This massacre was perpetrated by one person in one place and toward one group of people. Even granting that we share a faith and formal ecclesiastical ties, there is a case for many of us keeping silent and not presuming to advise or to otherwise discuss the matter. In a matter so awful even consolation can come across as callous, especially when it comes from strangers and via digital means.

The year that I graduated high school the county in which I lived was greatly affected by a jeep wreck that killed two young men who attended that same school. I suppose the news outlets in Charlotte were strapped for news that day, so at least one of them apparently sent a reporter out into the hinterlands to ‘get the scoop’ on what had happened. That caused no little furor among some of the locals, who objected that such a thing was an inconsiderate and insulting thing to do at a time when many people were in shock at such a sad affair.
I am paraphrasing/filling in the blanks and working from secondhand testimony here, but the objection was that under normal circumstances the media paid no attention to the county. Indeed, many of them were probably unaware that it existed, and even those that had a vague idea were probably not inclined to visit or to generally think or speak well of it: the meteorologists in particular caused an irritation every time there was a major thunderstorm and they mispronounced the name of one of our communities. And yet when something tragic – read: newsworthy – happened they acted as though they had a right to invade the community and interrogate total strangers about their feelings about the situation. Strangers, it might be added, whom they would probably look down upon under normal circumstances. The local rejoinder to all of this was something along the lines of ‘mind your business and leave us to grieve in peace, for we are hurting and have no interest in our pain being used as a revenue-generating spectacle in your news program.’
This affair came to mind after the recent outrage in Nashville. And as I watch people fall all over themselves analyzing, discussing, well-wishing, and politicking in response to that sad episode I am inclined to think that the response of my fellow citizens in the former case is wise and well-suited to the present moment as well. There is an important difference in that the former case dealt with a tragedy in the form of a vehicular accident, whereas in Nashville a heinous crime was willfully perpetrated by a person as a responsible moral agent. Still, the basic response in the first case is useful here as well.
This massacre was perpetrated by one person in one place and toward one group of people. Even granting that we share a faith and formal ecclesiastical ties, there is a case for many of us keeping silent and not presuming to advise or to otherwise discuss the matter. In a matter so awful even consolation can come across as callous, especially when it comes from strangers and via digital means. Those who have actual relationships with the grieving have an obligation to “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15), but those of us who do not have such relationships would probably do well to keep silence and to let our efforts be restricted to interceding with God for mercy for the grieving: this is a “go into your room and shut the door and pray” moment (Matt. 6:5-6).
Job’s friends are a helpful example here. They did not come from afar to console a stranger, but one whom they knew well. And they did not come in speech that presumed to comfort but sat speechless in the elements, exposed for seven days to the Near Eastern sun and the desert nights in torn garments while they waited for Job to break the silence with his laments (Job 2:11-13). That forms a remarkable contrast to our present situation, and it involved a sacrifice far greater than what I am suggesting. I do not ask you, dear reader, to lay aside your temporal affairs to travel to Nashville to sit in sackcloth and silence. But I do suggest real good might be done by simply not talking about the matter on the internet, and I think that you might consider whether your own behavior until now falls short of that of those who have otherwise become a byword for people who fail to comfort in a time of need.
Central to my thinking on this matter are several points. One, it is not appropriate to discuss the suffering of others in public. It is in fact rather rude, being actually a form of gossip. Two, there is such a thing as respect for the dead and for the survivors and the grieving, and such respect includes a solemn refusal to speak in the presence of or about those who have been killed or who have lost loved ones. Presence in our day includes not only real presence, but the digital sphere as well. I fear that such respect is in short supply at present, perhaps even among some believers. Three, it is not right to pretend that one knows or cares about people and places that one does not know and would not know or care about absent exceptional events that bring them to one’s attention. (That remark is directed to those in our wider society who have no relation to the victims whatsoever, not those of us that share a faith and ought to feel a general compassion for all our fellow believers, whether they are personally known or not: Rom. 1:10-13; Col. 1:29-2:5.) Four, opportunism is always revolting, and there seem to be many in our society who have no qualms about using a crime perpetrated against strangers as an occasion for sounding compassionate and important, or for their advantage otherwise.
