The Church, Culture, and God’s Appointment of Authority (Part 2)
God Turns the Heart of Leaders
Earlier, we saw that God raised up Hazael with the foreknowledge of the atrocities he would commit. Not only does God raise up leaders knowing what they will do, but He often puts it in their hearts to do these things. I’ll give three examples.
When Solomon turned from the Lord and to idolatry, God said that the kingdom would be ripped from his son’s hand. Before Solomon took the throne, God declared, “If he sins, I will punish him with the rod of men.” In other words, God would raise up men to power who would chastise Solomon. We see this at the end of Solomon’s reign. When he turned to idolatry, God raised up leaders who plagued this kingdom, and robbed Solomon of peace.
After Solomon’s death, the people came to his son, Rehoboam and said they would remain faithful to his throne if he would agree to lift the heavy burden put on them by Solomon. The wise elders advised him to speak peaceably to the people, but Rehoboam chose to follow the foolish counsel of his younger companions. He declared, “My father chastised you with whips, but I will punish you with scorpions, and my little finger will be heavier than my father’s waist.”
The people rebelled, and the kingdom was divided. When Rehoboam gathered his troops together to force the people back into submission, God sent a prophet to warn him not to fight against his brethren, “For this thing is from Me.” (2 Chronicles 11:2-4). God stirred the people, and God gave a foolish heart to the king. Consider Proverbs 21:1
The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD, Like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever He wishes.
The second example is found in 1 Kings 22:19-23. King Ahab was one of the most vile kings in Israel’s history. The time came for God to judge him, and he followed the tradition of inquiring of God before going to battle. Over four-hundred prophets gathered and proclaimed peace and prosperity to the king. Though he was in rebellion against God and all the prophets spoke in the name of the Lord, he recognized the absence of truth and asked for a prophet of God. Micaiah was called, and something interesting was revealed. Let’s start at verse 19.
19 Then Micaiah said, "Therefore hear the word of the LORD: I saw the LORD sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by, on His right hand and on His left.
20 "And the LORD said, 'Who will persuade Ahab to go up, that he may fall at Ramoth Gilead?' So one spoke in this manner, and another spoke in that manner.
21 "Then a spirit came forward and stood before the LORD, and said, 'I will persuade him.'
22 "The LORD said to him, 'In what way?' So he said, 'I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.' And the LORD said, 'You shall persuade him, and also prevail. Go out and do so.'
23 "Therefore look! The LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these prophets of yours, and the LORD has declared disaster against you."
Notice that God asked for volunteers. A deceptive angel (which is a demon) spoke up and offered to be a lying spirit. God sent the angel with the word, “You shall persuade…and also prevail.” It was God who determined to put in the hearts of the wicked the lie that they all wanted to hear. Even though the king asked why there were no prophets of the Lord, he still chose to side with those lying prophets because they said what he wanted to hear. This is no different than what the New Testament teaches in Romans 1 when God turns wicked men over to their vile passions after they shove truth aside, or 2 Thessalonians 2 when God gives the wicked a strong delusion that they should believe a lie once they have rejected the love of the truth.
As people turn from the Lord, God turns people over to the lies they have chosen over His word. God uses righteous people to fulfill His work of righteousness, and wicked people to judge wickedness.
The truth is that God raises up godly or godless leaders based on the faithfulness of His people. When leaders become absurdly foolish, it is a warning sign of a serious spiritual problem in His people. God raises up the wicked to judge the wicked.
In our third and final example, we’ll see that God sometimes even puts foolishness in the hearts of those who aren’t wicked in order to judge rebellion. Look at 1 Chronicles 21:
1 Now Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel.
2 So David said to Joab and to the leaders of the people, "Go, number Israel from Beersheba to Dan, and bring the number of them to me that I may know it."
…
7 And God was displeased with this thing; therefore He struck Israel.
King David had been raised to power by the mighty hand of God. Through the Lord’s hand, David subdued every enemy Israel had and established the nation. Now, David is putting his trust in the might of his army and the number of soldiers he had under his command. It was a foolish decision to turn his trust from the Lord to the might of his army. What’s more interesting is the reason behind David’s decision. Verse 1 says that Satan moved David to take this action, but there is more to the story than meets the eye. Look at 2 Samuel 24:1-2
1 Again the anger of the LORD was aroused against Israel, and He moved David against them to say, "Go, number Israel and Judah."
2 So the king said to Joab the commander of the army who was with him, "Now go throughout all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and count the people, that I may know the number of the people."
Even though Satan moved David to choose this foolishness, the move was actually the will of the Lord. Just as when God sent a lying spirit to deceive the prophets, now we see that God empowered Satan to move David to make a foolish choice. Part of this remained from the curse when David committed adultery and murdered Bathsheeba’s husband, and God said the sword would never depart from his house. But it also had a deeper purpose. The anger of the Lord was aroused against Israel; therefore, he moved David. It was the sin of the nation that caused God to put these actions into the heart of the king.
