Time for the ‘Benedict Option’?
This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says to all the exiles I deported from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and live in them. Plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters. Take wives for your sons and give your daughters to men in marriage so that they may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there; do not decrease. Seek the welfare of the city I have deported you to. Pray to the Lord on its behalf, for when it has prosperity, you will prosper.” (Jeremiah 29:4-7)
[Jim]This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says to all the exiles I deported from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and live in them. Plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters. Take wives for your sons and give your daughters to men in marriage so that they may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there; do not decrease. Seek the welfare of the city I have deported you to. Pray to the Lord on its behalf, for when it has prosperity, you will prosper.” (Jeremiah 29:4-7)
And what would the early church do? I Peter 2 and 3 (using the same exile language as Jeremiah)
The world around may legitimate whatever sleaze, self-indulgence and self-deception it may choose. It may decide that black is white, that up is down, and that north is south, for all I care. The needs of my congregation—of all congregations—will remain, at the deepest level, the same that they have always been, as will the answers which Christianity provides. The tomb is still empty. And my ministry will continue to be made up of the same elements as that of my of spiritual forefathers: Word, sacraments, prayer.
Because we live in a time of memorable names and terms, I wondered about whether to call this “The Calvary Option,” after the priest in the film Calvary who, knowing that a congregant is going to try to kill him within a week, just carries on faithfully fulfilling his pastoral call as usual. Despised and mocked by all around him, he plods towards death, faithfully doing that to which he has been called.
……that might be helpful is “ora et labora”, “pray and work”, something that all too often gets neglected by Christians these days. But that said, agreed that with rare exceptions, Scripture calls us to live among men, not in the desert.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
When we are confronting evil, that is no time for soft words. Rather than turning away wrath, soft words provoke the response of ridicule. The prophets were not mealy-mouthed in the presence of evil, apostasy, and blasphemy. They railed against them all. They did not hold back criticism and rebuke. John the Baptist was not soft on evil, and neither was Jesus soft on hypocrisy. When the American government has opted for financing the killing of innocents and now the selling of aborted fetus parts for a profit, and rejected the divine definition of marriage, we have moved beyond the mercy of God and entered into the realm of His curse. I am thoroughly ashamed to be called an American in light of the wholesale turning of this nation to hedonism. And I feel sure many of the fallen heroes we honor would join in decrying the the direction of this country. God, help us and save us, not bless us!
Discussion