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Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI210511A
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00:28 Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
00:30 This is a program designed to give you some insights 00:33 and encouragement and information 00:36 on the importance and value of religious liberty in the US 00:39 and around the world. 00:40 I'm your host, Lincoln Steed, have been for 20 some years. 00:46 And I'd like to share some things with you 00:48 on this program. 00:51 Of course, religious liberty without religion 00:54 doesn't make much sense. 00:56 And as a Seventh-day Adventist Christian, 00:59 I'm quite convinced 01:01 that there's a spiritual basis for religious liberty. 01:04 In fact, I've often pointed out to audiences 01:07 that all of our efforts to "protect religious liberty" 01:11 are really not quite 01:14 that we are protecting it is true against the norms 01:18 of a secular state. 01:19 But as far as religious liberty goes, 01:22 it's inherent in what Christ did, 01:25 as explained in the New Testament, 01:27 in freeing all human beings 01:30 from the final penalty for sin, 01:34 and giving the ability 01:36 to become as it says, the sons of God, 01:39 and to by repentance 01:42 and following Him as His disciples did escape 01:46 the penalty of sinfulness and the degradation 01:49 that comes with earthly norms, 01:51 and live with Him forever in an eternity made for us. 01:57 And so I pointed out to those that listen to my talks, 02:01 that you have religious liberty now. 02:04 And as the Bible says, 02:06 I've said before you in the words of Jesus 02:07 an open door, which no man can shut. 02:11 That's an incredible offer, 02:15 an incredible dynamic 02:16 when you see religious liberty that way, 02:18 it's a, you know, inviolable principle, 02:22 it's there, it's given. 02:24 And whether you live in North Korea, 02:27 or the United States, or Australia, or Canada, 02:30 some other antithetical system to that, doesn't matter. 02:35 In North Korea, you may lose your life, 02:38 practicing that liberty which you have. 02:41 And in North America, 02:42 you may be encouraged by the state. 02:44 Even worse, it may pay you your church money 02:48 to practice and, of course, money is the root of all evil. 02:51 So it might subvert your faith another way. 02:54 But the fact is, you have religious liberty inherently, 02:58 it cannot be taken away. 02:59 So on a certain level, 03:01 when we talk about religious liberty, 03:03 we're proclaiming an inviolable principle. 03:07 It's a proclamation, 03:08 it's informing people of what they already have. 03:11 And when they understand what they have, 03:13 they can put it into practice, 03:15 both in a society writ large, 03:17 where it can be an accepted norm, 03:22 a legal norm in that society. 03:24 And in your community it can be something 03:26 that you communicate to people 03:28 and encourage them to share in this liberty reality. 03:33 But it's a little bit more than that 03:35 and I've come to believe that religion, 03:39 while it's intimately tied up with religious liberty, 03:42 by definition, that religion by itself 03:45 or have what we understand of religion, 03:47 the structure of religious faith, 03:50 the elements of organization 03:54 that goes into a church of necessity. 03:57 The founder of the Seventh-day Adventist Church 03:59 or co-founder, Ellen White, 04:02 made some very interesting statements on occasion 04:04 that she was not comfortable with organization, 04:08 but that it was necessary 04:09 to carry things forward in good order. 04:12 But any structure can become bureaucratic, 04:15 it can, in the case of faith, 04:19 religious faith and even a political faith 04:22 it can sort of slow things down and become so ingrown 04:27 that you can lose track of the idea 04:30 that lies behind the door. 04:32 And I really have come to believe 04:34 that on religious liberty, 04:36 if you're not careful, religion itself, 04:40 the structure of religion, 04:42 the particulars that different people 04:44 are pushing can be in some ways, 04:48 if not directly oppose then inhibiting 04:51 of the great dynamic of religious liberty itself. 