The basic problem of the Christians in this country in the last eighty years or so… is that they have seen things in bits and pieces instead of totals.
—Francis Schaeffer—
Key point: Some might wonder why a Christian organization must hold unyieldingly to biblical tenets of marriage and sexuality when the world is so hostile to those ideals. Allegiance to biblical teachings is not something Christians can affirm or not affirm, depending on how cultural winds are blowing.
This post is for Christians. Non-Christians can “listen in,” of course, but here we’ll be discussing a matter that it is especially critical for believers to understand.
Background
As we have affirmed in our last two published articles, Samaritan’s Purse (SP) is a Christian disaster relief ministry seeking to bring help and hope to areas devastated by earthquakes, famine, floods, and other disasters, including pandemics.
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- In part 1 we highlighted how Samaritan’s Purse is uniquely equipped to bring much needed medical help to the city of New York, which has been extremely hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
- In part 2 we explored why, despite the excellent work performed by the doctors and nurses associated with Samaritan’s Purse, some New Yorkers are objecting to the ministry’s operating a field hospital temporarily in Central Park, even during a time of critical need. Succinctly put, hardline LGBT activists believe Samaritan’s Purse is bigoted for holding to a belief in marriage as being between one man and one woman, and for believing that homosexuality is a sin. Some activists apparently would prefer that Samaritans’s Purse not be in New York at all, even if the ministry’s not being there would mean more problems for existing hospitals, less efficient care for the sick, and a greater number of COVID-19 deaths.
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Part 2 of our series contains a 16-item list of observations and insights about the clash between worldviews occurring in New York City. In this post I want to focus on the 13th item on that list:
People, especially Christians, need to understand that SP’s beliefs about marriage are a part of the value system that serves as the bedrock foundation for SP’s existence in the first place. It is this same value system that compels it to serve people on the front lines in areas hard hit by disaster, illness, and other crises.
The Connection Between Offering Unconditional Help and Upholding Man-Woman Marriage
This post is not primarily about Samaritan’s Purse, but about Christian teaching. Thus, it relates to Samaritan’s Purse in the same way it relates to all Christians, Christian churches, and Christian ministries. If an individual, a church, or a ministry calls itself Christian, then Christian or biblical beliefs, as well as the actions that flow out of those beliefs, should set that individual or entity apart from others.
Biblical beliefs and principles are not individual, separate tenets that have been arbitrarily put together by man, but are divine ideals that are interwoven and tightly linked together. They weren’t even chosen by God arbitrarily, but were revealed by Him because they reflect His character. Consider several of the Ten Commandments.
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- Why is it wrong to have no other gods before the one true living God? Because God exists and because of who He is. He is God, and He rightly demands recognition as God.
- Why is it wrong to murder? Because God is the author of life, the God of life, and is life.
- Why is it wrong to commit adultery? Because God is faithful.
- Why is it wrong to steal? Because God is sovereign. Having created people in His image, God has made individual people sovereign on a human level, yet in a way that reflects His own sovereignty. God is the owner of everything, and He has given property rights to individuals, allowing them to reflect His sovereignty. Respecting them as persons means respecting their property and their property rights.
- Why is it wrong to lie? Because God is the source of truth and is truth.
- Why is it wrong to covet? For the same reasons it is wrong to steal, and for the same reasons it is wrong to have no other gods before the one true living God.
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Thus, the short answer to the question
Why is it wrong to do those things God forbids in the Ten Commandments, or to fail to do that which He commands? is this:
Because of who God is! Because of His character!
God’s existence and character constitute the “common denominator” of the laws that make up His moral and ethical standards. It is no coincidence, therefore, that before God gave the Ten Commandments to Israel through Moses, He reminded His people of who He was and of what He had done for them, actions arising out of His innate qualities. God said, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage” (Ex. 20:1-2; Deut. 5:5-6). As men and women God has created in His own image, all people—but especially God’s followers—have the God-given responsibility to reflect His character to the degree that they can, and to avoid violating it.
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
—God, in Exodus 20:2 and Deuteronomy 5:6, just before giving Israel the Ten Commandments through Moses—
Note that the command forbidding adultery assumes man-woman marriage and heterosexuality. It fits, then, that the command forbidding adultery is a command to uphold a true reflection of the nature of the Godhead through marriage as He designed it, as well as to uphold the gospel, which marriage also represents.
