"OF WHOM THE WORLD WAS NOT WORTHY"
-312-
DECEMBER
"MUST YOU LIVE?"
In the days of the early
church, Christians had to make a living even as you and I. Some of them
carved and gilded images for the pagans. They did not worship these
images, of course, nor did they bow in their shrines, but they saw no
harm in making and polishing images for sale. Their argument sounds
familiar today: "After all, somebody will do it anyway --and I have to
live." Tertullian, one of the giants of that day, answered such an
argument with one question: "Must you live?"
Tertullian held that a Christian has only one "must"
--he must be faithful to Jesus Christ, come what may, live or die. There
were no ifs and reservations and alibis. One did not have to live; he
had only to be true to the Master. "We ought to obey God rather than
men." --Acts 5:29
A lot of water has run under the bridge since
Tertullian. On Sunday morning multitudes of Church members sing:
Faith of our fathers, holy faith,
We will be true to thee till death.
Most of them are not true
enough to get back to the evening service! Today the issues are about
the same as in the early church. If a Christian belonged to a trade
guild, he was supposed to go to its orgies. If he did not participate,
he might have lost his job. Today we have the boss' Christmas party of
some other get-together. Some Christians defend the cocktail by saying,
"I must live." Tertullian would ask, "Must you live?" But we are short
of Tertullians.
There are clever ways and devious tricks by which
modern church members would stay on good terms with both Christ and
Belial. In the Roman Empire everybody was expected to put a pinch of
incense on the altar and vow allegiance to Caesar. Plenty of Americans
would see nothing wrong in that --"You see, I don't really worship
Caesar in my heart, but why get into trouble? I don't mind going through
the motions to placate the powers that be. Then I will go to Church and
worship the way I really believe."
The early Christians died rather than offer that
incense. They had but one Lord and they loved Him more than life itself.
They counted not their lives dear unto themselves. They did not have to
live; they had only to be faithful. Tertullian would have a rough time
getting that across to the average American Christian. In this nuclear
age, the all-important thing is to stay alive at any cost. Winston
Churchill envisioned the day when "safety first would be the sturdy
child of terror and survival the twin brother of annihilation."
Today we negotiate with Communist gangsters and
compromise our national integrity and reverse the American policy of the
past --all in an effort to stay alive. Everything is geared to
biological survival, as though that were the chief end of life. A small
boy was asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" He answered,
"Alive!"
We did not start out that way. Patrick Henry asked, "Is
life so dear, and peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of
chains and slavery?" He chose liberty or death. Today we must live,
liberty or no liberty. The fifty-six signers of the Declaration of
Independence risked security for liberty. Today we risk liberty for
security and we may end up without either. We are ready to do anything
but die. There was a time when some things were more precious than life.
Theodore Roosevelt said that among those things that would destroy
America was "Safety first" instead of "Duty first."
Tertullian might well ask at a summit conference: "Must
you live?" Peace at any price, they say, is better than no peace. Life
at any price, they say, is better than not to live. We are obsessed with
saving our hides at the cost of our honor, if need be, and we may save
neither hides nor honor.
'Tis man's perdition to be safe,
When for the Truth he ought to die.
At Munich, Neville Chamberlain
learned that "You can't do business with Hitler." The times called for a
Churchill. The price for survival is too high to pay. It is better to
die for a conviction than to live with a compromise. Self-preservation
is a powerful instinct, but it is not the most important thing on earth.
Christians do not have to live; they have only to be
faithful to Jesus Christ, not only until death, but also unto death if
necessary. When a man becomes a Christian, he loses his right to his own
life. He is not his own --he is bought with a price. He is the personal
property of Jesus Christ, bought and paid for with the blood of Calvary.
For him, living and dying are incidental, He is here to glorify Jesus
Christ, whether by life or by death. Whether he lives he lives unto the
Lord, or whether he dies, he dies unto the Lord. Whether he lives or
dies, he is the Lord's. He counts not his life dear unto himself. To
live is Christ and to die is gain. Anything that compromises that
all-out devotion is to be refused at any cost. A pinch of incense to
Caesar may look innocent enough to others, but to a Christian it is
anathema, for he knows but one Lord and he will not, by life or by lip,
pay even a gesture of allegiance to another. If a pagan guild would
compromise his vows, he would lose his job first. He doesn't have to
eat; he has only to be faithful to Jesus Christ.
