While sitting at my desk reconciling our bank account this morning, I put on my headphones and was listening to old Southern Gospel on Radio@Netscape Plus. As always happens when I listen to this stuff, I began to think back on days past when I would visit my grandparents home and my grandfather, now gone to be with the Lord, would sometimes load the turntable of his homebuilt stereo system and while away the time listening to old gospel albums. Then, as my mind wandered through treasured memories, I began to think about the times we are living in, and just how different the world seems today from the one my grandparents grew up in.

I recently listened (with a certain degree of dismay) as I heard well-intentioned Christians gathered on the steps of the courthouse in Alabama where a higher court had issued an order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the lobby. The gentleman whose voice I heard was obviously amplified and sounded... what was it... angry? Yelling about how they were not going to "allow" anyone to take away their religious rights, and how they were going to do "whatever it takes" to see that they were not trampled by the ungodly powers that be.

In my mind's eye, I came face to face with that little WWJD that people have been wearing on their wrists and necks for some time now. And in all seriousness, I really have to wonder... what WOULD Jesus do? While many people seem to think that requires a great deal of thought, I'd have to say that I believe there is enough evidence in the Scriptures to remove even the tiniest bit of doubt in this case. We who follow Him have been instructed to "Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's". In this case, no one is being asked, much less ordered, to do anything that violates God's commands to His followers.

Jesus indeed cleared the temple, at least twice chasing out the merchants and moneychangers and yelling at them with an "amplified voice". But let us carefully consider what drove Him to do these things.

The first time:
After this he went down to Capernaum, he, and his mother, and his brethren, and his disciples: and they continued there not many days. And the Jews' passover was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and found in the temple those that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting: And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers' money, and overthrew the tables; And said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father's house an house of merchandise. And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up. (John 2:12-17)

The second time:
And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, and said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves. (Matthew 21:12-13)

In both cases, Jesus acted out of "The zeal of thine house", meaning zeal for the Temple of God. We have no reference anywhere in Scriptures that would incline us to believe that Jesus went into the Roman Courts and began to demand His rights - even as the Only Begotten Son of God. In fact, the only reference we have to Jesus having anything to do with those courts is when He was brought before them, unjustly accused of wrongdoing, and He said nothing at all about the evil ways of those courts.

I mentioned previously that my grandfather has passed away. But my ninety-something grandmother still remains, and to me she is a pillar of the Christian faith. I cannot imagine her standing on the steps of any courthouse, attempting to gain her way by use of brute force or bullhorns, sounding for all the world like.....well... like the world. She is not rocked by the things going on in "Caesar's house", and she is still active in, and comforted by, the things that are happening in God's House. It seems to me that we ought to leave the bull horned belligerence to people like GREENPEACE, ACT UP, GLAAD, NOW, NAMBLA, PETA, and all the other unruly purveyors of the evils of this day. If we, the Church, are going to change things, it should be by an active participation in "Caesar's system" which puts the people in positions of power over us so that they can make calls like "Sodomy good - Ten Commandments Bad", "Abortion Good - Death Penalty for Capital Crimes Bad", "Moral Relativism Good - Absolutes Bad".

The problems in this country are not going to be corrected by Christians taking the bullhorns from the gays, the liberals, and the rest of the ungodly postmodernist thinkers attempting to take this country into social anarchy. I hope and pray that the Church in America will wake up and, in revival, take up once again the zeal for our Father's House which led our own American founding fathers to leave their comfortable homes abroad and strike out across the ocean to form this brave new land. They thought the Faith valuable enough to fight and die for, and I hope we, today, will make use of every legal means at our disposal to bring about the changes in the laws that will return our land to the foundations upon which it was built. But more than that, I hope we will do it while also "letting our light so shine that before men, that they will see our good works, and glorify our Father which is in heaven". I think the (predominantly born again) Founding Fathers of America understood that "defending the Faith" meant something far deeper than "defending the placement of a monument in a government courthouse".

When the powers-that-be in this country come into our churches and homes to force us to stop praying to the Almighty God, Creator of heaven and earth, THEN we can act righteously in civil disobedience. Until then, we still have the polls and we still have prayer and we still have a voice with which to teach the spiritually starved masses the truths of God’s Word. Let’s use them!

Peace,
Rod

II Chronicles 7:14

Authors Notes on Referenced Organizations:

GREENPEACE is an international radical environmentalist group which has been known to act violently and illegally in pursuit of their goals.

ACT UP (AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power) is a radical homosexual empowerment group which, among other things, "performs" parades in which our children and the children of our friends and family members can be exposed, quite intimately, to the depravity of the "loving gay lifestyle".

GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) is a group "dedicated to promoting and ensuring..." the homosexual lifestyle choice so elegantly displayed, for all to see, by the preceding ACT UP gang.

NOW (National Organization for Women) is "the largest organization of feminist activists in the United States", which promotes throwing off any semblance of adherence to the Scriptures; particularly those addressing issues of holy and righteous submission.

NAMBLA (North American Man/Boy Love Association) is a nasty little group which says, of itself, that it's "goal is to end the extreme oppression of men and boys in mutually consensual relationships". I need say no more.

PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) is another often violent group which places the rights of animals above the rights and needs of mankind. Here's a quote from their website:

"PETA believes that animals deserve the most basic rights—consideration of their own best interests regardless of whether they are useful to humans. Like you, they are capable of suffering and have interests in leading their own lives; therefore, they are not ours to use—for food, clothing, entertainment, or experimentation, or for any other reason."

Quite a contradiction to Scriptures, where it is written:
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. (Genesis 1:28)

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