Sometimes we as Christians can want to cloister ourselves away from the world by not keeping up with what is going on in the world. We can think “I am not of the world… (which is true, see John 17:16) so I don’t need to pay attention to what is going on around me, especially because it’s often so bad.” But this attitude flies in the face of what God teaches us in His Scriptures. Although we should not be completely consumed with the goings on in the broader society in which we live, we do need to be keenly aware of this society if we want to live biblically. Being aware in this way simply means knowing what is going on more broadly, namely what motivates individuals and governments, and what kind of cultural and political pressures exist. There seem to be three main reasons to be politically and culturally aware as a Christian: (1) to avoid the sins of the culture, (2) to address the sins of the culture, and (3) to adequately announce the gospel. In this post, we will think about our need to avoid sin as followers of Christ, and we will see that this demands a moral obligation to generally know what is going on around us.
To Avoid Sin
I struggled to arrange these three points in a logical fashion; part of me wants to start with our need to announce the gospel to the lost, as this would make it plain that we cannot completely separate ourselves from interacting with the world. We have to reach out to the lost. But most Evangelicals don’t struggle with this temptation. We are so gospel-focused that we want to reach out to those who have not accepted the good news of Christ Jesus. At least, I know that is how it is in my church. Instead, I’m starting with our need to avoid sin. The presence of sin in the world leads to the need for the gospel, so that’s why I’m starting here.
The New Testament authors routinely recognize the world as sin-ridden. John writes that “the whole world lies in the power of the evil one” (1 Jn 5:19) and that’s why he can say “if anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 Jn 2:15). The world is pictured as a place characterized by “the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life” (1 Jn 2:16). Similarly, Paul calls this an “evil age,” (Gal 1:4) and so he tells Christians not to be conformed to it (Rom 12:2). This is because, just as John notes, this world is sin-ridden. After all, the people of this world follow the devil and not the Creator, as demonstrated by their actions (Eph 2:1-3; 6:11-12). Although God has graciously made us alive through Christ (see Eph 2:5), we can be tempted not to “put on the new man” and live for the Lord (see Eph 4:17-24). This is why it is so important to be aware of what is going on around us, to be “of sober spirit” (1 Pet 5:8-9), because sin is always seeking to control us (Gen 4:7). By recognizing the devil’s influence over the world, and therefore the sin-ridden nature of the world, we can take the first step in avoiding the sinful influences of the world.
A great biblical model of avoiding the sin of the world can be found throughout the book of Daniel. The book of Daniel is all about God’s sovereignty; He is ultimately in control even when it might not seem like it (Dan 2:20-23). But the book of Daniel also shows us the evil one’s influence over the world, particularly in massive nations and their political leaders (e.g. Dan 7:1-12; 9:26-27). Even through all the evil of these world powers, God is still working His plan. Daniel and his friends find themselves taken into exile by one of these evil world powers, and throughout the book they are challenged to either obey men or God (see Acts 5:29).
The first example of Daniel and his friends’ choice to follow the world or follow God occurs in the opening chapter of the book. Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, went to war with Judah and subsequently took a number of their choice young men into exile (Dan 1:1-4). Instead of directly destroying nations, Babylon would try to subsume defeated nations by inculcating future leaders of the defeated nations with Babylonian culture. Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah were among the group of the sons of Judah that were taken for this project (Dan 1:6-7). Daniel and his friends don’t run away or try to kill their captures; instead, they understand that they are being called to live faithfully for the Lord in the midst of a wicked nation (Jer 29:4-7). But this calling will bring new challenges, namely new opportunities to avoid sin.
Immediately after Daniel and his friends get to Babylon, they are presented with an opportunity to avoid sin, because they are going to be given food from the king’s table to eat (Dan 1:5). Now if you hear that and think, “What’s the big deal?” you are demonstrating my main point. Daniel needed to be culturally aware enough, and he was, to see that eating the king’s food would make him unclean before God (Dan 1:8). Likely, the king’s table would have been filled with unclean food that was prohibited from being eaten by God’s old covenant people (see Lev 11:46-47; Ezek 4:13). Daniel needed to know God’s word, but he also needed to know what kind of food was going to be served to him. His cultural awareness allowed him to act before he was forced to eat (Dan 1:8).
Daniel also had political awareness; he knew who to talk to. In this story, Daniel and his friends didn’t have to choose completely between disobeying God or disobeying the governing authority (cf. Dan 3:12, 18; 6:10); instead they got to seek an exemption (Dan 1:8-14). Daniel had enough political awareness to go through the right channels when seeking this exemption. Ultimately, it was God who blessed Daniel and his friends and gave them the exemption they were requesting (Dan 1:9, 15-17).
The opening chapter of Daniel is such a great reminder of our need as Christians to be culturally and politically aware. If Daniel had never paid attention to who the Babylonians were, he would have likely found himself eating something unclean. But Daniel also needed to know his Torah – he needed to know God’s word so that he knew exactly what was sin. Notice the balance here: we need to know God’s word because it shows us how things actually are and what is actually true, but at the same time we need to know what is going on around us if we want to faithfully live God’s word. You cannot expect to live a life pleasing to God if all you do is engage, or worse, participate, with the world all day every day, and never worship on Sunday, touch your Bible, or pray. Likewise, you cannot read your Bible and pray all day every day, and actually live what God says to do in your Bible (this will be the focus of the next two posts). For some of us, probably most of us, we need to put down the phones and turn off the TVs, and spend time in God’s word. Others of us need to go out and interact with the people around us, or pick up the phones and read just a little bit of the news so that we are aware of the latest sin that the culture or the government wants to push on us. Daniel both knew God’s word and knew enough about the Babylonian culture; this gave him the ability to recognize what would be sinful to engage in and how to take the appropriate steps to avoid partaking in that sin.