Nationalism vs. Globalism

"And He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place." (Acts 17:26, ESV)

I have been thinking today about a comment that I heard to be made at the recent Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) convention, which event was televised over the last few days. Senior presidential advisor, Steve Bannon made a statement that put a label on the current political climate somewhat to the effect that it is nationalism vs. globalism.

This seems to me to be true, and it intrigued me to the point that I began to think whether the Bible has anything to say about nationalism vs. globalism. Among the first passages of scripture that came to mind was the one above, contained in Paul's sermon on Athens' Mars Hill . In this passage Paul says first of all, that God made " . . . from one man every nation of mankind . . ." which would at first glance seem to be a contraindication of nationalism, and a support of globalism if you stop reading at that point. He continues, however, to say that God determined both the boundaries of all nations, and the times that they would exist as nations, suggesting that His intent was that they, in fact are supposed to be separate nations, rather than a single global entity.

Among the cross-references given in the margin of the Bible that I was using in my study (Greek-Hebrew Key Word Study Bible), was Deuteronomy 32:8, which gives an additional twist to this idea:

When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when He divided mankind, He fixed the borders of the peoples according to the sons of God." (ESV)

I am not sure that I am ready to say that nations, and by implication, nationalism, is the God-ordained way that it should be, but at this point it sure seems that way.

It probably all started at the tower of Babel where we read this account:

"And the Lord said, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do, and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible to them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech. So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of the earth . . . "

(Genesis 11:6-8, ESV)

Now I stopped trying to psychoanalyze God a long time ago! I no longer try to explain his motivation for doing what He, in His sovereign will and purpose decides to do. I have, however, been hanging out with Him for long enough to believe that whatever He has on His mind is infinitely wiser than whatever I an come up with.

I do occasionally speculate, based on my limited perspective, what may be good about what He does. In this case, it seems to me that whenever we all get together we get into some kind of trouble. The aforementioned tower incident being a case in point.

Another thing might be that God had as at least part of His purpose, the preservation of the spiritual and ethnic purity of Israel, the nation out of which He had chosen that His Messiah would come. A footnote in my Bible regarding the above passage in Deuteronomy 32:8 tells that the latter portion of that passage which reads " . . .  the sons of God", in the Septuagint, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Masoretic text reads " . . . the sons of Israel", suggesting that the nations were divided in the way that they were to protect the purity of the spiritual life of Israel. We all know how much trouble they got into when they mingled with the surrounding nations!

Yet another reason for the nations of the world being their own entities is so that our world will find our true unity in Christ rather than in political harmony. Paul is also quoted as saying:

"There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28, ESV) 

While world peace, harmony and unity all sound like good things on the surface, our true and lasting unity, harmony and peace can only be found in our Lord, Jesus Christ.

Are we entering a time of nationalism? Are we leaving behind our international march toward globalism? I, for one, hope so. The world is too large, and its occupants are to prone to sin, and too tied to our own selfish interests to be able to make globalism work. Nationalism can help us to care for our own and do what is right on a more localized scale, and provides more opportunity for us to become personally involved.

Moreover, nationalism gives those of us who are Christians a better opportunity to work our Christian beliefs out in our national life. I see it as a way to move us closer to the day when:

[Christ has] . . . ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation "

(Revelation 5:9, ESV)

Pray for the peace of the nation of Israel.

Thanks for sharing this moment with me today.

Your Comments Please! (reprise)

First of all, I want to apologize to all and any who have left comments to any of my recent posts, but until now have not seen them published. This number includes my friends Bob Johnson, Paul Parris and perhaps others. Apparently sometime in the recent past, the provider, Blogger.com changed the rules.

I used to get a notice whenever I signed on that there were "(number) comments awaiting moderation" meaning that a reader had left a comment for me to review and decide whether or not to publish all or part of that comment. Apparently they are no longer making this notification. I recently went to the comment section to see when the last time was that I had received a comment, only to find that there were several comments, left over the past several months "awaiting moderation"!

It appears that what I am going to have to do is to sign on regularly to the comment section and check for your comments, which I will do.

In my first post, back in 2006, I invited your "respectful" comments to each and every post that I made. A short time later I posted the title "Your Comments Please" (7 September, 2007), in which I wrote:

"I value what my readers have to say and it lets me know not only that you are reading but it [also] gives the added dimension of combining your comments along with mine ton give a broader picture of what we are [all] thinking."

I continue to extend this invitation. Over the past decade I have published all comments offered by my readers in their entirety, with the exception of two or three instances that were personal in nature, and what the commentors had to say had nothing to do with the post that they dropped comment on. I remember one in particular that the commentor mentioned something personal to the extent that I thought it might be embarrassing to them if I were to publish it.

So please feel free to leave your respectful comments that are free from name-calling and innuendo, etc., and I will be proud to publish them with the post.

