Not my sin? How to pray for a nation on the brink

In Hosea 4, where God sets out his case against Israel, it is clear he is speaking to a society that is rotten to the very core. Israel’s idolatry has not remained an isolated problem but has bred a society characterised by corruption, bloodshed, prostitution and murder. When Hosea says that ‘bloodshed follows bloodshed’ and that their sins ‘know no bounds’ he describes a situation where there were not merely sporadic outbreaks but where these sins had become endemic, woven into the very fabric of society.  Everyone from the top to the bottom of society was involved, and all would be punished together. Even the tiny righteous remnant would go into exile with the others, sharing in the punishment of their community.

After the Second World War, some German Christians devoted themselves to a ministry of repentance and intercession for the sins of the German nation, even though they personally had not been involved in the atrocities perpetrated by the regime. The prayers of the Old Testament prophets reveal a similar view of their relationship to their community and its sin. We are not just accountable to God for our personal sins, but do at times share in the guilt of our community and also in its consequences.

When we consider our own society, we can surely only conclude that it is as rotten as the society of Hosea’s day.  It is not reports of horrific murders, child abuse or parliamentary corruption that lead me to that conclusion but the things I witness every day –  the loss of sense of responsibility for elderly family members, decline in attitudes of young people to parents, teachers and other adults in their communities,  the sea-change in attitudes to drunkenness, sexual promiscuity, etc.

But who of us as Christians can say we have been entirely detached from this state of affairs? Examination of our own attitudes often reveals that we have imbibed the world’s values more than we care to admit. And with iniquity vaunted and temptation advertised all around us, many Christians are falling into the same sins that are affecting wider society.  A generation ago divorce was almost unheard of between believers but sadly today we all know of many cases of marital breakdown, adultery and other sexual sins, including amongst ministers of the gospel. The church is struggling to know how to respond to issues like cohabitation, internet pornography, child abuse, gambling addiction and drug misuse – not only in the outside world but among its own members.

It is time for us to come to God with prayers of repentance for the sin of our society.  Let’s not pray arrogantly.  We must plead with God, not as outsiders looking on, but as part of our society and part of its sin. Surely we also need to repent and plead for God’s mercy for the state of our churches, afflicted by so many things that ought not to be and falling so far short of what the community of God’s people should be like.  When God has purified his churches, they can serve their function of being preserving ‘salt and light’ in British society. Perhaps our society may then be turned back from the brink, and we will not have to share in its punishment.

Divers and dolphins: clues to our role in God's world

This week there was a remarkable film in the news of an injured dolphin apparently deliberately seeking out human help and waiting patiently whilst a diver gave it assistance. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21176914 For a lifelong wildlife fanatic like me, it was fascinating footage but it also seemed to me to give a brief glimpse of how things might have been between man and beast, had it not been for the Fall.

As the chief among God’s creatures, man was not only the pinnacle of God’s creative achievements  but was also set apart by being given a conscious mind, vastly superior intelligence and spiritual awareness – being ‘made in the image’ of God. The Genesis account portrays the role God had in mind for man as manager or steward - to ‘subdue’ the earth and make it fruitful, for the glory of God and the blessing of all man’s fellow creatures.

Instead, man has used his gifts to exploit his fellow creatures and abuse the earth’s resources. Far from making the world fruitful, man’s selfishness has resulted in famine, drought, species loss and desertification.  The vast majority of animal species regard man as a threat and either flee or respond aggressively to his presence.

I don’t go for the gaudy, sentimental pictures of man and beasts together in Eden that you sometimes see. Even before the Fall, I suspect man’s role as manager of God’s creation would have required all the strength, mental ingenuity and spiritual wisdom with which God had endowed him.  Personally I do not picture Adam spending his days in sleepy idleness with a lion on his lap, as some of these images suggest! But I do believe the relationship would have been very different, with animals viewing man as a benevolent authority figure rather than a threat, and man in turn treating God’s creatiures in a responsible way.

Although creation will now never be as God intended until he ‘makes all things new’, (Revelation 21:5)  Christians can still make an impact today by taking this ‘steward’ role seriously. Only this week I was reading about ‘integral mission’ projects which use principles from the Bible about looking after the earth, crop management and community relations to help poor communities develop, at the same time as proclaiming the gospel to them. As Evangelicals, I fear we have been prone to make an artificial distinction between ‘the Gospel’ and the rest of life, forgetting that God has given us a framework of glorious principles that speak to every aspect of our communal life. We have left the platform entirely to a largely atheist environmental lobby, the new pagans, liberal ‘Christian’ organisations and secular humanitarian organisations and I have no doubt this has been to the ultimate dishonour of our Creator God and the obscuring of his Gospel.

{NB – in the above post, my use of ‘man’/’he’/’his’ is deliberate as,  although  in many senses we are talking about the roles and responsibilities of all human beings, this stewardship role was specifically laid on Adam, the man, and therefore substitution of gender-free terms like ‘humankind’ does not sufficiently reflect the Biblical nuances involved. Very happy to discuss further  in ‘Comments’! }

The hand that smites is the hand that heals

Like children disciplined by a parent, we can be tempted to flee from God when we feel his hand of discipline upon us. But there is no restoration for the child until he returns to mummy with words of repentance, and then there are words of love, forgiveness, happy tears and cuddles all round. In the same way, J.A.Motyer says:

 'When the LORD is offended, and his anger and wrath loom and his arrows begin to fly, it is to the same Lord that we appeal for his presence, nearness, help and salvation. Only the Lord's favour can deliver us from the Lord's disfavour.'

 

(J.A. Motyer, Psalm 38, New Bible Commentary, my italics)