When God’s people turn from His ways, he raises up enemies from within, from the outside, and turns the hearts of our leaders. When God’s people turn from their own ways and follow Him with their whole heart, he heals their land, restores what has been broken down, raises up people to do his will, and turns the hearts of our leaders to do what is right. He can use circumstances to force even the most wicked person into the direction that can either bless or curse God’s people.
The Problem and God’s Solution
The Lord does not need godly leaders to bless a godly people. God is fully capable of turning the heart of those in authority to fulfill His purposes, willingly or unwillingly. Look at some of the examples in scripture. In the book of Ester, Haman hated Mordecai. Haman was the second highest person in authority in the Persian Kingdom. He built gallows 50 cubits high (approximately 75 feet) for the purpose of hanging this man. He built it high enough for the whole city to see the body of his enemy. Haman deceived the king into passing a law that would give him the power to kill all the Jews, and he counted the days down to when he would have the thrill of personally hanging Mordecai. Yet an interesting thing happened when God’s people dedicated themselves to fasting, prayer, and seeking God’s face.
When Mordecai discovered a conspiracy against the king and thwarted it, Haman was forced to parade Mordecai around the city on the king’s horse, shouting his praises. Then the tables really turned when the wickedness of Haman was revealed to the King of Persia, and he was hanged on the gallows he built for Mordecai. The king’s heart was turned in favor of the Jews, he was inspired to honor Mordecai, and then he passed laws to empower the Jews over their enemies. Haman, who was the most honored man in the kingdom, ended up being judged by God through the king who once honored him.
Throughout the Bible, God gives many examples where He uses His enemies to do good to His people when they seek to do the Lord’s will. Not only do we see these things in the Bible, it also occurs in our own history. The example of William Tyndale is a good example. William Tyndale produced the first English New Testament. This put him in direct conflict with Cuthbert Tonstall, the bishop of London. God used Tyndale’s enemies to assist in his work.
Tyndale’s goal was to make the New Testament available for the common man to read, but without an English translation, this was impossible. In the 1500s, printing was a costly endeavor. Tyndale had a partially translated version of the New Testament, and had it printed and distributed. Upon completion of his revised New Testament, he had no money to pay for a new print run, but the corrupt Bishop unwittingly came to his rescue.
Cuthbert Tonstall had already begun a campaign of rounding up Tyndale’s first printing and burning them, but a friend of Tyndale came forward and said he could provide the rest of the printed books by purchasing them from the owners. The Bishop authorized the buy back with the intention of destroying as many New Testaments as possible. Tyndale gladly provided all of his older Bibles, and took the money to fund his new printing. Thus, he was able to remove his stockpile of partially translated Bibles, and print the completed New Testament at the expense of his enemies. The corrupt leaders who thought they were destroying the scriptures were actually funding the first complete New Testament English translation.
These examples serve to show us that we need not concern ourselves with who is in charge or what their motivations are. We stand upon the truth, and trust God to fulfill His word, and honor His word. But this can only happen when we are standing upon the word, and that requires humility and obedience on our part. It is not merely an agreement with the word, but a surrender to obedience. In the next portion of study, we’ll look at what it means to keep the word and how we know good fruit, but for the remainder of this study, we’ll focus on our role in obedience.
The responsibility for obedience in the church is upon you. If the church has gone astray, repentance begins in your own shoes. And mine. When God is not blessing, and the culture is decaying, we must look at ourselves. We don’t preserve the culture by fighting the culture. The culture is preserved by God through a people who obey the word and live out their faith according to God’s own word. When we begin to see the warning signs in our culture and the world around us, it isn’t because our leaders are corrupt, it is because God’s people are no longer making Him their first love and obeying the scriptures.
Read Amos 4. God declares that He sent hardships to the nation for the purpose of showing the people that they were departing from God, their provider. God gave them a lack of bread and took away their prosperity. God withheld rain from one city and dumped rain on another city. Blights came to kill their plants. The crops in dry areas withered, and pests devoured the areas that prospered. God sent diseases, raised up enemies, and destroyed many people. Yet for all that, God said they refused to repent.
Consider that the Bible warns that any nation that forgets God will be turned into hell, but the nation whose God is the Lord will be blessed. Now look around and see the hand of God. Is God blessing His people, or giving the warnings of judgment? In our world, blights are destroying crops. SOD, or Sudden Oak Death syndrome is wiping out California forests at an alarming rate. SCC, or Sudden Colony Collapse disorder and varroa mites are wiping out the honey bee population, the Gulf oil spill destroyed the livelihood of people on five states, and natural disasters are just a few examples that strongly resemble the warnings God gave to His people. A few years ago, seven major hurricanes descended on the southern coastal states, and this year many cities have had record flooding. It’s much easier to blame it on industry and global warming, but the Bible says, “Yet for all this, they did not repent.”
