Sunday, November 28, 2010

Multiculturalism & Belief

Not all values, beliefs, and lifestyles are equal.

Does this sound contrary to “All men are created equal?“ It is true that all men and women are created equal. But all cultural values and lifestyles are not equal.

The Bible backs this view. The message from God to Pharoah in the midst of the Old Testament plagues was, “I will make a distinction between my people and your people.” (Ex 8:23) God Himself declares a difference between my and your.

Christian leader Josh McDowell writes, “The basic belief of multiculturalism … is that all cultural values, beliefs, lifestyles, and truth claims are equal; there is no standard by which one can judge one cultural value as “better” or “worse” than that which exists in another culture.”1

German Chancellor Angela Merkel recently said multiculturalism has failed in Germany. She challenged Turkish immigrants in Germany to embrace her countries ‘Christian’ values. Not to become Christians, but to adapt to the cultural values, lifestyle, and language of Germany rooted in a Judeo-Christian worldview.


In the New Testament Paul draws a distinction between the believers and the worldly. “All of us also lived among them at one time … like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath… But … God … made us alive…” (Eph 2:3-4) Us and them. In another place he writes, “Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers.” (2 Cor 6:14)

Today, many tell us that all beliefs and lifestyles are equal. If that is true, then the Ku Klux Klan lifestyle is equal to our current pop culture lifestyle.

As Christians we’re called to love all people and to hold what is true. We are not to give equal value to every belief.

How do we do this? We can begin by heeding the advice of Paul: “… speaking the truth in love” (Eph 4:15) Not just speaking truth – and not just “love” that compromises our convictions. McDowell says, “strike the biblical balance of aggressively living in love while humbly standing for truth.”2 Aggressive in love… humble in truth!



1 - Josh McDowell and Bob Hostetler, The New Tolerance (Carol Stream, Ill: Tyndale House Publishers) 63
2 - Ibid, 97

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Quotes of Note ... The Invisible World

“Spiritual warfare is learning to recognize the strategies, refusing to cooperate with them, and aggressively cutting off the schemes of the devil in Jesus’ name.” Dean Sherman

“those who protest that God cannot exist because there is too much evil evident in life… Evil exists; therefore, the Creator does not. That is categorically stated… If evil exists, one must assume that good exists in order to know the difference. If good exists, one must assume that a moral law exists by which to measure good and evil. But if a moral law exists, must not one posit an ultimate source of moral law, or at least an objective basis for a moral law? By an objective basis, I mean something that is transcendingly true at all times, regardless of whether I believed it or not.” Ravi Zacharias

“But the Devil is no big threat to God’s purposes; he is not even remotely comparable in power. He has been given a limited time before his final judgment to try to prove his case, just as all other moral beings who have chosen to live in rebellion against heaven.” W.A. Pratney

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