Most of us, I think, are genuinely aiming to find some balance in these things. We aren’t looking to speak only about what the world will applaud us for saying. We aren’t spoiling for a fight and looking to always wade into controversial things. We aren’t necessarily seeking to keep our heads down in the hope nobody asks us anything that might get us in trouble either. We should be suspicious of those believers who are always falling into one of these camps.

All of us Christians like to think that everything we do is thoroughly biblical. We all genuinely believe we speak when and where the Bible speaks and we are more measured when and where it doesn’t. But it is telling what we are often willing to speak up about.
Some of us are very happy to speak up on matters that our culture also consider to be problems. We readily call out issues that large sections of society agree with us on – particularly those issues that garner respect for our ‘bravery’ in speaking out – and tend to major on these. I, for example, find that people are generally quite supportive when I speak on issues of mental health or racial inequality. These things can get the likes and clicks from many outside the church.
Others of us are very happy to speak up on things that our culture generally do not consider to be problems. We are quick to call out those things that we perceive our culture will largely not give us any great plaudits for mentioning. We are keen to raise issues such as abortion or sexual ethics that go against the overwhelming consensus. These are the things that tend to receive the ire of the those outside the church.
It is interesting to me when there are folks who only ever seem to be in one or other of those camps. If the former, it feels like they are keen for approval and are desperate to be applauded. If the latter, it feels like they are spoiling for a fight, all of the time and love the controversy. John speaks about the former group when he says:
Many did believe in him even among the rulers, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, so that they would not be banned from the synagogue. 43 For they loved human praise more than praise from God.
John 12:42-43
Jesus himself has this to say:
Woe to you when all people speak well of you, because this is the way their ancestors used to treat the false prophets.
Luke 6:26
To the latter group Paul says:
As far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
Romans 12:18
And similarly:
Reject foolish and ignorant disputes, because you know that they breed quarrels. 24 The Lord’s servant must not quarrel, but must be gentle to everyone, able to teach, and patient, 25 instructing his opponents with gentleness. Perhaps God will grant them repentance leading them to the knowledge of the truth.
These things do not mean, of course, that we can’t speak on issues. Of course we can.
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Our King is the one who put the world on notice. That babe in swaddling clothes announced to the nations you will either bow down and worship Him or be trampled underneath His glorious feet. The Son of Man, the Prince of Peace, entered brokenness and brought His Shalom. He went raiding behind enemy lines, rescuing His elect and delivering them safely back to God.

One of the most significant accomplishments in antiquity, in a history littered with wars and violence, was a hundred years of peace known as the Pax Romana, which in English means the peace of Rome. This unique and peculiar era of warless tranquility, which is unmatched in any other period known to man, saw no more nation rising up against nation, rumors of wars no longer on the lips of women in the market, and the myriad of complex personalities, usually unrestrained, now contained within a burgeoning peace, which lasted from 27BC, under the reign of Augustus, to the death of Nero Caesar in 68 AD. This is the world and setting that the Savior of the world was born.
On that first Christmas morning in Judea, God did not show up for a press conference at a palace or a “Precious Moments” commercial in the big city. Instead, in a surprise attack, He stormed the beaches of Bethlehem. He blitzkrieg’d the stables of that old country barn and assembled all the legions of heaven to herald Christ is Lord to shepherds in their fields. He held His fiery star in the sky to announce kings and kingdoms would either worship Him or be put down. While under the peace of Rome, God was bringing war.
And He was bringing war because this old world had fallen into bitter, soul-crushing slavery to an evil dragon. A serpent of great beguiling who tricked our only king into trading in his scepter for over-tight handcuffs… His crown for rusty chains. On that first Christmas morning, after legions of failed men who came before Him, the heaven-sent God-Man was born the royal Man-King. Delivered as a helpless babe to deliver and set the helpless free.
