Ephesians 5:15-17 Daniel 6:1-10

Ephesians 5:15-17 Daniel 6:1-10 TITLE VIDEO RELIGION & POLITICS DON'T MIX My attention was drawn to this story when I first came to the church seven years ago. What is rather curious about the Anthony Allington story is that in the minutes, most individuals hardly got a mention, but this man got a few column inches. Most curious was the reference to Allington not seeing anything wrong in singing a song about Nelson whilst drunk at a pub. After all, soldiers often sang rude songs about the Navy it's a military tradition. Why did this offend the Baptists so? It's as I said in the video, Baptists were tolerated but they were disenfranchised, had limited education and employment opportunities and richer dissenters and all tenant farmers had to pay the tithe to the Parish Church even though they disagreed with the establishment. They were not popular by the early 1800s, even though nonconformity was growing fast, they put up with their disadvantage, and kept their heads down, with the exception of a few activists. They just prayed that they may live their lives in all godliness and honesty. But was that right? I was brought up in a very conservative evangelical church. They believed in separation from the world. Their only engagement was through direct evangelism, otherwise the lives of church people seems to have been compartmentalised into church and world. It was common to find Christians thinking this way in the 60s and 70s. Church and world, them and us. But that wasn't always the case. There's an old pub saying you can talk about anything except religion and politics, as these are the tow subjects that lead to the most bitter arguments except perhaps football. Can religion and politics mix? It's another one of those big questions. It's a similar subject to war, which I preached on a couple of weeks ago. People don't explore Christianity because they see religion as causing repressive and evil regimes. Well, does it? BANKSY PICTURE Let's have a look at some repressive regimes. ISLAM Here's some really nice characters. Some of the most evil and murderous regimes currently on the planet are Islamist. There is no questioning the fact that the Middle East and many parts of western Asia are the most dangerous places to live, particularly if you are a Muslim of the wrong sort. We hear about Christian persecution, but it's far more dangerous to be the wrong sort of Muslim. CHRISTIANITY Not that Christian regimes have fared much better through the ages. There have been many bloodthirsty episodes in the name of Christ, and much persecution, Christian on Christian over the years. But don't let your atheist questioners get way with smugness over the years. ATHEISTS The most murderous regimes of the 20 th Century were all atheism based and in a short period of years caused the deaths of as many people as centuries worth of religion based repression. A humanist would throw his hands up at this point and tell you that this isn't what humanism is about. Touché

As I said when we looked at war, what murderous regimes have in common to give them legitimacy is some kind of philosophy which allows them to suspend conscience and do horrendous things to those they don't agree with for the most base reasons. So in the case of Christianity, down the years the Bible has been bent to justify horrific executions, torture, rape, ethnic cleansing, robbery, massacre and the rest. None of it can be justified in the words of Jesus who commanded the complete opposite. Worse, rather than Christians being perpetrators of prejudice, murder, violence, theft, destruction of property, abuse and the rest, in the world today they are invariably the victims BURNING CHURCH When Christians become the victims of violence what do they do. Take revenge? In the past many of those who had weapons available did just that. But we know that isn't the command of Jesus who said love your enemies and bless those who curse you. SO HOW DO WE RESPOND to violence and discrimination? This is a live issue right now in some parts of the world. What do we do? PERSEVERE In many parts, Christians have no choice but persevere because they don't have the means to do anything else. In Iraq, Christians had the choice of either running or dying when IS moved in. What would you have done? But even in countries where discrimination is petty, Christians often feel the need to just put up and shut up. Such was the case of our predecessors here. They just accepted a status quo. They may have thought that was the lot that God had ordained for them. So when unwarranted accusations were made against them, they were forces on to the back foot and affirm Nelson to mark them as patriotic citizens. ACT Should loving our enemies and blessing those who cure us mean that we just roll over and take persecution or should we be doing something proactive. In every land there are ways of bringing about political and social change, why not use them? We are fortunate that we live in a land where we have very good access to the political process better than most of us think? If something is not right, then the means exist to do something about it. Sadly Christians are often like my old church which didn't see engagement in community and nation as a part of their witness. But the Good News compels us to show people there is another way a better way. Therefore Christians in repressive countries may not have too many options to speak out and change their lot, but we do have the power to influence out politicians to influence theirs. We can and should act and I'll come back to this in a moment. Coming back to Anthony Allington incidents like his were actually repeated down the land. By the end of the Napoleonic Wars, people wanted a better country (that often happens after big wars), one of enfranchisement, and end to political corruption, electoral reform, the end of the tithe, access to education. Dissenters, realising that their churches were growing rapidly in growing industrial communities stopped persevering and started acting political and social change in the nineteenth century as well as values of freedom of religion, politics and speech as well as social reforms had a nonconformist flavour. Dissenters were mostly identified with the Liberal Party and liberalism. ENGAGING So, is engaging with the world a Biblical principle? We are God's people, a holy nation, heavenly citizens. Should we really be a part of the worldly system? As I said earlier, separation was a common theme a few decades ago.

