In the recent post The Sexuality Obsession, there has been a heated debate over the issue of a Christian’s role in legislating morality. Ingrid wrote

I’m amazed at those who make the statement that you can’t legislate morality. Someone’s morality is always legislated, the question is always, whose? Right now the morality of the child-killers has been codified into law. We have 50 million dead babies because of this. Chattel slavery was the morality codified into law here in the United States and in Great Britain. It took a William Wilberforce, a Christian, to spearheaded moral opposition that changed the law (politics, Henry) to free blacks in England and a civil war to end it here in America where Christians had made peace with slavery.

All I want to say is that fighting for basic rights that all humanity should have (life, freedom, food, etc.) is one thing. Fighting for all humanity to act as we would like them to is a whole other ballgame. Calling for humans to not be sold as property is not the same as calling for everyone to have sex as we would like them to. Ending the genocide in Europe is not the same as fighting for our morals to be made laws in America. We Christians in the United States fight so hard for our moral freedom. But, as soon as someone else wants to exercise their moral freedom, not even asking for us to curb our beliefs, we react with vicious words and actions.

Look, I believe the scriptures. I believe that homosexuality is a destructive and ultimately godless lifestyle. I believe that having sex inside the context of heterosexual marriage is the only acceptable context for it. I believe that God longs for people to honor His instructions for sexual practices. However, I also believe that adultery is biblically wrong. I believe that marriage is exclusively between one man and one woman for life. I also know that more people commit adultery in America (14-22%) than live homosexual lifestyles (1-3%). If we are so concerned about legislating our sexual morality, why are we not strengthening the marriage contract? Why are we not fighting for making adultery illegal? Of course, we can’t stop there in being the moral majority. We will have to make it illegal to not attend church. We will have to enforce coveting with the law enforcement. We can force people to give 10% of their income to the church.

If we are going to be the group who controls everyone’s morality thru the government, we have to think thru the long term ramifications. Are we really called to do this? Or, are we just picking and choosing our battles to keep our comfort levels at their peak?

Hell froze over this Monday when CRN reported something positive about an emerging church. They also didn’t point out that Mark Driscoll was the “cussing pastor”. Rumor has it that they’ve decided to forgive Driscoll and move on with their lives.

Pigs were seen flying through Claremont, NH as well.

Brant writes here:

Anyway, my point is: We shouldn’t replicate the early church. What should we be doing, then? I submit, humbly: We love Jesus with everything we have, study him, and love our neighbors, and stay open to what that might look like in our neighborhoods, our workplaces, our cultures, our contexts.

It may turn out that what the best way to be a Jesus movement in your context is by starting a fund drive for a big tract of land, building a multi-million-dollar edifice, and paying someone to talk at everybody, lecture style, in a big theater-type thing at 10 and 11:30 Sunday mornings. But maybe not. My guess? Probably not. But maybe.

…….

You can try to be the first century church, but you’ll fail, because you’re not in first century Corinth right now. (Or, if you are, tell that one guy to quit messing around with his stepmom, and take the “30 day singles challenge”.) Point is, my neighbors, co-workers, family, and friends don’t need me to be a first century anything. They need me to take Jesus seriously, and they want to see people take Jesus seriously, together.