There are many modern ways of offering incense to
Caesar, and polishing idols is a flourishing business in America. The
business, social and entertainment worlds are under the god of this age
and they are not friends of grace to help us on to God. To be sure, all
of us cannot make a living in business operated by Christians. It is not
obligatory that the top man in your line be a deacon or that the main
office be staffed by Sunday school teachers. We must work in a pagan
world and let our light shine in a dark place. But when the setup
demands that we carve images or burn incense to Caesar, then we have but
one loyalty. If our living, or even ourselves be involved, Tertullian is
still up to date, "Must you live?"
There are a thousand angles to this problem. Selling
books in a store where filthy literature is a part of the stock, waiting
on tables in restaurants where liquor is served, playing for dances as a
member of the school band --from these to major issues of principle in
high position. Tertullian is still up to date. The old argument is still
advanced: "After all, I don't run the place. I only work here and I have
to live." But Tertullian would ask, "Must you live?"
There are no easy solutions. Sometimes we must cut
knots instead of tying them. Radical? Yes, but the early Christians
upset the world. Later, when Constantine joined the Church and the
world, there were no such scruples --and the glory departed.
0f course, there is infinitely more to the Christian
life than refusing to gild images or offer incense to Caesar. There must
be more to refusing to sell beer or leaving the Sons and Daughters of I
Will Arise because they sponsor dances. This is the negative side, but
it is there and the New Testament stresses it. We are not only to put on
the Lord Jesus; we must make no provision for the flesh. Although the
ideal is to be so much in love with Jesus Christ that the world presents
no problem, most Christians are not that far along and we need to hear
Tertullian thunder his question. The devil has cleverly set up this
present age in such a way that what puts butter on our bread too often
determines our conduct. We have developed a pleasant, agreeable
Christianity, an amiable neutralism that raises no eyebrows at gilding
images and offering incense to Caesar. We are like the church at
Thyatira where, along with the agape of which we hear so much today,
there existed a smiling "get-alongism" that allowed Jezebel to set up
her altar, bringing the reproof of the Lord.
This world has been moved by "fools for Christ's sake"
who count not their lives dear unto themselves. In order to build a
popular, prosperous, religious super-church we have thrown open the doors
to unconverted pagans. In order to create a huge ecclesiastical empire
we burn incense to Caesar. But God is taking out a remnant, marshaling a
Master's minority at the end of the age, love-slaves of Jesus Christ who
do not have to live but only to be faithful. Like Paul, they are not
here to survive but to serve: " ...to abide in the flesh is more needful
for you" (Philippians 1:24). All that matters is that Christ be
magnified, whether by life or by death. We are here not for survival or
success but for stewardship; and it is required of stewards only that
they be found faithful.
Such a Christian has nothing, yet he possesses all
things. Satan can give him nothing, for he possesses all things. Satan
can take nothing from him, for he does not have anything. Satan may kill
him, but to die is gain. I have read of a Coast Guard crew summoned on a
stormy night to rescue survivors from a sinking vessel. One member of
the crew was fearful: "Captain," he moaned, "we'll never get back." "We
don't have to come back," was the reply; "we only have to go." That
sounds like Tertullian again. It is true faith that is "not belief in
spite of evidence but life in scorn of consequence."
Paul did not say, "I count not my life dear." Life is
dear and precious in God's sight. Paul said, "I count not my life dear
unto myself." There are two ways of counting not life dear unto oneself.
Every few days we read of a car full of teenagers at the end of a wild
ride, a horribly scrambled mass of flesh and glass and steel. That is
sin's way --the Devil's way --of counting not life dear to oneself. That
is "living dangerously" --the wrong way.
There is another way. The body of Jim Elliot in Ecuador
was another mangled sight when the savages were through with him. But
his soul went marching home through gates of splendor. He counted not
his life dear unto himself. That is Christ's way, Paul's way, the
Christian way. That is "living dangerously" --for God. One need not be a
martyr at savage hands to do that. There are dangers aplenty around us
every day, far more subtle and more devastating to the soul. Amidst them
all, we have but one obligation --to magnify Jesus Christ, whether by
life or by death, for whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. We do
not have to live; we have only to be faithful.
-Vance Havner, Why Not Just Be Christians? (Revell, 1964) pp. 48-52.