Whose side are you standing on?

Remember that old youth group sing-along, “Who’s Side Are You Leaning On?”  The antiphonal response was “Leaning on the Lord’s Side.”  It had motions and the verse included clapping, singing, shouting, jumping, or whatever else you wanted to make up.  Well, who’s side are you STANDING on?
 
I was watching a movie the other night and the protagonist was asked to take a side on an impending matter of crisis.  His response was “I don’t take sides”.   I paused to think about that.  Is it wrong to take sides?  What does that mean? 
 
As I’ve taken a few days to ponder this, several things have come to mind.
 
First, taking sides is biblical.  There is good and evil.  Eventually, you will be JUDGED based on what side you have chosen.  God is good.  Mark 10:18 says, “No one is good but one; that is God.”  Everything God made is good, but it all came under a curse when sin entered the world.  So until Jesus comes back to redeem that which was lost, it is all cursed and therefore, evil.  Siding with evil (Satan, the world, the flesh) will lead to an eternal separation from God.  Siding with good (God) will lead to an eternity with God.  Which side do you want to be on?  Those who reject good (God) will go to hell.  Dallas Willard says it is the most gracious thing God can do for them since they clearly don’t want to have anything to do with God and heaven is an eternity with God.  Jesus will separate the sheep from the goats at the Judgement of Nations at his return.  What side do you want to be on?  Heaven or Hell?  Those who are judged at the Great White Throne judgement at the end of the Millennial Kingdom will be sent to Hell.  Do you want to be on THAT side?  You choose.  But you must choose a side.  Jesus told the story of the space between heaven and hell in Luke 16: 19-31.  He calls the space between, ‘a chasm’ that no man can cross.  You see, there IS NO in between. 

Second, NOT taking sides is cowardly.  Would you have been a Nazi because you lived in Germany in the 1930s?  Not being one, would mean punishment or death.  Jesus said, “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”  John 15: 18,19.  While Hollywood would portray the protagonist in the film I watched as noble for not taking sides in a matter of good against evil, it is in fact, cowardly.  If you are a Christ-follower, you can be sure that your opinions won’t be main stream   Jesus also warned those who are lukewarm, that he would ‘spew them out of his mouth.’  (Rev 3: 15, 16)  Trying to hold the middle ground is NOT the work of the Christian.  There is coming a time soon, where that will be harder and harder to do.
 
People that don’t take sides are people of preference, not conviction.  I have friends that are smitten with liberal theology; a heresy that Jesus also warned about regarding latter days.  (2 Timothy 3:5)  One tenant of liberal theology is “Jesus is Love”.  It ‘sounds’ good and it’s true.  But it’s not the whole truth.  Jesus is Just.  Jesus is Righteous.  Jesus is Holy.  Reconcile those types of images in Revelation with Jesus is Love from the Gospel.  It’s still Jesus.  But the book of Revelation isn’t just about end times.  It starts off with “The Revelation OF Jesus Christ…”   The NIV wrongly interprets the phrase “from Jesus”.  In all the other places it’s used in the New Testament, it is “of Jesus” as it is translated in the King James version of the Bible.  My point is that Jesus is showing John yet another side of WHO HE IS and it seems radically different than what John (and we) experience in the Gospels.  Yet, this is HIM.  And the reconciliation is very simple.  It is not possible to be loving and be unjust.  Love demands justice and the book of Revelation shows Jesus as Judge.  It is not a pretty picture.  Where this liberal heresy hurts Christians is that they think ‘taking sides’ is unloving.  They wink at sin under the guise of being loving and then it’s easy not to take sides.  I read a meme this week from an avowed atheist that said, “How much do you (A Christian) have to hate a person that you would not tell them the truth about the Gospel?”  I’m guilty. 

Taking sides is becoming risky.  Evangelical Christians are becoming the minority and even ‘fringe’ in society.  Our ‘talk’ is hate speech and we are becoming more marginalized as culture becomes more Post-Christian.  The world WANTS you to LOVE everyone.  Be tolerant of everything except sin.  Sin is about the only thing left that doesn’t offend anyone.  In his book, BRAVE, Allistair Beggs discusses the dilemma when Christians compromise with the world’s idea of ‘intellectual tolerance’.   In summary, he says modern culture prizes a version of tolerance that permits all beliefs to be expressed,so long as none are held to be finally true.  It’s the natural evolution of the Thomas Anthony Harris book “I’m Okay.  You’re Okay” published in 1969.   Christianity is tolerated only when it is relativized—treated as a private preference rather than a truth claim.  The moment Christians speak with clarity or exclusivity (“this is true,” “this matters”), they are no longer seen as tolerant but as dangerous or arrogant.  The temptation then is for Christians to soften language, blur conviction, or retreat into silence, mistaking passivity for faithfulness
This is all part of the spirit of the age that we are warned about in Scripture.  Relativism and fear will eventually plow the road needed for the delusional spirits that are infiltrating our culture psyche.  But two things: 
·     
We win (Not “Love Wins” as the liberal churches like to  put on their neon signs.)  Because Jesus won, we will win.  The scroll in Revelation will be opened by the Lamb of God who sits on the throne.  That scroll is the deed to this earth, which Jesus will claim at just the right moment in time.  When He does, “every knee will bow and every tongue will proclaim He has WON.  There will not be sides on that matter. 
·     
The Church of Jesus Christ remains His chosen vessel in this dispensation of time and the Gates of Hell will NOT prevail against it.  If you are not a part of the Church (with a capital “C”), then you will certainly be on the wrong side of what is to come after the Church is taken out of the Earth.  

One of the most descriptive Bible verses uses the word STAND, three times in two sentences.   Ephesians 6: 13, 14,  says,  Therefore, put on the full armor of God so that WHEN the day of evil comes you will be able to take your stand and after you have done everything to stand.  STAND firm then…. From here it goes on to outline the armor of God.

​Take a side.  Take a stand.  It’s time.  If you don’t you’ll fall for anything