Distractions

Distraction is a major enemy of better things for our lives, including the meaning of truth and its benefits.  Writing about prayer, A. W. Tozer warned that distraction was a major enemy of prayer.  The person of prayer would have to make effort, resisting the interference of distraction in cultivating effective prayer experience.  It is good to be aware that distraction deflects truth and meaning in many areas of life.

In the decade before the War Between the States, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin was published.  It may have been the most important singular influence in the ending of slavery in the United States, capped only by the war itself.  A number of characters emerged from the story that have become by words for characterizing persons in society.  Our concern relates to only one, Uncle Tom.  In the story, Stowe presents Uncle Tom as a noble fellow.  However, as in many instances related to life and literature, there are those who turn things around, and interpret them to the opposite of their original meaning and purpose.  The same thing happened to Scrooge in Dickens’ Christmas Carol.  To Scrooge a person is to treat that person poorly, and we forget that: Scrooge became as good a friend, as good a master, as the good old city knew. . . . And to Tiny Tim he became a second father.  It was always said of him that he knew how to keep Christmas well.  (Not so in our era.)  As one reviewer put it: Paradoxically, the phrase Uncle Tom is known today as an epithet for spineless collaboration with master oppression, the antithesis of the morally heroic character for whom Stowe named her first novel.  In fact, the application is a contradiction, not paradox, and has been applied to modern persons trying to improve matters, not only in racial issues, but in other areas as well.  The reason for these distractions is found in human negative spirit to distraction.

As I am writing this Page, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is challenging some religious colleges – that they have lost their religious immunities with the government because they have, essentially, become secular in most areas.  This is partly done, so believes the NLRB, in order to gain government funding for various programs.  There is even a feeling that the casualness toward some issues like co-ed dorms and sexual conduct in students may violate what the religious order is supposed to teach and foster – and sometimes enforce.  Although I have not seen the deposition, so cannot side objectively with either the government or the institutions in the piece, the point is made – to be genuine, which is to say to be honest in what you are and mean to be and do.  Do not distort something for personal benefit.  Do not invent dark clouds so to win a point by distraction, misinterpretation, or a ruse.  But, many distractions do appear. Christianity: the Church, Scripture, even the Great Commission (Mission) of Christ, as they were designed, published, and declared have been contradicted, distorted, subjugated, amended, denigrated by persons with other agendas, purposes, beliefs and attitudes than the biblical declarations.  The original purposes remain for the evangelical Christian, and are relevant.  Even the Tom reviewer referred to above said that the original of the Cabin story held its: elevating Christian message of martyrdom and redemption.  Christianity, in its biblical form, supports the search for truth (all truth natural and spiritual), for redemption in Christ, for gospel mission that includes lifting of suffering, for the nurture and benefit of human beings and society.  How can that improve as mission?  In this is found Christian education, life practice, and hope.  The true Christian is willing to rest intellect, faith and conduct in the context of the meaning of Scripture.  On occasion that takes some extra effort to gain adequate understanding, but that test is true of all meaningful contexts of culture and belief.  The Christian finds nothing better available to the life of nature, and its conclusion for the individual.  If there is something better, what is it?  Christianity expects much of its people, but demands comparatively little for God’s acceptance.  The faith factor, as defined by Scripture, is a command from God, if the person is to experience the peace promised in Scripture, and the inclusion of God.  That experience must always begin with the individual, and is presumed to carry over to the human culture in which the individual resides.  Culture is only Christian when Christians make it so.  There is much that is Christian (right/righteous) in any society.  God will have a Christian society ultimately.  We call it heaven.  Christians should feel obligation to inform society about the good news.