Go Out Among Them AND Be Ye Separate
Posted by Tim on August 11, 2008
There seems to be an eternal struggle among followers of Jesus. I know there are many disagreements and theological arguments but there is one big behavioral diving line. That line seems to be between those who feel we should “come out from among them (sinners) and be ye separate” and those who believe we should be “in the world but not of it.” Which of these verses resonate with us in the strongest way, determines how we live out our faith.
If the first verse resonates with our spirits, we want to be holy and so we pull away from everyone who does not follow Jesus (not to mention those who do not follow Jesus the way we do). We form Christian alteratives to everything and pretty soon don’t know anyone who is not already a follower. Evangelism becomes going out on the streets and telling the sinners what is wrong with them.
The problem is that the first verse is Old Testament. Of course it is still inspired scripture but Jesus came to fulfill the OT. That means all of the Old Testament must be filtered through His words. It was Jesus who prayed that we would be in the world but not of it. He did not want us to physically separate from those who do not yet follow Him. He wanted us to engage them. To work with them, befriend them, love them. Evangelism is doing life with people who don’t know Jesus and explaining to them why He makes a difference in our lives along the way. Of course we keep our hearts pure in the process. But remember holiness is being set aside for a purpose, not just being set apart. The purpose is to change the world. We can’t do that from the commune.
This all jumped out at me recently when I was studying about Paul planting the church in Corinth. Corinth was the sin city of it’s day. It was THE commercial and business center of ancient Greek. It was the center of worship of Aphrodite, the goddess of love. They had a temple there with 1,000 temple prostitutes. Going to church consisted of sleeping with one of them (talk about a user friendly church). There was a saying at the time, “not every man can afford a trip to Corinth.” When Greeks did a play and wanted to bring in a character from Corinth, the actor always had to act drunk. It was the kind of city that made any God fearing person sick. But when Paul arrived, he did not run away. He stayed a year and a half. He wrote letters, he kept coming back. In other words, he engaged the culture. Instead of opening a church door and saying, “come in when you are ready to behave” he lived among the people and built relationships with them before they were ready to change.
If we avoid all the “sinners” out there, who will reach them? It won’t be the guy on the street. Overwhelmingly people start following Jesus because of other Jesus followers they know, not because of strangers.
They reason most people think Christians are judgmental gay bashers is that they don’t personally know any Christians. Who will change that perception? Who will go out among them AND be separate?
