Ask Pastor Mike Fabarez

Speaker 1

Today on Focal Point, author and teacher Mike Favares discusses both politics and religion. Welcome to Focal Point. I'm your host, Dave Drouehe.

Today we'll hear Mike Fabarez address the controversial topic of politics here at Focal Point. We aren't afraid to talk about money, religion, and even politics. So if you have a question of your own, send it to us at focalpointradio.org. More on that later.

Right now we're joining our teacher Mike Fabarez and Focal Point executive director Jay Wirton, inside the Pastor Study for another edition of Ask Pastor Mike.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Dave.

Pastor Mike, let's get right to it. We spent some time last week talking about a Christian's responsibility to obey the government and even when they're bad.

But I wanted to continue that conversation along a different line. Is it the responsibility of a Christian to be actively involved in politics and political activism?

Speaker 3

Well, there is that negative sense, and I think we should clarify that perhaps in a way that we didn't last time. That is, there is a kind of activism that disobeys and clearly disobeys the government. The only allowance for that I understand in Scripture is when the government is telling me to, in some way, disobey God. Therefore, I'll disobey the government when my obedience to that government is going to make me disobedient to Christ.

So that needs to be a kind of activism that we're ready to engage in at any time. When Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were told to bow down to this idol, they were going to be activists of a sort. They were going to say, "We're not going to do it," and they refused to do it. When Daniel was told not to pray anymore, he opened his windows and kept on praying. There's a kind of activism in his life.

But if you're thinking about the rallies and signs and all of that, I...

Speaker 4

Think you need to look at that.

Speaker 3

From a perspective that you would see yourself in any situation of a leader doing something that you don't agree with. In other words, it may be that at your school your teacher's giving too much homework to your kid, and it's just unreasonable. You're probably not going to pull out signs and march around in front of the school and protest your teacher, because you would figure that's probably not the best way to affect change in this situation.

And so it is that often there's better ways than the traditional focused kind of gathering with buses and signs to get change affected in our leaders. Thankfully, in our government, we can vote them out and vote others in. That is the ultimate kind of activism that's built into our system.

So I find oftentimes the very ostentatious displays of disagreement are more of a ranting than a real calculated, thoughtful approach to determining what is the best way to go about changing what is repulsive to me as a Christian or repulsive just in general, in terms of being something unbiblical or unvirtuous or immoral or wrong.

But that's a kind of activism, and there is a place for that. However, I do think when you think of activism, you're considering a kind of involvement in something that rarely produces what people claim they want produced.

Speaker 2

Would you classify civil disobedience or boycotting in that avenue? Those are clearly allowable means, according to our government, to be against the politics. But what about for Christians?

Speaker 3

Yeah, and I'm fine when you say boycotts; there's a good example. Now, you think about commercial boycotts. We're boycotting something because we think that there's something wrong with what they're doing. In some cases, you've got to recognize that Christians are trying to employ a set of standards that you would expect in the church on some commercial entity. I think there's a part of our problem. You know, I can't possibly disengage from everything that is sinful or immoral or idolatrous in my commercial exchange of my money every week. I just can't do that. It becomes an absurd way to live your life. As Paul put it, I'd have to leave the world, as he says in 1 Corinthians 5, to avoid that kind of entanglement with my money.

In some sense, people feel they're supporting things that are bad and immoral. And then in some cases, clearly we are. That's part of my being, you know, set in a world that is counter to God. I'm going to be spending my money, I'm going to be engaging in things or going to restaurants and, you know, spending my money at a hotel chain that may stand for things I don't agree with. So you're going to have to get used to that.

You know, when it comes to the government, though, as I said last week, when it comes to my taxes and my support and my honor and my prayer for these people, I have to honor them, I have to pay my taxes. I have to support them even when they are doing things I don't agree with. I would say take every advantage that you have as a citizen of the United States of America, in particular, to do what you can to effect change in those leaders, in those legislators, the congressmen, the governors, the executive branch, all of that, to try and see that change affected.

We can write letters, we can call our representatives, we can vote in a way that's different and let our voice be heard. That's fine. Every Christian should do that as an individual and do that in accordance with scriptural principles and in accordance with conscience. And that's perfectly fine. I think that's biblical. That's expected. That doesn't turn the church into an activistic political group. I do think that's a selling out and a stepping down of the high calling. We have to engage in something that's much less than what we're called to. We're called to something much greater than being political activists.

Speaker 2

What else as Christians can we do to affect change in our society and our governments?

Speaker 3

Well, two primary things the Bible continually repeats. We as Christians are called to pray. And God says that God can affect a lot of radical changes through a praying church and a praying group of Christians.

