these Sabbath hours. Uh for those of you watching online, we give you a warm welcome as well as we gather here in
Toronto and we talk about liberty of conscience and religious liberty. And so
I um it’s a privilege to come and share on these topics. The first concept I had of religious liberty was when I was a
boy. I was about 9 years old and uh my father used to run stop smoking clinics
and he was a pastor and we do these five-day um um stop smoking clinics. I remember going and helping him. We had
this little mannequin. Uh we called him smoking Sam and we put a glass bottle on the back and we put some um tissue paper
in and we’d puff a few cigarettes. So we’d hold up this black and brown tissue and we’d say, “Do you really want your
lungs to look like this?” And so this is what we used to do. I see some of you are smiling. you’ve done the same thing
as well. Well, um after a while I I came to discover that at the end of the first night of a 5day stop smoking clinic, my
father would gather up everybody’s tobacco and bring it home in a big box and that disappeared into his office.
And a few weeks later, it would all be disposed of at the dump. And so I would sneak into my father’s office about the
age of 9 or 10 cuz I’d seen the loose leaf tobacco and I’d seen everything else and I wanted to smell it. Well, I
went into my father’s office once and I was trying to find this box of stuff and um I came across a brown envelope and I
opened the envelope and I really shouldn’t have been doing this and I’m not recommending this to young boys to go rustling in parents’ offices and
there was um a a paper my father wrote when he was at Andrews and it was it was
called religious liberty and at Jones at the age of nine I sat down and and I
managed to read through that paper. Now I, you know, I was a nine-year-old. I didn’t understand much, but I there was
something in that paper that caught my attention. And I thought to myself, there’s something about this at Jones
guy. And so, um, at the age of nine, I said to my dad, who is this guy at Jones? And he gave me a brief
explanation to suitable for a nine-year-old, uh, before we had a more uncomfortable discussion about why I was
rumaging in my father’s office. And I I learned my lesson after that. I didn’t
do it again. I didn’t sit down for a week, you might say. So, um maybe I
should have argued it was my religious liberty to go looking for truth. Who knows? But anyway, from an early age, I
realized that religious liberty is important. And uh living in Europe um
under the during the Cold War in the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, we were very aware
of the Iron Curtain and the divide in Europe between NATO in the West and the the Warsaw Pact in the East. And
occasionally we would hear stories of persecuted Christians and the persecuted church. And sometimes um we’d have
refugees coming to our churches in England who’d escaped from persecution in different parts of the world. And I
always was blessed to listen to their stories because what I discovered um and I found this out later in life um in my
own life experience is that when you go through persecution, it’s not a very pleasant experience. It’s not something
you look for. It’s not something you look out for. Um and you may not be happy you’ve gone through the
persecution, but in my own experience, I’ve discovered this. I’ve learned this from people who’ve gone through persecution that you can look back on
persecution not with joy that you went through it but with a sense of gratitude to God that he brought you through it.
Not just so I may be I’m not happy it happened but I’m grateful that it happened. I’m grateful for how God
carried me through. I’m grateful for God how shaped me how he shaped me in that process. I’m grateful for the fact that
God burns away the froth and the meaning meaningless noise of this world and made
me realize what is truly important because pain rearranges our priorities and it teaches us what is truly
important in life and what is not important at all. And so um I it’s my privilege to come and share with you
today and I’m talking I’ve called this liberty of conscience 101. And I’m going
to be sharing uh this morning um some some basic principles of liberty of
conscience. Where do we derive it from in scripture and how why is this a blessing for the society in which we
live? And as was shared last night, um liberty and liberty of conscience um are
incredible um concepts for use in evangelism because nobody says I don’t want liberty. And so when we talk about
liberty and soul liberty and liberty of conscience, this is a this is an important thing to talk about in a
society that is living increasingly under cancel culture and coercion of conscience. And so um this is our
journey this morning. Uh we’re going to be looking through the order of creation. We’re then going to look at the lordship of Jesus Christ. We’re then
going to look briefly at what the conscience is in scripture. Then look at the separation of church and state. We
then touched briefly on Martin Luther and liberty of conscience. We we spoke about Martin Luther last night and that
should be going online I guess in a few weeks. Then the general conference definition of religious liberty. Then we
come to liberty of conscience and wider society before coming to our conclusions. That’s the journey we’re
going to make here this morning. And um I just want to make sure I know when I’m due to finish. I think it’s 12:30. Is
that right? Approximately 45 minutes. All right. Okay. So you know
there was a famous British general admiral called Nelson and he was in the Battle of the Nile and this was when
Napoleon invaded Egypt and the British sent their navy and Nelson was in the fleet that attacked the French Navy off
the coast of Alexandria and the British admiral sent Nelson a signal that said withdraw from the battle. We’re going to
retreat and Nelson he put the he put his telescope up to his blind eye and said I
see no such signal and he carried on the fight and won the battle. So when people say to you five minutes, you you have to
ask, am I Nelson up here or not? Did I see it with my good eye, with my bad eye, but I know I’ I’ve confessed I have
seen that signal. So I need to stick within these time limits here. So we’re going to start out with a order of
creation. But as we do so, I invite you to bow your heads with me and invite the presence of God’s uh precious Holy
Spirit. Our heavenly father, we thank you for the blessings of the Sabbath day. We thank you that we live for seven
days but only work for six days for our daily bread. I thank you that the Sabbath is a sign of your grace and your
provision for us. It’s a memorial of our creation as moral, created, rational
beings and it’s a celebration of the deliverance you have given us in Jesus Christ from slavery to sin and Satan.
