God and Country – In that Order!
Matthew 22:15-22
July 4, 2010
THE AUDIO FOR THIS MESSAGE IS AVAILABLE AT WWW.ABERDEENWESLEYAN.ORG
NOTE: THE ME/WE/GOD/YOU/WE FORMAT IS FROM ANDY STANLEY'S BOOK. "COMMUNICATING FOR A CHANGE."
Me: I love America. I’m proud to be an American, where at least I know I’m free. And I won’t forget the men and women who died to give that right to me.
In fact, I’d gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today, if called to do that (although I don’t think they’d be looking for a 46-year-old soldier).
I hope that there’s no doubt among you that I love this land.
I say that because some of you might be put off by some of the things I’ll say today, but I want you to know that I love America.
But I have to confess that sometimes I feel a tension between love of country and allegiance to Christ.
Not necessarily because I have to choose one or the other, but because I’m told from various sources that to be a good Christian I have to feel certain ways about America, from both ends of the political spectrum.
And I find myself having to think through some things that, when I’ve thought through them, may put me at odds with either of those.
We: I wonder how many of you here today feel that same tension sometimes.
In the years since President Reagan, it has become almost a requirement to be a Christian to be good American, and a Republican to be a good Christian.
Of course, neither of these are true, but it’s gotten to the point where I have switched my own party affiliation to Independent because I didn’t want anyone to accuse me of trying to lead this church down any particular party line.
I had to really slow down in my talking about some of these things because I realized that I had been swallowing the party line without thinking.
Sometimes the party line is correct, and sometimes it’s wrong, no matter what party you belong to.
And Christians need to be encouraged to think for themselves on these things without the threat that their salvation will be questioned for it.
So how can we be both good Christians and good citizens of the United States – or any country for that matter?
I think that the answer lies in the title of the message: God and country – in that order.
The goal of today’s message is to help us grasp that so not only can we have a Biblical perspective on this whole thing, but allow us to have the greatest appreciation and enjoyment of what this great country has to offer.
God/You:
We’re going to look at a few different passages of Scripture throughout our time today, but the primary one is found in Matthew 22:15-22 (p. 699) –
15 Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words. 16 They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians. "Teacher," they said, "we know you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren't swayed by men, because you pay no attention to who they are. 17 Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?"
18 But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, "You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? 19 Show me the coin used for paying the tax." They brought him a denarius, 20 and he asked them, "Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?"
21 "Caesar's," they replied. Then he said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's."
22 When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away.
This passage goes way beyond just the idea of whether you should pay a portion of your income to the government.
We’re not even really going to go into that, because I don’t want to hear all the tired arguments of whether or not the income tax is constitutional, biblical, or whatever.
The religious leaders weren’t concerned with tax money, they were concerned with the question of allegiance.
If Jesus said they should pay taxes to Caesar, He would be saying that the government in power is more important than Jehovah God, and they could persecute Him for disloyalty to God.
If He said it was wrong to pay taxes to Caesar, they could report Him to the Roman government for trying to undermine their control in Israel.
If you and I were asked this question back then, we might not catch the intent, and we might end up saying something that would trap us in our words, even if we didn’t mean to say that.
Happens all the time. Many of us have said something we didn’t mean, or was taken out of context and misunderstood and/or misrepresented.
The basic question they were asking Jesus was this: who should we follow – God or the Romans?
And Jesus answered that we should give to each what each should have.
That same teaching applies to us today. We obviously make money that has our government’s image on it.
But having that image on our money does not mean that the country should own us.
So how do we go about this business of being proud of our country and yet loving Jesus above all else?
Let me give you five ideas that I think will help with that.
I originally had 7 steps, some of which were combinations of other ones, but I got to thinking that if I didn’t cut this down, you’d miss the concert and fireworks display tonight, not to mention any grilling you might have planned, so I chopped it down to 5.
So I understand that I’ll probably miss something you might have liked to see in this message, but I’m also hoping you might catch something you hadn’t thought of before.
So let’s look at these five ideas, okay?
1. Remember where your primary allegiance must lie.
Philippians 3:20 (NLT) –
But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.
Christians have a dual citizenship. We have an earthly citizenship in our country of choice, and we have a heavenly citizenship.
But only one of those homes will last for eternity, right? And it’s not the USA, as great as it is.
Only one of these places where we have our citizenship will last, and it’s not the earthly place.
One day this great country of ours, in fact, this whole planet will be gone – replaced with a new heaven and a new earth.
So our priority shouldn’t be the earthly kingdom, it should be the heavenly one.
Our main allegiance should be to our King, not our earthly country.
If love for country comes before love and service to Jesus, your priority is wrong.
Remember where your primary allegiance must lie.
The second idea for keeping God and country in the right order is this:
2. Don’t let national pride overcome Christian wisdom.
As I mentioned before, I’m proud to be an American, and I don’t just say that to quote song lyrics.
Let me tell you what I mean by this idea by telling you about something I saw about 15 years ago.
I was reading Pastor Erwin Lutzer’s book, “Hitler’s Cross,” and found a picture that I simply couldn’t believe.
It was a picture of a church altar, draped with the Nazi flag, with Nazi flags all over the place. I tried to find a copy of the book so I could take a picture of it to show you, but I couldn’t find one.
