The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

One of the dangers the Church faces when they address moral and social problems is the possibility of interrupting their primary mission in the world, that of reconciling man to his maker. There is a very thin line that separates dogma and dogmatism; especially when there is a level of rightness that is presumed.

There are many unqualified church leaders operating far above their pay grade in this country, they are disqualified not because they do not have bona-fide degrees, they are disqualified because they are operating within a framework that is outside of their mandate.

I have seen “lesser” men of God, who have never been “papered”, but they “deliver what they have received of the Lord” and they do not display that particular kind of zealousness that causes the persons on the other side of the issue to be unreachable. The true test of this “run” we are on, this gambling mish-mash, is what comes about after the smoke clears. Did the Church represent the mandate purely and within the prescribes Biblical framework, or did it go the way of the world giving blow for blow and putting their trust in something that is lower than themselves.

Perhaps the former Prime Minister had a point almost forty years ago when politics and church first locked horns in an independent Bahamas, when he told the church leaders that “they did not know their people”; perhaps implying that they were not fully aware of what their mandate was.

We are naive to think that a moral choice by an immoral people is going to cause God to bless us, this is a road that we go down each Lord’s Day, because an immoral people cannot sustain a moral choice; and outside of His Grace we are all immoral persons. The immoral, sinful, person has to make a spiritual decision, and this may be seen as a more difficult choice, but if you are “dead in your sins and trespasses” only God, by the power of His Holy Spirit can cause a man or woman to make such a choice. Because He is the only one who gives the Grace, mercy and power to sustain and live with that decision.

At the end of the day, gambling, adultery, theft or covetousness, bigotry, homosexuality and dogmatism all come under the same label of sin. There are no bigger or lesser sins, they may seem so because of a culture make up but they are all equal and they cannot be separated from each other, and this must be kept in mind. Do not be deceived, at the end of the day it is not going to be about what you did and did not do, judgment will come because of a deeper and darker component that persons on both sides of any issue should be aware of. It will all be about motive or why we did what we did.

On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?” And then will I declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.” (Matthew 7:22-23 ) It really does not matter who wins the argument, it will not stop God from being who He is, my concern is that He is properly represented and those who speak for Him “know Him”, and especially what He has said about the human condition and the power to make a moral choice.

I think that God is a Bahamian in some ways, and you know what they say about Bahamians, “if u fer dem, dey fer u, if you ’een fer dem, dey ’een fer u”. However, He is always trying to reach us.

EDWARD HUTCHESON

Nassau,

September 23, 2012.