PUSSYFOOTERS

From My Perspective - - - 

When the 45th Governor of Alabama, George Corley Wallace, Jr., became a candidate for President on the American Independent Party ticket, he made a memorable and worthy statement regarding why he had shifted from another Presidential attempt with the Democratic Party. It was due to his observations and characterizations that the politicians had become pussyfooters. When he used this term, he was inferring that they were apt to “move stealthily or cautiously; to act timidly to avoid committing oneself.” 

Sadly, it is not just in the area of politics where “pussyfooters” are prominent. The culture is not only dictating to the government. The Church is also succumbing to the cultural pressures and adapting to the alternative lifestyle choices of a society that has moved toward the edge of the dangerous precipice that will lead to demise. Rather than standing in the gap as a roadblock to the places of danger and demise, the church has assumed the posture of accommodation and a willingness to adjust and adapt. The words of Proverbs 24:10-12 (NASB) should be etched upon our hearts, minds and souls: “If you are slack in the day of distress, Your strength is limited. Deliver those who are being taken away to death, And those who are staggering to slaughter, Oh hold them back.If you say, See, we did not know this, Does He not consider it who weighs the hearts? And does He not know it who keeps your soul? And will He not render to man according to his work?” The NLT paraphrase is: “If you fail under pressure, your strength is not very great. Rescue those who are unjustly sentenced to death; don't stand back and let them die. Don't try to avoid responsibility by saying you didn't know about it. For God knows all hearts, and he sees you. He keeps watch over your soul, and he knows you knew! And he will judge all people according to what they have done.” 

The point being made is obvious: (1) the danger of falling under pressure; (2) the avoidance of responsibility; (3) the thought that God might not know what you knew and when you knew it; and (4) the hope that one will not be held accountable for what one has done (or not done). The word of God is clear regarding what constitutes holiness, righteousness and godliness. Romans 3:10-23 is a clear statement of what God sees and knows about the sinful behavior within a given culture and society. It culminates in verse 23 with the summary statement: “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” However, there is always the word of hope because of God’s readiness to act in a redemptive way to remedy the cultural and societal propensity to head toward demise as they slide into the abyss of certain destruction. Romans 3:24-26 states the word of deliverance and hope: “being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

Man is unable to activate this process because: “Justification is an act of God's free grace, wherein he pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.” An evidence of the fact of justification having been actuated in one’s soul and life will be the change that begins to occur. This process is known and defined as: “sanctification is the work of God’s free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole person after the image of God, and are enable more and more to die to sin and live unto righteousness.” If the process of change is not occurring, then there should be no claim to an act that may not have occurred. The pussyfooter pastor may be an enabler and allow a lost person to think they are going to heaven because they have been a long-standing church member and have consistently tried to do good. The danger to this is that it ignores a very clear declaration in Ephesians 2:8-10 of the proper redemptive order: “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” Paul was not a pussyfooter. Consider these things with me!