"Spiritual Sheriffs"

“Spiritual Sheriffs”

(The title comes from a message by Pastor Wayne Blackburn delivered at Victory Church)

For several years Karen and I lived in an apartment in Manchester before purchasing our fixer-upper house. During one summer we went on a ten day trip and our son Dave moved in to care for our cat. I went to our management office to find out if he needed a parking permit and was told (paraphrased), “He probably ought to have one. We have a resident who thinks he’s the Sheriff of Dodge who goes around checking for stickers and reports license numbers to have the offending vehicles towed.” Needless to say, we got Dave a temporary permit and his car survived the scrutiny.

While serving in Manchester a pastor whose church had recently closed due to dwindling attendance visited our service. The next day I received an email pointing out all the things we’d done wrong by his standards for how church should be done. I responded (hopefully kindly, not in kind) explaining our rationale for how we conducted our ministry. (I never received a reply and the gentleman never returned.) I also had a few phone calls over the years asking what version of the Bible we used. Normally I’d answer that we endorsed none exclusively and encouraged our congregation to utilize one which was best for them provided it was true to the original languages and who Jesus is. Usually this wasn’t good enough for the caller and we were labeled “liberal” or another uncomplimentary term.

In each of these examples individuals had appointed themselves the arbiter for what in their opinion was right. Jesus had some harsh words for the “spiritual sheriffs” of His day (teachers of the law and Pharisees), referring to them as hypocrites numerous times in Matthew 23:13-36. Later Paul cited an incident in which “…some false brothers had infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus….” (Galatians 2:4). So both our Lord and a leading apostle spoke against holding people to a personal (and often unbiblical) standard (“Do not judge, or you too will be judged.”—Matthew 7:1; “…Christ has really set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law.”—Galatians 5:1, NLT). But Paul went on to say that this freedom was to be used to “…serve one another in love.”, not to “…indulge the sinful nature….” (Galatians 5:13).

God doesn’t need sheriffs—he needs servants. Which will I choose to be?

Grace and Blessings!

Jim McMillan