One of the most difficult things for most Christians to deal with as we interact with the culture is the charge that we should not express our religious values out in society. Those who oppose Christians expressing their faith assert that there are other values that exist as well, and that by promoting Christian values we are either mixing church and state, or we are being unfair by pushing our religion on others. In spite of the fact that neither of these things is true, there is a tremendous amount of pressure put on people who hold Christian values to just crawl into a cave and not express them. This problem plays out in some very interesting ways.
Even within the last few months, some very big moral issues have burst on the scene in society. We have, for instance, professional football players not kneeling for the national anthem, a librarian in a Massachusetts elementary school rejecting a set of Dr. Seuss books for her library because they are, allegedly, racist, the National Basketball Association making plans to do a lecture or video before games to promote social justice, the Black Lives Matter protests, and attacks and rioting by the people in the Antifa movement to shut down free speech. Now, supposedly, all of these actions are religiously neutral, and are attempts to promote justice using a secular, or non-religious, point of view. And when people push back at those promoting this “secular” agenda based on Christian values, the promoters reject the push-back because they say the values of those who are pushing back are not legitimate.
Most people promoting these actions do not see them as religious, and even claim they are not. Beyond that, because of the way they are expressed, even most of those who are the targets of the protesters don’t see the religious nature of the actions.
The proof that they are religious points of view, however, is demonstrated in the fact that all of these protest actions promote a particular set of values – in other words, a different religious point of view. So, just what are the underlying values that are in play? Simply put, they are the values of a naturalistic worldview. Let’s look at a few examples of these underlying values. These values are:
- Relativistic – There is intense interest in some injustice but not all.
- Man Centered – There is an interest in a political outcome, but not in a spiritual result.
- Self-centered – There is an interest in personal grievances, but not in God’s agenda for humanity, or even in the viewpoint of other people who have a different opinion.
- Offensive – They have as their goal to “put down” those who are considered opponents, regardless of what offense it might bring to others.
- Divisive – They intentionally promote actions that isolate those with a different point of view, rather than being open to bringing people together.
Many more expressions of naturalistic values could be listed, but these serve well to illustrate the point.
So, where do these naturalistic values come from? Certainly not from the Bible – in fact, they are just the opposite of biblical values. The truth is, Naturalism does not recognize the existence of God at all, so all values are necessarily relativistic and emerge purely from human desire; there is no other place for them to come from. And it is this naturalistic foundation that results in the kinds of values we see expressed in the protests. This certainly is not meant to imply that all of the protesters actually hold these kinds of values openly. In fact, many of them, if the values themselves were exposed, would actually disavow them – which exposes one of the serious problems at play. Worldview beliefs are unconscious for most people. When these protests occur, most look only at some temporal outcome that they wish to accomplish, rather than at the values that underlie the acts.
Now that we have looked at the nature of the expressions of these protests, we can turn our attention to the purpose that the protesters are trying to accomplish. They do not do their actions merely so that other people will recognize their point of view. Rather, their purpose is to ultimately change the minds of those observing their protests and get agreement with their cause. In other words, the protests are an attempt at evangelism.
In understanding this, though, we must also recognize that what these people are attempting to convince people of is not simply the issue at hand. Rather, they are actually attempting to get others to accept the mindset (worldview) that supports their beliefs. For instance, in the case of the NFL protests, no unifying single reason has been expressed for why they are happening. Different people participating in the protests have very different reasons for doing it. That said, the protesters do want the public to accept their grievance (whatever it is), and have even tried to get the fans to participate in the protests by encouraging them to lock arms in solidarity with the players. This attempt to get the public to support their cause is an attempt to evangelize the public.
But there is something going on behind the outward expression of protesting. The outward expression does not make any sense without acceptance of some set of underlying beliefs that give meaning to the protests. And we see how this has played out based on the fact that the fans, as a whole, have been against the protests, while many of the players seem unable to understand why there is such a negative reaction.
How Do We Deal with This?
The truth is, we face people every day who are trying to convert us to their way of thinking. They do it by trying to shame us into thinking our Christian values are somehow bad or outdated, by physical or psychological intimidation and attacks, by filling the environment with their false beliefs to make us think we are alone in our beliefs, and by any other means they think they can use to win the day.
As Christians, we need to respond to this – and respond in a way that reflects our Christian values. So, what do we need to do?
What we need to do is to evangelize back – to counter their beliefs with our beliefs. Of course, we can just respond back using their tactics and try to bully them in the same way they try to bully us. But that is not the Christian way. God does not accept people simply because they verbally express Christian ideas. He accepts people who, literally, have a change of heart and willingly invite Christ into their lives. If we want to promote that, we have to express our faith in ways that help the contrarians understand what they need to do, and come to a place where they actually desire to do it. So, what do we need to know and do in order to be that kind of instrument in God’s hand? Actually, the solution is quite simple.
First, we need to understand the beliefs that are in conflict. We need to understand the naturalistic beliefs that are being expressed and the tactics being used to try and overcome our biblical beliefs. If we don’t understand that – not only the arguments, but the foundation of the arguments that are being pushed on us – it will be very difficult to combat them. On the other hand, when we do understand, they are very easy to counter.
Second, we need to understand our own beliefs and how they are not only different from the beliefs of the Naturalists, but why they are true. Ultimately, the truth will prevail, but only if it has the opportunity to expose the untruth of the false beliefs.
When Naturalists evangelize using their methods, we must evangelize back using ours. We must explain how their belief in “social justice” is a false imitation of “actual justice,” and how only Christ can provide the means for actual justice to occur. Then, we must offer an opportunity for those who are speaking untruth to step into the light.
If we truly want our beliefs to win the day, we have to do it by conveying the truth using methods that express God’s values. Only then can we expect to see the kinds of results that overcome the evangelizing attempts of those who oppose Christian values.
© 2017 Freddy Davis