Remain Silent
To say the world is in a state of need is a major understatement. Everywhere you look there are new issues we are being forced to face. Things we never thought we would see are happening, not just in big far away cities, but just down the road. I’ve had countless conversations with people about the world and most people have the same conclusion. They say, “Yeah things are bad but what am I going to do about it?” I’ve even heard, “I’ll mind my business and let everyone else mind theirs.” I can’t say I’m perfect when it comes to this mindset either. So many times I have told myself that it’s okay to be silent because Jesus calls us to love, no matter the person or sin. That statement is so so true and important, don’t get me wrong, we are called to ALWAYS love. However, there comes a time when righteousness and our love for Christ outweighs our fear of stepping on toes or upsetting someone else.
Looking to my last post about the comfort Jesus provides, this post seems to be the exact opposite character, but our Lord is not just some friendly guy in the sky who says love and peace to all. This is where many people are getting confused and thinking they are living in the way Christ wants us to because they share all the right Facebook posts, go to church on Sundays, and never make a fuss. We so easily look past the times in the Bible when Jesus showed us how to have righteous anger and stand firm in the word of God. The best example of this righteous anger is in John chapter 2 when Jesus goes to the temple and discovers the money changers.
There’s two things I want to point out about this set of scriptures. The first thing is in verse 17 of the chapter where it reads, “His disciples remembered that it is written: ‘Zeal for your house will consume me.’”. Zeal is defined by the Oxford dictionary as “great energy or enthusiasm in pursuit of a cause or an objective”. Jesus was consumed with great energy and enthusiasm for the house of His father. He had this passion and love which caused Him to stand up for the wrongdoings and to do what was right in the eyes of the Lord. Today we lack that same zeal. We are consumed with zeal for other things that we have no room left for enthusiasm for the Lord. By the time Sunday comes around we are so drained of zeal we can barely even sing along to a worship song or say amen when the word is stirring your spirit. This lack of zeal is the reason so many other things have taken control of our lives and of the world around us.
Second, backtracking in the scripture a bit I want to point out the first part of verse 15 which says, “So he made a whip out of cords, […]”. You see, Google didn’t exist then, so Jesus had to already have previous knowledge of how to make a whip. This means he took what he knew and implemented it into use. How many times do we have the problem where we are met with something which requires our reaction and we have no prior knowledge of the Word to use in that moment. I personally believe that this is why a lot of Christians, myself included, stay silent when faced with something we know is wrong. We don’t have the knowledge of how to make our whip so we can’t use it. We aren’t in the Word, studying it and living it to the point where we know it inside and out.
Do you know who does know the Word inside and out though? The enemies do. There are accounts in the Bible of demons recognizing Jesus and His power when humans couldn’t. Satan’s favorite tactic is to manipulate the Word of God to make people believe that false things. Is this not what he did to Eve in the garden or what he tried to do to Jesus when tempting him in the desert? Satan hasn’t changed his tactics just because everyone has an iPhone now. All he has done is strengthened those tactics and he sets out to manipulate anyone he can into falling into his trap of sin and causing them to remain silent.
Proverbs 14:12 says, “There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.” How well does that verse relate to us today. Like I said before, we are being faced daily with the issues of the world and we struggle to determine what we should stand against and speak out for. Many times we decide to keep our head down because that seems right, that seems like the best option. It isn’t! Remaining silent leads to death Christians! God has called us to be meek, not weak and He tells us that we are more than conquerors! (Matthew 5:5 & Romans 8:37) Now is the time to build our knowledge in the Word of God, strengthen our foundations, because the hour is at hand for God’s children to be full of zeal for Him. We no longer need to be idle and have conversations about the state of the world, we need to do something about it, speak up and let our voices be heard before it is too late. I would rather die standing for God than die sitting because I remained silent.