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What Mr. Hervey also means by the “separation of law and gospel” is as unclear to me as some of the issues of the Statement seem to be to him. How the separation of law and gospel relates to the issue at hand is also a puzzle to me.  The same statement, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” is part of law AND gospel. This needs further elaboration and I look forward to it.

Mr. Tom Hervey has offered a lengthy and searching essay concerning a Statement by Coordinators and Presidents of committees and agencies of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), that appeared in ByFaith webzine concerning racial justice. In his thought-provoking essay, he takes the agency heads to task on many issues that need further discussion. I believe that many of the points he makes in his piece are excellent, well balanced, and represent an honest, Christ-centered commitment to the Scriptures and to our common faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

I certainly applaud Mr. Hervey’s concern that zeal without knowledge is not productive. I share his concern.  My hope is that Mr. Hervey will continue to read and think deeply about the experiences of people of color, present or past.  However, some of the assumptions lead me to believe that more research and careful listening is needed.
For one thing, the issue about who “we” are. The article lists the staff.  Responsible people and those who feel that they must respond to the times.   One could ask the same question of the Founders in their drafting of the Preamble.  Certainly, “we” did not include everyone either.  Justice and righteousness is something to strive for.  It is part of the race we are in.  Whether or not Mr. Hervey agrees with the authors of the Statement, one must ask who he does identify with if not the “we” included in the Statement.
Hervey suggests that in a time of moral foment that words spoken in truth and humility are NOT likely to be well-received so perhaps we should find some other vehicle. But for the people of God, the current climate should never dictate whether we respond biblically. Is he distinguishing between law and gospel here?  I hope not.  Truth and humility, especially when I am under pressure from unbelievers are non-negotiables according to I Peter 3:15-17.
He insists that the writers of the Statement do no exegete the Scriptures properly. However, I want to point out that the Statement does not say that foreigners were MORE oppressed than citizens but that they were oppressed and Isaiah calls this out as sin.  Missing from the Hervey’s discussion is the clear prohibition of such in the Exodus 22.  Why is the command even there? To remind the Israelites that they, too, were ethnic strangers in Egypt and oppressed.  In other words, don’t do it – you know what it feels like (empathy?) Yet he chooses to quibble with the fact that sometimes foreigners were the oppressors themselves within national Israel.  I’m not sure I understand all the ink devoted to watering down the clear prohibition of oppression of outsiders.
Hervey also appears to erect a straw man by assuming that “people of color” and “ethnic outsiders” are synonymous when the Statement does not imply such a relationship. Ethnic outsiders could include any category of immigrants. And need I remind the author of an entire OT book devoted to such sojourners/outsiders? I really don’t understand the point. Don’t oppress the vulnerable.  Period. We do not want to lower ourselves to the clever gymnastics of pro-slavery apologists trying to counter the growing abolitionist sentiment in the Antebellum era. Suddenly there was this crying need to defend the institution of slavery by clever exegesis without dealing with the other, more basic scriptural issues such as the impact of slavery on the institutions that God had created – the family for one.
To me it is perplexing that he attempts to undercut the argument of extending justice and care for all people in Exodus to make the argument that this passage did not include criminals and the Canaanites. I would not imagine linking the two together. I am not sure why he does.
Too, his quibbling over the meaning of “Jesus serving outsiders proactively,” makes me want to ask more questions. Precisely then how does Mr. Hervey define service? Does it include evangelism? Healing? Preaching?  Or are these separate categories of ministry (perhaps I shouldn’t use that word since it is a synonym of “service”). And if Jesus’ initiation of contact with the Samaritan woman was not proactive, then how would the author define it?  Reactive? Jesus initiated the contact and chose to take the direct route through Samaria rather than around it as many devout Jews would do.  And how does he assess the value of the parable of the “Good Samaritan” which clearly would have been an insult to devout Jews (represented by the priest and Levite)? I could go on. Does not the Holy Spirit’s initiation of the mission to Cornelius qualify as “proactive?”  Philip’s trip to Samaria?  His conversation with the Ethiopian eunuch? One pillar of the Reformed faith is that God is always the proactive one.  We are not.  Hervey seems to imply that because Jesus’ interactions with Gentiles were few, that they were relatively unimportant. Unless, of course, one delves into Acts, right?
