Come Out, Christians, Wherever You Are

Just wondering if you heard about the tens of thousands of Christians who converged on Washington D.C. last weekend? No news reports about looting, vandalism, calls to “burn it down”, no acts of violence and destruction? That’s because the tens of thousands of Christians came to pray for our nation. Worship, prayers, humility and repentance prevailed.

A consistent theme of the events was the broken condition of America and the urgent need for repentance. We, the followers of Jesus, have sinned and fallen short. Every. Single. One of Us. We who are called to be light of the world and the salt of the earth have not lived up to our high calling. That’s why those gatherings in D.C., with minimal press coverage and without the drama of the protests and the riots, could well be the thing that saves our nation. And while the media may not have paid much attention, we trust that God Himself did. That is WHO matters.

Maybe we didn’t make the big events, but many of us watched and prayed from our homes. That’s a good place to start, but it’s time to come out of our homes long enough to go into the world to boldly declare WHAT and WHO we stand for as Christians. Too many of us keep our Christianity in a closet. We heed the old admonishment to not discuss religion or politics. Really? The two major discussion points for letting our lights shine are not to be discussed? How can our voices be stifled when the voices of others who oppose God’s side are so loud?

I heard it said: “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” That means that the loudest people are the ones who get the most attention. I hear those loud, noisy, angry, bitter, mocking-God-and-His-people voices in our world who oppose the 10 Commandments, God’s Word, morality, and God, Himself. They get so much attention because they are boisterous and loud. Christianity remains the largest religious group in the world at 31.3%, yet we restrain our voices.

Jesus didn’t call us to be closet disciples. He gave us stern warnings about denying Him. “Whoever denies Me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 10:33) Keeping our faith to ourselves isn’t the “light” that Jesus said we should be. He told us to go into all the world with Him. Our faith was made to be made public because we are called to evangelize the world and we cannot do that silently.

It’s time we bravely use our “outside voices”. The election is around the corner and we can make our voices heard. One of the greatest ways to be bold and loud as followers of Christ is to believe that politics really does matter. We better believe that this upcoming election is important. We better believe that voting for the principles in God’s Word will make a massive difference for our nation. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.” Psalm 33:12