Everything is Secondary

A five-part series about priorities

This is a five-session devotion considering the pre-eminence of Jesus over everything else in this mortal life. Ideology has taken over faith in many churches and among many people who call themselves Christian.

I don’t think anyone will argue that the world is bitterly divided in 2024. Wars, both heavily reported and ignored, cover every continent. Governments may start wars, but the people pay the price in lives lost or destroyed, vocations disrupted, homes bombed into oblivion, and horrors too gruesome to fully understand. Philosophies pit neighbor against neighbor. Slavery and human trafficking are just as real as decades ago, while social networks argue over trans issues, abortion, and politics. All nuance is erased in the us vs. them mentality that pretends the world is black or white, rather than a million shades of gray.

Christianity, particularly evangelicalism lately, is not immune to hard-line divisions that do anything but glorify God. I engaged in a short dialogue with an apologist who said that Christians should treat their gay children as apostates, but that the treatment didn’t mean burning down the bridges of relationships. I reminded him that Paul wrote to the Church writ large, not to families and friends. Because I know the gay community pretty well (years in theater and a gay child), I informed the gentleman that treating a gay child as an apostate absolutely burns bridges, often irreparably. Paul wrote to Timothy, “The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1:5). That doesn’t happen if a person disfellowships someone for a sin more egregious than their own. Sin is sin is sin. No sin is less sinful than any other. Sexual sins are no worse than sins of speech (e.g. gossip, lies, or judgment), sins of the hand (e.g. murder or theft), or sins of the mind (e.g. lust, covetousness, or pride). Looking at the current state of evangelicalism, there’s plenty of sin to go around, and holding a hard line on one particular sin is antithetical to mercy. It is not defaulting to grace.

This series is not going to be a diatribe about any particular sin. As far as Scripture is understood, all sin leads to death and only the mercy of God through the blood of Jesus can make the sinner right with God (Romans 3, Psalm 14). What I plan to consider are ways in which Christians have substituted their first love for something more culturally relevant (Revelation 2:1-7). In the next four weeks, I will explore themes of ethnic allegiance, political affiliation, professional ambition, and personal acceptance through social influence. They are touchy topics, I know, so pray I listen to the Holy Spirit as I write and think on these things. I have opinions, but my opinions are no substitute for Biblical pondering through difficult ideas. I also welcome conversation in comments or notes as I seek to both learn and teach through the reminder that everything must be secondary to Jesus.

Resources

Jason Cook (2024, January 28). “Belong: Go” [Sermon] Belong: Membership at Fellowship Series, Fellowship Bible Church, Roswell, GA. https://fellowshiproswell.org/sermon7/belong-go/

Exodus 19:4-6; 1 Peter 2:9-10; 2 Timothy 4;2 Corinthians 5:20; 2 Corinthians 2:15-16; 2 Corinthians 1:12