I read in that book that parents were having their children baptized into the name of Hitler.
The main churches had sold out to Hitler.
Why? How could the representatives of Christ in Germany just let this happen?
Let me give you just a little history. It won’t take long, I promise.
Germany had been beaten in World War 1, and the Treaty of Versailles humiliated them and ruined their economy.
Hitler promised to bring them back from humiliation to glory with the rise of the Third Reich.
Many German ministers, saddened by their country’s disgrace, felt this would be a good thing, so they encouraged it.
They saw Hitler as a kind of Messiah, and they elevated him even in church, to the point where Hitler was the hope of the nation, not Jesus.
Of course, there were some who resisted all this, and many of those suffered for it, the most famous of whom was Dietrich Bonheoffer, who was put to death for his part in a plot to assassinate Hitler.
The German Christians let national pride come before Christ.
They let the wisdom of Christ’s Scriptures be pushed aside for the sake of their national pride.
It can, and does happen here in the USA as well.
Don’t let it happen to you, okay?
3. Put the Scriptures ahead of the Constitution.
Some of you may not believe this, but they’re not the same thing…
It was hard for me write this point out, and I’m still not sure I phrased it right.
My point is that we have to put the Word of God over the law of the land.
There’s an example of this in the book of Acts, after Peter and Paul were commanded to not teach anymore about Jesus.
They’re answer is recorded in Acts 5:29 –
Peter and the other apostles replied: "We must obey God rather than men!
I think that there will be times in our lifetimes when our government will require us to do things that are contrary to what Scripture requires of us.
I don’t know what that will be, necessarily, but I think it’ll be within our lifetimes.
In that case, we must always obey God rather than men.
Don’t confuse this with what the government allows.
Friend from Canada who disregarded traffic laws because the US allows abortions. He said he had no respect for a country that allows abortions so he didn’t feel he had to obey its laws.
So he thinks it’s okay to speed through residential zones, endangering little kids. Real smart, huh?
Bottom line of this point: Make sure you’re obeying God above the law of the land – even the laws of America.
4. Pray for our government and our military.
1 Timothy 2:1-4 –
1 I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone-- 2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. 3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.
Notice it says pray FOR our leaders, not AGAINST them. There’s a difference.
I have to admit that our current president wasn’t my choice. In fact, neither of the major candidates was my choice, to be totally honest.
But if Paul can pray for Caesar who was persecuting the church, I can pray for President Obama.
I pray that some of his policies may fail, but more than that, I pray that he will surround himself with godly advisors, and that he will submit himself to Christ and the Scriptures, just like I would pray for any president.
Also, remember that God isn’t concerned with who is in the White House or which party controls Congress.
He’s in control, and He can lift up or remove absolutely anybody He wants to at given time.
I know a lot of concerned Christians are upset by the war, and think it is unjustified, and vilify both President Bush and President Obama for it.
But no matter what your position on the war, you can still pray for the health and safety of our military, and you can still pray for the president, even if you don’t agree with him.
And here’s the fifth idea for
5. Respect those who disagree with your definitions of patriotism and the role of Christianity in our nation.
This might be the hardest pill for some of you to swallow, so get ready.
Did you know that it’s just possible that someone can be a Democrat and be a Christian? Really!
Even Republicans can be Christians. No kidding!
To hear the rants and ravings of some people on both ends of the political spectrum, you’d never know it.
I hate to tell you this, but God’s not a Republican. And He’s not a Democrat, either.
And He doesn’t determine who gets to go to heaven or who gets to be effective in His kingdom based on a person’s political ideas.
I can’t believe some of the stuff on the radio I hear, and the stuff on the internet and newspapers I read.
“You can’t possibly be a Christian and vote for Obama.”
“You can’t possibly be a Christian and believe in gun control.”
“How can you support this war and call yourself a Christian?”
“How can you not support it and call yourself a Christian?”
Easily – if you’re a Mennonite or a Quaker or any number of Bible-believing denominations who don’t believe in war.
Christians throughout the centuries have debated the role of government in the lives of its citizens, war, the economy, and all sorts of things.
They study the Scriptures and pray, and come to different conclusions about these things.
And Christians throughout the centuries have struggled with how to respect and even love each other in spite of the differences they share.
You would think that if anything, we should be getting better at getting along about these things.
Obviously I’m not saying you should drop all of your thoughts, ideals, and convictions for the sake of respecting the other person.
I’m saying that you need to at least consider the possibility that they can love Jesus every bit as much as you do.
And after considering that possibility, offering them the love and respect you would want them to offer you.
Seems like Jesus said something about treating others like you want to be treated… I suppose I should have put that in your bulletin, but you can look that one up on your own.
You don’t have to agree, but you do need to respect.
The Bible says that every servant is accountable to his own master. Our job isn’t to judge another servant’s salvation based on their political opinions. That’s up to God.
Our job is to make sure our own convictions and opinions are based on our own study of God’s Word.
We: Folks, I think that too often the world thinks
that a Christian patriot is an oxymoron along the lines plastic glass, pretty ugly, and congressional ethics.
I don’t think that. In fact, I think that with the priorities in place – God before country, Christians can and will be the best citizens a country can have, because they show the rest that love for God and allegiance to Him makes it possible to impact and influence a society for its good, and for the glory of God.
Let’s pray.
