HONEST QUESTIONS, AND OUR ALIGNMENT WITH GOD

Questions are important and integral part of any learning process worth its salt. Questions can be uncomfortable for the one who is asking. Questions when asked, can unsettle the other person. It can cause discomfort and uneasiness among people. However, unless we ask HONEST QUESTIONS with humility and love, we cannot find out the truth, nor can we find the solution, which is sought for.
– “Sometimes Christian pastors, parents and teachers are afraid of the questions young people and others might ask. Questions of another generation, or generated by secular teachers and other models can seem rebellious and threatening. Questions arising out of other cultural and worldview assumptions than those of the local Church can seem to be coming from another planet.” – Ellis Potter

Today is 22 October and the Church History gives us two very interesting incidents – one in 1746, and the second one in 1870. These two incidents from the Christian history, needs HONEST QUESTIONS to be asked, and hopefully each of you who is reading, will arrive at HONEST ANSWERS. I have my answer, now it is your turn? 

On 22 October1746 Jonathan Dickinson, a prominent Congregational and Presbyterian leader during the Great Awakening obtains a charter for the College of New Jersey to train Presbyterian pastors. Latter it will become the famed Princeton University. 

The HONEST QUESTION is this – How and why did a college that was started with an explicit purpose of training ministers for the kingdom of God, turned out to be so different and so far away from its original intentions? I wish each of us to answer it for ourselves. Personally, I feel this is one of the sad tragedies of the Church History.
– “4 Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place—unless you repent.” – Revelation 2:4-5

On 22 October 1870 James William Charles Pennington, an escaped slave who had become a Presbyterian pastor and abolitionist, dies. His autobiography “The Fugitive Blacksmith” and “The Origin and History of the Coloured People” the first book on the history of “Blacks” speak a lot about James William Charles Pennington who authored them.

The HONEST QUESTION is this – How can one be God’s child, and the disciple and the ambassador of Christ the LORD, and yet believe, practice and propagate slavery? I wish each of us to answer it for ourselves. Personally, I think practice of slavery among “Christians” is one of the darkest tragedies of the Church History. How can one believe and practice such a sinful and evil thing, and yet call myself a child of the Living God, and the disciple and ambassador of the LORD Jesus? Only the “blackest” of hearts and the “darkest” of minds can believe and balance such an impossible proposition of slavery and Christ the LORD, as morally legitimate and spiritually right thing to do.
– “26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness…” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over…every living thing that moves on the earth.” – Genesis 1:26a-28
– “26 For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” – Galatians 3:26-29

I am sure each of you have your own answers. Arriving at a conclusion is the easy part. However, do the conclusions that we have arrived at, align themselves with those of God Almighty? Would God our Creator and Redeemer agree with our answers; or, would He disagree with them? May we always align ourselves with God, and be found to be faithful and obedient disciples and ambassadors of Christ Jesus, our LORD and our Redeemer. Even so the LORD help us.