And now Lord, as we talk this morning about liberty of conscience, may your Holy Spirit descend upon each and every
one of us. Lord, it may not just be me speaking, but may your spirit speak through me and for me. I ask, Lord, that
your spirit will whisper into each of our ears. This is the way. Walk ye in it for the decisions that we are each
making on a daily basis through life. So, Father, I pray that you be glorified in this morning’s um uh sermon. And I
ask that our lives will be a hymn of praise to the one who loves us and who redeemed us and who is coming again for
us. In his holy name we pray. Amen. All right. Right. So, we’re going to start out with the order of creation. And uh
some of you are familiar with scripture. There’s an image there from Revelation 12. You have the dragon representing
Satan coming after the church. Um the pure woman that um she’s pregnant with a
child who of course was Jesus Christ. But um I’m going to start out with Genesis chapter 2 and verses 15-1 17.
And this is what the order of creation teaches us about liberty of conscience. It says, “The Lord God took the man and
put him in the garden of Eden to till it and to keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, you may freely eat of
every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat, for in the day that
you eat of it, you shall die.” End quote. And so this is the uh the instructions that God gave to Adam in
the Garden of Eden. Before the creation of Eve, God had given this instruction to Adam. And that’s an important point
to note. Eve appears later in Genesis chapter 2, but she’s not quite here yet
in Genesis 2 15-17. This verse tells us that we are created
beings within a moral universe and we are morally accountable to our creator.
God holds us accountable for the decisions we make. And we are moral beings and the
decisions we make have eternal consequences for whether we live for eternity or whether we are destroyed for
eternity. And this passage tells us that um we are morally accountable to our
creator before we are accountable for to other people. The text goes on to say or Jesus said in
Matthew 22:37, they asked him, “What is the greatest commandment of all?” And Jesus says,
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” And then he says,
“And the second is like unto it, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” So God created Adam and revealed his
perfect will to Adam before Eve was created. That means that our first
relationship, our first priority, uh the first um u um uh goal of our life is to
be faithful and obedient to our creator, before a spouse comes along,
before children come along, before we think about our extended family, that our primary responsibility
is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And before Eve was created, Adam could not love his
neighbor as himself. He could only love God. And his love for God was expressed
in obedience to the commands of God. You know, when we get married these days, um
we often, you know, different cultures navigate this differently. But in some cultures, if I marry you, I also marry
your extended family. Is that right? And in some cultures, if I marry you, I
just marry you and your family just happen to be somewhere out there. And different societies have different ways
of of managing the relationships with the extended family. Um I have African friends in Berin Springs. Um once they
get married, they’re responsible for supporting dozens and dozens and dozens of cousins, second, third aunts who
appear out of the woodwork once they know they’re in America and they have to send money back all the time. And I say,
“Why’ you do this?” They say, “It’s my responsibility. They’re my family.” And from a Western perspective, I’m
astonished. And from an African perspective, he’s not astonished that I’m not sending money every month to my
parents who live in England. And so we have these different cultural understandings of our responsibilities
to our families. But this passage here in Genesis 2:15-17
teaches us that it is both our right and it is our responsibility um to live in
harmony with God’s revealed will whether that is revealed through the scriptures or through the convictions of the Holy
Spirit upon our conscience. Liberty of conscience is a principle that governs our relationship with our heavenly
father before we deal with our fellow man. And because God is agape love,
God’s character is love. Once we have a right relationship with our heavenly father, that will automatically overflow
into a right relationship with our neighbor. So if I want a moral society, rather
than regulating how we behave one with another, it is more important to appeal to people to have a right relationship
with their heavenly father because that translates then through into a right relationship with your neighbor.
