Christianity is a Contact Sport

Robert Oscar Lopez is right — Christianity is a contact sport. Here is Lopez writing at The Stream:

We need only to reread the New Testament to see, in stunningly resonant imagery, what awaits a follower of Jesus in a world full of unbelievers. As many of my scholarly friends debate Rod Dreher’s Benedict Option, I offer my own viewpoint, which might or might not conflict with a Benedict Option, depending on how one parses it.

My view comes from the advice of Christ and His disciples: Christianity is a contact sport. It is, in fact, war. So it has been, from the beginning — a war waged in the spiritual realm.

A host of recent books and articles have lamented that American Christianity is at a nadir and may vanish entirely within two or three generations. Fortunately, the Bible’s inerrancy and sufficiency guarantee that we will not lack for advice. Ecclesiastes counsels perspective, while Psalms and Proverbs offer us plentiful reasons not to view the depravity of the 2010s as unique. While Jesus still wore a mortal body, He said, “This generation is an evil generation” (Luke 11:29).

Wartime presents many options, but all are painful. The lack of a painless choice does not mean that we are being forced into one set course of action. God gives us free will. We have had it since the Garden of Eden.

Wartime Options

What are Christians to do when we face so much cultural animosity? The temptation in such times is to seek comfort in a setting where it seems that enemies cannot harm us. But that defies Jesus’s own commands: “Go your way; behold, I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and salute no one on the road.” (Luke 10: 3-5).

Read more: The Stream