Living in the City of Man, Part 1

There's a growing pessimism. There's a growing movement of isolation among believers. I'm even hearing Christian leaders with followings of millions of people suggesting maybe it's time we just kind of abandoned culture altogether and it's all ahead for the hills. Does it ever occur to you the reason Jesus Christ did not take us immediately to heaven upon our salvation was because he wants us to live in the city of man, demonstrating the reality of the city of God? God calls his people to live distinct lifestyles, to live in such a way that we reflect Jesus Christ. Our lives are to demonstrate the fact that the gospel has changed us. Quite simply, Christians are to live differently from how the world lives. But we're not called to isolate ourselves from the people in our culture. We live as fellow citizens in our society.

We just live by a set of biblical principles. Today, Stephen Davey begins a series called Remarkable Christianity. He'll be exploring what it means to live as Christians in the midst of our culture. Today's lesson is called Living in the City of Man. That earth is home to two very real worlds and the Christian happens to be in contact with both of them. Augustine referred to them as the city of man and the city of God. The city of man is that physical world around us and we engage in it with our senses of sight and touch and taste and hearing and smelling. But at the same time, the Christian is very aware of another world just as real, an invisible world.

In fact, it is eternal. It's a world that we connect to not by means of senses, but by means of the Spirit. The designer and creator of both worlds is the same person, our creator God.

Now, most of the world would agree with everything I said until I got to that last point. They believe in something out there beyond the city of man. Just don't talk about a designer or sovereign creator. William Irwin Thompson likened our unbelieving world to flies crawling across the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, blissfully unaware of the magnificent shapes and forms and colors and design that surround them.

So true, oblivious to spiritual reality, they even might deny it exists. Certainly the sweep of evolution has gained the majority opinion in our culture that there is no designer in the creative painting that surrounds us all. Some even take the time to study the complexity of the patterns of the painting, but then they deny that it ever had a painter, that someone outside the world of flies and insects actually designed and painted this incredibly beautiful mural.

Educators are busy washing off the walls of history and science any reference to him. The politically incorrect crime of our generation is to state with any sense of certainty that he's even around, much less responsible for the painting. And if you really want to shake things up, mention that he not only painted it, but he owns the ceiling. He owns the chapel. He owns the ground upon which it stands. He owns the earth. And by the way, it's his universe, too.

We have watched over the last several decades, especially concerted efforts of our world to remove the signature of the painter from the mural of his universe. I just read this past week of one more case, this one brought before the U.S. Court of Appeals. Just a couple of months ago, the court ruled against a little town in New York for opening its town council meetings with prayer. And you automatically think by this time, well, certainly there's no surprise there.

We knew they had that coming. But what makes this ruling so strange is that the town had already tried to be politically correct by inviting a variety of religious leaders to open in prayer. They even brought an atheist in. They even invited a Wiccan priestess to pray. But the court wrote in its conclusion, and I quote, the town's prayer practice has the effect of affiliating the town with Christianity, end quote. Even the concept of prayer is just too Christian.

So we got to abandon it. If I were God, somewhere along the line here, I'd start putting stuff in the clouds, you know, like, hello, excuse me, something, you know, rained pink this morning or send Skittles cascading down so that people have to admit there's somebody up there. God evidently isn't intimidated by unbelief.

He evidently isn't intimidated by being ignored or disrespected. But we are. In fact, we can become frustrated and resentful and bitter as we watch his signature being erased. One author wrote, in reaction to the rapid and pervasive escalation of immorality and ungodliness in our generation, believers have become both saddened and angered. Hostility among some of them has even intensified still further when they learned that their taxes are being used to fund ideas and practices that only a generation ago was condemned even by most secularists. They fear now for their children and even more for their grandchildren because of the kind of world into which they will be born, educated and have to live in. And I would agree there is a growing antagonism in the Christian community to government. There's a growing pessimism, if not frustration toward institutional authority. There's a growing movement of isolation among believers.

I'm even hearing Christian leaders with followings of millions of people suggesting maybe it's time we stop paying taxes. Maybe it's time we just kind of abandon culture altogether and it's all ahead for the hills. Sort of the attitude of the city of man is going to hell and so I'm just going to give all of my attention and money and interest and it's all going to go to the city of God. Does it ever occur to you the reason Jesus Christ did not take us immediately to heaven upon our salvation was because he wants us to live in the city of man, demonstrating the reality of the city of God.