Secondly, we need to go about the kingdom work of getting the gospel out to people. We need to call people to repent, put their trust in Christ, and believe in the gospel. That is going to radically change hearts. God wants to rebirth people in the interior of their lives so that they become new people in Christ.

You know, if people got saved, whatever sins they would commit or crimes they would commit or compromises they would engage in, those would all be increasingly curtailed as they grow in Christ. So there's no better civic improvement process, there's no better political enhancement, there's no better societal transformation than when sinners become saints, when non-Christians become Christians.

And so that brings us back to.

Speaker 4

What the church is all about.

Speaker 3

That's why it would be a stooping to a lower calling in the church. To become a church that's all about political activism.

We need to be about life change. We need to be about the gospel. We need to be about people's hearts being converted, people seeing sin for what it is and repenting of their sins.

Speaker 2

Nobody has any interest in changing their activities unless their heart has changed.

Speaker 4

Right.

Speaker 2

They want to do what they want to do.

Speaker 4

Sure.

Speaker 3

It starts with a heart change and that changes everything. Right. That's why the church is a different kind of environment for people than the world.

Because we are a place where sin is being curtailed, it's being fought against. We're waging war against the passions and desires of our flesh. We're concerned about a whole higher set of responsibilities and accountabilities than the world is.

And the more people that join our cause and through new birth, you know, specifically, the more we see society changed.

Speaker 2

Well, thank you, Pastor Mike. I trust that this conversation is very clarifying for our listeners. And we're going to finish up today with a message you gave called Elections, activism and civil Disobedience.

Speaker 4

Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's. Now, I mean, if you want to put it in classic paradigm terms, it's the state and it's the church. Church and state. It's my relationship with God and my relationship with the government. It's being a good Christian, being a good citizen. And those are overlapping spheres that I live in, and I live under both. Jesus now says, well, there's stuff you've got to render, give or defer to Caesar, and then there's things you need to defer to God. That sounds hard, and I want him to explain it, that it's not as hard to figure out as you might think.

Because you do this to your kids, and you expect them to know intuitively how to live with two authorities in their lives. Put them on a sports team, for instance. Just by way of example, my middle kid, 12 years old, John, is playing again this year on the Little League District 55 All Star Baseball team. He has a coach, and he lives under the authority of the coach. I don't even have to tell him this because he knows I expect him to be a good player, respectful to the coach, obedient to the coach. When the coach says run a lap, run a lap. If he says pitch five more times, you do it. You do what the coach says. You live under the authority of the coach.

But then again, here's what he needs to understand and probably never needs to be told. When you're a baseball player on that team, you don't cease to be my son. My rules and my authority and everything I've taught you does not somehow go away because you're on the baseball team. Now, the baseball team can be a kind of environment that is different than the environment at home. Just to drive this point to our point of application, certainly the government operates with a different set of values and a different set of principles than does God's kingdom. So, I mean, they're in conflict at times.

And so it is with my kid's baseball team. For instance, I was dropping him off the other day, and we were running late, and he needed some hydration. I stopped at the 7:11 across from the ball field and said, go in and get yourself some Gatorade, and off to the game you'll go. He said, oh, this is where my coach stops off before the games to get his chewing tobacco. He said, oh, okay, that's great. Now, my coach is a decent baseball coach, but he's not a great model for life for my kid. For instance, chewing tobacco. I've told him if you chew tobacco, cut your tongue out. I mean, I don't know. We've threatened him. This is not good. We don't want you coming home chewing tobacco.

I know my kid's coach's language is a lot more colorful than what he'll hear at home. He knows the rules about profanity, and he knows that that's not acceptable. I mean, the Bible is our constitution, and it says, let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, and you won't hear it from mom and dad, and you're not going to have it. We don't want you to use those words in our home alone. When you're on the baseball field, you can't use them. He could come home and say, well, you know the coach, he's told us he's a really cool coach. Everybody in the dugout can cuss if they want to. He could tell us that.

But he knows that even if his coach allows something that his authority, his dad knows is not allowed, he's got to balance this because he recognizes it doesn't matter what the coach says if it has to do with something allowed by the coach but not allowed by his father. But that doesn't mean that he doesn't run laps when the coach says run laps or do push-ups or whatever the weird things that they do or do more drills; he's got to do that. If the coach at some point imposes a new rule that before you go out and play the game, the championship game, everyone has to chew tobacco for half an hour, right? This is all an illustration. I don't think that he's doing any of this.

