When enemies harm us, instead of retaliating, let us remember that, unless that person repents, the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. As the Preacher of Ecclesiastes said at the very end of his book, “For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil” (Eccl. 12:14). It is only because of the certainty of God’s justice at the end of history that now, in this life, we can respond with grace and mercy toward those who hurt us.
How to Respond to Those Who Hurt Us
Written by Michael G. Brown |
Friday, December 8, 2023
In 2 Timothy 4:14–15, Paul warns Timothy of an enemy of the gospel, someone who had caused him much pain. “Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message.” Who was Alexander the coppersmith? It is difficult to identify this man precisely. Alexander was a common name in the first century Greco-Roman world, and there are several possibilities concerning his identity. He may have been a man in Troas of whom Paul wanted Timothy to beware. Given that Timothy would be stopping in Troas to pick up Paul’s coat and books, he should be careful to avoid him (2 Tim. 4:13). Another possibility is that this was a coppersmith in Rome, where Paul was then imprisoned, or this may have been the Alexander in Ephesus who was involved in the infamous riot (Acts 19:33). It seems most likely, though, that this was the same Alexander whom Paul mentions in his first letter to Timothy, the man in Ephesus whom Paul “handed over to Satan,” along with Hymenaeus, so that they would learn not to blaspheme (1 Tim. 1:20).
Whomever this Alexander was, he had done serious injury to Paul. Paul does not specify the nature of this “great harm,” but it seems to have been linked to his arrest and trial. He says in the next verse that “at my first defense no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me” (2 Tim. 4:16). Alexander may have brought false testimony against Paul during the first stage of his trial (what Paul refers to as his “first defense”). Paul says this man “strongly opposed our message.” This was not a fellow Christian with whom Paul had a disagreement. Paul is not expressing an unforgiving heart toward a man with whom he needed to reconcile. Rather, he identifies Alexander as a fierce opponent and bitter foe of the gospel. That is why he warns Timothy to beware of him.
It would have been easy for Paul to complain about what Alexander had done to him.
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Social Implications of Spurgeon’s Gospel
A thorough commitment to evangelical and Reformed theology was everything needed in times past to move Christians to compassion and care for the neediest members of fallen humanity. All the resources for a vibrant social ministry are found in the Reformed tradition. But more importantly, they’re found in the Scriptures themselves, which summon Christians to love their neighbors (Mark 12:31), to do good to all (Gal. 6:10), and to be a people zealous for good works (Titus 2:14).
In conservative evangelical circles, “social ministry” can sometimes sound like a four-letter word. Some view Christian activism and ministries of mercy among the poor as an impulse of theological liberalism. This isn’t altogether surprising, as theological liberals often promote social activism as part of the church’s primary purpose in the world. So when one finds a group of Christians passionate about social justice, helping the poor, and feeding the hungry, some may assume they must be theologically liberal or, at least, acting out the instincts of liberalism.
It’s worth noting that political and economic developments, especially in the 20th century, caused a net deflation in the value of Christian social ministry, as many advanced Western countries launched government-subsidized welfare programs to care for their neediest citizens. What some had once understood to be the responsibility of churches and charitable organizations (often founded by conservative evangelicals) was, by the early to mid-20th century, increasingly seen as the responsibility of the wider body politic, mediated through local and national taxation.
It’s at least plausible, then, that the twin developments of the rise of theological liberalism on the one hand and state subsidies on the other sapped conservative evangelicalism of what had been its characteristic zeal for mercy ministry.
Nonetheless, Charles Spurgeon should challenge us in this regard. If his social concern seems unusual today, perhaps it says more about us than about him.
Charles Spurgeon, Liberal?
Though “the Prince of Preachers” by no means championed a social gospel, he oversaw dozens of benevolent ministries in the heart of 19th-century London—organizing free schools for destitute children, advocating for American slaves, and caring for orphans and widows. But was Spurgeon’s social concern an evangelical anomaly, deviating from the Calvinistic tradition in which he was raised?