One thing we as Christians should always keep in mind is that God judges the nation based on His people, not the wickedness of the lost. “If My people,” not “if the culture.” We are called to humble ourselves, turn from our own sinful ways, seek the Lord and then pray. We are not called to win elections, defeat political groups, scourge the nation of sinners, or establish a theocracy. It is God’s role to heal the nation. It is God’s role to raise up those who will rebuild the nation(Isaiah 58:6-12). The church is trying to take God’s role upon themselves, while neglecting the basic discipleship God has called us to learn.
It sounds bleak when we only look at these things as problems. But the Bible warns us of these things, not so we are overwhelmed, but so we know something needs to change. It is a reminder to step back, examine our lives, and turn our hearts back to the Lord. God uses hardship to remind His people of the futility of life without him. As Peter said to the church, “Seeing all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of people ought you to be in holy conversation and godliness?” Why are we living for a world that is destined for destruction? And ignoring the new life destined for eternity?
The Christian is the Preservative of the Culture
It’s interesting to look back throughout history and see how God has blessed nations when the church is obedient. Just look at American history. We rose to a world power, but not on the coattails of godly leaders. It was not our leaders that influenced the church, it was the church that influenced the leaders. Why is it that every political leader becomes a Christian during campaign season? I’ve watched speeches where leaders mocked the Bible and insulted Christians, but when the time of the election drew near, they were carrying a Bible to church and openly talking about their faith.
Cultural accountability restrains evil in a culture. The moral climate affects the focus of leadership. Most of all, God turns the hearts for good or bad based on the state of the church. Problems develop when the church begins looking to the culture for answers and allowing themselves to be led by the world. As Jesus said, “If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a ditch.” If the church becomes blind by forgetting their redemption and the light of the word (See 2 Peter 1:9), they cannot see any better than the world. As we’ll see shortly, God blesses in spite of our leaders when His people are right with him. And, God curses in spite of our leaders when his people turn from Him.
We have already looked at King David. He was a godly leader, yet when the people of the nation walked in disobedience, God turned his heart to make a decision that would bring judgment on the nation. If you aren’t familiar with the account, God gave David three choices. To flee from his enemies for three months, have seven years of famine, or three days of a plague. David decided to put himself in God’s hands and chose the plague. In the end, David pleaded with God saying, “I have sinned, but what have these people done?”
What he could not see is that God’s anger was not against Israel’s political leadership, but against the people. The judgment began when God’s anger was aroused against the people (2 Samuel 24:1), and the purpose of David’s foolishness was to judge a rebellious people. This was true, even though, David was a godly leader. This is why it’s vain to try to change the culture through politics.
A godly leader can’t compensate for a rebellious people. Nor can a godless leader overthrow the work of God in the church. Many have tried, and all have failed. I believe it was Spurgeon who once said, “The Bible is the anvil that has worn out many hammers.” Many governments, dictators, and powerful people have launched missions to destroy the scriptures, yet it stands, and they have fallen. The power of the church is the word of God, and each member of the church is salt and light to the world around them. Only negligence can hinder the gospel. Look at Matthew 5:11-14
11 "Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake.
12 "Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
13 " You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.
14 "You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.
It’s no coincidence that Jesus began with persecution before explaining our role in the world. It is the Christian that preserves the culture. In the world of Jesus’ day, there was no refrigeration. Perishable items such as meat were preserved by curing them with salt. Not only does salt enhance flavor, but it also prevents decay. The Christian, living out their faith, becomes the preservative of the culture around us. Sin decays the culture, but we, the salt of the earth, prevent that decay. It the absence of salt, meat would spoil and soon fill the air with stench. In the absence of having Christians living like Christ, the culture spoils and decays around us.
The same is true with light. The Bible says that God’s word is a light to our path, and a lamp to our feet. Because the word is implanted in our hearts by God’s Spirit and our willingness to abide in it, we become the light of the world. We become lights to the culture, or as Philippians 2:14-16a says:
14 Do all things without complaining and disputing,
15 that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world,
16 holding fast the word of life,
We can’t neglect the absolute necessity of holding fast to the word. Jesus also declared that we must abide in Him, and His word must abide in us (John 15). Only then can we be the light pointing to Christ, and the salt preserving the culture. If we lose these things, we become worthless and just like the culture. Jesus said those people will be trodden underfoot. What’s happening to the church today? Our culture wants to walk all over the church. In the past, immoral behavior would destroy any hope of a career in politics. Today, it is faith that destroys a career. It’s okay to through around a few religious jargons to gain votes, but let someone who is a true man or woman of faith step forward, and what happens? The fear-mongering begins and the media begins to trample them, colleagues begin to distance themselves, and voters begin abandoning in droves. The culture has decayed to the point to where anything not in decay is despised.