Amen. And so Acts 5 and verse 29, Apostle
Peter, a very famous verse, he says this. Then Peter and the other apostles answered him and said, “We ought to obey
God rather than men.” So the first principle in scripture is that we are
created beings. We are we inhabit a moral universe. God has revealed his
will to us. That is known as morality. And we are morally accountable for how we treat others and how we respond and
worship respond to and worship our heavenly creator. And if we get our relationship with our heavenly father
correct, then that will take care of the relationships with those around us. So that means that the number one
relationship in your life, the first relationship is not with your spouse, it’s not with your parents, and it’s not
with your children, and it’s not with your employer, and it’s certainly not with your government. The primary
relationship in your life is between you and your heavenly father. and maintaining and investing in and
deepening and making meaningful that relationship is the greatest privilege and joy we have as citizens of this
world. I was just at a conference last week down in Huntsville, Alabama
and it was called the Blue Star 2.0. I think those those talks coming out in next week or so on the internet and
there was some astronomers speaking there and they were showing the glories of the universe and these pictures from
Hubble um and the James Webb telescope of the just how beautiful the universe is and they they had this certain
picture and it had the they had the universe at certain Milky Way at an angle. It looks a bit like a sombrero
and it’s brilliant white light. is like diamonds spread through space and there’s a gleam of light in one corner
and there’s a little speck in that and that’s planet earth and you look at the glory of the Milky
Way and then you think when Satan said to Jesus in the temptation if you will bow down to me I’ll give you all the
kingdoms of this world and all its glory from an earthly perspective it looks like a lot a lot but from a heavenly
perspective no I don’t want just planet earth it’s this tiny little dot hanging in space look at the glory stories of
the Milky Way all around us. And so we’re invited in this first principle of religious liberty to to uh
to remember that our primary relationship and our primary responsibility is to our heavenly father.
Everything else is secondary to that. Amen. The next principle we have is the
lordship of Jesus Christ. Because to be a Christian means that you
not just that you love Jesus, not doesn’t just mean you talk about Jesus. It means that he is the Lord of your
life. We want Jesus to be our savior, but he also wants to be our Lord. And
the the the great gospel commission in Matthew chapter 28 18-20 um Jesus commanded the disciples to
teach teach all men to observe all things that he has commanded us. So our lives are to be a reflection of the
teachings of Jesus Christ. If people see how we live, they should be able to see the teachings of Jesus without hearing a
sermon on the matter. So if we ask ourselves, do our lives reflect the teachings of Jesus? Do people know you
are a Christian by the way you live? Do Christians have a sermon on the teachings of Jesus? Do they see the
sermon on the mount in how you live, not just in what you say? And when we when we give our lives to Jesus Christ, we he
is our Lord and our Savior. And in Acts 2:36, we read this. Um this is Peter speaking
at Pentecost. He says, “Therefore, let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both
Lord and Messiah. This Jesus whom you have crucified.” So Jesus is both
Messiah, Messiah, Christos, and he is also Lord. And so what this means uh is
that um what what does this mean? This means that we are to be obedient to the teachings and the commandments of Jesus
as Jesus said in the gospel commission you see on the screen there teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I
have commanded you. Now Jesus sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost to the disciples and promised that if any
disciple asked God for the Holy Spirit, God would give the Holy Spirit to that individual. We find that in Luke 9:11
9-13. God gives us the Holy Spirit to point us to Jesus to remind us of the
teachings of Jesus to convict us of our sins and our need of a savior that is Jesus and to bring conversion through
the new birth experience. And the Holy Spirit also brings specific convictions
on the individual that are not mentioned in scripture. And now this is a really important point for liberty of
conscience because in the pandemic people are asking Christians and those who had a religious objection to the
mandates. They were saying there’s nothing in the Bible about it. Therefore this cannot be the Holy Spirit bringing
conviction upon your conscience. But here’s an example from scripture from Acts chapter 16 from Paul’s um second
missionary journey says when they’d come opposite Misia they attempted to go into Bethnia but what the spirits of Jesus
did not allow them. Now this text tells us that the Holy
Spirit can convict you on a particular matter that that that scripture seems to be silent on.
And we were told in the pandemic there is nothing in the Bible against uh mandates for public health. And we were
told there’s nothing in the Bible, the spirit of prophecy against vaccines. But this verse tells us that the Holy Spirit
can convict you on a matter that is not explicitly addressed in any other form of revelation.
Acts 16 and verse 7. And so if we are to be faithful to the scripture, to the testimony of
scripture, we must allow for people to be convicted on matters that are not covered in scripture nor in the spirit
of prophecy, but they they still have the conviction of the Holy Spirit upon their hearts.
And let me tell you this, when people were convicted not to do things in the pandemic, they did that conviction came
at an an enormous personal cost. This was not an easy conviction. It was
not a convenient conviction. It was not a comfortable conviction. It was not a
conviction that one you favor in the eyes of the government, the media, your employer, or even our own church.
And so when the Holy Spirit brings conviction upon somebody, we are to respect that conviction.