Such a question betrays a contemporary consciousness shaped more by modern cultural debates than a serious reflection on the heritage of the Reformed and evangelical traditions. To properly understand Spurgeon’s commitment to social ministry, we must realize he saw care and concern for the needy as springing forth from his understanding of the Bible—as well as from the body of doctrine he’d received from his theological forebears. Without question, Spurgeon saw himself as living out the consistent social implications of Reformed and evangelical theology.
When one studies how many Protestants, beginning in the 16th century, prioritized care for the poor and needy, Spurgeon begins to look more like the norm. Meanwhile, many evangelicals today who are suspicious of social concern appear more like a departure from their historical and theological heritage.
Reformed Benevolence
Consider the Belgic Confession (1561), which requires that churches be properly ordered, in part, “so that also the poor and all the afflicted may be helped and comforted according to their need.” Or the Thirty-nine Articles of the Anglican Church (1571): “Every man ought, of such things as he possesseth, liberally to give alms to the poor, according to his ability.” Or the Second Helvetic Confession (1566): ministers should “commend the necessity of the poor to the church,” and the church should use its resources “especially for the succor and relief of the poor.” Or the Heidelberg Catechism’s (1563) question: “What is God’s will for you in the fourth commandment?” The answer in part is “to bring Christian offerings for the poor.”
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The Nashville Shooting and Christian Warfare
As Christians, we follow the Lord Jesus Christ, who, for the joy set before Him, endured the most wanton and senseless violence in order to bring about the most tremendous peace. As soldiers of the Living Christ, let us shine as lights in this dark and decaying world.
To the Church
Dear Christian,
As I write to you this day, my heart is filled with tremendous grief and sadness over the events that have transpired in Nashville, Tennessee. On Monday morning, a mentally ill biological woman, who identified as a transgender male, shot her way inside The Covenant School, a Presbyterian school in East Tennessee, firing indiscriminate rounds at both helpless children and adults before being gunned down by local police officers. In fourteen horrifying minutes, 6 innocent people were brutally killed, including three little ones aged nine and 3 adults in their sixties. One of the children who tragically perished was the daughter of Chad Scruggs, who serves as lead pastor over Covenant Presbyterian Church, the church that founded the school.
During such awful instances of darkness, we must remember we are children of the light. We are living examples of Christ to all who are perishing. How we respond to tragedies like this will say much about how we think, believe, and cherish the Gospel. Thus, as we pray for the victims, let us also pray for the victimizers. As we pray for affected families, let us diligently pray for the shooter’s family. And as we are bombarded with all sorts of opinions on this subject, let us be slow to speak, quick to listen, and ready to pattern our response in accordance with Scripture.
With that, I would like to consider how a Christian is supposed to respond to awful tragedies such as this.
This Memes War
Whether you like it or not, you will be inundated in the coming days with a cacophony of “hot-takes” from trolls on Twitter, rants by activists and personalities on social media, biased coverage by the news, and shots fired from both sides of the Left / Right culture war. You will also see this situation entirely weaponized by gun control activists, the news trying to play up the perpetrator’s victim status, and the trans community crying out for justice and days of vengeance, as we have seen in Virginia. Yesterday and today, instead of seeing an empathetic president consoling a wounded nation or addressing the victims, we saw a depraved dottering dolt making inappropriate jokes about what flavor of ice cream he stacks in his fridge before blaming republicans for this incident of gun violence. (Sadly, this was not the only occasion our dunderhead-in-chief quipped sardonically when doing so was both vile and inappropriate). Perhaps you also saw the despicable and insensitive meme posted by Arizona press secretary, Jocelyn Berry, depicting a woman holding two handguns in a threatening pose, captioned: “Us when we see transphobes.” Or maybe you saw any number of shameless responses on the vast interwebs, such as I have found here.