His discussion of the passages in Galatians and Ephesians regarding spiritual and social unity is certainly on target. However, I fear that these same arguments are often used as an excuse for Christians to avoid confronting injustice in biblical terms wherever we find it. When I was in the Air Force, I confronted a senior NCO who was using some very inappropriate language toward a young female airman.  Should I have refrained from this because there was no specific command to do so?  The author’s argument has often anesthetized churches against confronting any injustice, including racial injustice, especially in the 20th century or failing to carefully listen to the voices of the oppressed wherever we find them.  And when they did, they were labeled either liberal, social gospel advocates, outsiders, or worse, Communists.  Today, they are just called “woke,” leftist, socialist, and yes, Communist. To paraphrase Samuel Johnson’s words about calls for American liberty from Britain, I find that the loudest calls for the status quo come from those who do not take these voices seriously.
“But it is a fair question just what is entailed in standing against injustice in the church.” I am reminded of the question of the Pharisees to Jesus in Luke 10:29, “But he wanted to justify himself,” so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”  I believe Mr. Hervey is a godly, skilled expositor and interpreter of Scripture. Surely, he would recognize that the authors of the Statement are not advocating a radical socioeconomic restructuring of our church and a muzzling of the gospel but a recognition that there is or there may be a problem and we need to do something about it. Only in the area of racial injustice does there seem to be a pulling back from the clear demands to examine ourselves.
I also find the analysis of Jesus response to the question of the Tower of Siloam and Pilate’s brutality curious. Jesus responded to their questions in ways that truly revealed their hearts.  After 9/11 I heard John Piper speak of what should be a similar response to the question of that tragic day.  People who ask such questions are focused less on socioeconomic injustice than they are about why “bad things happen to good people.”  Jesus cuts right through that.  And so should we. Jesus responded in much the same way that he did with the question about taxes to Caesar. He was not going to be drawn into a trap by dealing with secondary issues.  Neither should we.  But if the matter is a primary issue for which prophetic responses are appropriate, this is a different story.  Here, we must go back to the role of the Church in every age for calling out injustice.  We did it in the early church with infanticide, with gladiatorial combats, with indulgences, with slavery, with fascism, with Bolshevism, with civil rights, with abortion.  Are we to stop now because we are afraid of misunderstanding the terms of the fight?  The answer to that is not less talk about the issue but more and, as Mr. Hervey rightly points out, more precise talk.  And all in love.
I am not sure where Mr. Hervey is going in his brief comment about Romans 13:10. In attempting to separate law and gospel he believes that Paul is not discussing the gospel but the Law. The author is correct but only in a limited sense.  And, as I am sure Mr. Hervey will recognize, although Paul lays out the gospel in Romans chapters 1-11, the applications of the gospel present themselves in the beginning of chapter 12 and continue to the end of the book.  Just as he did in Ephesians and Colossians.
“This may seem an unfair charge….” Hervey seems to believe that the expression of sorrow over oppression would therefore, logically include supporting those whose values we do not share (i.e. BLM).  I agree – this is certainly an unfair charge and I am puzzled why the author would include it. It is, however, consistent with his fears that recognizing our responsibility to condemn and destroy racism automatically leads to losing ourselves in social justice movements and destroying our mission.  One does not logically follow the other.  It reminds me of the many fears generated by Black equality in the 50s and 60s which I will not go into here.  It seemed logical to those who feared it.  But it is a fear.  That is all.
Perhaps if the Statement had defined its terms more carefully, Hervey may have had less of an issue with its so-called ties to “contemporary activist rhetoric.” Unfortunately, apart from three examples (also inadequately explained) he seems to fall unintentionally into similar errors.  It may have helped if he had cited precisely what makes these terms “activist rhetoric” and to cite the sources he is using.  Certainly, we can all profit from careful attention to definition and eschew the claims of CRT. Yet labeling something as “contemporary activist rhetoric” rather than careful exegesis of why this rhetoric does not align with Scripture takes more than the paragraph allotted for it in this essay.
