Following the Trail

Perhaps you heard that Tim Tebow decided to opt out of a speaking engagement at a church in Dallas. At this point, no one can be absolutely certain why (except, perhaps, Tim himself). Conjecture is that the media's certainty that the church in question is a "verulently anti-gay, anti-semitic" church is the reason and would be "Tebow's greatest sin." He didn't say, so I am not here to comment on Tebow's decision. What I want to do is follow the logic trail being laid down for Christian life-hikers.

Here's the claim. The First Baptist Church of Dallas has gone on record that Islam and Mormonism are false religions "from the pit of hell". They have argued that you can't be saved by being a Jew. But, wait! It gets worse! They also argue that homosexuality is a sin and do so ... hold on to your seats, folks ... based on the Bible. Shock of shocks! I know! Hard to believe, isn't it? I mean, in this day and age that any thinking Christian would believe something is true and right simply because it is abundantly clear in Scripture and has been agreed upon by the Church since the beginning! What nonsense!!

So, there you have it, Christians. You have a choice. Two paths. Two possible trails to follow as you hike through life. One is much easier than the other, of course. The hard path is to stick with a biblical worldview, follow Christ, retain the Word of God as your guide for living, and, even according to that Word of God itself, anticipate that the world around you will hate you. Not easy.

The other alternative is much simpler. The easy trail is to go along to get along. To hike this trail you'll need to lighten your load, so to speak. Give up that silly biblical worldview. Surrender that nonsensical "The Bible is God's Word and defines truth and right" concept. That should be fairly easy. After all, it is a 2,000-year-old book written by men. Things change. Cultures change. Perceptions change. Morals change. Sticking with that old book is not reasonable. After that it gets easy.

It should be noted that these two trails are not simply parallel. They lead to two different locations. Because, you see, the "easy trail" requires that you surrender your Bible as valid guide to life. Thus, both Scripture and Church history become useless aids to life. They are gone. But, of course, if Scripture and Church history are of no value, you have to recall that they are the primary source of what Christ taught and what God said. Thus, you'll be abandoning Christ on this particular trail. To argue that the 1st Baptist Church of Dallas is "anti-gay", "anti-semitic", and anti-tolerant because it aligns with Scripture and the unbroken position of the historical Church is to argue that belief in the Bible and Christ Himself is "anti-gay", "anti-semitic", and anti-tolerant. If you want this easy path, you will need to abandon those things. Oh, maybe not right away. "We like Jesus." That works. But only as far as "Jesus loves everybody". Don't got to His instruction to the woman in adultery, "Go and sin no more." Don't look at His intolerance of the Pharisees of His day. And absolutely don't consider His assault on the moneychangers in the Temple. But that should be easy to do since you've already given up any authority that would make such claims, since that would be the Bible, God's Word.

Go along to get along. That's the path offered ... no, demanded. It can only end badly for Christians because "Christians" requires "Christ" and "Christ" is only found in Scripture and Scripture demands that it is God's Word and, as such, it is authoritative. In other words, go down the easy path and you haven't a leg to stand on. Hmmm. Maybe that's not the best choice.