Of course, my son now wouldn't just say, I'm not going to do what he allows. Now he has to actually be disobedient to his coach, right? Because he knows his dad has said, you can't do that. You understand, that kind of dual authority is not something complicated for a kid. It may be uncomfortable at times, and it may even be difficult and costly at times for him, and it may cost him his reputation among the other players. But that kind of balancing act is not something that needs, you know, lecture after lecture to explain to him how this works, particularly because he already knows and hears from dad from time to time that when it comes to baseball, that's not your life; it's a part of your life.

Now, 96%, and these are just rough and dirty numbers I'm throwing out, it's a Mike fabarism. But let's just say 96% of the New Testament is going to hammer this at us: be loyal to God, be faithful to God, be obedient to God, follow God. And then about 4% of the New Testament, as you open up the Bible, you look at Titus 3:1-8, you look at passages in Peter, several of them, and you look at this passage in Romans 13, you recognize that a lot of the Scripture, at least a small portion of it, I guess, by comparison, is going to tell us that you need to be loyal to the coach, to the government, because they're a rightful authority. That authority is in your life because God has determined for it to be, and you are to be a good citizen.

Now, just by the preponderance of proportionalism here, we have a clear understanding that God does not equate these authorities. Even though I live under the authority of my government, we are citizens of heaven. First, I'm a Christian; second, I'm a citizen of the United States. If I can start to get some of that in perspective as a kid kind of innately gets in his own family life before he joins the baseball team, it may help to answer some of the more thorny or difficult questions that arise as a Christian in a country under a government that is not living by the same values as God or his kingdom.

I must obey my government until obedience to my government makes me disobedient to Christ. I must obey my government even if taxes get crazy, even if the things that they ask me to do to fill out forms before I can plant a tree in my yard if it gets nuts. I've got to obey my government until obedience to the government and its rules specifically lead me to be disobedient to Christ. We looked at, I don't know, a big idol in the valley that was erected to Nebuchadnezzar, and they said, you got to bow down and worship it. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego said, no, can't do that. So they arrested them. They heated up the furnace. They said, we're going to throw you in the furnace. They said, fine, throw us in the furnace if you want, but we're not going to do it.

They were evangelizing in Acts 4 and 5, and they said, stop evangelizing. Don't do it. Don't make disciples of all the nations. And they said, I'm sorry, we have to. Now that was the clear and simple example. God blesses that kind of civil disobedience, if you want to call it that. But before we go too far with this, let's make sure we clarify what we're saying and what we're not saying. We want our governments to be like a church. They can't be. That's not what they are. They're led by unregenerate people. There is an anti-Christian, anti-God movement on every government of the world, even if they have Christian principles of right and wrong built into their founding documents or their law code. Therefore, I can't expect the same things there.

In my mind, I've got to recognize that's just the way a lot of it is. Do I want it to change? Yes. Do I ignore the bad? No. Well, what do I do? Seven things. Jot down these references real quick: Mark 8:14-15, Luke 22:25-27. In both of these passages, Jesus uses the government as an example of what we should not be. My first responsibility is to point out the wrong of the government to the church so that they don't mirror that. He tells them this. Here's an amazing statement from Christ. He tells his disciples, just to mix another metaphor, watch out for the leaven of Herod. Herod was the Roman leader of the government. In Luke 22, he says, you know, amongst the kings of the Gentiles, they love to lord their authority over people and then call themselves benefactors. What hypocrites. It's not supposed to be that way with you, the government.

My first responsibility is to point out the bad of the government and say, don't be like that. Right, kids? Don't be like Congressman Weiner. How about that? Does that help? I want to point out that about the. That's responsibility number one. Responsibility number two. As I have opportunity, I want to point out the leaven of the government to the government. I want to point out the evil of the government to the government. Okay, there are plenty of biblical examples of this. How about Luke chapter 3, verses 18 through 20? John the Baptist exhorted the people and preached the good news. Herod the tetrarch, who had been reproved by John the Baptist because of his marriage to Herodias, which was his brother's wife. It was an immoral relationship, and he was reproved for all the other evil things that Herod had done.

Now, it doesn't end well for John. He gets his head cut off in chapter six of Mark, and he gets thrown in prison in this passage. But he definitely has no problem saying, hey, you're sinning. Or how about Justin Martyr in the first century? At the end of the first century, I love this letter to the Roman Senate. He says to the emperor in the Roman Senate, I give you advanced warning. You will certainly not escape the coming judgment of God if you persist in your injustice. If you want to quote him for your senator or governor or your congressman, fine. You can write that to them. Do it respectfully. It is definitely not only in Christian tradition; it is within the pages of the Christian scripture that there's nothing wrong. It is actually appropriate for you to point out the sin of the government to the government.