And the greater the difference between those two cities the more remarkable our demonstration becomes. By the way, the world that you might be growing to resent, that you might become angry with, is not your enemy. It is your mission field. And it's not really doing anything we shouldn't be expecting it to do. So what do we do about it? How do we live in the city of man while we wait for the city of God? Well the believers living in the first century certainly asked the question and they would be asking the question about this time in the letter of Paul to Titus, okay what do we do now? I mean you've told us how to act in church in Titus chapter one. You've told us how to relate to each other in the church primarily in chapter two.

Is that it? Is that the end of our obligations and our responsibilities while living temporarily in the city of man? Well hang on to your hat because Paul is about to inform them that Christianity does not remove the Christian from society. It makes the Christian a productive member of society. Christianity does not call for you to become an isolated citizen. It makes you a better citizen and for the right reasons. You see Christianity does not relieve any of us of civic duty. It actually enforces it.

Are you serious? Well I want you to get ready dear flock. In fact I've simply entitled this series through chapter three, Remarkable Christianity, because we're going to discover that Christianity should make every one of us remarkable standouts in the city of man as we ultimately represent the city of God. And the first area where Christians show remarkable distinction is in their attitude toward those in authority. Their attitude and their response to rulers. Would you notice now verse one of Titus chapter three, Titus he's saying effectively, remind them to be subject to rulers, to authorities, to be obedient.

Now the opening verb is in the present tense by the way. So the Paul is telling Titus remind them and remind them again and remind them again and keep on reminding them to be subject to rulers, to authorities, to be obedient. And the first reminder here is in their response of respect to their civil authority. You see if you travel back in time to the island of Crete in the first century, you would have as I have found in my own research discovered a people who had earned sort of an empire-wide reputation for being disgruntled, dissatisfied, ornery people. In fact they were always involved in some kind of plotting, some kind of conflict, and they hated Roman rule. In fact Plutarch, the first century historian who lived during the time of Titus ministry on the island of Crete, wrote that Cretans were always on the verge of revolting. I mean they had a chip on their shoulder, you try to knock it off and we're ready to revolt.

Give us a reason, give us an excuse, we'll tell you what we think about authority. And of course the large Jewish population there would not have hesitated to lend a hand in any kind of revolt against Rome. Add to that and keep in mind as we've already learned in previous studies that the island of Crete had for generations been a haven for pirates.

I mean this is an island that reveled in a swashbuckling, you know self-serving style of independence that answered to nobody. Cretans had become a byword, a nickname for liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons. Titus chapter 1 verse 12. So Titus remind these believers you come out of this culture but don't act now like your forefathers. They may have pirate blood in their veins but you're a new creature in Christ and you're going to stand out remarkably different in your respect to authority. In the original language here Paul uses two infinitives and two nouns.

He kind of squishes them together so that it can read be subject, be obedient to rulers, to authorities. And here's the radical thought. Christians are not above the law. We can't say hey look we belong to the city of God so phooey on all you people living in the city of man. We're above you. We're beyond that.

Not quite. In fact if you went over and I'll just briefly mention it we don't have time but if you go over and explore Paul's broader explanation of this issue in Romans chapter 13 you discover several mind-altering principles related to the issue of secular government. The first thing you discover both in Romans and here in Titus is that obedience to governmental rulers and authorities is not an option but a command. Paul is not suggesting this. He's commanding this. Titus remind them this is a command from the breath of God.

You are to respond to your authority. So what that means is we don't have to pray over whether or not we're going to pay our taxes. You don't have to put that on your prayer list. You know would you help me pray about that?

I'm not quite sure so would you add that to your... no I don't think so. You don't have to pray about meeting city codes for your building process. Do you know how challenging it is with a campus this size to just meet those codes? Hey wait a second we belong to the city of God. No you're living in the city of man. How are you going to respond? See you're supposed to pay an honest wage and there is a minimum wage according to the government.

How do you respond? I mean you got to get your car inspected. You got to pay that registration fee.

You got to stand in that line of DMV forever and ever and ever and ever and they don't seem very happy to see you showing up which I don't understand. We're paying them. Christians don't get a free pass. Paul also informs us. He implies it here in Titus. He makes it clear in Romans 13 that the institution of government is the creation of God.

