Ok to understand this post you need to read an article i read first. Click here to read the article.
I think this person has his expectations a little high. When Jesus was on earth, he was mocked, beaten and killed. And he was killed in a most humiliating way. It seems to me to make perfect sense that 2000 years later people would make similar comments about him (although it seems this history professors comments may not have even been that bad).
You can't expect to follow Jesus and not be insulted for your faith. To demand otherwise is out of selfish pride or some other mixed up emotion. Not out of a desire to serve God. Jesus said that his followers would be persecuted and suffer. I thank God that i live in Australia and that means the persecution is nothing compared to my brothers and sisters overseas. This person in America might be wise in simply doing the same. Not taking people to court. I find his actions more disgraceful than the teacher who said something nasty in the first place.
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I'm of two minds on this matter.
ReplyDeleteIn one sense I agree with you I should expect persecution and it really is rather light in comparison to overseas. And I'm not sure what sueing someone will archive it seems like a waste of time.
On the other hand people constantly mock God and get away with it- shouldn't we be undignified that our great God is mocked with out reason. Probaly the things that annoys me the most is that this seems to be done mainly to chirstians. It doesn't seem to happen quite so much to say hindus and buddist - because we are of course a tolerant society of everything but christianity. And people are always wary of bagging out mulims because that often leads to violence protests around the world.
Interesting thoughts Astrid. I guess in light of Hebrews 10:26-31 God explains that it is for him to avenge, so for us to Sue someone on God's behalf? It's not our place. And I guess also seeking monetary gain from the conscience God has provided is bad enough in itself.
ReplyDeleteIn John 15:18, Jesus talks about the World hating disciples in this way: "'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also."
Jesus tells us to expect such treatment (Also Paul writes in 2 Tim 3:12), and to expect it for ourselves also. I guess the challenge is to acknowledge this, hold firm to our faith and follow the two Great commandments, an application of that is to love those who persecute us, written in Romans 12:14
For me I guess it is becoming evident that we are to love those who persecute both Christ personally, and those who persecute him through persecuting his church.
And to do so in good spirits.
Matthew 5:11-12 says that because of this you can be sure of a reward in heaven.
We are called to be Salt and Light to the world, not Lawsuits and Self-Righteousness.
I think both teacher and student need a lot of prayer, and that both may come to know Christ's love in all its fullness so that on judgement day they can both profess to enduring the world's slander for the spreading of the Gospel and furthering of God's kingdom.
We can leave the Judgement of such things to our God and Sovereign King.
Yea I agree with you allan it is an issue I have been thinking about but I never considered the persecuted part of it.
ReplyDeleteSueing for finiacinal gain- is wrong but who knows where the money is going to. I think its harsh to make the teacher resign he should at the most just have a written apology I think I have heard much worse things said about christianity. The lecturer could have said a lot of those things in jest. If anything it will turn the lecturer to have a more negative view of christianity.
I understand we live in a society where there is free speech and people have differently opinions - and I like that its means people can be honest. But when people take pot shots at christianty which are hugely damaging which are generally not based on fact like the lecturer who should know better it does two things.
It slanders God.It further turns people away from christ - making it harder for people to hear the truth and to them rationalises their negative view of christianity.
so should we do nothing? I have to say that I take a lot of my views from peter woodcock who in a talk about Gods jealousy. I believe his message was that we should just let God's name be dragged in the ground and laughed and just let it happen.
I guess alan your suggestion of pray is a very good idea and very powerful. The other thing christians could do is make written complaints say if there is something on tv that offended you a lot not in a horrible emotive way but pointing out that you are offended and do not apprieciate the degoratory and untrue things said.
People take pot shots because they reject God. It's simple. The best way we can show them Jesus' love and have them return to God is to Love them in the way Jesus Called us (sorry to state the obvious)..
ReplyDeleteGod says we are a chosen people (Colossians 3:12), and 1 Peter 3:13-16 explains how, as God's chosen people for His work, we are to answer those who question our faith. This would I guess include slanderous people because they dont only question but ridicule. 1 Peter 2:8b-12 encapulates what we are to do as Christians rather well.
I guess anything we do needs to adhere to what God asks of us, and not to take his judgement into our own hands.
I agree with you Alan sueing in an Un-christian thing to do... It creates conflict other worldly items.
ReplyDeleteRather we should defind Christ's Name by being the salt and the light. Their is a place for christians to be involved with law, and perhaps even in relation to cases in which sueing is involved however this is not one of them.
i've loved the comments so far, but the article infuriated me!
ReplyDelete"I'm tired of being criticized and ostracized for being a Christian. I'm glad Chad filed his suit. It's time we Christians fought back," the pastor said.
yuck. to say that christians need to 'fight back' in modern-day america, of all places, is ludicrous. to compare the persecution that the student felt with persecution overseas or in early-days christianity is a joke.
it doesn't sound like the teacher was bagging out god. sounds to me like he was having a go at the poius, self-righteous side of christianity. and good on him.
when my god is mocked i grieve, and i long for his kingdom where all will be perfect. but christians have done appalling things in god's name, and that is a part of history.
hinduism and buddhism aren't attacked because they haven't done much to offend. jesus was a pretty offensive character.
i will rejoice, not mourn, on the day i am really persecuted because of who christ is. it means i am not being persecuted because of my own selfishness, self-righteousness, and judgemental character. it means that people notice jesus, and are affected by him.
ok just to throw a bit of a thought i had out there but i think its certainly worth thinking about...
ReplyDeletewhen Christians (including you and me) say, "i'm offended at God's name being slandered or dragged through the mud" or some other similar saying, is the actual motive behind that offence on God's behalf? or is it self centred pride at having a substantial part of our identity slandered?
If it is the latter, which is suspect it is often, then no wonder we appear self righteous!
That's a good question Chris. I've always felt that Christians have no right to be offended but are instead called to place others above ourselves, even if what others say isn't nice or what they do isn't good. If they steal our coat we should give them our shirt too.
ReplyDeleteWe shouldn't be so proud that we get offended, and God doesn't need people getting offended for him - He's alright without us.
Not that I want to lower the level of debate or anything:p...but I would like to see in what context the teacher made the remarks quoted in the article. Whether they were actualy made in the course of teaching history or just the teachers personal oppinion on an unrelated topic.
ReplyDeleteI think there are alot of teachers who should be forced to resign because they can't (or don't) actualy teach you anything. If this guy's a good history teacher, let him teach history. If he spends his lessons bagging christianity and his kids fail the year, what's he doing in a class room?
I've had teachers make the odd remark about my faith, but they were pretty darn fine teachers, so it didn't bother me. I'm not sure if that's a bad way to look at things. Or if I sound stupid. But any dumb comments (or bad spelling) I blame on my teachers not educating me well enough over the years:p
On a side note, (and again, I don't mean to ruin the conversation or anything, maybe I should have just not said anything.) five of your last seven posts Chris have been on christian/church type topics, and have all been pretty negative. Not that it's a bad thing to discuss these things, or talk about what we dont like in order to try and improve them. But it'd be kinda nice to read about something that excited you, or something your really positive about. Surely there is something happening around the world in our faith which is worth writing a glowing report about on your blog...
ReplyDelete