It is perhaps disingenuous to entitle this as Responsibility and Inability, but it is still in the overall context of the real issue of this BLOG. I received the October 2007 issue of SBC Life today. Just inside the front page an article with large letters stood out: A Call for Christian Civility. The antonym for “civility” is “rudeness” while synonyms are “polite” and “courteous.” While there are a lot of positive things that can be said about Dr. Page’s article, there is a gaping hole in it as well. It is the God-centeredness part that is not really brought into play. Let me explain.
There is a lot of concern today about love. That is a concern that is biblical, but we must take care that what we mean by love is what the Bible means by love. If we replace the biblical meaning of love as that which simply means being outwardly nice, polite, and courteous and things like that, we have missed a large part of the meaning and perhaps the most important part. There is no love apart from the love of God dwelling in a human soul. The outward man can be nice and polite and have no love at all. The outward man can sell all he has and even give his body to be burned and have no love (I Cor 13:1-3). One can practice all of those things and have no love at all. We must be careful or we will replace biblical love with external actions or appearances.
The heart of true love is a love for God first and foremost. I never love another person if I am telling them something that is not to the glory of God and is not intended that way. I also do not love another person if I withhold the truth of God in order to be polite. In fact, it can be idolatry to be outwardly polite and nice if the other person needs to hear some truth of God which is best for his or her soul. This past weekend Paul Washer was in Kansas and spoke several times over a period of three days. He spoke of a physician that would not tell the person what was wrong with them. That is a great analogy. Can you imagine a physician that would not tell patients what was wrong with them because he wanted to be nice and polite? How can we tell people in a way that they will hear us that they are dead in sins and trespasses? How can we tell people in a nice and polite way that they are enemies of God and that they hate Him?
It is true enough that Dr. Page is speaking of believers speaking to believers. However, the same truth still exists for believers as well. We must know that just because a person is religious does not mean that person is a true believer. It is also true that believers are wrong on many issues and need correction. In fact, just after II Timothy 3:16 which teaches the nature of Scripture it teaches us a few of the purposes of Scripture: “I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction” (II Timothy 4:1-2). The Word of God is breathed by God, but that same Word is to be preached and taught and people are to be reproved, rebuked and exhorted by that Word. We must never lose sight that true love is never opposed to the application of the Word of God.
We must also learn from the New Testament that true love will take strong stands on the Word of God and that is always oriented toward God. It is almost never love for another person to withhold what is good for another’s soul. It is never love to allow others to malign the name of God in their theology. Dr. Page rightly bemoans personal attacks on other people, but we must also realize that all sin of life and theology is a personal attack on God Himself. There are times when we must be something other than what our modern age thinks of as nice in order to rebuke people for their personal attacks on God. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is primarily the display of the glory of God. When a person does something in life or theology that is contrary to the Gospel, that person has personally attacked God. This is something that must explode into our reality. We are to be lovers of God and of the Gospel first and foremost. When a human being attacks God by word or life, it is love for God and the other person to rebuke that other person even if it does not have the appearance of niceness or politeness to it. It can still be love.
We are to be people that live before God first and foremost. If the society does not appreciate that, it may simply be that they don’t appreciate people that live in the presence of God. Love is not the same thing as politeness though they do converge many times. But since they are not the same thing, they are not always seen at the same time. A desire to be polite and nice can keep us from true love. In that case, civility and politeness can be stumbling blocks and we must be non-civil for Christ’s sake. For Christ’s sake, people, love God and others enough to be willing to be less than civil and polite in appearance. Love for God demands it.
God Loves... Himself 
Leave a comment