It's his idea. He wrote to the Romans for there is no authority except from God ultimately and those on the planet which exist are actually established by God. In other words every civil and political power has actually been appointed by God. The apostle Peter wrote it this way submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution whether to a king as the one in authority or to governors note this as sent by him.

Keep in mind it's as if they have been sent by God even though they deny him or maybe believe in him. It doesn't matter they have been appointed by him. So we engage in the due process as citizens of our beloved country and the freedoms that we now enjoy. We gladly vote. We gladly speak our conscience. We declare our virtues and we don't just talk about values. We can rest at the same time with complete confidence that God's purposes will not be thwarted. He has every office and every officer under his control. Every judge is a minister of his providential direction and the heart of every king is in the palm of his hand. There's no reason for a Christian to panic or get angry.

Fear and resentment about the culture around us may be an indicator that the church thinks that God is not keeping up, that he's letting things slip out of control and what in the world must he be thinking? He's AWOL. So I'm going to give up. I'm going to buy some land somewhere and I'm going to go away and create my little community and disappear. Now if we understand these implications maybe you're supposed to run for office. Maybe you're supposed to be a judge or an attorney. Maybe you ought to write a gracious informative letter to the editor. Maybe you ought to serve on the education board.

Perhaps you ought to volunteer in some kind of capacity in the community. Take your candle out there and shine the light in the city of man and demonstrate remarkable Christianity as you ultimately represent the city of God in the way that you act and respect and treat authority, which lets us uncover one more principle in our response to rulers and that is the Christian is to obey authority regardless of that authority's attitude toward the gospel. And don't forget that when Paul is writing this letter, Neewer's on a rampage.

He's on the throne. Society is depraved as ever. There were no sexual norms at this time. Heterosexuality was considered prudish by the elite Roman society. The emperor was bisexual. Pedophilia, adultery, idolatry, abortion, prostitution, drug addiction were not only empire-wide, they were legal and openly acceptable. And this was the century in which Jesus Christ planted the living church and the church exploded into existence.

Why? Among other reasons because Christians were so remarkably different in this new thing called the church than their culture. They had respect for authority.

These children of pirates could care less. You got around authority. Even when authority hated the very ground that Christians walked upon. In fact, Rome will eventually demand that Christians express their allegiance to the city of man by actually offering a pinch of incense and declaring Caesar as lord and Christians will die as martyrs rather than attempt to overthrow the emperor. They simply refuse to deny that Christ alone was lord. So is it ever right to disobey the law?

Absolutely. Whenever the will of the law demands that you violate the word of God, you stand with the apostles and say we will obey God rather than man. Rather than mount an insurrection or instigate a plot to overthrow Nero, Paul is actually delivering rather shocking news that they are to respect and pay taxes to Nero. The authority of the land to keep the law of the land unless it causes them to violate the word of God and at that point they are willing to lay down their lives and die. And the Christians did what? They did that and they sang on their way to their execution.

They'd served the city of man as bright lights and they knew now they were about to enter the city of God according to the will and providence and direction and purpose of God and the world then could only shake its head in wonder at those remarkable people. So before I leave this let's practically apply it in a few ways and when it gets too convicting I'll move on. What's your attitude toward the authority in your life? I mean we're all under the authority of somebody. Everyone in this auditorium is. What's your attitude toward the authority of your parents?

Man I can't wait to get out of the house. What's your attitude toward the authority of your teachers, your supervisors, your pastor's elders, your town council, the IRS as you fill out those forms? When you meet your hunting or fishing quota? When you write out your check for property taxes? What's your attitude when the police officer pulls you over?

I really don't want to go there so we're going to keep moving on fairly quickly. But what do you do at a red light at 1 a.m. when nobody else is on the street? You're wondering was he there? Did I see? No I wasn't there.

I just pulled that out of the air. I watched one television show some time ago where young children in kindergarten one at a time it's part of an experiment on how they respond to the authority were put in a room with toys and a plate of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and they were told they could play with the toys but they couldn't eat any of the cookies until the teacher came back into the room and then the teacher left. Then the tape began to roll and the agony was terrible. Some kids immediately walked over to the plate just stared at the cookies just stared and stared and some started talking to themselves don't eat the cookies don't eat the cookies don't eat the cookies don't eat the cookies don't eat the cookies don't eat the cookies.