The author’s comparison of the level of rioting with the 1960s seems to be ahistorical. Suffice it to say that “1960s rioting” taken over several years beginning with the tragedy of Watts in 1965 cannot be compared with what took place over the past two or three years. I am not sure where the author has obtained his history of the 1960s.  It is important to keep in mind, too, that many of the key marches and rallies in that decade and since the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-1956 were non-violent although there was plenty of provocation that would have made them violent apart from commitment of the movement’s early leadership to Christian non-violence. It seems that the author is gravitating toward a “Et tu, What-about-them?” argument rather than engaging with the Statement’s aims and designs.
The author also contends that certain so-called “contemporary activist rhetoric” identifies sins that the Bible never calls out including “racial sins,” “silence in the face of racial injustice,” privilege.” This statement reminds me of the argument I often here that since Jesus did not condemn homosexuality, it must therefore be ok. When we approach those sins – any sins in the light of God’s complete revelation from Genesis to Revelation we realize how extensively corrupt our sinful hearts really are – especially those of us who are redeemed. The Puritans practiced a form of self-examination at least weekly before the Sabbath – rigorous as it was – to root out every conceivable barrier between them and God. Dare we do less? Can I claim that because the Scriptures do not specifically call out racial sins that I am therefore not obligated to repent of it if I am guilty of it? Do I look at an attractive woman and then look at her again?  Do I steal a few paper clips or a sharpie from my desk at work? Do I unconsciously look behind me on the street because a person of color is following me or hold tightly onto my possessions? Do I get nervous when a see a car full of young Black men circling my block at night? If the answer is “yes” or “maybe” to any of these questions, I need to take a Puritan approach to my own indwelling sin, call it whatever you wish.
Certainly “All Lives Matter, as Mr. Hervey says.” But I must remember when I make that claim that I have just communicated something very different to the person making the claim that “X” Lives Matter. I have told them in so many words, that their experience or pain means nothing to me. What if it were a believer confessing a real and painful encounter to me? Do I disregard their own real experiences simply because “All Lives Matter?”  Doesn’t this violate the nature of the body of Christ and our call to suffer and rejoice with those who are suffering and rejoicing, as the author rightly pointed out earlier?
I grew up white in Honolulu – not on a military base, not in the middle-upper class communities that attended private schools but poor, on welfare, and the product of a single unmarried mom. Thus, as a minority, I was extremely conscious of my color and how intensely hated I was in some areas of the city. Suppose I mentioned this to some of my brethren and was be greeted with “All Lives Matter”’ I would feel that the message really was “Your experiences do not matter – your pain does not matter and therefore, you do not matter.”  All lives matter, but so do individual lives.  And we are called to love individuals. One cannot picture “all lives.”  But I can picture one.  And loving and taking seriously the claims of one does not mean that I reject the others.  Love is not a zero-sum game – if I love Joe, I cannot therefore love Jack.
We can and should ask for clarification of terms as Mr. Hervey does. But I must always ask myself the same questions I ask unbelievers who are testing me.  “If I answer your question to your satisfaction, will it influence what you think about Jesus Christ?”  If the answer is “No, then I do what Jesus did when asked about the authority of John the Baptist, “Then neither will I tell you.”  So, my question to my brother in Christ is this – if the Statement did answer your questions to your satisfaction would it influence your own reading, listening to, spending time with people who are really hurting in these ways?  I must assume that the answer is yes.