Number three, to serve in the government. As we've already made the point, I don't need to belabor this, but when Christian evangelists hit people that worked for the government, they never gave them a lecture, a call, a command to change their occupation, whether they were soldiers, centurions who trained soldiers, tax collectors for the Roman IRS. Zacchaeus, Levi, Matthew, you know these people, Cornelius, even Paul himself is trying to convert King Agrippa II, trying to turn him into a Christian. Now, I know he's under arrest and on trial, but he doesn't have a problem sharing the Gospel. And I guarantee you, if he becomes a Christian, he's not going to say, you got to quit now.

So all I'm saying is some of you are inclined to serve in some level of the government. It can be civil service. It can be governmental service. Nothing wrong with civil service. Nothing wrong with that. So serving in government, great. And some of you are inclined to do that. Have at it. Do it. Stand up for what's right. Be a reasonable, respectable, just servant of the government. Number four, you and I need to set the example for the rest of society. Titus 3:1-8 would be a good place to start. Even Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, he said about salt and light. I am to be an example to the pagan government and the pagan society.

When my kid says, my kid, back to the Little League, my kid's coach, let's say none of this is true, says, hey, kids, you can cuss all you want to in the dugout. My kids should sit there as a good example and never cuss. See what I'm saying? And you and I, they can say, you can do this, you can do that, you can do this. If you want, we should say, listen, we're only going to do what the Bible tells us we can and cannot do. So be a good example. That's what Titus 3:1-8 is all about. Number five, you want to see things better in our country, you need to evangelize as many people as possible. Because even if you do change laws, we're never going to change behavior unless we change hearts.

You want new things to come in people in our society, you better be sharing the life-changing message of repentance and faith and devotion to Christ. That's what we need to preach. So evangelize as many people as possible. Number six, you should vote. And every time there's an opportunity to vote, you better go in there informed, knowing something about the issues or the people being elected, and vote. Number seven, you need to pray for your kings and for those in authority that what they do would end up allowing us to do what we need to do in this case, to live a dignified life, a quiet life, a godly life.

Jeremiah, chapter 29. Would you turn to Jeremiah 29:4-7? Here's some instruction to some expatriates who were being taken to Babylon, a pagan government, and they were going to live there for 70 years at least. And here's what God had to say to those expatriates. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon. Okay, now you're not here amongst your own people, in your own country. You're now under the government of a pagan, you know, idol-worshiping king. What am I supposed to do? Well, here's what you're supposed to do: build houses, live in them, plant gardens, eat their produce, go to Lowe's, go to Home Depot, get your house in order, take wives, rent out the banquet hall, have sons and daughters, take wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage.

But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. So get out there and be a good Christian who's also a good citizen. Let's pray. God, these are important issues for us, and I pray they wouldn't just be academic issues of the past and of history, but that we might recognize that no matter what pressure is placed upon us, that we would think biblically, respond biblically to be praying, to be responding, to be serving when we're called upon to do so, to do what we can do in our nation, our government, our state, our county, that we might enhance its welfare. We'd like it to go well for our country, because when it does, it goes well for us. Let us be focused ultimately and with the preponderance of our lives and the majority of our effort on things that will last a hundred, a thousand years.

Speaker 3

Ten thousand years from now.

Speaker 4

So get us busy about the work of the kingdom. While we're faithful and conscientious about being good citizens of our country, I ask that for us that we might grow in Christ in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ, in whose name I pray.

Speaker 3

Amen.

Speaker 1

We're learning about our role in church and state and the reality that government can never be truly godly. This is Focal Point with Pastor Mike Fabarez, and the abbreviated message you just heard is called "Elections, Activism and Civil Disobedience." Hear the complete message online at focalpointradio.org.

Well, today we found it's possible to be a good Christian and a good citizen at the same time, and one secret to walking that line is to act responsibly within the bounds of governmental authority, imperfect as it may be, and exercise the freedoms built into the system. That's a healthy alternative to bucking the system altogether and allows us to focus on offering the prayer and godly convictions that can shape a society.

If this resonates with you, you can continue this line of thought in a free message Pastor Mike's prepared called "Being a Careful Student in a World of Crazy Teachers," and there's no cost or obligation. Just ask for your free CD message when you call 888-320-5885 or find it online at focalpointradio.org.

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Speaker 4

I'm Dave Droue.

Speaker 1

Have a wonderful weekend. Pastor Mike Fabarez returns to our study in Luke Monday, so be sure to come back for Focal Point. Today's program was produced and sponsored by Focal Point Ministries.

Speaker 4

Sam.