Becoming what you oppose

One of the ironies of any protracted struggle is the tendency for combatants to start resembling each other. In saying this, I’m not implying moral equivalency in every conflict – far from it. What I’m saying is that participants often begin to use the same methodologies to continue the match, often unaware a lowest common denominator is being established. It shouldn’t be surprising…after all, the human tendency is to self-justify by saying “well so-and-so did such-and-such…” We define the legitimacy of our methods and actions on a sliding scale, relative to our neighbors and even our enemies, rather than in comparison to a transcendent, objective standard.

The result? Hezbollah fires rockets at civilians in Israel (a despicable act), and Israel responds by leveling the country of Lebanon, Hezbollah and innocents alike. Regardless of the history of the region, regardless of the current provocation du jour, this is simply an extension of a game of tit-for-tat that goes back centuries. “An eye for an eye, and all end up blind.”

But this is not limited to a particular region of the world. Such struggles exist across the planet, because the human soul is hostage to sin and selfishness. Even in America, the so-called Culture Wars follow this trend. Those who set out in the first half of the 20th Century to change the ethical framework and worldview of the U.S. used very specific levers, most associated with governmental power. The Church, initially dazed and confused by the onslaught, began a cultural counterattack by the late 1970s. Yet while the worldviews involved were universes apart, the Church chose to fight on ground and with weapons more appropriate to her adversaries: the halls of secular power. Some Christians began picking up the trappings of bareknuckle, political streetfighting that is not God honoring and more closely resembles those we set out to oppose in the first place.

The result? A dangerously widespread assumption that all will be well if we can just get the “right people” elected, or the “right laws” passed. Christ said His kingdom was not of this world. That doesn’t mean Christians abstain from participation in the world—it’s hard to be salt and light if you withdraw to a cultural ghetto. But it does mean we expect change to come from within individuals, not from without. That’s one of the singular distinctives of the Christian faith – it is the work of the Spirit within, and not the confines of external legalistic constraints, that produces the sanctified life most pleasing to God and most enjoyable by Man.

I would never advocate withdrawing from the world—that’s overcorrecting to the other extreme. But I remind today’s “Culture Warriors” the most important battles will not be fought in Congress. They will be fought in our homes, where we prepare our children to live lives very different from those surrounding them, and in the workplace, where we must be ready to give an answer to all who ask the reason for the hope that we have. Politics are important, and the government is one of the three spheres of authority to which the Christian has some obligation. But it is not the ultimate high ground, or the end all of existence. To paraphrase, what does it profit a man to gain the whole Government, yet lose his soul?