By Ife J. Ibitayo
Highs and lows have filled my holiday season. I relaxed with my parents while we watched a blockbuster movie. Then I rushed to the toilet as my dinner found a new home. I played video games with my little brother on my laptop. Then I cursed that same machine for suddenly bricking out on me. Turbulence was my only constant during this past Thanksgiving holiday.
And the same is true for our nation. Within the space of one short week, we celebrated justice as three guilty men were condemned and decried injustice as one guilty man walked free. Or was it three innocent men who were condemned and one innocent man exonerated as many assert? Have I gone too far? Should I just stop talking politics and stick to the Bible?
Dangerous Speech
Speaking of the Bible, John the Baptist was murdered for denouncing injustice. He was incarcerated and eventually beheaded because he called out King Herod for marrying his brother’s former wife. I sat in church one Sunday and heard a message that heaped the blame onto John the Baptist for “veering out of his lane.” His calling was to be Jesus’ forerunner, to prepare the way for the Messiah. But once he’d finished his job, he ran out of topics to cover. So he started speaking on things he had no business talking about. And that was why he was killed (Mark 6:17-18). But since when did the living Word become divorced from the lives we live?
Dangerous Silence
Some say that the Bible is silent on many issues that stir the hearts of Americans today. And they argue, “Where the Bible is silent, we are silent.” But that logic doesn’t hold water. Consider if a mother commands her son not to punch his brother. Then the child starts slapping his sister. When his mother sits in him timeout, does it really make sense for her son to argue, “But you never send anything about punching my sister?”
The same principle applies to the Bible. Some say that the Bible says nothing about abortion. Yet the Bible says, “‘Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in His own image’” (Genesis 9:6). Just because this verse does not explicitly refer to “man” as “helpless baby” doesn’t mean that the Bible says nothing about abortion. Likewise, even though the Bible does not explicitly say “you shall not target other people on the basis of their class, gender, or ethnicity,” it does say, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself. For love does no wrong to one’s neighbor” (Romans 13:9-10).
Conclusion
When Christianity is constrained to Sunday services and church buildings, it becomes dangerously close to a prescription drug we take on a weekly basis. ” But it was crafted to be a “sword that pierces our very souls” (Hebrews 4:12). If we let the Bible dictate the way we view all aspects of our lives–from the way we treat our families, to the way we work our jobs, and even, dare I say, the way we view politics–then it becomes the most dangerous weapon in the world.
“But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves.”
(James 1:22)