It is not our job to second guessess or override the convictions of the Holy Spirit. Even in this case when it is on
a matter where scripture has nothing to say on the matter. And so the argument that you can only
have a conviction, you only allowed a convict a religious objection if it’s sustained by scripture is not true
because scripture gives us at least one example here of the apostles who were convicted to do things that that
scripture has literally nothing to say about. That’s an important point for us today. It is it is critical that we develop a
conscience that is sensitive to the convictions of the Holy Spirit that we may both recognize and follow God’s will
in our own lives. We do this through a daily study of the word of God and through a meaningful devotional life. We
can nurture our consciences which leads us to the what is the conscience in
scripture. Well, the the conscience in scripture, the Bible doesn’t say an awful lot about your conscience in
scripture, but if you were to summarize what the conscience is in scripture, the con your conscience is a God-given inner
faculty by which the Holy Spirit gives you an awareness of the morality of your
de of your decisions, your deeds, and your thoughts. And Romans chapter 2
14-16 is a great example, a great passage that discusses how the conscience works in
practice. And in Romans chapter 1, the Apostle Paul is talking about how um how
the the the Jewish people who had the law and had the prophets um they have had a full revelation from God um but
they haven’t done much with it. And and then then in Romans chapter 2 near the end of that chapter he talks about so
how does God judge those who have no knowledge of the law of God? How does God judge those who never heard a voice
of the prophets? How does God judge those who don’t have access to the scriptures? And the apostle Paul says
this. He said when Gentiles who do not possess the law do instinctively what the law requires
though these though not having the law are a law to themselves. They show that what the law requires is written on
their hearts to which their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts will either accuse or perhaps
excuse them on the day when according to my gospel God through Jesus Christ will
judge the secret thoughts of all. So this passage here talks about your conscience. And Paul is talking here
about those who are outside the community of faith who don’t don’t read the Bible. They’ve never read the
scriptures. But God knows the inner thoughts of the man. And this verse is saying that. Let me give you an example.
A little boy called Muhammad who’s 10 years old who dies today in a road accident in Saudi Arabia. How is God
going to judge little Muhammad for eternity? Well, this verse tells us that God knows
the light that Muhammad had. And God knows how the Holy Spirit strove with
little Muhammad to be kind to his sister and not to hit his little sister. And
God knows how little Muhammad reacted to the convictions of the Holy Spirit upon his heart. Little Muhammad may not have
understood it as such. He may not have said that’s the convictions of the Holy Spirit. God is not concerned about that.
God is not willing that any should perish at least let let alone little Muhammad here in Saudi Arabia. And so
God will judge the inner thoughts of every individual who does not have access to the scriptures and the gospel.
And God knows the struggles we all go through. Is this right or is it wrong? God knows the convictions you brought
upon that individual and God knows how they responded to that convictions. And you may say, “But little Muhammad didn’t
know Jesus Christ.” And the response to that is Jesus is the foundation for for all who are saved. Jesus is the
foundation for their salvation. When we walked into the building this morning, how many people consciously thought, “I
hope this building has got a structurally sound foundation.” Did anybody think that?
No. We saw a beautiful building and we just assumed or we implicitly assumed.
We didn’t even think about it. We just assumed that somebody got the foundation right. And we come into this building
and we enjoy the blessings of being in this building without actually seeing the foundation. But by an act of faith,
I’m telling you today, there is a foundation under our feet right now. And the death of Jesus is the foundation
that makes salvation possible for people all around the world. And people may not know that, but they may not explicitly
know that. But this verse tells us that God judges those who never received the gospel, never had an active knowledge of
God through the conflicting thoughts of their minds. That the thoughts of their minds will either excuse them in the day
of judgment or um accuse them in the day of judgment. And so God knows our thoughts even when we are not within the
body of Christ. And God who is not willing that any should perish is doing his utmost that
as many people as possible can be brought into his everlasting kingdom when Jesus comes again. So we also learn
in the conscience in scripture that through our conscience the Holy Spir spirit bears witness to what we already
know to be God’s will. Romans 9:1 says this I’m speaking the truth in Christ. I
am not lying. My conscience confirms it by the Holy Spirit. And so through our
conscience, the Holy Spirit reveals God’s will to us as individuals and also as to a wider community of faith. Maybe
in your house church or prayer prayer meeting group or Bible study group or the house church that you may have set
up. We read in the scriptures that the Holy Spirit strives with men and women in Genesis 6:3. The Holy Spirit teaches
us in Luke 12:12. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin in John 16:8. The
Holy Spirit directs the affairs of the body of Christ. In Acts 13:2, the Holy Spirit in Romans 8:27 intercedes with
our heavenly father on behalf of the saints. In 1 Peter 2:21, the Holy Spirit
inspires the prophets. And in 1 Peter 1:2, the Holy Spirit sanctifies the believer. And so, the role of the Holy
Spirit is really important in the life of Christians.
Somebody once asked me, they said, “If the Holy Spirit were to
die tomorrow, when would you notice?”
When would you notice in the life of your church? Sometimes we are so program driven and
calendar driven and budget driven and policy driven
that we almost manage without recognizing our dependence upon the Holy Spirit.
And so if nothing else from this weekend, I want to encourage you to be asking and
seeking and knocking on the door for the Holy Spirit to be poured out upon you every day of your life. I’ve learned
this in my own experience in the last four years and um I I’ve I’ve gone through I’ve gone through some hard
times and some good times in life. Um this isn’t my first rodeo with the General Conference. I’ve had debates
with them in the past. They weren’t on a global level. But this much I’ve learned is that when you enter into a battle,
even if the battle is righteous and just, you may be destroyed by the battle itself.
