I look at the newspapers and the campaigns in this life and I see a lot of stuff about the US elections. Or the EU. There is horror from the elite. For Trump may have been one of them, or Farage in the UK, but they are now aligned with the nationalists who want immigration controlled, (which in the UK it is not: the EU court of Human Rights trumps the British judiciary).
There are scandals made up of people resigning. Of being shoved. The veracity of some are doubtful. However, we do not look for perfection from our leaders. We either look for someone who will do their duty.
The principle here is that the emperor need not be perfect, or of the faith. But he must be competent. As Luther said, he’d rather be subject to a competent Turk than a fool of a bishop.
Moses was a murderer; David was an adulterer; Samson was a fornicator. But God saw fit to use such unworthy vessels for His holy purposes: to lead His people Israel.
By contrast, this here is just a temporal, secular office, the United States presidency. It is not a holy calling. And so if God can choose men who have lived ungodly, unworthy lives for holy purposes, how much more can a mixed group of Christians and unbelievers together decide, if they please, to choose a man who has lived an ungodly, unworthy life for a secular, temporal endeavour, the United States presidency?
The scandals of the elite are not scandals. They are signs of a holiness spiral: if there is no truth, we must make one: as Brecht cynically noted, if the people do not see the need for our agenda we must select another people
But God mocked will not be.
A Song of Ascents.
To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens!
Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a maidservant to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the LORD our God, till he has mercy upon us.Have mercy upon us, O LORD, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt.
Our soul has had more than enough of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.(Psalm 123 ESV)
Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature. In the Law it is written, “By people of strange tongues and by the lips of foreigners will I speak to this people, and even then they will not listen to me, says the Lord.” Thus tongues are a sign not for believers but for unbelievers, while prophecy is a sign not for unbelievers but for believers. If, therefore, the whole church comes together and all speak in tongues, and outsiders or unbelievers enter, will they not say that you are out of your minds? But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or outsider enters, he is convicted by all, he is called to account by all, the secrets of his heart are disclosed, and so, falling on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is really among you.
What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up. If any speak in a tongue, let there be only two or at most three, and each in turn, and let someone interpret. But if there is no one to interpret, let each of them keep silent in church and speak to himself and to God. Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weigh what is said. If a revelation is made to another sitting there, let the first be silent. For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all be encouraged, and the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets. For God is not a God of confusion but of peace.
As in all the churches of the saints,
(1 Corinthians 14:20-33 ESV)
The elite hate us. Nothing new there.
And what are we to do? Well, we are to not be like them. We must be in control. We must not quench the spirit: nor should we allow things to degenerate into disorder. The elders need to talk and test what is being said. For we have control of the words we are given,
The Catholics define scandal as that act which reduces the faith of another. Not what is in the paper: not which is reality TV, or whatever is the movie star gossip, but instead the deliberate acts we do that remove faith. That remove truth. That remove love and caring.
I accept that tongues has a place, perhaps even in worship. As a witness to the power of God. But it needs to be combined with Godly behaviour. Here we all have our own favourite sins, and our neat rationalizations. We need to confront our greed and gluttony as well as the hatred, lust, and their consequences: murder, dissolution of families, institutionalized serial fornication and damaged, alienated children.
Who are fed up to the back teeth by scandal within the church.
Let us be grown up. Let us be decent, quiet and sober. Let us live not as this world demands, but as Christ showed us.
In my view the biggest scandal within the church is the quality of teaching and that fits easily within the RC definition. Becoming grown up in Christ requires sound teaching based on sound theology and sound doctrine but these foundations appear lacking in many churches within NZ. Many Christians are doomed to sipping baby formula having no idea of what constitutes the solid food that leads to maturity.
Brecht’s poem ‘The Solution’ indeed explains what Western governments have chosen to do: to dissolve the people, and elect another. Hence mass immigration, beyond the assimilable point.