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A Little More Chutzpah Please

Since the Court's decision on same-sex marriage, I’ve read numerous writings by pastors about how the church should respond. In general, they say we should be clear that the gay lifestyle is wrong, but as well we should be compassionate, loving, gracious, fence-builders, and ready to offer a defense of the faith. 

All of these qualities are certainly Christian. But what is lacking is a sense of urgency. That is, a perception of the serious, alarming, and destructive impact the current institutionalization of immorality poses to the health of this nation and to churches. Pastors may as well be counseling us on “How to engage non-Christians at the community yard sale.” 

But there’s a world of difference between how one engages unbelievers at a social gathering and Jim Elliot’s posture before the Auca Indians. Our public posturing on homosexuality, same-sex marriage, and soon transgender-ism, can say all the right things. But unless the church responds with a bit more chutzpah to the normalization of sexual perversion, plan on our aloof, theological propriety being overrun by a sweeping and zealous anarchy. 

I recall the day of 9/11. As soon as I heard word of the attack, I ran around the North building of Campus Crusade for Christ, as if in a panic. As I moved down the hall, I noticed a lady from HR interviewing a young lady as both sat comfortably on a couch. They seemed indifferent to the most violent and shocking attack on this nation since Pearl Harbor. 

Perhaps they hadn’t heard. So I interrupted their discussion, and asked with great earnestness, "Did you hear what happened?" As if perturbed by my interruption, the HR rep responded, "Yes, we know!" I'm sure she could have told me how to be "compassionate, loving, gracious, a fence-builder, and ready to offer a defense of the faith." But it was her dispassionate quietism that spoke loudest. As she turned back to speak with the young lady, literally before Tower 2 had fallen, you would have thought 9/11 to be the equivalent of a tree falling in the Central Florida scrub. 

So, I'm asking, pleading, for a little more “chutzpah.” Of course, the same plea has been made by others regarding the war to save the unborn, and a host of other things. We always have the right response. But do we join right words with right action? If not, what’s missing? Passion. Remember this: Only the passionate are risk takers. And only risk takers are world-changers. 



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