“Be saved from this perverse generation!”  (Acts 2:40).

God´s people in Denmark - or in Europe for that matter – can´t really pick out in the crowd whom they want to give their political vote.  Homosexual  (same sex) marriages have not only come into fashion, but will be passed as a law imposed on the official state (Lutheran) church, and this will not be just a socialist decision (our government is primarily a socialist, atheistic one) but will be a majority vote in the parliament comprising almost all political parties.  “Unrighteous decrees” (Isa. 10:1) are more and more robbing us of God´s righteous laws.  So whom do want to give our vote?

My American friends are in the same dilemma.  Whom do they want to rule their awesome nation?  And so I find my friends, so endeared to me, perplexed and at a loss to know what to do.  They begin to realize that the more they talk about it the less relief they get.  But there is a way out to us in Europe as well as God´s people over here.  There are some basic truths that need to be radically revived so that we may again in a real way be stirred up for the cause of Christ:

First, what does it mean to be “God´s people”?  Secondly, what does it imply?  And thirdly, what is God´s agenda for us right now?

Firstly, to be God´s people means to be saved by the precious blood of Christ from our sins and old sinful life, including a worldly outlook, pursuit, life style, thinking, behavior and objective. In short, it is salvation “from this present evil age” (Gal. 1:4). O, do you really have the assurance and the Spirit´s testimony in your heart that you belong to Christ and are among His people?  God´s people are a separated people (2 Cor. 6:14-18), but not isolated into gloomy monasteries or the like.  On the contrary we are sent to the world (Joh. 20:21).  The principle of the apostle Paul´s call applies to all God´s people, “I will deliver you from your own people as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you!”  (Acts 26:17).  If not “delivered” or freed from our own people and their thinking, we will not be fit to go to them with the gospel.

Secondly, the practical implications are very concrete.  Our time, passion and energy will not be taken up with worldly affairs (2 Tim. 2:4).  We will not run any “well-intentioned” campaigns to make this world better (for it´s already doomed) or throw mud at our rulers (praying for them is much more pleasing to God, 1 Tim. 2.1-3), and we´ll encourage one another to be faithful witnesses of Jesus Christ before a watching world.  A young friend of mine always put this simple question to us, “How does your witnessing go?”  (He was sick and the Lord took him home still young).  “Whatever you are, do the work of an evangelist!” (Billy Graham at a conference in Amsterdam 1972)

Thirdly, God´s agenda for His people is unambiguous and has not changed over the centuries. “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature!”  (Mk. 16:15).  I agree with an American conference speaker I listened to in Denmark last summer who said, “When it comes to spiritual warfare, the gospel is at stake!” and I believe he was biblical and referred among other things to the apostle´s evangelistic passion in Eph. 6:19-20 - … “that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel…”.  In the foregoing verses he had just talked about our spiritual warfare.

A dear retired pastor friend just said to me yesterday, “You know as long as the Christians are sitting inside, in quiet rooms, they are pretty bold, but as soon they get outside that boldness has gone.”  Far from uttering snide remarks about it, we should rather be humble enough to admit how difficult it is and what a spiritual battle we´re facing.  Paul did that, and so he humbly coveted the prayers of his fellow saints so that he may boldly open his mouth about the gospel  of Jesus Christ.

A vote for a political leader is a formal thing and doesn´t cost you much.  A heart´ vote for or dedication to Jesus Christ afresh will invariably be more costly, but it will be a happy vote that will answer the relevant questions, “What are we here for?  What is our true citizenship?  Whose ambassadors are we?”  When these questions burn themselves into our souls, our relationship to our nation will also be clarified and we can still press on for Christ no matter what state the country is in. 

The principal of Trinity College, Dublin,  said to the very gifted scholar, William Kelly (1821-1906), when he graduated at the age of  20,  “You could make your fortune in the world!” to which Kelly calmly replied, “Which world?”

Which world are we living for?

Clovis, CA, April 14, 2012, - jn