When you study the Holy Scriptures, how do you do it? First, you research. You compare scripture to scripture, consult a concordance, dictionary, and a Bible commentary. Then you reason from the biblical truths and identify spiritual principles. Finally, you relate these truths and spiritual principles to your own life. Many people record their Bible studies. To help you develop a biblical worldview you will use the research, reason, relate, and record teaching method, popularly called the Principle Approach. To learn more about the Principle Approach for teaching and learning, visit the Foundation for American Christian Education.
Select and print the lesson below. There are 10 lessons, each one containing scriptures and words to define using the online Noah Webster 1828 Dictionary. The study questions are designed to help you develop a biblical worldview and the principles of godly leadership. The training is based on the book, The Kingdom Leadership Institute Manual: Raising Up Leaders a Time Like This Demands, by Rev. Rusty Lee Thomas.
Lesson 3: Christianity in Conflict
The early church was accustomed to risk and danger. They were familiar with conflict. There were heresies from within and great persecutions from without. These early Christians were “birthed in battle.”
The idea of the church militant, of a conquering battling church advancing the cause of Christ, has become a faded memory for most American Christians. Our foreign brothers and sisters often experience this type of baptism, but not us. As a result, we have grown complacent. Too often we compromise, concede, cater, and coddle instead of confront. In America’s present backslidden condition it would be prudent to remember the necessity of conflict.
German church historian, Dr. Augustus Neander (1789-1850), in Memorials of a Christian Life, wrote:
As the whole of the life of the Christian, from the beginning to the end, is a conflict with the world and the powers of darkness, a conflict within and without, the kingdom of God in this world must appear as militant, and must make its way by conflict; so that often, in Holy Writ, the calling of the Christian is compared to that of the military life, and the Christian is represented as the soldier of his LORD.
This image was very clear and familiar to the first Christians. Though Christians, in later ages, may have been led to forget the nature of their calling as one of conflict, amidst external tranquility and prosperity, yet in primitive times their entire outward condition served to remind them of the spiritual warfare; for the church found itself on all sides in conflict with the heathen world, and the public profession made by Christians compelled them to take a share in this conflict.
Christians rejoiced to consider themselves as the soldiers of God and Christ (milites Dei et Christi), against the hostile powers of darkness, against everything which appeared to them as belonging to the kingdom of Satan, against the service of sin and of false gods.
Look up the definition of the word “conflict” in the online Noah Webster’s 1828 American Dictionary. Write out the four definitions below.
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Read Jeremiah 9:3-5, Micah 7:6, Matthew 10:32-38, Luke 12:51. As the kingdom of heaven advances, does truth create conflict or peace?
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Continue your word study. Look the definition for "violence." Record definitions one and two below.
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Read Matthew 11:12 and Luke 16:16. Record the words of Jesus below.
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Matthew Henry was a Bible scholar and preacher from England. Written in 1706, his epic commentary on the Bible is perhaps the best and most widely used. Visit http://www.biblestudytools.com/commentaries/matthew-henry-complete/ and compare Matthew Henry’s classic commentary to the words of our Lord. An abridged version follows.
This violence denotes a strength, and vigour, and earnestness of desire and endeavour… It shows us also, what fervency and zeal are required of all those who design to make heaven of their religion. Note, They who would enter into the kingdom of heaven must strive to enter; that kingdom suffers a holy violence; self must be denied, the bent and bias, the frame and temper, of the mind must be altered; there are hard sufferings to be undergone, a force to be put upon the corrupt nature; we must run, and wrestle, and fight, and be in an agony, and all little enough to win such a prize, and to get over such opposition from without and from within. The violent take it by force.
Reason from the scriptures and your word study. Definition number two of “violence” speaks of “moral violence.” Matthew Henry refers to a “holy violence.” In Matthew 11:12 is Jesus speaking of physical violence or spiritual and "moral violence?"
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Reason from the scriptures and the lessons of history. Is conflict a necessary component of biblical Christianity?
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Finally, relate what you have learned to your own life. Are you willing to do violence to your corrupt nature? Are you advancing the kingdom of God and conflicting with the forces of darkness in the culture? Are you engaged in the spiritual battle for the souls of men? For America's Christian heritage? Is your Christianity passive or active? What cultural battles are you involved in? In what areas can you become involved?
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Any place the enemy savages the souls of men and our country, there the good soldier of Jesus Christ proves his loyalty to Christ. There are demonic strongholds in our land that are invoking the wrath of God upon our heads. Just like the notable Christians from history, we must engage the enemy, culture, and our communities with the truth of God's Word. We must go to the gates of hell (abortion clinics, pornography establishments, homosexual events, and the stately halls of civil government) and wage spiritual "war" with the Word of God.
Our continual silence and inaction enables the powers of darkness to wreck havoc in our beleaguered land. Christian patriots are needed to stand in the gap and make up the hedge of protection once again. We cannot accomplish this within the four walls of our church. Our call is to be "salt and light;" soldiers of Christ "against the hostile powers of darkness" in our culture, in our land, and in our self.
The Great Reformer, Martin Luther (1483-1546), stated it best:
If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battlefield besides, is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point.
For a fuller treatise of the subject, read The Kingdom Leadership Institute Manual: Raising Up Leaders a Time Like This Demands.
Proceed to lesson 4.
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