By DAVID EPPS
Pastor

My first encounter with Christians being involved in public protests occurred in the mid-1970s. A local drive-in theater had begun showing R-rated movies after 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights.

The real problem was that, if you were driving into town from the south, there was a brief stretch of road where, for about five to 10 seconds, the movie screen could be seen from the road. Therefore, it was possible, if one made some effort, to see nudity on the screen from the roadway. Also, there was one spot just outside the theater fence that one could stand and see the screen. As far as I know, no one ever stood in that one spot, but, as I would find out later, one could do it and see all there was to see in R-rated movies.

Anyway, that’s why I received the telephone call from an outraged pastor who was marshaling the forces of good to combat the evil that had invaded our town on Friday and Saturday nights after 11 p.m. for five to 10 seconds, if one made an effort to actually view the terrible evil. The protests would begin on the following Friday and continue each Friday and Saturday evening until the movies were stopped.

I was in a quandary. Friday evenings were, and still are, “date night” for my wife and me. Saturday nights were generally spent in final study and prayer in preparation for the Sunday sermon. But, if this was what God wanted for us to do, I would just have to sacrifice.

I wondered what the Bible had to say about this type of “social action,” so I did a brief review on the subject. The Old Testament was filled with admonitions to help the poor, administer justice, and stand up for the oppressed. I could easily see that the antislavery forces of the 19th century were working for justice.
The civil rights movement had crested just a few years prior to the R-rated movies coming into our community and I believed that it was right and good to work for equality for all people.

And, in our century there has been no population more oppressed and deprived of rights than the unborn of America, so I fully supported (and continue to support) the pro-life movement. But the movie theater didn’t seem to be addressed by these sweeping injunctions to work for justice.

The New Testament didn’t persuade me to give up my weekend nights either. In fact, the only instance where the church “protested,” at least outside the confines of the community of faith, was found in the book of Acts when the apostles Peter and John were arrested for preaching the Gospel in the name of Jesus Christ.
After they were punished, they were released and ordered to cease public preaching in Jesus’ name. With boldness, the apostles risked arrest, beatings, and death by declaring that, “...we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20 NKJV).

They went right back out and resumed preaching, believing that the eternal destiny of men and women was of far greater importance than the risk to their freedom. In fact, Peter and the other apostles would be arrested again and faced the murderous fury of the same authorities who had ordered them to stop preaching. Their response? “We ought to obey God rather than man” (Acts 29).

Interestingly, the church faced many of the same social problems in Jerusalem, and in the area ruled by Rome, faced by society today. The Roman world was ruled by an oppressive, corrupt government, taxes were high and unfair, and citizens could be compelled by authorities to do things against their will. Temples to pagan gods were everywhere, prostitutes plied their trade openly, and moral corruption was the norm. Yet, the church is not seen protesting any of these evils.

In fact, instead of demanding their rights, what few they had under Rome, the early Christians laid down their rights and became “slaves to Christ.” They were taught to obey the authorities, pray for the rulers, and live in quietness and peace. The one glaring exception is that they refused to be silent about their faith, even when faced with execution.

Yet, quietly, believers treated slaves in the realm with dignity, rescued unwanted children from the garbage heaps, and took care of the needs of widows and orphans. They “protested” the evil around them by being and doing good. They changed society by winning people to Christ, not by carrying placards, being engaged in protests, and signing petitions.

A few years ago, I drove through a community and observed a group of well-dressed, but unsmiling, Christians walking up and down the sidewalks of this town carrying signs. The messages on these posters read, “God hates Fags!” and “Queers Will Burn,” and a host of other such friendly declarations.

Can you imagine Jesus engaging in such an activity? How about Paul, or Peter, or any of the other leaders of the church? The deacon Stephen was stoned to death for preaching Christ but, can you see him carrying a sign like these people were carrying?

I couldn’t, which was why, years ago, I declined to protest the drive-in theater. If I couldn’t imagine Jesus and the apostles doing something or acting in a certain way, I decided that it was probably inappropriate for me to do or act either.
The local pastor was angry with me, of course, and accused me of harboring wickedness in my heart (which is true enough, I suppose) and not loving Jesus and righteousness. A few weeks later, I was returning from the hospital late at night and passed by the drive-in theater. They were there in force, these protesters, carrying their signs. Yet one pastor had found the one spot by the fence where one could watch the entire movie. And there he was, sign in hand, looking over his shoulder and observing the nudity on the screen.

The problem with being a Protestant is that many feel that they have to go out and protest something. After all, “Protestant” simply means “one who protests.” Granted that some things are worth protesting. Some things are even worth being harassed, persecuted, being arrested, and jailed.

Many Christians, Protestants and Catholics alike, risked all to bring freedom to American slaves. Thousands were jailed and many killed, especially in the South, in the attempt to end the oppression of segregation. Thousands of believers have sat in jails in their attempt to end the wanton legal slaughter of 30 million unborn boys and girls.

But in all my 49 years of life, I haven’t seen any preachers in these United States arrested for preaching, in public places, the freedom found in Christ. Of course, I haven’t seen more than half a dozen ministers preaching anywhere outside the safety and comfort of their own pulpits or their uniquely Christian meetings.
Perhaps, if we took the message of the love of God to the streets, more of us would be arrested. That would be something worth being jailed for, at least by biblical standards. We might even begin to change society. [Father David Epps is rector of Christ the King Charismatic Episcopal Church in the Fayette/Coweta area of south metro Atlanta. He may be contacted at fatherDavidEpps@aol.com or at www.ChristTheKingCEC.com.]

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