This Means War
From such a smattering of debased opinions, I believe it is obvious that we are in a war. But let me be unequivocally clear here, we are not in the Left / Right “culture war” that has captivated this nation for decades. We are not on the left; we are not on the right; we are on the side of Christ. When the pundits, politicians, and the ideological left blame Christians and gun laws for this attack, we must not respond with the equal and opposite fury displayed among activists on the right. As Christians, we must respond as Christians and not as activists! We are citizens of heaven, not paupers, in this pitiful and polarized political war game.
We have been called to war, but not that one. Instead, the battle that we have been called into is a war – first and foremost – against the flesh (Romans 8:13). We are to be killing that which is wicked and depraved in us, mortifying it by the Spirit so that we may live. As Christians, we do not begin a plank-eyed campaign against a horde of sawdusty sinners without first pointing the lens of Biblical truth upon our own hearts and our own soul. We must make war through repentance, not hollow pharisaism.
But, this does not mean we have nothing to say. In fact, the Bible does call us to a kind of warfare with the world. According to Scripture, for the love of God and the redemption of the planet, we are called to expose the damnable misdeeds of darkness (Ephesians 5:5-13) and to call out pagan philosophies such as transgenderism with the light of the Gospel of Christ (Colossians 2:8; Jude 3). We are to be salt, which preserves the decaying world. We are to be light in the midst of a crooked people, which means exposing and chasing away the darkness (Matthew 5:13-16; Philippians 2:14-15) And if we do that work faithfully, meeting mistruth with love (Ephesians 4:15), we fully understand that the world will still hate us because it first hated Christ (John 15:18). No matter how the world views us, we labor on until every nation has been discipled according to the vision and Biblical standards of Christ (Matthew 28:18-20).
It is also a battle fought against the demonic principalities and satanic powers who wage war against the plain truth of God (Ephesians 6:12). We must remember that the transgender community is not our enemy. Likewise, the LGBTQLMNOP activists are not our foe. We do not wage our warfare against them but for them! We wage a spiritual war against spiritual opponents with unique non-violent weapons that will advance the Gospel of Jesus Christ and take back dominion for our King in a world that is hopelessly lost and dead (Ephesians 6:13-17).
The Christians’ warfare brings life and light to the world, not death and hot-takes, which brings us to an apropos passage for such a time as this. In light of the events that occurred in Nashville, and whenever the next grisly evil is unleashed upon the world, may the words of Romans 12:14-21 become our guide on how to respond to the world, the flesh, and the devil, with uniquely and poignantly Christian warfare. This is our battle guide:
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God is Great
God is simple and my conviction is that people need to know Him. It is not enough to assume that people know about God nor will it do to throw out a few words like communicable and incommunicable every now and again. As believers we must delight in God. Actually, “must” doesn’t seem like an appropriate word. I should say that we have the privilege of delighting in God. We get to delight in Him! Personally, I love to preach on the doctrine of God. My heart literally thrills in the moment to proclaim God in all of His splendor.
Many years ago I was listening to Christian radio. It was in the early 90s and there was a lot of talk about self-esteem. In fact, if you were raised in the 80s and 90s you probably remember the government, media, books and lingo associated with the self-esteem craze. Maybe you were small enough to have been read, The Lovables in the Kingdom of Self-Esteem! Maybe your mom read to you over and over again the inside cover, “I am lovable! I am lovable! I am Lovable! By using these magical words, the gates of the Kingdom of Self-Esteem swing open for readers of all ages.”
Yes, well, I remember listening to a radio program during those self absorbed years. A preacher was preaching, though I don’t remember who it was, and he said something I have never forgotten. He said if you want to improve self-esteem in a person, I think he used self-worth then you must teach them about the person and nature of God. He said that the only way a person will have any sort of self-worth to speak of is if they understand who God is. I agreed then and I agree now.
Every once in a while in my preaching I take my congregation to theology proper. I want them to look at God. I have even preached on the simplicity of God from the pulpit. Why? Because God is simple and my conviction is that people need to know Him. It is not enough to assume that people know about God nor will it do to throw out a few words like communicable and incommunicable every now and again. As believers we must delight in God. Actually, “must” doesn’t seem like an appropriate word. I should say that we have the privilege of delighting in God.
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