Hervey appears to narrow privilege to economic privilege and there I agree with him. But to assume that this is all that privilege is narrows it outside of reality. Certainly, we are aiming for equality of opportunity rather than outcome but let’s take the issue of privilege further.  In 1960s and early 1970s Honolulu, I longed for the privilege that came from having Asian or Pacific heritage.  I’d be able to blend in.  I’d have teachers who looked like me (I had three during my K-12 years). I also wouldn’t be beaten up on the last day of school or isolated in Boy Scouts.  I also wouldn’t be teased by my 7th grade shop teacher for being white and dumb. I have since spoken to my peers in education who have been pulled over in their own neighborhood because of their color, had the cops called in front of their own house. Privilege is real.  The larger question is, am I humble enough to investigate its manifestations, both present and past, without succumbing to unscriptural ways to dismantle it?
Hervey believes rightly that Scripture speaks for itself. This was a hallmark of the Protestant Reformation and its leaders’ desire to put the Scriptures into the hands of the people in their vernacular.  But it was also recognized that Scripture needs to be interpreted.  And a false interpretation can lead to disaster.  So, when my brother contends that we merely need to let the Scripture speak for itself and not be influenced by contemporary movements or worldviews he is absolutely right.  The problem, though, is that history is replete with examples of misinterpretations of Scripture.  Using the Scripture to one’s own end.   Sometimes I fear that many of my brothers are doing the same thing and I too, must be careful of using the Bible for my own selfish ends. Too many times in American history have we forgotten that our interpretations merely service our own worldviews.  Lincoln recognized this in his Second Inaugural Address. In rejecting the German Christian movement’s antisemitic “Aryan” view of Scripture in Nazi Germany, so did Bonhoeffer.  White supremacists insisted on the natural inferiority of people of color because of the so-called curse of Ham. This is why we need to listen carefully and read carefully to draw conclusions that do not accord with the Word of God.  It takes a tremendous degree of humility and openness to correction to do this.   As a history professor I shudder at how much I took for granted until I really started to do this. The assumptions I hear and read on all sides of the ideological divide astonish me.  God preserve me from unwarranted assumptions about the people around me. One thing I have noticed is that our society asks few questions anymore.  I mean real questions about people that are designed to help me get to know them. No, the questions I see in print and elsewhere are more like the questions a prosecutor poses to a witness.   They are accusations disguised as questions and designed to win – not to understand. And, as Proverbs 18:13 warns, giving an answer before one hears is a folly and shame.
I am not sure if Mr. Hervey is actually charging the writers of the Statement with unintentionally seeking to overthrow God’s government or providence. Perhaps it appears that way.  But conflating the Terror of the French Revolution and its outcome with the aims of the Statement seems to be on the level of the assumptions I mentioned earlier. May we seek to understand before we seek to destroy, whether these be systems or arguments.
Again, I don’t understand how Mr. Hervey separates the message of the gospel with its practical implications. As I view it, the Statement merely commits us to rooting out sin wherever we find it. If that sin is idolatry, it needs to go.  If it is greed, it needs to go.  If there is any kind of systemic injustice, it needs to go.  But to paraphrase the author, what if there is no idolatry?  What if there is no greed? Sin has consequences; it is written all over our history. The most deceitful thing we can say to ourselves is, “I don’t need to examine myself in this.  I am clean.”  Perhaps we are. But I would rather “examine myself (constantly) to see whether I am in the Faith” (II Cor. 13:5). That is my calling.  That is the calling of the Church.
What Mr. Hervey also means by the “separation of law and gospel” is as unclear to me as some of the issues of the Statement seem to be to him. How the separation of law and gospel relates to the issue at hand is also a puzzle to me. The same statement, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” is part of law AND gospel. This needs further elaboration and I look forward to it. Unfortunately, although the writer severely takes authors of the Statement to task for its application section, he does not seem to offer any real solutions himself beyond the exhortation to preach the gospel. I certainly applaud that. Workable solutions take time, work, love, blood, sweat, and tears.  Perhaps this too, will be elaborated.

Chris Bryans is a member of Northside Presbyterian Church (PCA) and teaches history at Eastern Florida State College in Melbourne FL.
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