That when you fight for what is right, other people are blessed, but you end up as a broken, twisted, bitter individual
because that’s what fighting does to you. So, I’ve learned over the years that if you want to retain a Christ-like
character, you have to ask every morning for the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
You have to be intentional about saying, “Lord, I’m in a struggle with my landlord. I’m in a struggle with my local congregation. I’m in a struggle
with my spouse. I’m going through a struggle with my teenage kids. Lord, please give me an outpouring of your
Holy Spirit today. Keep me Christlike. In this struggle, may I not become
bitter, but may I become better.” And when you ask God for the promised Holy
Spirit, Jesus’ promise to us in the Luke of Gospel is if we ask we shall receive
and if we knock we we the door will be opened. The doors of our hearts will be opened and God will pour out his holy
spirit upon us. Now the holy the the conscience can also be seared.
1 Timothy 4:12 1-2 says this. Now, the spirit expressly says that in later
times, some will renounce the faith by paying attention to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons through the
hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared with a hot iron. And so,
everybody has a conscience, but some people continually refuse the prompings and convictions of the Holy Spirit. And
so, after a while, their conscience is seared. They can no longer differentiate between right and wrong. They can no
longer differentiate what is morally right. So instinctively they go they follow their fallen desires and their
fallen lusts. And so you can have a seared conscience and a seared conscience happens when we pay attention
to the teachings of fallen spirits or the teachings of demons and through the hypocrisies of liars. So we know as
Adventists there is something called a great controversy. How do you say that here in Canada? Controversy or controversy.
Controversy. All right. Thank you. Won’t have a debate about that this morning. But the great controversy, we know
there’s a great controversy between Christ and Satan. But I want to share this morning is that great controversy
is lived out in my life and in your life. And the decisions we make on a daily
basis show our allegiance to the kingdom of God or our submission to the kingdom of Satan.
And as we yield to the temptations and the lies of Satan in our lives, so we develop a seared conscience. And a
seared conscience leads ultimately to the unforgivable sin where we can no longer hear or are sensitive to the
prompings of the Holy Spirit upon our conscience. When you have a seared conscience, your conscience becomes an
unreliable moral guide. And so Romans 14:23 says this, “For whatsoever does
not proceed from faith is sin.” This was a verse I used for many people
in the pandemic who had religious objection to the to the shots. It’s not just that God convicted me not to do it,
but this is another test that you have to actually believe it is God’s will for you to do something. And if you don’t
believe it is God’s will for you to do something, but do it, that in itself is also a sin.
Whatsoever does not proceed from faith is sin. So to go against God’s will as
revealed by the convicting power of the Holy Spirit in our conscience is a sin. So our conscience is to be informed and
nurtured by daily study of the word of God which is also truth and which like the Holy Spirit leads us to the
incarnate word of God himself Jesus Christ and John 16:8 you see the verse
on there in the screen speaking about the Holy Spirit this is Jesus speaking in the upper room Jesus taught this he
says and when he comes that is the Holy Spirit he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment
and so if we want to protect protect and preserve our conscience. Jesus in asks us to invite the Holy Spirit to daily
convict us of sin. Jesus asks us to ask the Holy Spirit to daily lead us to the righteousness of Christ. And Jesus asks
us daily to ask the Holy Spirit to remind us of how we are spared eternal judgment only through our daily union
with Jesus Christ. So let us come then to the separation of church and state in scripture.
And we’ve already touched on this. Um, brother Zurkl has mentioned this. Yes. Last night, brother Jay Cameron spoke
about this. And this is the most famous proof text, you might say, that we have in the scripture for the separation of
church and state. And uh, this is the story. I’m going to read it out. You can follow me. Many of us already know this
story well. It’s taken from Matthew 22 15-22. And it says, “Then the Pharisees
went and plotted to entrap him in what he said. So they sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians, saying,
“Teacher, we know that you are sincere and teach the way of God in accordance with truth and show deference to no one,
for you do not regard people with partiality. Tell us then, what do you think? Is it lawful to pay taxes to the
CRA or not?” But Jesus, aware of their malice, said,
“Why are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin used for the tax.” And they brought him a
Denarius. Then he said to them, “Who head is this and whose title?” They answered, “The emperors.” Then he said
to them, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperors and to God the things that are gods.” When they
heard this, they were amazed and they left him and went away. So Jesus teaches
four basic principles in this passage about the separation of church and state. One is this. Jesus recognized the
legitimate claims and authority of the civil state upon the individual. We are
to render unto Caesar what is Caesars’s. I’m sorry about that, folks.
You have no liberty of conscience objection to income tax.
You may have a fallen nature reaction to income tax, but you don’t have a liberty of conscience objection to income tax.
