On the route to personal peace, and confidence in one’s faith, is the rightful concept of cooperation with others at any level of legitimate life involvement. Many Christians interpret compromise (cooperation with) as surrender (agreement with). For these to cooperate with a pagan is to imply agreement with the basic context of that person, even to identify with the culture and errors of any colleague relating to this purpose and meaning. Therein is a major misunderstanding of Common Grace. I read that Jesus followed custom in going to the synagogue. He was in disagreement with the shifting that many leaders in the Jewish culture had made in the scriptural directives vital to his message of truth. Nevertheless, he would not surrender the Temple concept to those who would amend it – had amended it. Even the Apostle Paul apologized to a priest with whom he had disagreement, when he learned the man was a priest, no matter what his practice may have become. In all, Scripture recognizes a basic truth that the dignity of mankind is embedded in a belief in God, even if that belief is pagan (presumed effective by adherents, but may be unacceptable for God). The issue begins with whether or not some deity is posited in the argument.
Jesus would be humanly comfortable within the confines of any culture or society that permitted him, and his followers, to function freely. He would encourage support for anything that would care for the rightful (necessary for life) needs of mankind, encouraging positive environment for living and growth in the care of the creation and life of it. His message was to address a main issue: What is my ultimate destiny? This is to ask: What is the consequence of death? Bertrand Russell, no friend to religious answers, said that we must live with unyielding despair. Jesus would answer: There is no need for despair. There is God who is forgiving of the person lost in the void, and offers hope (immortality) for those who will accept it on his terms. His nature, best understood as holy, is not to be violated. His plan meets his requirements. We prove his desire to be included through penitence, followed by faith in the redemptive plan, and supported by a life dedicated to service (ministry to others) and righteousness (affirmative spiritual growth) in his people. That is it. All else is peripheral to it. Because service directly to God is meaningless, because God is quite fulfilled within himself, he accepts service to mankind as service to him, and attached to his creative gestures. It is full, complete, and there is no substitute for it. We must live with that plan, if we are to gain the Hope of life in immortality, in the promise of God. There it is, as we say, in a nutshell.
The plan of God is so designed that the identification of the Christian with the good to be achieved in society and nature requires the cooperation of persons of faith with persons of non-faith. We have no assurance that the Queens Sheba, or Kings Hiram of nations were of orthodox faith. Like David, the King, we make friends of mammon to serve God by serving them, perhaps also to be served by them. The return is not of our major concern. This concept of reaching out, with some risk, either alone or with others, reminds me of an event of some decades ago. The Queen of England was called upon, in a national ceremony, to award medals and national gratitude to men who had paid great human price in World War II. She did so with all the sincerity, honor and grace that attended the English respect for the purpose of royalty to the people. A few days after the ceremony it was discovered one of the soldiers to be an interloper. By cleverness he had joined the legitimate heroes, and was given the honors of the people through the Queen. The response was anger at the fellow, believing the whole effort was sullied. Then a wise analyst pointed out, Let us not give up doing a good thing because someone violated our ideals. The honor to the several was greater than the distortion of the interloper. We serve, for God and good. Therein is his will. Our concern is to be motivated by the character of Christ. We find nothing in his ministry that can be seen as prejudice, phobia, despair, elitism, animosity, or any other negative factor. His call is to light, truth, hope, righteousness, adequacy, forgiveness, devotion, equity, love, joy, peace, service and other positive factors. The first purpose of the Church is to advance the positives, and thereby diminish the negatives in the lives of any and all human beings. To this each Christian is dedicated – affirmation. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020