There are varied theories of how Missouri came to be known as “The Show-Me State.” Regardless of how that came to be, the idea behind the slogan is clear – don’t just tell me what you believe, show me through your actions. This concept, deeply embedded in Scripture, seems to be absent from the church far too often at far too great a price. Here are 4 reasons that properly grounded orthodoxy (beliefs) compels visibly tangible orthopraxy (actions).
Truth COMPELS Action
George MacDonald said, “To give truth to somebody who doesn’t love it will only give them more multiplied reasons for misinterpretation.” The most dominant current creed is to “live your truth,” which I refer to as the Oprah phenomenon, and it is problematic for a few reasons. First, if it is possible for each of the 7 billion people on this vast planet to live “their” truth, that would effectively mean that truth does not exist in any objective sense of the word. Second, each of us knows or knows of people with whom we disagree, sometimes even vehemently. Are we then willing to allow those with whom we disagree, who may harbor detrimental or even deadly philosophies, to live their truths as well? I would hope not, as this is neither logical nor moral.
Therefore, those in the “live your truth” camp, have undermined their own paradigm. The mantra must now become, “live your truth as long as it doesn’t bother me.” The “live your truth” faction has produced a self-appointed morality police to ensure that your “truth” and my “truth” falls in line with the collective “truth.” But where then, does this moral standard find its grounding? The answer, as Francis Schaeffer once said, is with “both feet firmly planted in mid-air.”
Truth is the foundation for everything and there are agreed upon methods for arriving at truth, both propositional and existential. But it seems that the preferred epistemological method (how you know what you know) of today is rooted in “I feel” and not “I think.” If the goal is to arrive at conclusions regarding ontological realities, how we arrive at those truths does matter. For example, if justice is an ontic reality, which is to say it is rooted in a physical, real, or factual existence, then truth about what justice is and what it means matters! The same is true with love and a bevvy of other terms that have become nebulous in a largely relativistic society.
Even those who are not aligned with the “live your truth mantra,” can fall victim to a society which bolsters loosely defined terms and phrases. When people attempt to redefine terms, such as love or justice, others who seek to keep those terms rooted in their etymological foundation, can at times become unloving and unjust. The desire to fight for what is right or for truth itself can often cause the tone of such conversations on these topics to lose the tenor necessary to compel the “live your truthers” to hear the truth. Nevertheless, to know the truth regarding love or justice must compel us to not only hold onto the truth propositionally, but to live the truth in praxis.
Christ COMPELS Action
As we have seen, truth must be grounded. Thankfully, Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, clearly defined truth for us. He said “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” It is important that Jesus, unlike every other prophet or religious leader, did not claim to have the truth, or to have special knowledge of the truth. Jesus claimed to BE the truth. Even if someone is not a follower of Jesus, this claim should give everyone pause. What would it mean to be truth?
Atheist W.E.H. Lecky remarked, “The character of Jesus has not only been the highest pattern of virtue, but the longest incentive in its practice, and has exerted so deep an influence, that it may be truly said that the simple record of three short years of active life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists.”[1] The Quran speaks more about Jesus than Muhammad. Gandhi, who carried a Bible and often referenced the sermon on the mount said, “You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilization to pieces, turn the world upside down and bring peace to a battle-torn planet. But you treat it as though it is nothing more than a piece of literature.” However, the truth of what Gandhi saw in the person of Jesus compelled him to act.
For those Christians who have intellectually and spiritually assented to a relationship with Christ and thereby knowledge of the truth, yet are not compelled by that truth to act incarnationally with a world increasingly devoid of truth, is to abdicate your most important obligation. The night before His execution, Jesus prayed, “Sanctify themin the truth” and then continued by saying, “I do not ask that you take them out of the world…I have sent them into the world.”[2] In other words,
Jesus was saying to His disciples and to us,
take your orthodoxy and demonstrate it
through your orthopraxy, and thereby change
the world! Click To Tweet
Jesus was saying to His disciples and to us, take your orthodoxy and demonstrate it through your orthopraxy, and thereby change the world! For Jesus, propositional truth was never divorced from practical application. For Jesus, it was always “both/and” and never “either/or.”
Love COMPELS Action
Jesus told His disciples, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” So how did Jesus love His disciples?
First, He corrected them. Luke records that, “An argument arose among them as to which of them was the greatest.But Jesus, knowing the reasoning of their hearts, took a child and put him by his side and said to them, ‘Whoever receives this child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. For he who is least among you all is the one who is great.’”[3] Love should compel us to correct those who are in error, even if it risks our fellowship with them. Love and truth are inextricably linked. To love someone and not tell them the truth, is not loving them well.
Second, He instructed them on how to do the work. Again, Luke records, “And He called the twelve together and gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal. And He said to them, ‘Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money; and do not have two tunics. And whatever house you enter, stay there, and from there depart. And wherever they do not receive you, when you leave that town shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony against them.’”[4] Practical application of truth and love requires honing, but this process is best learned in the process of engaging in the work of implementing Christ’s love on a daily basis. Some lessons are caught not taught.
Third, He sent them out. Once you go you will begin to grow. You will also begin to understand what you don’t know. That wasn’t intended to rhyme, but perhaps that mnemonic device will aid us in remembering to “be doers of the word, and not hearers only…”[5] At some point love must compel us to actually go love those who don’t think or look like us. There comes a time where those who have never experienced the love of Christ should have the opportunity to experience that love through us.
Justice COMPELS Action
James 2:14-16 reads, “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food,and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit?” It is far too simplistic to ground the current discussion surrounding justice solely within the confines of police interactions or criminal proceedings. We must be ‘boots on the ground Christians’, in line with Christ, rather than ‘pull yourself up by your bootstraps spectators.’
What results from those who push against the incarnational, communal work of justice and faith commanded by God, due to the fear of aligning with certain unbiblical social theories, is that the church’s witness is effectively muted. This then causes some people to disavow God and to believe in false ideologies, simply because proponents of those ideologies choose to be present, when some in the church, choose to preach (or lecture) from a distance. To those in the “anti-social justice” camp, it needs to be said that rebuke without relationship has never been an effective leadership strategy. Only after I have developed a relationship with a young man from the projects, a homeless man on the street, or a man currently housed in the department of corrections can I begin to rightly judge the positions and presuppositions held by such a person.
Biblically, justice is a verb, not a noun (Luke 3:10-14, Micah 6:8, Isaiah 10:1-2, Matt. 23:23). It is not an abstract metaphysical reality, but it is the activity of those who are aligned with Christ, who is the embodiment of love and truth. Therefore, truth and love are best communicated in the act of doing justice. It is a consistent command which, when done to and for others is the best apologetic for the existence, love, and proximity of God to a lost and hopeless world. As Scott Coley said, “Orthodoxy without orthopraxy isn’t Christianity – it’s religious studies.” Perhaps, if the church was more intent on doing justice, we could, as Gandhi said, “turn the world upside down and bring peace to a battle-torn planet.” May we all seek to practice what we preach so that what we preach is heard, seen and most importantly felt.
Please click the links at the bottom to share this on social media!!!
HOST AN APOLOGETICS WORKSHOP!!!
[1] William Edward Hartpole Lecky, History of European Morals From Augustus to Charlemagne (New York, NY: Wallachia Publishers, 1869).
[2] John 17:15-19
[3] Luke 9:46-48
[4] Luke 9:1-5
[5] James 1:22