It’s All About God
You see, God’s moral and ethical standards are all about God Himself.1 We can emphasize this, not just by looking at the Ten Commandments, but also by looking at the greatest and second-greatest commands God gave. In Matthew 22:35-40, Matthew, inspired by the Holy Spirit, reported this:
35 [O]ne of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”
37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment.39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
If the moral and ethical law of the Old Testament is all about God, and if the commands to love God wholeheartedly and to love our neighbors as ourselves provide the hook on which “hang all the Law and the Prophets,” then we can be assured that the two greatest commands are all about God as well. Like each of God’s moral and ethical standards, these two commands also are about both the Lord’s existence and His character.
Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
—Matthew 22:37-40—
Indeed, love of people, sinners though they are, is at the very heart of who God is! His love compelled Him to sacrifice His own Son to pave the way for those who believe on Him to have eternal life:
It wasn’t an accident, therefore, that just before Jesus told His parable of the good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37, the two greatest commands God ever gave were front-and-center.
10:25 And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested Him, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
26 He said to him, “What is written in the law? What is your reading of it?”
27 So he answered and said, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,’ and ‘your neighbor as yourself.’ ”
28 And He said to him, “You have answered rightly; do this and you will live.”
29 But he, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
30 Then Jesus answered and said: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a certain priest came down that road. And when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.32 Likewise a Levite, when he arrived at the place, came and looked, and passed by on the other side. 33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. And when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 So he went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; and he set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said to him, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I come again, I will repay you.’ 36 So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?”
37 And he said, “He who showed mercy on him.”
Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
God Gives His People a Joy and a Desire to Love and Serve Him and Others
The command to “Go and do likewise” might sound obligatory to some, but it isn’t for those who truly understand Jesus’ love. God gives His people His love, a love that compels them to serve others, sometimes at great risk and at at great cost. While, as I have said, this post isn’t primarily about Samaritan’s Purse, the work the members of the Samaritan’s Purse medical team are doing in New York illustrates well How God infuses in His people a love for Him and for others—a love that compels them to want to represent the Lord authentically to everyone with whom they come in contact.
In the following one-and-a-half-minute clip,2 you will hear from two nurses who work the night shift at the Samaritan’s Purse field hospital in Central Park. The first voice is that of Christine Rutledge, RN, and the second one belongs to Sonja Nisley, RN.
This does not mean that every believer is called to help others in this same capacity. Yet each one has opportunities to serve others that other believers do not have.
The main point here is that it is God’s love that compels His people, not just to meet others’ needs in ways that represent Christ faithfully, but also to convey the truth about Him so people can get the clearest possible picture of Him. And it is the Holy Spirit who enables believers to do these things. Empowered by God’s Spirit, Christians are to seek to help those in their spheres of influence know, not just about God’s love, but also about His majesty, righteousness, and holiness.
People need to know, not just about God’s love, but also about His majesty, righteousness, and holiness.
Not Christian Beliefs; Instead, a Christian Belief System
Can’t you see it? Why must Samaritan’s Purse, as well as every Christian organization and every individual who take God and the things of God seriously, affirm man-woman marriage, biblical tenets of sexuality, and all the other ethical and moral teachings the Bible affirms? These—all of them—are reflections of God’s character, just as the command to love one’s neighbor as oneself is a reflection of who He is.
Of course, we need not make God’s laws the front-and-center issue when we work to meet people’s needs; we meet those needs unconditionally, just as Jesus did and just as the Samaritan in Jesus’ parable did. Yet in our commitments and in how we live, we are compelled affirm God’s moral and ethical teachings without hesitation, reservation, or embarrassment. To minimize, ignore, or deny any of these tenets means distorting a portion of God’s revelation about Himself. Consequently, any of these amounts to misrepresenting Him to the world.
Let’s put it another way. As believers, we can’t throw out one part of that which God shows us is a reflection of Himself and continue to uphold a clear picture of Him in our work and ministry. Clarity is essential. Remember, Jesus came to us “full of [both] grace and truth.” People misunderstood and rejected Jesus, and many will misunderstand and reject us when we give unyielding allegiance to Him.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.…And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
—John 1:1,14—
The wonderful news is that some who initially fail to understand will come around. Remarkably, it may be the very issue that was problematic to them to begin with that helps them sufficiently comprehend God’s love and His expectations of them, and that helps them see their need to come to Him on His conditions.
Our job is to remain faithful, just as Samaritan’s Purse is doing.
God will honor that faithfulness.
Copyright © 2020 by B. Nathaniel Sullivan. All rights reserved.
top image credit: Lightstock
Note:
1Yes, the laws of God make us aware that we are sinners and have strayed from Him, and they show us our need of His grace. But they do this by showing us what God is like, and consequently how unlike Him we are!
2The clip comes from this Samaritan’s Purse video on You Tube.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture has been taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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