So Jesus recognizes that government, which we read in Romans 13, is instituted by the authority of God for
the good of society. That government does have a legitimate claim upon the
citizens of the nation. But Jesus also affirms in this passage in this teaching
that God also has a legitimate claim on the individual as well. So we live as
citizens of Canada um and we have legal obligations to the government of Canada but we also have obligations to God.
Both of these are are explained in this passage here. Then Jesus also affirms
here that when there is a clash we are to obey God rather than man.
But he also gave there was another lesson he gave us in this passage here. He said bring me a coin. and they
brought him a coin and on the head of the coin was a statue of Caesar just like today. Do you have coins here in
Canada that has the head of the queen on it? Yeah, we have the same in England. I think we have George Washington on our
pennies in America. Is that right, Jonathan? A quarter. Yeah, I I don’t I can’t
remember the last time I saw a coin. Anyway, um Jesus held up a coin that we have today like the picture of Queen
Elizabeth, the picture of of of uh of um Julius Caesar on it, Tiberius at the
time, the king. And Jesus said, “Whose image is this?”
The emperors. All right? So gives the emperor what belongs to the emperor.
We understand that the coin bears Caesar’s image. So the coin belongs to
Caesar. But in Genesis 1 27, we are all created
in the image of God. Each every person here today bears the image of God.
Therefore, just as the coin belongs to Caesar, we belong to God.
And that means that our primary responsibility, our primary obedience, our primary submission, our primary love
is not for Caesar or the powers of this world, but it is for our heavenly father. Amen.
We belong to God. We are his property. We were redeemed with a price. We
redeemed with the precious blood of the lamb of God. Therefore, we are to honor God in all aspects of how we live our
lives, including how we treat our bodies. That principle came to the four in the
last four to five years. So, never forget this. We may live in a secular society, but you bear the image of God.
You are his image bearer. And one of the one of the reasons that we are Christians is for God to restore in lost
humanity his perfect image that has been defaced by sin. Amen. What that means is that if God is
restoring in us his image, it means that we expect to grow as Christians. We
expect our characters to be purified. We expect our characters to be enobled. We
don’t get up in the morning and say, “Tonight I’m going to be the same person that got up in the morning.” We are looking to grow as disciples of Jesus
Christ. We are looking for every day his image to be more perfectly reflected in our characters. Do you know when silver
is is completely pure? Do you know how you know? You can see your reflection perfectly in the silver. So when they’re
refining silver and they put it through the refining process, they know the silver is pure and polished when you can
see the maker’s face in the reflection of the silver. And we are purified as gold and silver to reflect our heavenly
father’s image. So if we say I bear my father’s image, it means Lord help me
not to be the same man in the evening as the man who got up this morning. Amen. I’m looking to grow spiritually. I’m
looking to gain victory over those besetting sins. I’m looking to gain victory over the works of the flesh that
hold me back. And I’m looking for a manifestation of the fruit of the Holy Spirit ever more fully in my life on a
daily basis. So when we talk about liberty of conscience, it’s not just I don’t want to do this that the
government mandates or I don’t want to do this that my employer is mandating. Liberty of conscience is an invitation
to become more and more Christlike because I bear the image of my creator. He wants to recreate it more perfectly
in my life and my character on a daily basis. And my creator wants the world to see his image in who I am and how I live
my life. It’s an invitation to spiritual growth, to spiritual maturity. As
Newton, the um the slave trader once famously said, he used to take slaves across the Atlantic. He said, um, I’m
not the man that I want to be, but by God’s grace, neither am I the man that I used to be. And he was speaking of what
God did in his life to turn him from a slave trader in a storm in the Atlantic to becoming a champion for God when he
gave his life to God on that ship in the ocean. So, let’s uh come then to what Martin Luther had to say about liberty
of conscience. We touched briefly on this last night and we were very familiar with what Martin Luther said at
the diet of vorms but before that he was actually quite prolific in his writings. He wrote um he wrote a book called an
appeal to the German nobility um back in 1520 the year before he appeared at the
diet of worms. And in the appeal to the German nobility Luther was appealing to the German nobles to stick true to the
principles of the reformation that he had been teaching. uh the appeal to the German nobility. I preached a sermon
once called an appeal to the Adventist nobility. That’s why I I called it this because I was appealing to our leaders
to stay true to the principles of Protestantism. And um on that day, it was the 15th of
January 2022. These dates kind of burn in my memory. There was a lot of people at that event at my local church, a
village, 7th avenist church in Baron Springs, Michigan. I went home that night and I went down with Omicron.
you know that version of COVID. Now thankfully I had a supply of horse
dewormer at home and I took my supply of horse dewormer
otherwise known as ivamein and the next day I was up and about and healthy again. And my wife said to me on the
Sabbath night she says Karen she said you better not die after preaching a sermon like that.