04:54 And one way to come at that is a statement that I made 04:58 at in International Religious Liberty Conference once. 05:02 Admittedly, I wanted to shock them a bit, 05:04 but I had an idea behind what I said and I got up 05:08 and these were mostly people of faith. 05:10 Some people perhaps were secularists, 05:12 but believed in the civil liberty, 05:15 idea of religious liberty, 05:16 but I'm sure 99% of them 05:19 were people of one faith or another. 05:21 And I got up and I said, 05:23 "There is way too much religion in the world today, 05:28 way too much religion, and not enough spirituality." 05:33 And I believe that fervently, 05:35 religion without spirituality without as the Bible says, 05:39 charity, if I have no charity, I have nothing. 05:42 And you can substitute love for that. 05:44 But it's the dynamic 05:46 that gives life to religious faith. 05:50 It's not just, you know, a doctrinal list, 05:53 or hierarchical structure, or priesthood, 05:58 you can get that idea now. 05:59 And then even from looking at some groups like 06:01 the Roman Catholic Church, 06:03 you know, there's the pope and the cardinals, 06:05 very problematic to me once, to read the Lateran Treaty, 06:10 whereby Mussolini gave power back to that church, 06:13 and it said that the cardinals 06:15 would be treated as princes of the blood. 06:20 Sad statement, because spiritual leaders 06:24 are not to be equated with secular princes 06:28 and elected officials and so on, 06:30 you're dealing with the spiritual reality. 06:33 And so the structure doesn't define it, 06:36 the dynamic, the faith that lies beneath it does. 06:39 And the best way to express 06:41 that in a Christian context is the new birth, 06:45 a change of heart 06:46 from a secular mindset to a mind, 06:51 an inner compulsion 06:52 that's dedicated toward the principles of your faith, 06:55 and the person of your faith, Jesus Christ. 06:59 Many Christians, Protestant Christians, 07:01 particularly, are inclined to think 07:04 that it was only in the New Testament 07:07 that we would have such a concept, 07:10 but it really isn't true. 07:11 I remember years ago as a young man first noticing, 07:16 in the reading the story of the children of Israel, 07:22 who ended up with a capital of Jerusalem, of course, 07:25 but the children of Israel, 07:27 for many years were led directly by God, 07:30 it's called a theocracy. 07:32 And ironically, in the United States today, 07:35 there are many hungering and thirsting for theocracy. 07:39 But you know, it can't happen now, 07:41 God is not visibly present, 07:44 He lives within the heart, 07:46 which again brings us back to the new birth experience. 07:49 And we can't well judge the heart of other people. 07:53 So if you try to establish a theocracy, 07:55 and even a benign place like the United States, 07:59 what you're quickly going to have 08:01 is some self-anointed spiritual leaders 08:05 that are forcing their view 08:06 of what religious practices on other people, 08:09 so we reject the theocracy. 08:11 But the truth theocracy, in the Old Testament, 08:14 had God directly speaking with Moses initially, 08:20 it had the Shekinah Glory, 08:23 the visible presence of God, 08:27 dwelling out front of the camp, 08:30 and then hovering over the sanctuary. 08:33 I mean, there was a link, 08:35 a visible practical link 08:38 between God's presence and His will 08:40 and the actions of those people. 08:44 At the end of that period, 08:45 when people started to look around them 08:49 and see the false gods and the false systems, 08:51 and in particular, 08:53 they see their neighbors ruled by kings 08:56 and political leaders of one type or another, 08:58 they started to hunger after having a king. 09:04 And it's a rather sad story 09:06 as it's told in the Old Testament, 09:08 where the people went to the prophet. 09:10 And again, in the theocratic model 09:13 back then God was speaking very directly 09:15 to a number of prophets. 09:17 And one at the time was Samuel. 09:21 Remember, Samuel as a young boy 09:23 heard the voice of God calling to him, 09:25 "Samuel, where are you? 09:27 "And he said, "Here am I." 09:29 And He led Samuel through his long life. 09:32 And so the people went to Samuel 09:34 and they said we want a king, like the rest of the nations. 