One kid went over to the corner just banged his head against the wall. Well the truth is the camera is rolling. People are probably watching but even if they aren't what does your spirit say? What is your attitude? What is it communicating to you as it relates to authority?

Anything remarkable there. Okay I'll knuckle under you know the Bible's clear I need to get with it and obey the law that's great but I gotta warn you the Apostle Paul is just getting started you'll notice that he not only has something to say about how we relate to rulers he has five commands about how we relate to others. Let me give them to you as we work through this quickly the first thing he says effectively in relating to others is to go the extra mile.

Notice the last part of verse one. Be ready for every good deed. There's eagerness in that phrase. Be ready. It's on your mark get set and you're ready. You're ready to go out of your way to serve your community its leaders its citizens as you live in the city of man with the truth you represent. That's how we're salt and light.

Be ready for good deeds. That means that Christianity does not give us a free pass from society and this attitude is going to be remarkably different from the status quo. The Jewish community on the island of Crete in fact throughout the Roman Empire urged separation from local culture and they all just kind of huddled together. In the first century Jews who lived outside of Israel formed tight-knit communities where nobody got in and nobody went out.

Historians say they were slow and reluctant to submit to local laws and authorities. They felt they were above it. One author wrote that they were that they treated the people around them with a thinly veiled disdain rather than live among the people and demonstrate the glory and character of God they kept to themselves and did nothing at all in what they would have defined as secular society. So now they come to faith in Jesus Christ. We want to stay in our little community.

Let's just hang around each other. Let's not in any way be touched by secular society which means you can't touch it. Maybe you're thinking well you know Paul's telling the church to do that to each other. Well certainly that's a biblical principle. Galatians 6 says you know do good to all people especially those of the household of God. Absolutely should be emphasized above everything here but Paul isn't just talking about us.

In fact you'll notice he ends his statement here with the clarification we're to do these things to all men not just believers. So what does my heart communicate about this idea of going the extra mile? What do my hands communicate? My feet, my spirit. Is it I'm gonna let somebody else do that or I'm ready.

I'm on ready. See at any moment on this occupied island a Christian could feel the touch of the flat of a Roman spear on his shoulder and he knew he was immediately by law compelled to carry that soldier's gear for one mile. Everybody despised the practice. The people of Crete, the Jewish community especially, no doubt believers. Why would you want to interrupt your schedule and walk a mile out of the way? A Roman mile was considered a thousand steps and it's not too much of a stretch of the imagination to imagine that that that person then picks up that gear and that backpack and they begin he begins to walk a mile out of the way. Gear in that backpack and they begin he begins to walk and he counts one, two, three, four, and just the attitude and the way he's counting five, six, nine hundred and ninety seven, nine hundred and ninety eight, nine hundred and ninety nine, one thousand plop. There's your gear.

I'm out of here. And Jesus Christ prepares the way for the church and the preaching of these distinctives all the way back in Matthew chapter five. And he says, whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him to probably get the phrase going the extra mile. Can you imagine the surprise of a Roman soldier if you were to say, hey, listen, I know I've counted out a thousand steps, but I'm willing because of my obedience to Jesus Christ, my savior, to carry your gear one more mile. You want to demonstrate remarkable Christianity?

Be ready to go the extra mile. There's more that God wants us to learn from this passage, but we need to wait till next time. This is the first lesson in a series called Remarkable Christianity. This message is called Living in the City of Man. I want to remind you that we have a free resource available for you this month. The belief that salvation can be lost is an error into which many Christians fall.

Instead of living fruitful lives, they live fretful ones. Steven has a booklet called Blessed Assurance. That e-book is free right now. You can go to our website, wisdomonline.org. The link to this free resource is posted right on our home page.

Follow the instructions and download that e-book. If you need the print version, we can help you with that if you call us today. Our number is 866-48-BIBLE. Our ministry is on social media, and that's a great way to stay informed and to interact with us. Be sure and like our Facebook page so that you'll get updates. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram, and we post a daily Bible message to our YouTube channel, so you can subscribe to that as well. We'd enjoy interacting with you. Well, thanks again for joining us today. I hope you'll be with us for our next Bible lesson, right here on Wisdom for the Hearts.