Politics
Thursday June 3, 2004
"Christianity and the Cultural Mandate:" Vote Wisely Warns US Evangelical Leader Colson
"If Christians do not seize the moment and act on the cultural commission, there soon will be no culture left to save"
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RESTON, Virginia, June 3, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Thursday's BreakPoint commentary, by Charles Colson, is appropriate for this season, as Canadians and Americans both prepare for federal elections.
Colson describes an address he made to evangelical Christians, on the need to renew culture. The Christians seemed perplexed, that he would suggest the renewal of culture as an important mandate, versus, for example, "winning souls for Christ." Christians are "agents of [God's] common grace," he argues. "We're to sustain and renew His creation, defend the created institutions of family and society, and critique false worldviews."
Colson described the mandate to renew culture as one directly from God: "This is a matter on which the Scriptures are very clear," he explained. "In Genesis, we're told that for five days, God created the universe. On the sixth day, He created human beings -- and ordered them to pick up where He left off. They were to reflect His image and have dominion -- but from then on, the development of the creation would be primarily social and cultural: It would be the work humans performed as they obeyed God's command to fill and subdue the earth."
Colson described how "The same command binds Christians today." He said that although sin separated humanity from God, it did not "obliterate" it. We still farm, build, create art, elect politicians, and have families. "And when we are redeemed, we are both freed from sin and restored to do what God designed us to do: create culture," he said.
Colson entreats Christians that, "We must not stand by while our culture is hijacked by alien philosophies hostile to the created order." He describes the issues we face today, such as homosexual "marriage," cloning, abortion, terrorism. "If Christians do not seize the moment and act on the cultural commission, there soon will be no culture left to save."
"But when we do our duty, we can change the world," Colson contends. The duty Colson refers to includes such things as "voting wisely, contending for truth, and helping redeem our neighbors and our neighborhood."
Read Charles Colson's BreakPoint Commentary at:
http://www.pfm.org/BPTemplate.cfm
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