But Luther wrote his appeal to the German nobility in 1520 and he spoke
there about how that the papal system was not listening to any appeal to
reason or scripture to reform. And what he said there um he said the Romanists
have raised three barriers against all reformation. When the temporal power has attacked them they have denied its
authority and asserted that the spiritual power was superior to it. when anyone rebuked them out of scripture,
they’ve answered that no one but the pope should be able to interpret scripture. We saw that last night with the doctrine of authoritative
interpretation. Then he goes on to say when they have been threatened with a council, the reply has been no one but
the sovereign pontiff has the authority to convoke um to convoke a council. And
so before Luther stood at the diet of verms, he was already saying the papal system is immune to any cause for
reformation. when you argue with them from scripture, they say only the pope can can rule and
can determine the authority of interpretation of scripture. He said when the civil authorities claim authority over the papacy, the papacy
says the spiritual rules in the realm of life rather than the the civic. And when anybody um tries to call a church
council to reform the church, they say only the only the not the general conference president, only the pope can
can call the uh session. That was an unfortunate slip of the tongue.
It really was unfortunate. So he nailed his thesis to the door of
the Vittenberg Castle. He stood at the diet of worms in 1521.
And we saw these words last night. Famous words. Unless I’m convicted by scripture and plain reason. I do not
accept the authority of popes and councils because they’ve contradicted each other. My conscience is captive to
the word of God. I cannot and will not recount anything for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. So
help me God. Or some versions say here I stand, so help me God. Amen.
For Martin Luther, if you read the writings of Luther, our conscience is that God-given faculty by which God
speaks to us and reveals his his perfect will for each of our lives. And Luther’s
revolutionary contributions liberty of council was the freeing of man’s relationship with God from the need for
intercession by a human priestly hierarchy. Based on the word of God, Luther argued that no human priest has
authority to intervene or to come between a man and God. He argued that any individual guided by his or her
conscience can communicate with God in prayer and Bible study and can both seek and receive full forgiveness and the for
their sins and the promise of salvation with no need for a priest, a pastor, a bishop or a conference president to hear
confession, declare absolution, determine penance or to pervert the Lord’s supper into the mass. So for
Martin Luther then coming through to Roger Williams, the conscience becomes the most intimate meeting point between
God and man. That’s where God speaks to you. We may have our we may have our Bibles here, but when you read your
Bible, it goes into your mind, but the conviction comes upon your conscience.
The conscience is the meeting ground between man and God. Therefore, it is to
be sacred. And Christians are to be guided by communication with God through
their conscience and their understanding of the gospel. And so Luther championed liberty of conscience over church cannon
law and papal supremacy. And Luther practiced what he preached. After the diet of vorams he was, you might say,
um, taken captive and he went to the Vortberg castle in Germany and he translated the Bible into German.
and his translation of the German Bible has has profoundly influenced the the German language ever since. And it’s
just like the King James version had a profound impact on the English-speaking world. So the Luther’s New Testament,
the Old Testament has has had a profound influence upon German society. You know,
there were times where he added words, “The just shall live by faith in Romans 1:17.” Luther added the word alone. Like
he wanted to make sure you got the point. So the German New Testament says the just shall live by faith alone. Now
that word alone doesn’t appear in the in the Greek, but it’s certainly there in Luther’s New Testament. So he added a
few like little I going to make sure everybody gets the point here. But for Martin Luther and then comes through to
Roger Williams, your conscience is the meeting place between you and God.
Your husband, your wife, your children, your parents, your mothers-in-law, your
employer, your government, the social media cannot trample upon that sacred meeting place.
It’s between you and the Lord. And it is our privilege and our responsibility as followers of Jesus to
nurture that conscience. Amen. Because the longer you walk with Jesus and the more you read his teachings and
put them into practice, the more sensitive you become to the convictions of the Holy Spirit.
So I I’ve been married almost 26 years as this December is our 26th wedding
anniversary. Um do you know the story about my 20th wedding anniversary on hog hunting?
No. So, it was in August 2019 and my wife who’s very gracious and she
knows I don’t have a good memory in general. She said to me, “What would you like to do for our 20th wedding
anniversary?” And I said, “Well, what do you mean what would I like to do? I know my 20th
wedding anniversary what you want to do. We want to go to, you know, Olive Garden or something like that.” But she said, “No, I want to know what you want to
do.” And I said, “You honestly want to know what I want to do?” You know, for guys in America, April 15th, tax day is
the most important date of the year. Wedding anniversaries come and go, but tax years have genuine consequences if
you forget those. So my wife said to me, “Well, I’d like to know what you would like to do.” And I said, “Well, this
isn’t a trick question.” She says, “No.” I said, “Do you genuinely want to know what I would like to do?” She said, “Yes.” I said, “Do you want me to be
honest with you?” She said, “Well, that would be nice.” I said, “Okay.” I said, “Do you want me to be vulnerable by what’s going on in my heart?” She said,
“Yes, please.” I said, ‘ Do you want me to be authentic about this? Well, yes. Yes. Would you like me to be present for
this conversation? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. These are all the marital counseling buzzwords that, you know, people learn
about. So, I took my life in my hands. I took a deep breath breath. I said,
“Well, I was hoping we could go to Texas for a 3-day hog hunt.”
