An athletic man, all of 6’2″, in full uniform, clad with helmet, batting gloves, and a shin guard, takes a few practice cuts in the on-deck circle. Focused, he concentrates on timing his swing perfectly. “See the ball out of the pitcher’s hand, track its path, judge the speed, stay back, stay compact, and execute,” he tells himself. He’s looked forward to this moment for 25 years: a chance to be the hero, to put his team on top for good, to get the big contract, to etch his name into history. All of his training, coaching, countless hours in the gym, on the field, in the cage, beating his body into submission to one solitary goal, has coalesced into this one moment.
As he approaches the batter’s box, something seems a little out of place. He can no longer hear the crowd. A quick glance around reveals that the stadium is empty, save for the cleanup crew collecting spent peanut shells from the concrete steps. The game, long over, was a thrilling spectacle. By now, however, the teams and fans have all gone home. Yet, the batter remains, intent on taking his big shot.
Defiantly, he digs into the batter’s box anyway. He buckles down and, with a hard-set jaw and look of steely determination, swings with all of his might, executing the perfect swing with expert, finely tuned mechanics. Predictably, he comes up empty. No matter. Without fanfare, he flips his bat as though he’d just walked off game 7 of the World Series. “Perfection,” he thinks to himself.
“Ding-Ding”
Like a boxer who never heard the bell, evangelical pastors are taking big swings themselves. But like a playground bully, their singular target is the only kid they know they can beat—the scrawny, awkward, autistic kid who hasn’t yet found his confidence.
Big Eva pastors don’t step into rings against formidable opponents because they know they can’t win in their own strength. If the outcome isn’t known ahead of time, they won’t engage at all. They don’t believe the Lord fights for them, and they know that losing the fight means losing everything that matters to them (I mean, “they’re not David”). They lack confidence in a spiritual fight because they’ve invested everything into their own intellect, charisma, and strength.
Repentance is not an option because so many have put so much stock into their brands; it would be like walking away from a long-term investment. To reverse course now would be to lose followers, influence, and, well, lose. So they chose their battles shrewdly, picking opponents they knew they could humiliate and who couldn’t humiliate them in return. They punched down at uncredentialed pew-sitting men who made noise and didn’t have the pulpit to lean on. They sided with reviling wives over their bewildered husbands. They ignored conflicts that would require them to show up anywhere but the church: their domain. They disfellowshipped anyone who publicly dared to take any political position that happened to be to their right. With loving care, they carefully jettisoned anything that was “not the gospel.”
This trend represents a special kind of wickedness. Rather than prepare the believer for the fight, they were trained to lay their weapons down. They disembodied evil; they sanitized it, and spiritualized it while divorcing it from reality. While their sheep were walking among wolves, they bid the sheep lie down. While the moral fiber of the community was being burned, they pleaded for unity. When sin entered the church, they excused it. They made it clinical. When the strong men left, they declared, “Good riddance.”
With a finger to the wind, they will take their swings: hard, fast, and well-timed to occur well after all possibility of risk or reward is long past. Any punch that actually lands is placed squarely on the jaw of any faithful Christian who dares to question him. They risk nothing, gain nothing, and lose nothing. Like the one-talent servant, they wickedly cloister themselves and their treasure, terrified of any task remotely challenging. No, cowardice is much safer. No one expects them to lead the charge against degeneracy anyway.
These men lack confidence in the Spirit of God because they have never relied on Him before. Whatever they’ve built has come through their own gifts and abilities. With years of steadfast devotion, these highly respected theologians will formulate their arguments, reading only the deepest theology, learning all of the Latin, Aramaic, Greek, and Hebrew terms, contexts, tenses, and translation nuances so as to craft the most perfect interpretation of the minutest detail of Scripture. With painstaking attention, they will thread the most crucial theological needles in distinguished fashion and demonstrate to the world just how thoughtful and careful they are with the text of God’s Word. This work is so important that they will sacrifice duty, family, and pastoral care to build the largest, most influential platform possible in order to write that book, give that speech, publish that article, take that interview, cash in on that one single thing that will change the world, and be recognized for their brilliance.
The Cowardice Contagion
When the pitch came across the plate, they had not yet arrived at the ballpark for warm-ups. While a family was sending their kids to public school, he was recording podcast episodes. While a husband was trying to hold his marriage with an uncooperative woman together, he was speaking at that prestigious pastor’s conference. While some members of his church were openly supporting child sacrifice, he was secluded in his study trying to rationalize reinterpreting “Arsenokoitai.” When abortion was being debated, he couldn’t be bothered. While the local school board was devouring children, he was taking a leave of absence. All of that work leads to burnout, you see.
Misery is not alone in loving company. Likewise, cowards are never satisfied with their own cowardice. The one who spots the lion in the street does not simply keep the news to himself. He must shout it from the rooftops. He needs everyone to join him in his panic. To do otherwise would be to risk being found out. Anyone who denies the lion is putting lives at risk, you see.
To maintain their upstanding image, it is also imperative that they destroy anyone around them who appears even remotely courageous. They will label it brash, callous, even sinful. They can never allow the contrast between such men and themselves to be drawn and will remove the threat at any cost. Courage anywhere is a threat to cowardice everywhere. They will hold those meetings behind closed doors, thank you very much.
A Word Spoken In Season
Where are the shepherds? The bar for faithfulness in the pulpit has never been lower. To simply take a biblical stand on any issue whatsoever would be considered courageous. Differentiating yourself from cowardly pastors isn’t difficult at all in the current climate.
While we all want to do righteously, the timing of that righteous choice matters greatly. Anybody can do the right thing when it’s easy. It takes a warrior, a true shepherd, to do the right thing when there are consequences. In a society that turns its back on the God of the Bible, holiness becomes personal, righteousness becomes wicked, and cowardice becomes piety.
We must purge the church of cowardice and cowards. It takes courage to step into the ring with an opponent you’re not sure you can beat. All the more if you know for certain you can’t win without a miracle. But that is what God calls us to do. Like David, he calls us to step up to any opponent in the confidence that it’s not us that fights or wins: it’s the Lord who fights for us and the glory belongs to Him. You are David. You are Joseph. You are Elijah. You are Nehemiah. What you do, you don’t do for yourself, or by yourself.
What does all of the theological precision on planet Earth matter if it does not produce in us a culture that upholds God’s righteous standards and prohibits open wickedness?
“Hate evil, love good;
Establish justice in the gate.
It may be that the Lord God of hosts
Will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”
–Amos 5:15
We serve a great and merciful God who is able to grant us repentance if we seek it. If the American church is to survive, it must be led by men of courage and not careful men who wait until the heat is gone to do what is right. The latter type of man cannot be trusted in such consequential times. As contagious as cowardice is, courage is all the more. Thankfully, a new generation of young men is beginning to take shape. Many young men are returning to the church. What will they find when they arrive? If what they find is simpering white knights, the result will not be a sanctified, victorious bride. Of that we can be sure.
