Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Why Christians Should Support Religious Liberty for Muslims (and Everyone Else)
Why Christians Should Support Religious Liberty for Muslims (and Everyone Else)
Apr 3, 2025 5:33 AM

The fight for religious liberty is only beginning to intensify in America, whether for retail giants, restaurant chains, bakers and florists, sacrificial nuns, or the imminent obstructionson the path paved byObergefell vs. Hodges.

Yet even when facing these pressures for themselves, many American Christians still seek to withhold such freedoms from those of differing religiousbeliefs. Forgettingour position of exile,such a stancetrades the first of our God-given freedomsfor narrow self-interest and self-preservation.

Suchprofound disconnect was recently on vivid display at the Southern Baptist Convention’s 2016 Annual Meeting, where a pastor asked Dr. Russell Moore how a Christian can possibly support religious liberty for Muslims.“Do you actually believe that Jesus Christ would support this,” the pastor asked, “and that he would stand up and say, ‘Well, let us protect the rights of those Baal worshipers to erect temples to Baal’”?

Moore’s answer couldn’t be clearer:

What it means to be a Baptist is to support soul freedom for everybody. When you have a government that says we can decide whether or not a house of worship can be constructed based upon the theological beliefs of that house of worship, then there are going to be Southern Baptist churches in San Francisco and New York and throughout this country who are not going to be able to build.

The bigger issue, though, is not one of self-interest. The bigger issue is the fact that we’ve been called to the gospel of Jesus Christ. A government that has the power to outlaw people from assembling together and saying what they believe, that does not turn people into Christians, that turns people into pretend Christians, and it sends them straight to hell.

The answer to Islam is not government power. The answer is the gospel of Jesus Christ and the new birth es from that.

As we fight for religious liberty, let us heedMoore’s reminder that our actionnot be inspired bynarrowself-interest or self-preservation, as if Christians are trappedwithin a temporal,humanistic order.It is the Christian’s role to fight for the advancement of God’s Kingdom, andthis includes the fight for a government that aligns with the powers God gave it.

“Conscience marks a boundary that the state may never cross,” as Abraham Kuyper puts it, no matter what beliefs theconscience adopts.Religious liberty is a divine right from God.

He holds the authority, not the government, and thus we ought to be vigilant in assigning such authority towhere it belongs.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Verse of the Day
  1 Corinthians 1:10 In-Context   8 He will also keep you firm to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.   9 God is faithful, who has called you into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.   10 I appeal to you, brothers and sisters,The Greek word for brothers and sisters (adelphoi...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Proverbs 10:19   (Read Proverbs 10:19)   Those that speak much, speak much amiss. He that checks himself is a wise man, and therein consults his own peace.   Proverbs 10:19 In-Context   17 Whoever heeds discipline shows the way to life, but whoever ignores correction leads others astray.   18 Whoever conceals hatred with lying lips and spreads...
Verse of the Day
  2 Corinthians 12:9 In-Context   7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.   8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.   9 But he said to me, My grace is sufficient...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on 1 Corinthians 13:1-3   (Read 1 Corinthians 13:1-3)   The excellent way had in view in the close of the former chapter, is not what is meant by charity in our common use of the word, almsgiving, but love in its fullest meaning; true love to God and man. Without this, the most glorious gifts are...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Matthew 7:1-6   (Read Matthew 7:1-6)   We must judge ourselves, and judge of our own acts, but not make our word a law to everybody. We must not judge rashly, nor pass judgment upon our brother without any ground. We must not make the worst of people. Here is a just reproof to those who...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on James 3:1-12   (Read James 3:1-12)   We are taught to dread an unruly tongue, as one of the greatest evils. The affairs of mankind are thrown into confusion by the tongues of men. Every age of the world, and every condition of life, private or public, affords examples of this. Hell has more to do...
Verse of the Day
  John 3:18 In-Context   16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.   17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.   18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned,...
The Intersection of Christianity and Libertarianism
A brief summary of the article discussing the intersection of Christianity and libertarianism.
Verse of the Day
  Deuteronomy 4:29 In-Context   27 The Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and only a few of you will survive among the nations to which the Lord will drive you.   28 There you will worship man-made gods of wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or eat or smell.   29 But if from there you seek the Lord your...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Deuteronomy 30:15-20   (Read Deuteronomy 30:15-20)   What could be said more moving, and more likely to make deep and lasting impressions? Every man wishes to obtain life and good, and to escape death and evil; he desires happiness, and dreads misery. So great is the compassion of the Lord, that he has favoured men, by...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved