Culture Shift

The trouble, as I see it, with Christian political activism — “religious right,” “Moral Majority,” “Christian Coalition,” etc. — is not that Christians should not be politically active. On the contrary, I believe that Christians have a duty to actively participate in their political systems. The problem is that the motivation (which influences the means, for better or worse, as well as the outcome) has been wrong. It has been very earthy-minded. It has been focused on how to create the world we want for ourselves and our children. Certainly, a better world in which to live would be a natural outcome of proper Christian involvement in the system; but it ought not be our motivation. Albert Mohler writes,

   An evangelical theology for political participation must be grounded in the larger context of cultural engagement. As the Christian worldview makes clear, our ultimate concern must be the glory of God. When Scripture instructs us to love God and then to love our neighbor as ourselves, it thereby gives us a clear mandate for the right kind of cultural engagement.
   We love our neighbor because we first love God. In His sovereignty, our Creator has put us within this cultural context in order that we may display His glory by preaching the gospel, confronting persons with God’s truth, and serving as agents of salt and light in the dark and fallen world. In other words, love of God leads us to love our neighbor, and love of neighbor requires our participation in the culture and in the political process.

—Albert Mohler, Culture Shift: Engaging Current Issues with Timeless Truth (Moltnomah, 2008), 2.

It seems that almost everyone is offended by something these days. Secularists are offended by public religious expressions. Muslims are offended and provoked to violence when their religion is besmirched. Christians are offended by secular manifestations of secular morality. (I’m reminded particularly of the foolish outcry several years ago over the movie The Last Temptation of Christ.) But these days it is most often secularists who jump to playing the offendedness card. Albert Mohler writes of how this “culture of offendedness” undermines free society:

   The very idea of civil society assumes the very real possibility that individuals may at any time be offended by another member of the community. Civilization thrives when individuals and groups seek to minimize unnecessary offendedness, while recognizing that some degree of real or perceived offendedness is the cost society must pay for the right to enjoy the free exchange of ideas and the freedom to speak one’s mind.
   Professor [Paul] Helm is surely right when he argues that the “social value” of offendedness is now increasing. All that is necessary for a claim to be taken seriously is for the claim to be offered. After all, if the essence of the offenedness is an emotional state or response, how can any individual deny that claimant has been genuinely offended? Professor Helm is right to worry that this will lead to the fracturing of society.

We all hear things we don’t like said about people and causes that we are fond of but in the changed social atmosphere we are being encouraged to give public notice if such language offends us. I am now being repeatedly told that I am entitled not to be offended. So—from now on—not offended is what I intend to be. Does this heightening of sensitivity make for social cohesion? Does not such cohesion depend rather on enduring what we don’t like, and doing so in an adult way? Does not the glue of civic peace rest on such intangibles as the ability to laugh at oneself, to take a joke about even the deepest things? And is not a measure of the strength of a person’s religion that they tolerate the unpleasant conversation of others? Isn’t playing the offendedness card going to result in an enfeebling of culture, the development of oversensitive and precious members of the “caring society”? Whatever happened to toleration? [Paul Helm, “Offendedness,” Salisbury Review, June 2006, 16–18.]

   Given our mandate to share the gospel and to speak openly and publicly about Jesus Christ and the Christian faith, Christians must understand a particular responsibility to protect free speech and to resist this culture of offendedness that threatens to shut down all public discourse. Of course, the right for Christians to speak publicly about Jesus Christ necessarily means that adherents of other belief systems will be equally free to present their truth claims in an equally public manner. This is simply the cost of religious liberty.

—Albert Mohler, Culture Shift: Engaging Current Issues with Timeless Truth (Moltnomah, 2008), 32–33.

In a chapter of his book Culture Shift entitled Neneveh, New Orleans, and the City of Man, Albert Mohler looks at the destruction of cities and civilizations and reminds us, the citizens of Augustine’s “City of God,” what our perspective ought to be:

   Poetry and literature are filled with references to ruins and the passing of civilization. Percy Bysshe Shelley told the story of King Ozymandius, whose abandoned statue mocked his claim to be “Ozymandius, king of kings.” As Shelley described the scene: “Nothing beside remains, round the decay / of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare / die lone and level sands stretch far away” [Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandius (1818)]. Standing at the very apex of Queen Victoria’s empire, Rudyard Kipling warned of the judgment that was to come. “Far-call’d our navies melt away / on dune and headland sinks the fire. / Lo, all our pomp of yesterday / is one with Nineveh and Tyre!” he intoned [Rudyard Kipling, Recessional (1897)].
   Remember that Augustine described the two cities as created by two kinds of love. As he taught his fellow Christians, “The earthly city was created by self-love reaching the contempt of God, the heavenly city by the love of God carried as far as contempt of self. In fact, the earthly city glories in itself, the heavenly city glories in the Lord. The former looks for glory from men, the latter finds its highest glory in God, the witness of a good conscience” [Augustine, The City of God]. Alas, we are tempted by the wrong love, and we are easily seduced by the wrong city.
   Augustine was absolutely certain—and absolutely correct—in emphasizing the temporary nature of the earthly city and the passing power of its love. Only the heavenly city remains, and all earthly cities will follow Nineveh, Tyre, Babylon, and every other metropolis and village into oblivion. One day, unless that Day of Judgment comes sooner, New Orleans, New York, San Francisco, and all the cities we now know and admire will be covered with dust, if not with water.
   In the midst of all this, the church—representing the city of God—must keep its wits about it. Jerome, one of the great leaders of the church as Rome fell, asked the wrong question: “What is to become of the church now that Rome has fallen?” The City of God is represented wherever the church is found, and the church is safe by the power of God. Christians must be humbled by a biblical view of history that understands the difference between the earthly and the heavenly cities, one that understands full well that every earthly city will fall and that only the City of God will remain. In the meantime, we should pray humble prayers and ask for God to preserve the earthly city until His kingdom comes. As Kipling called England to pray: “Lord God of Hosts be with us yet, lest we forget, lest we forget!” [Kipling, Recessional].

—Albert Mohler, Culture Shift: Engaging Current Issues with Timeless Truth (Moltnomah, 2008), 142–143.