OT But look in the Old Testament, and you find men of God in the highest echelons of government in pagan empires Joseph in Egypt and Daniel, first in Babylon and then in Persia. As we saw in our reading this morning, Daniel had enormous authority. What did he bring to his position as a man of God integrity, wisdom, trustworthiness. He was so impressive that his opponents could only think of persecuting his religion as a way of undermining him it didn't work! Being a part of our world, brings our values to our workplaces to our communities and even our politics. As the early video said, we need Christians in every walk of live even in our political system because we not only bring good news, we are good news if we do God's will. NT It's no surprise to find that Jesus actually never said we should by force or political endeavour bring the Kingdom of God into the world lots have tried that down the century the Roman system, Christian kings and presidents, even Anabaptists and they were quite awful. But in the NT we saw people from every walk of life becoming Christians. Apart from people involved in idolatry, most people were not encouraged to change their occupation, but to bring their faith to it. Read Paul's letters and people of all backgrounds are addressed rich and poor, male and female, Jews and Gentiles God is no respecter of persons. Similarly, rather than overthrow the Government, they were told to respect and pray for their leaders something quite hard when the leader of the land is out to get you! Verses? So Biblical precedent is that we don't become a separate nation when we become Christians. The Kingdom of God is about hearts and minds, not about territory, but as we know Christianity, or versions of it have become part of the fabric of politics in many countries including our own. There is still the establishment, with it's established Church of England. HISTORY The reason I gave you the Napoleonic Wars as an example, apart form the local relevance of the story and this year being the bicentenary of Waterloo is that it marked a turning point for the engagement of Christians with the political system, apart from the established church. It's a long story. The strongest advocates of engagement were those trying to apply Biblical principles similar to those I've just mentioned, and those were the Evangelicals. They were drawn from both the Church of England and amongst dissenting denomination. They even founded an organisation to front their activities which was a lobbying organisation for existing political parties rather than being one itself. It was called the EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE and it still exists today we are affiliated to it! As I said earlier, about 30 years ago, our engagement with the political system and the community generally was at its lowest ebb. Part of that was because many of the good things church had done in the past had been taken over by the state, which we actually advocated, so we were left with spiritual stuff. But in the last 20 years we have seen the rise again of engagement of Christians and church with community to the point where Government accepts that without the work of faith groups (mostly church) a considerable amount of necessary community work couldn't be done. We've found ourselves as part of that movement as we have developed Parish Nursing. What are the rules of engagement for engaging with the community and with the political system so that we can be good news to people. They were in the verses I read in the video. Here they are in the GNB So be careful how you live. Don't live like ignorant people, but like wise people. 16 Make good use of every opportunity you have, because these are evil days. 17 Don't be fools, then, but try

to find out what the Lord wants you to do. (TEV) The passage tells us three things BE WISE So be careful how you live. Don't live like ignorant people, but like wise people.... Don't be fools, then, but try to find out what the Lord wants you to do. You can't separate being a Christian from anything else you do as a human being. True wisdom is when we seek and do God's will. Like you I've read and heard a load of nonsense in the past few weeks, mostly from national political leaders. Our business is truth. Whatever you get yourself involved with from a political group to club you are a part of, be a Daniel and be known for your integrity it's a disappearing ingredient in our society as far as I can see. BE CIRCUMSPECT Make good use of every opportunity you have, because these are evil days. Any entrepreneur will tell you that success is about seeing and taking opportunities. We live in a free society that has many opportunities to worship and share our faith. How long will this continue to last. Make the most of every opportunity God gives to be salt and light in this community. BE PRAYERFUL Don't be fools, then, but try to find out what the Lord wants you to do. I bet some of you have been waiting for this one. If you want to be a world changer pray. Pray a lot, pray specifically, pray in faith it really does work. Pray for our nation, pray for our community, pray for the persecuted church, pray for change in repressive regimes we do all of those in our prayer meetings. How much praying do you do. One of the biggest discoveries in the last 20 years or so is that a commitment to prayer by churches and individuals really does transform communities and nations. I haven t got time to explore that further today pray, pray, pray. If you can do nothing else, pray. And that is the essence of today's sermon. Religion and politics do mix and we can be community changers, nation changers and world changers. You have just heard what the key is prayer. But let's be really practical. What can we do? VOTE People struggled to be enfranchised have the vote. Are you planning to vote on election day. You should. You may say, but this is a safe Tory seat and I don't vote Conservative. Maybe, so but we are also voting for Suffolk Coastal as well. Many of the candidates we know personally. Votes for whatever party really do make a difference here. If you keep up with local news you ll know that our present councillors have been involved in some controversial things over the past few years. Vote, because it can make a difference. Think, pray, vote. ENGAGE There are so many opportunities to be involved in how our community is run councillors, school governors, part of clubs and organisations, charitable work (PN). Let's be salt an light in our community. Too often the only friends Christians have are other Christians and their only involvement is church. But what about all the people who have views that we disagree with? Yes they do exist but how will they ever know a better way unless you are good news to them and speak good news. PRAY Let's pray for our community, nation and world. Let's be specific. As I said earlier, if you can do nothing else, pray it really does make a difference. Let me encourage you with the words we started with:

Micah 6 With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? 7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? 8 He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? How do we please God? Do we do lots of religious stuff? No. Let's go backwards. Walk humbly with our God? Yes, got that. Love kindness? Yes, got that too we have so many opportunities to be kind. Love justice? To that we've got to be engaged with our community. Church gives us some opportunities, but let's see what else God has for us out there which will be an opportunity to be good news to others. Preached by Mark Reid MRBC Felixstowe 26/4/15 (c) Mark Reid 2015