Thanks for sharing this moment with me today.

Hucksters

"And He entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying  to them, "It is written, 'My house shall be a house of prayer' but you have made it a den of robbers"" Luke 19:46 ESV

As I read this scripture in my daily Bible reading a few days ago, it struck me that this passage has a contemporary application. I have been negatively impressed in recent days at how many there are who trying to make money from their religion. I think also, that this goes beyond the televangelists who are always asking for our money (and it seems that these are on the increase these days) but I would say that it also includes those lay people who are trying to" give in order to get".

Now, let me say at the outset, before I go any farther, that I do not regard all televangelists as money-grabbers. Many are sincere in their efforts to preach God's word, and to minister to His people. I am increasingly disturbed, however, at how often I turn one of them on (TV) and I find myself quickly turned off (pun intended) when their message turns into a pitch for a donation. I am particularly appalled when they imply, or just outright proclaim that this donation will result in a proportionate "blessing" for the giver and will be "multiplied" in the effect it will have on the world through their ministry. Sometimes, in fact often, this is the only message that they offer, and there is a total absence of any other Bible teaching. That I find particularly disturbing.

I looked at the cross-references attached to this passage in my Bible. When Jesus said "it is written ..." there were two passages that were listed as being the ones He was citing:

"these [gentiles] I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer, their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples" Isaiah 56:7 (ESV)

"Has this house which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the Lord." Jeremiah 7:11 (ESV)

We have been going to church services at a nearby park since we got here to Arizona, as our park does not have it's own church service. I am continually impressed that Bro. Ed Berger, a CRM affiliated Chaplain emphasizes before each offering that we should be giving willingly each time we give.

Also, do not misunderstand that I am not trying to diminish the act of giving as a necessity of our worship. Please read the chapter in my book, Going Forth in the Name (chapter 11, Stewardship, Part B, Giving Tithes and Offerings).  What I am saying is that I am beginning to hear some things, both from the pulpit and the pew, that go way beyond biblical giving and proper attitudes toward giving, and I am becoming quite disturbed by this.

I think that the "give in order to get" group of lay people are every bit as bad as the "gimme and God will bless you" hucksters. In all of this I think what is wrong is that the focus is in the wrong place. What is being focused upon is either the giver, and what they will get as a result, or upon the receiver of the gift, and what it will do for their particular ministry. The focus needs, rather than this, to be on our Lord, and we need to seek His direction as to how we allocate our monetary gifts.

There are many facets to the teaching about giving in the eighth and ninth chapters of 2 Corinthians. I outline these and other New Testament teachings  about giving in the above-mentioned chapter of my book. I encourage you to read both.

Indeed, our Father's house, whether it is a meeting that we attend (in any context), or one that we watch on TV, needs to be an occasion for prayer, and for Biblical teaching. Giving of monetary gifts is not out of place, but should never overwhelm these other purposes.

Thanks for sharing this moment with me today.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

Make America Great Again--For God

"From our shores has gone the greatest missionary force in history"

(Dr. David Jeremiah)

The last time I bought a book from Dr. Jeremiah, I got along with it as a free gift, a set of prayer cards. In my morning prayer time ever since, I have been praying one of these cards. This morning's card was a prayer for America. I was drawn to the phrase above that was included in that prayer.

I cannot confirm or deny that this statement is literally true. England also sent out a rather large amount of missionaries during the nineteenth century, as well as many other Christian nations. The precise truth of the statement is irrelevant. The fact remains that the evangelical church in America has been a great force for missions throughout the world over the last 200 years.

We are all familiar these days with the slogan "Make America Great Again." As I read the above phrase, it occurred to me that missions is yet another area that we need to make ourselves great again. We are already probably one of the most active nations in this area (although I have heard that South Korean Christians are particularly active in missionary activity), but there can be little question that we are not what we once were. If I am to believe the literature that I read which the various missionary organizations themselves are putting out, they are mostly holding in place, and some are even cutting back their mission activity. There seems to be, not only a reduction in funding for most mission organizations, but a lack of Christian folks who are going into career missionary work.

As I have shared in past recent postings, I believe that the American Christian church is being granted a temporary reprieve from both the persecution that had been a threat to us over the last eight years, and an have been given an opportunity to avoid other distractions, and get on with our urgent mission of reaching "every nation, people, tribe, and language . . . " (Rev. 5:9)

The new political climate in our country extends to us a new opportunity to double-down on our missionary efforts and truly send out "the greatest missionary force in history."

This can be done by the giving of our prayers, the giving of our funds, and the giving of ourselves to a renewed and directed effort to accomplish this goal. Never before, since the era of the Apostles, in the history of the world have we had such an opportunity. Never before has it been so important that we take this opportunity!

It is vital that we get about the mission that our Lord gave us:

"Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." (Matthew 28:19-20, ESV)

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

Thanks for sharing this moment with me today.