"the higher law"

In my few encounters with people who do not profess the Christian faith, I have encountered an attitude that I find rather alarming. They assume that I, professing to be a Christian, want to tell them about all the things that they are doing wrong--basically, they expect me to spend all my time condemning their immorality. I could be wrong, but I highly doubt it, when I believe that this tendency of condemnation is the first characteristic of Christianity that secular individuals think of. If I classify myself as a Christian, people assume that I want to impose my morality on them.

With the present 'immorality' of the United States, many conservative Christians are freaking out because they know they could possibly loose their rights to upholding their own values. So the startling reaction would be to marshal up as many conservative Christians as possible and mold them into politicians so that the Republicans can out number the Democrats and we can succeed in keeping our values. There have been many who have proclaimed that the way to a more moral nation is to change a lot of legislation. Basically, make all these immoral behaviors illegal--and to enforce those laws. Forget mercy and enforce morality. I am convinced this is one of the worst things any group of Christians could do. By imposing morality without a foundation, without a source of desire, will only create more immorality--only of a different kind.

The very point of morality is not to keep a man made law, it is not to achieve the religious right's standards of respectability, it is solely to obey God out of love. God forces no one to obey Him, if we obey Him it is because we believe that the reward is worth the cost--and so how can we as God's children seek to make other people who have no relationship with God follow our rules?

Nation wide morality cannot be imposed on unwilling individuals because of the very nature of morality. It is not a behavior that can be donned, it is something that sprouts from loving God. So how can we attempt to force morality into someone who does not share the foundation from which morality comes from? Also, by imposing these rules of respectable conduct, are we not converting them to the different kind of immorality called hypocrisy--as Jesus described, washing the outside and neglecting to remember the inside-- if they do not possess the foundation?

In order to succeed in a moral society, everyone in that society would have to be of one faith, mind, and purpose. Basically, a utopia. However, because we cannot force anyone to accept Jesus as Christ or even the existence of God no matter how convincing our arguments may be to try to do so would be yet another imposement that would result to turmoil and immorality. Good intentions that backfire terribly.

Because we have no right to force morality or belief unto an unbelieving group, condemning their actions with expressions of hatred are not beneficial to the furthering of God's children. In his book What's So Amazing About Grace? Philip Yancey recalls an account of a friend that illustrates this point clearly:

"A prostitute came to me in wretched straits, homeless, sick, unable to buy food for her two-year-old daughter. Through sobs and tears, she told me she had been renting out her daughter--two years old!--to men interested in kinky sex. She made more renting out her daughter for an hour than she could earn on her own in a night. She had to do it, she said, to support her own drug habit. . . . I asked if she had ever thought of going to a church for help. I will never forget the look of pure, naive shock that crossed her face, "Church!" she cried. "Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They'd just make me feel worse."

He then goes on to tell the account of a good friend who came out of the closet and then participated in gay rights marches in Washington D.C. Yancey himself went along for the sole purpose of observance; he witnessed the gay rights marchers and also the church groups protesting the march. The gay rights activists did their thing, while the protesters waved hateful signs and called the marchers crude names. Is it any wonder that hate is the face of American Christianity?

The apostle Paul wrote the passage of 1 Corinthians 13 to insist that any righteous action done without love is worthless, Bono sang that love is "the higher law", Jon Foreman wrote that love was "the movement", "the revolution," and "redemption", Kevin Max proclaimed that "if people would love more of us would be alive". How can we miss the point?

Is it because we are uncomfortable around people who tell us in their defense that they have been attracted to their own sex since they can remember? Is it because it is so much easier to condemn and exhibit actions of hatred than to get our hands and knees dirty pleading that God will give us the right thing to say? Perhaps it is easier to love the ones that look, act, talk, and dress just like us, and yet Jesus said that even the sinners do that and we are to be different.

We must realize that exhibiting true unconditional love does not mean we agree with their beliefs and behavior.