09:38 And I sometimes think facetiously, 09:40 that even in the United States, 09:42 there is royal envy. 09:45 And many people still hark back to the Kennedy era as Camelot, 09:49 the time of kings. 09:51 But we don't have a king in a democratic system, 09:54 but people sort of hunger for this authority figure. 09:59 And I didn't intend to say this, but as an aside, 10:03 in the Western world and in England, 10:06 getting rid of the kings, 10:08 they had to deal with the idea that the king felt 10:10 that he was authorized by God, 10:12 it was called the Divine Right of Kings. 10:16 Didn't really exist in England or in France, 10:19 or anywhere in Europe, 10:21 and only briefly existed in God's people 10:25 after the period of God's rule. 10:29 But God gave into them through Samuel 10:31 and chose a king for them. 10:35 Saul, a goodly young man, as Samuel said to him, 10:38 you were a goodly young man, 10:40 head and shoulders above the others, 10:42 he had the presence that you would expect 10:45 of a dominant king. 10:47 And he was selected first by God. 10:50 But then, interestingly enough, 10:51 God allowed the people to draw lots 10:54 and have a selection process and in the end, 10:57 they chose the one God wanted, Saul. 11:01 And it's very interesting. 11:03 In the Old Testament, it says, 11:05 specifically there that God gave Saul a new heart. 11:11 And he was counted as one of the prophets. 11:14 He went around prophesying which could mean, 11:17 nowadays we think, 11:18 you know, telling deep things under direct inspiration, 11:21 but it meant then speaking spiritually, 11:24 and preaching and holding forth on spiritual things. 11:27 So he was marked as a person of deep religiosity, 11:31 with a new heart. 11:33 And we tend to think of that 11:35 as the model in the New Testament, 11:38 but it clearly 11:40 was what God always was always wanted. 11:44 In the New Testament, 11:45 there's no better illustration 11:47 of the importance of this new heart 11:50 than the story in the Gospel of John, 11:54 where a ruler in Israel, not a king, 11:57 but one of the ruling Sanhedrin 12:00 came in the evening to talk with Jesus. 12:02 And you know, I've heard many preachers 12:04 and read many articles commenting on this, 12:07 and they tend to portray Nicodemus, 12:10 as rather fainthearted, 12:12 not game to come talk to him in the day. 12:15 That may be so the later story of him 12:20 doesn't bear that out, in my view, 12:22 because he very publicly went to the authorities 12:27 and asked for the body of Jesus. 12:28 He very publicly stood up for Jesus in the Sanhedrin. 12:32 I tend to think 12:33 it was because the business of the day was over. 12:37 He was a ruler in Israel, 12:38 as Jesus called him a ruler in Israel. 12:40 He was ruling during the day, 12:42 he was part of official business. 12:45 And without air conditioning, 12:47 and a harsh climate that still to this day 12:52 is when people would socialize in the cool of the evening, 12:55 in fact that even hits me that in Genesis it says 12:59 God came walking in the garden in the cool of the evening. 13:02 It's a natural time to come talk 13:05 together and Nicodemus sought out Jesus 13:08 in that Mediterranean coolness. 13:11 And he says, "You know, Teacher, 13:13 we know You're from God." 13:15 Well, he was being a bit cute. 13:17 Jesus called him on it. 13:18 And He says, "Unless you're born again, 13:21 you cannot see the kingdom of God." 13:25 And again, I've heard many people preach on that, 13:27 and I'm sure many of their lessons were correct, 13:30 but I'm not sure they were all correctly explicating 13:35 the meaning that Jesus gave in the conversation. 13:38 I believe what Jesus was saying, 13:41 and it's borne out by what we know 13:44 of a Christian commitment, 13:46 unless you are born again, 13:48 unless you have had a deep change of heart. 13:52 And Jesus characterized that as mentally being reborn, 13:56 throwing off your old life 13:58 and thinking on spiritual things. 14:00 Unless you have had that experience, 14:03 you cannot comprehend, 14:06 understand or identify correctly 14:09 with what the kingdom of God is. 14:12 We'll take a bit of a break now 14:14 and I'll continue this exposition 14:16 after the break. 14:18 Stay with us. |
Revised 2021-11-04