is one of the reasons God reveals truth to us. He desires to liberate us from falsehoods. He does this by revealing who he is and who we are in light of him. This type of truth frees us from the modern tyranny of feelings-based truth. Christians must know the truth so that their feelings, thoughts, and actions are sanctified by it. In this way, our feelings and emotions become a tremendous blessing. To be clear, it is not wrong to have emotions, but it is wrong to absolutize them.

The Christian life must be dedicated to pursuing the truth, precisely because Jesus Christ is the embodiment of truth (John 14:6, 18:37). As we live out our faith, we grow in the knowledge of the truth and degree by degree become more like our savior (2 Cor. 3:18). Truth is not relative, but it is personal. Jesus Christ is the embodiment of truth. As such, truth is a pursuit worthy of our whole lives.

Levi J. Secord

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