Seeking Truth in Today's Troubled World

On Tuesday, May 27th, a Christian-sponsored “Rattle in Seattle” demonstration began at 5 p.m. on the 4th Avenue steps of City Hall in downtown Seattle. After the protest turned violent across the street at a counter-protest, Mayor Bruce Harrell gave the following statement, “Seattle is proud of our reputation as a welcoming, inclusive city for LGBTQ+ communities, and we stand with our trans neighbors when they face bigotry and injustice,” the mayor said at the time. “Today’s far-right rally was held here for this very reason – to provoke a reaction by promoting beliefs that are inherently opposed to our city’s values, in the heart of Seattle’s most prominent LGBTQ+ neighborhood.”

“Anarchists infiltrated the counter-protestors group and inspired violence, prompting SPD to make arrests and ask organizers to shut down the event early, which they did,” he continued.

The mayor also released respective statements on Tuesday from several of the city’s Christian and Jewish leaders siding with Harrell and condemning the weekend “Rattle in Seattle” protest.

“Mayday’s desire is to wrap their personal hate, fear, and bigotry in Christian speak. It won’t work,” Rev. Dr. Patricia L. Hunter, a Baptist pastor, said in a statement. “The call of Jesus to his followers was to first love God and secondly to love our neighbors. In no way does the ideology or bad theology of this fringe group embody the love of God we are to exhibit. Those of us who actually follow the Jesus of the New Testament work to make the welcome tent bigger so that all God’s children regardless of sexuality or sexual identity are welcome at the table of love, justice, grace, and mercy.” Foxnews.com

There is a fashionable form of love today that bears no resemblance to the blazing holiness of the God who thundered from Sinai or bled on Calvary. It is a thin sentimental affection that demands no repentance, seeks no transformation and worships a deity who affirms rather than redeems. This is not the love of Christ as shown in the Bible. It is the love of a mirror.

It is said that God’s love means unconditional affirmation. But biblical love is not the absence of boundaries, it is the presence of a Cross. It does not nod politely at sin for the sake of inclusion, it wages war against it for the sake of salvation. If God’s love were merely tolerant there would have been no need for a Savior, no need for suffering, no need for resurrection. But the gospel is not a therapy for the self assured, it is a ransom for the condemned.

“God loves you just as you are” is indeed a true statement but it is woefully incomplete. God also loves you too much to leave you that way. The love of God does not rubber stamp our identities, it redefines them entirely. He does not merely set a bigger table, He provides new clothes for those He invites (Matthew 22:11–12). The feast is for sinners, yes, but it is not a celebration of sin.

And here is the deep irony the very people who proclaim the widest welcome often slam the narrowest gate when it comes to truth. To speak of sin today is to be labeled a bigot even by clergy who wear robes, but discard the cross that gave them meaning. If a man points to the lighthouse while others sail toward the rocks, he is not hateful, he is merciful.

Loving one’s neighbor never required moral blindness. No parent expresses love by applauding a child as he plays with fire, no shepherd earns the name by ignoring wolves. Jesus did not call us to unconditional affirmation, He called us to unconditional surrender.

Now as for the “values of the city” they are not the measure of righteousness. Cities have values. So do kingdoms. But only one has a throne that lasts forever. And His values include grace and truth, mercy and judgment, welcome and transformation. The real Jesus welcomes the outcast and then tells them “Go and sin no more.”

Let us not confuse the clamor of the crowd for the call of Christ. True love does not abandon truth to appear kind. It speaks the truth in love because it believes the truth IS love. Anything else is flattery with eternal consequences.

In Christ’s Service,

~JFH