Thought for the week
THE news has recently highlighted the importance of peaceful protest both here and in Hong Kong.
In the early church Peter and John were involved in civil disobedience. Jesus told them to go and make disciples of all nations and the Jewish authorities had ordered them not to speak again in the name of Jesus.
Who should they obey? For them there was no question that
Jesus came first. Any violence that occurred was against them not initiated by them.
I’m sure all of us would protest against racism. Racism is always wrong as also is the more subtle national stereotyping to which many people unconsciously give their support. 99% of the protestors against racism are peaceful.
The main problem is that any public campaign will attract a small minority who just love to cause havoc and look for any excuse to fight or have a go at the police. The difficulty for the legitimate campaigners is the same as in racism. They all get tarred with the same brush.
We Christians understand the problem of trying to distance ourselves from those who give Christ and the church a bad name. Our history as a church is full of people who let power go to their heads. More recently we have had church leaders who have abused the trust of young children to satisfy their own sexual desires. However much we try to say that they don’t belong to our church, the world puts all Christians together and reject Jesus as a result. It’s important that we distance ourselves and point people to Jesus rather than his wayward followers. It’s also vital that we follow Jesus’ advice that we know people by their fruits and not by their labels.