The Christian Turns Away Wrath
Even in the midst of corruption, God spares the culture when God’s people are the light. When God decided to deal with the wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the five cities of the plain, He agreed to spare them all if he could find 10 people who walked in righteousness. Through archaeological finds, we now know that these five cities had a population of approximately three-hundred and fifty-thousand people. Yet God promised to spare them all if He could find 10 righteous.
When God brought judgment upon the Southern Kingdom of Israel, God told the prophet Ezekiel the reason for judgment. The people of God lost the ability to distinguish what was holy from the unholy, they listened to prophets who claimed to speak for the Lord but taught lies, and then God says something interesting. Look at Ezekiel 22:30-31
30 "So I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found no one.
31 "Therefore I have poured out My indignation on them; I have consumed them with the fire of My wrath; and I have recompensed their deeds on their own heads," says the Lord GOD.
In spite of all the sins of the land, God did not choose to judge until he couldn’t find a man to stand in the gap, and intercede for the nation. If the church would consistently seek the Lord in their own lives, and be in a faithful position of lifting up our leaders to God in prayer, we have the promise of peace. Look at 1 Timothy 2:1-4
1 Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men,
2 for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.
3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior,
4 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
This does not say, pray against the leaders we don’t like. It is supplication – to entreat to God on behalf of someone’s need. It is intercession – to petition to God for mercy on behalf of our leaders. It is prayer – approaching God in conversation. It is giving of thanks to God on their behalf. Since all authority is appointed by God, all leaders are lifted up for a purpose and we are to be thankful for the work of God – even when we don’t understand what God is doing.
The scripture doesn’t say to just pray for the godly leader, or those who act honorably. We are commanded to petition for all leaders as if they are someone we sincerely care about. The word ‘all’ is not a slip of the pen. It is exactly what God intended. What would happen if God’s people started taking the word seriously in their own life, and began consistently lifting up their leaders as this passage commands? We know what would happen. We would lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. And our attitude and behavior would be acceptable in the sight of God.
The prophet Jeremiah was to Judah what the prophet Ezekiel was to Israel. He witnessed the decaying culture, the warning signs, God’s call to repentance, and finally God’s judgment. Just before Jerusalem’s walls were broken through by the invading armies, God told Jeremiah, “Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem; See now and know; And seek in her open places If you can find a man, If there is anyone who executes judgment, Who seeks the truth, And I will pardon her.”
The mercies of God are made clear in this passage. All the spiritual leaders had adopted the practices of the pagan culture around them. People still did religious things, but it was all meaninglessness. No one truly sought the Lord. Yet, God gave an amazing proclamation. Find one person, and I will spare the entire city. There were many, many religious people. There were many prophets proclaiming in the name of the Lord. They used biblical sounding speech and even practiced the things in the scripture that fit their ideas of right and wrong. But no one truly sought the Lord. They sought fulfillment in themselves. It had become a worship system based on picking and choosing what felt good to the human heart.
In Conclusion
Once someone has been born into the Spirit, there must be a willingness to obey. We have the promise that we have been given all things that pertain to life and godliness. We also have the promise that the word of God makes us complete and fully equipped for every good work. But that profits nothing if we don’t study diligently to show ourselves approved. All things center upon your heart of worship. Worship is not just singing and making music, it is lifting God up to His rightful place while humbling ourselves before Him. Submitting to God requires us to submit to the word and be a doer of the word. When the church fulfills this basic requirement, God will fulfill His promises. He will raise up those who restore and rebuild, and He will turn the hearts of leaders to do His will. Obedience in the church begins with you, and me.
The responsibility of every Christian is to pray for, petition for, entreat on behalf of those in authority. Whether it is on the job, in the local government, in our national government, or in the local church, we are commanded to intercede on behalf of our leaders. Only then can we hope to obtain the promise that we will lead a quiet and peaceable life.
Stand in the gap. Regardless of the direction the world around us is going, we stand in the gap for our culture. If we are faithful, God will be faithful – even if the church and the world around us is not. The battle is not yours, it belongs to the Lord. Our only role is faithfulness and obedience. If God provides us the opportunity to make a difference, we should do so faithfully. Whether actively working with the culture around you, or living in a role no one will ever see, your responsibility is the same. Seek the Lord, study the word, pray for leaders, and be salt and light. This is how you stand in the gap and make a difference in the world.
Eddie Snipes
Exchanged Life Discipleship
Follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/eddiesnipes
<<Click Here to Sign up for Weekly Messages>>
Return to the Bible Studies Page