Lastly, as for the specifically political opportunism, there is much in the present case that shows the civil affairs of our nation are in a poor state. It is the depth of brazen knavishness to use a massacre committed by someone in one of your side’s favored groups as an occasion to demand that your own preferred policies be enacted posthaste, especially when those policies would tend to make the victims more defenseless against those and other groups that conspicuously hate them. Then too, the concepts of dignity of office and proper civil decorum seem to be wholly unknown to many in our society, including some who have attained to high office: we have many of whom it can be said that they “neither fear God nor respect man” (Lk. 18:4). I have no interest in entering too much into a partisan political discussion of that, but it does much to reiterate that we are as sheep among wolves (Matt. 10:17), and that we ought to be diligent in prayer that the ruling authorities will be just and wise, and that we might “lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Tim. 2:2). And as for the larger matter at hand, let us recognize that this is for many of us “a time to keep silence” (Ecc. 3:7) and act accordingly.
Tom Hervey is a member of Woodruff Road Presbyterian Church, Five Forks (Simpsonville), SC. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not of necessity reflect those of his church or its leadership or other members. He welcomes comments at the email address provided with his name.
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Embracing a biblical siege mentality doesn’t mean adopting aggressive evangelism or open hostility toward unbelievers. The full compass of Christian living – warm hospitality, sensitive evangelism, joyful fellowship, and discerning cultural engagement – are arrows in the Christian’s quiver. It is worth noting that these do not exist alongside the Christian’s spiritual warfare, they are our spiritual warfare. These are precisely the behaviours that Christ is pleased to use to storm the very gates of hell.

When discussing missions with any zealous evangelist, it won’t be long before the phrase ‘siege mentality’ is mentioned with a head shake and a furrowed brow. From their spiritual walled castle, adherents of this mentality fearfully examine the moral decay in their surroundings and resolve to have little to do with unbelievers. The call to keep oneself unstained by the world has become their great commission; they’ve raised the drawbridge and put extra piranhas in the moat for good measure.
It is an amusing thought experiment to look out over my Tasmanian suburb and imagine a walled castle amid the streets. While such a building would be geographically strange, perhaps it is spiritually appropriate. After all, the siege mentality has one thing going for it: Christians are actually at war (Eph 6:12). This celestial war, waged on a terrestrial battlefield, rarely reaches the front intellectual burner for many Christians. While the siege mentality is a problem – and it is a problem – very much greater is the problem of believers walking out into the battlefield each day with their spiritual armour in a box under the bed. Walking out into the fray in one’s spiritual birthday suit doth not a battle plan make.
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That any endeavor to soften the blunt message of Scripture that homosexuality is utterly perverse and shameful and ought to be forsaken entirely runs a risk of blurring the absolute difference between the Christian position and that of the sinful flesh, and thereby risks making repentance seem less urgent and of making redemption seem less liberating.

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That affixing any adjective that describes a heinous sin or lifestyle to what we are in Christ is blasphemy. Well might a man tear his clothes and gnash his teeth to hear or read such a phrase used anywhere, but especially in the church of God assembled.
That the judicial powers of the church ought to be used to discipline and discourage such blasphemous speech.
That no new or special overtures ought to be necessary to prosecute those whose manner of life is so obviously contrary to the example Scripture requires of ministers of the gospel, especially when they have committed other sins (as blasphemy), that ought to be disciplined.
That the foregoing thesis is not limited to such adjectives as same-sex attracted, but that it would have equal propriety in condemning the blasphemous terms of movements to normalize swindling, stealing, reviling, drunkenness, or the other sins of 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, if ever such movements should arise.
That the absence of such movements, coupled with the existence of a militant movement to normalize homosexuality, is the reason for the church’s present concern with sexual ethics rather than with those others.
That notwithstanding that no special overtures should be necessary to preserve the church’s purity in this matter, yet the practical exigencies of the situation commend the contemporary adoption of such overtures.
That the prevalence of other sins in no way deprives the church of its right and duty to condemn homosexual immorality.
That past failures in this or other matters in no way deprives the church of its right and duty to stand firm in this matter, but only indicate it has need to repent in such other matters.
That any endeavor to soften the blunt message of Scripture that homosexuality is utterly perverse and shameful and ought to be forsaken entirely runs a risk of blurring the absolute difference between the Christian position and that of the sinful flesh, and thereby risks making repentance seem less urgent and of making redemption seem less liberating.
That they who convert from homosexual sin to Christ will often be drawn because of the difference in experience between his service and that of their previous life.
That those who commit homosexual sin are no less human thereby, and are to be prayed for and ministered to no less than any other people, in keeping with the Lord’s admonition to love our neighbors as ourselves.
That all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23) and are absolute lawbreakers from the standpoint of his law, for every command of which they are responsible (Jas. 2:10).
