I wonder if you watching the news on TV as a crowd of “peaceful protesters” run riot over cities, become as provoked within yourselves as much as Paul did as he watched the people of Athens give themselves to their plethora of false gods.Are you provoked as Paul was and for the reason Paul was and will we allow ourselves to be provoked to the same action Paul took?

These Athenians had constructed out their various religions a strategy in which to deal with the inner stirrings of their souls. Regularly a new god was imported into the city with the hope that it might complete their search and answer their longings. No god did and so these Athenians kept stacking up one god upon another. Paul knew that his God, who alone could answer their great need, was unknown to them, unmet by them. How maddening to see the riot of their worship and know that it was futile and destructive to their lives and those around them! Their religiosity left unchallenged, and uncorrected was only going to lead them further from the truth and deeper into darkness. Paul had to address their religion exactly where it failed in meeting the great impulse of their beings. Paul had to then tell them where that impulse could be met. So, he began speaking, in their market, to whoever he could.

Our nation today needs people who will react as Paul reacted… with a proper recognition of what is before us, with the proper spirit of provocation at what we see and with the readiness to address everyone you can in the marketplace about the deeper issue lying behind the strange religious activity that we are now witnessing in our nation. And make no mistake this is a religious exercise at heart. It is a religion made up of three parts, 1^st the congealing of complaint against some original sin and 2^nd a human effort at reform with 3^rd a vision of a future hell to be avoided and heaven to be won. All religions are made of the same formula. Just as Paul saw Athens being swallowed up in a false religion that was destructive and God denying and so was vexed. We need to see what is before us as it is and see it in the same way Paul saw the idolatry of Athens.

Let me develop this further by briefly explaining to you what lies underneath all religions… John 16:8-11 reveals the probing and convicting work that the Holy Spirit has brought to the heart of every person since the day Adam and Eve disobeyed God and fell into sin. John tells us that the Holy Spirit is at work convicting people of sin (their guilt before God) of righteousness (the desire to be good and knowledge that they are not) and consequently of judgment. This convicting work intensifies in humanity when a faithful, Spirit filled church engages lost people with the declaration of the person and work of Jesus Christ. But even before we go to people with the message of Jesus they are under this conviction. This is an understanding generated the Spirit of God.

And here is what people do with this threefold conviction from God: They suppress it. Romans 1:18 says, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. You can’t suppress what is not there. God is not silent. He speaks to all people and makes Himself known to them and they suppress this knowledge but still they come away convicted of sin, a lack of righteousness and of pending accountability none the less. Because people will not go to God for the answer to this pressing God agitated concern in their lives they produce alternative strategies for dealing with this conviction. And thus, religions are born. Every religion will have some idea of sin to be avoided or overcome, some idea of righteousness to be gained or realized and some idea of consequence in the future to avoided or to be pursued. The formulations are wrong but the three points of concern they attempt to address are true, produced by the Holy Spirit and need addressing. There is sin. There is righteousness. And there is judgment.

Just here consider the latest upheaval of protest largely rising from a younger generation in our land. The nature of their complaint is a moving is shifting all the time, but we can at least identify these three components. The protesters believe that there is an original sin in our nation that is still bearing its poisonous fruit. At the same time, they are vigorously attempting to absolve themselves of this sin through a series of dramatic acts they believe are right. They offer us a confession, We must all confess the same things. We must confess white privilege. We must all acknowledge systemic racism. If we don’t we are guilty of being complicit in that racism. We must repeat the creed, “Black Lives Matter.” We cannot say “All Lives Matter” nor even “All black lives matter.” And when we say “Black Lives Matter” their orthodoxy dictates that we mean only black lives that suffer violence at the hands of police, as in the 158 that died in police shootings in 2019. We must not be referring to the black babies that are annually aborted at a larger rate than are born in New York City. Nor of the roughly 3000 black lives that are lost in black on black violence in the same year. We must repeat the confession as subscribed, for all righteousness sake. Again, they take action against institutions they believe house this sin attempting to tear those houses down or burn them down. Please note that there is a striving here to right themselves by projecting on our nation, on something external from themselves, their unique construction of righteousness.

And they do all of this with an eschatological viewpoint - a view to some destiny out there. So, they employ phrases like “a day of reckoning for America.” And they have ideas of a utopian society that they will construct in the place of the nation that they wish to bring under judgment.

Now let me express the irony of this situation. These protesters are revealing to the Church the core components of a message that the Church has neglected for decades. Our neglect has not been to fail to lead the way in championing social reform or social justice; it has not been the failure to identify and address the forces of racism; it has not been the failure to call for a healthier environment or a more equitable economic system… It has been a failure to present to lost people a message of good news in Jesus Christ that will satisfactorily answer the Spirit driven awareness that is in all people of their sin, their lack of righteousness and the reality of oncoming judgment.

Our churches have been grooming for decades a public image in order to attract people to ourselves and to Christ. We have offered people a salvation that promises significance, meaning, purpose, community, a healthy self-esteem, a place of belonging, a deliverance from self-defeating constructs to attitudes of acceptance and personal affirmation… but it is a salvation that does not strike the core of people’s Spirit authored, subconscious need to have their sin identified and their guilt removed, their lives turned into the way of an unrealized righteousness and the need to escape an oncoming judgment.

This generation of protesters are twisting this consciousness and selectively pointing it outward at our nation, our history, our past and present and saying “There is a sin among us” “We are going to protest it’s the righteous thing to do” “There must be a reckoning and a judgment made and reparations given. We can create a new and better society. We can bring down hell on some and heaven to others.” It is not possible. It is not possible because they are the sinners, they are the unrighteous, they are coming before the Judge. But they are more right in many ways than the church has been because they know what needs to frame religion and the conversation that is most persuasive and powerful that should form around. There must be a confronting sin and confessing it, there must be a righteousness found that would bring us to truth. There is a hell and a heaven. Only we do not make it. God does and He determines in judgment who will go to either.

What is our opportunity in this? We must talk with those we can and turn the finger that is being pointed outward back inward where the Spirit is at work. The protesters are striking out in a mad act and destructive act of self-righteousness. They are constructing a religion and idols and altars that the we in the Kingdom of God; we in the church must never bow before. Instead we must pursue dialogues in the gospel. We must again turn their fingers to pointing back to themselves where the Spirit is convicting them of sin, them of unrighteousness and them of judgment.

Let us agree with them this far. There is sin in the world and the sins of the past find their way into the present. There is a need to do what is right and there has been a failure to live in righteousness and there is a judgment coming that will determine hell or heaven for us all. Agree with them thus far. But then tell them the turn does not begin with society as a whole. It begins in each human heart. And the turn is not one we take before one another to measure up to social pressure. It is a turn we must take before the God of all creation before who we must give an answer.

From there sin, their sins, we must help them explore and help them see the need to confess them. And they must be confessed foremost as sins before a holy and loving God. Then we must gently expose to them their lack of righteousness and the impossibility for them to generate a righteousness that will cover their sins and make them right with God needs to be made plain to them. Finally, they need to understand that as a result they face God’s just punishment and His everlasting hell.

Here is our opportunity to talk and listen and then turn the conversation inward to these truthes that demand good news… the good news of a Savior who became sin for us and bore on the cross our guilt… the good news of a Savior who lived a righteous life, and would cover us with his perfect righteousness and pour into us that righteousness so that we may live good works, we might do good to all people… the good news of a Savior who would rescue us from hell and is preparing a place in heaven for all who in faith have laid hold of the answer to this deep need through that Savior alone.