That the foregoing being true, there is no occasion for believers to be proud or to look down upon or despise those who are ensnared in sexual immorality of any type. As an old adage says, ‘there but for the grace of God there go I.’
That God’s hand is not shortened that he cannot save (Isa. 59:1), and that it is his pleasure to effectually redeem his elect out of all types of sinful living (1 Cor. 6:11).
That the church, as such, should diligently witness to those ensnared in sexual immorality of all types.
That mercy takes different forms, depending upon the nature and needs of its recipients.
That it is no act of mercy to minimize the severity of a person’s sin, and that mercy too contains within itself the other virtues, such as hatred of evil. As Jude says, “save others by snatching them out of the fire; to others show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh” (Jude 23).
That he is mistaken who imagines that mercy is only passive and meek, and who does not recognize that it is also, as befits the occasion, zealous and aggressive.
That it is an act of mercy for the church to declare, frequently and plainly (yet with tact), that those ensnared in homosexual sin ought to repent hastily for the sake of their present and future lives.
That it is no mercy to be inconsistent in these matters or to waver as regards fidelity to the historic position of God’s people.
That friendship with the world is enmity to God (Jas. 4:4), an inexcusable act of infidelity that profits nothing and brings only woe. The world has ever shown itself a fickle and cruel seductress, always intimating its acceptance and respect if this or that offensive doctrine is surrendered, but never giving such respect and always desiring more compromise and infidelity on the part of the church.
That a desire for the world’s acceptance lies behind much of what factions such as the National Partnership seek. The notion that the church might offend unbelievers seems to loom large in their thought, however much they might say that this is only a desire to be effective in reaching the lost.
That the contemporary language of many of our ministers is liable to corruption and to being used to excuse a lack of zeal in contending “for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). We are often told of the need to ‘contextualize’ the difficult teachings of the church. How easily this can come to mean that we compromise to avoid giving offense, that the one who ‘contextualizes’ so tempers his words as to attempt to make an unpopular teaching palatable to infidels. How different this is apt to be, in practice, from the direct and simple style of such examples as John the Baptist or our Lord and his apostles.
That he who avouches his orthodoxy ought not to be taken at his own word, but should have his actual teaching and, more than that, the fruit of his teaching, examined to see whether it is good or bad. For it is the mark of the heretic that he regards himself as right and faithful where everyone else has gone astray, and therefore self-testimony is always to be abetted by careful examination.
That he who holds to the orthodox faith is yet unfaithful if he does not defend it actively against those that would subvert it. For Scripture says that the maintenance of sound doctrine is a duty of elders when it says that an elder “must hold to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it” (Titus 1:9).
That one should not listen to the wicked, nor give heed to the slanders of unbelievers, except it be to refute them. At the 47th General Assembly one pastor stated that hatred of homosexuals is believed to be the foremost characteristic of believers among contemporary youth, his point being that we should labor to modify this perception of us that the world has. Such a statement only proves that the world is ensnared in the lies of Satan and misunderstands us and our beliefs.
That to be thus misunderstood is neither surprising nor an occasion for modifying our presentation of the faith; for doing so would not release unbelievers from deception, and would likely only lead to them believing some other lie about us. And have we forgotten our Lord’s teaching that “blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account” (Matt. 5:11), and that we are to meet such a prospect, not with embarrassment and a public relations campaign to rehabilitate our image, but are rather to “rejoice and be glad, for [our] reward is great in heaven” (v. 12)?
That the world lies in the power of the evil one is seen especially in this, that it misunderstands the nature of hatred. For the unbeliever regards any disapproval of the behavior of others as an act of hatred and unjust judgment, no matter its motivation or manner of expression. Yet hatred is not disapproval as such, but rather a feeling of strong antipathy which might be either wicked or righteous, depending upon its object and motivations.
That the respect of the world is neither good nor desirable, and that its presence would indicate infidelity to our Lord, whose words the world hates (Jn. 15:18-25). For he who chases the acceptance of the world chases a phantom, unless he be willing to surrender fully his service to Christ; and what does it profit a man to gain the world and to lose his soul (Matt. 16:26)?
That what is enjoined to increase the church’s effectiveness and size has ever tended to do the opposite.
That doctrinal decline is gradual and accomplished in phases. Seldom, if ever, does orthodoxy yield to obvious heresy in a single act of change. In small increments fidelity gives way to apostasy.

Tom Hervey is a member of Woodruff Road Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Simpsonville, S.C.