Now, the book of Revelation says there was silence in heaven the space of half an hour.
There was silence in heaven in the space of half an hour. That was the fulfillment of that prophecy. And my
wife has she’s very calm. She has very little emotional oscillation. Um she she
kind of puts up with me and she kind of nurtures me and shapes me in good ways. And so I I could see that I hadn’t hit
the ball out of the ballpark. There was something in her eyes told me that that wasn’t a good suggestion. So I said,
“Well, are you upset about this?” She says, “A little.” She said, “Are you disappointed?” “Well, yes.” I said,
“Well, were you hoping for a 5-day hog hunt?” And she said, “No.”
So, she said, “I’m going to rewind the clock 30 seconds, and I’m going to ask the question again, and you’re going to give me the right answer.”
There is a right answer. So, it’s not what I want to do, but there is a right answer. So, I we round
we reround the clock and she says, “What would you like to do for our wedding anniversary?” And I said, “Well, I was
hoping we could go to Texas for a mini safari.” She says, “No, we ain’t going hog hunting in Texas. I’ll ask you
again.” So she asked me again. I said, “I was hoping we could go on an ecoourism trip to southern Texas.” She
says, “No, we’re not going hog hunting in Texas.” She says, “This is your final opportunity.” Ah.
So she asked me again and I said, “Well, I was really hoping we could go to Olive Garden.” That was the right answer.
And what moral lessons we learned from this tale is that it is not popular to tell the truth in end time events.
It is not popular to talk about the truth in the end times. Now, how did we get on to that? All right. Um,
I’m not sure how we got on to that. Anyway, the point is this. Um,
your conscience is sacred, but you need to nurture it.
And if you don’t actively nurture it, it will wither just with the temptations of life.
Amen. So nurture your conscience and then be willing to live and to speak the
truth that the Holy Spirit has convicted you of. And the more you are willing to do that, the more sensitive your conscience
becomes and the clearer the voice of God becomes in your life. And so as coming
back to I’ve been married for 25 26 years now if somebody asks me a question like would you and your wife like to do
X Y or Z I already know in advance what the answer is because after 25 years of living together I know what she thinks
and she knows what I think. And if somebody says would you like to go with us to the certain place if they ask my
wife my wife will say yes or no because she knows what she thinks and she knows what I think and she knows what the outcome of a discussion on the matter
would be. So after a while, you don’t need to discuss anything because you actually know what the other person is going to say already. Some of you are
nodding. Yes. Yes. Some with smiles on your faces and some with tears in your eyes. I can see that. But you know
already what the other person is going to think. The point is as you walk with the Lord through your life, the voice of
the Holy Spirit becomes stronger and stronger upon your convictions. And when the Holy Spirit convicts us, it is our
privilege to live and to walk in the light that God gives us.
So then we come to the general conference’s definition of religious liberty.
Now this is from the general conference working policy manual. It’s actually a very fine statement. This is in the the
the passage relating to public affairs and religious liberty. It says there
religious liberty includes the fundamental human right to have adopt or change one’s religion or religious
belief according to conscience and to manifest and practice one’s religion individually or in fellowship with other
believers in prayer devotions witness and teaching including the observance of a weekly day of rest in h and worship in
harmony with the precepts of one’s own of one’s religion subject to respect for the equivalent rights of others public
affairs and religious liberty One of the original core departments of the church was initially established to promote and
maintain religious liberty with particular emphasis upon the most intimate freedom, individual liberty of
conscience. And I put that last bit in red because that is so important. We as a world church have recognized that the
most intimate of freedoms is your liberty of conscience. This is why you know in the American
constitution in the bill of rights the first amendment to the bill of rights the first sentence in the first
amendment to the bill of rights is saying that congress shall not make make no law regarding the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof. That is the the US framers of the constitution recognized that the foundation for all other civil
liberties is the right to think for yourself without condemnation. the idea
to think not just the thinkable but sometimes to think the unthinkable. That is how progress takes place within
society. But in the pandemic, many of you already know this, our general conference issued what we now call the
reaffirmation statement in October 21, which actually suspended religious liberty for members worldwide. And this
is the core paragraph. And uh all the rest of the paragraph is kind of like yeah, it’s kind of waffle essentially.
But uh there was one paragraph that was used by employers worldwide to deny liberty of conscience to Adventists
worldwide. And it says this. It says, “The 7th Adventist Church in consultation with the health ministries
and public affairs and religious liberty departments, the general conference of 7th Adventists is convinced that the
vaccination programs that are generally being carried out are important for the safety and health of our members and the
larger community.” That’s the greater good argument right there. Therefore, claims of religious liberty are not used
appropriately in objecting to government mandates or employer programs designed to protect the health and safety of
their communities. And as we’re going to see later this afternoon, and I’ve got some sermons on this coming up in Maine
in a couple of weeks time, um that the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights says that everybody has certain
rights, but paragraph 29.2 2 and 29.3 of the Declaration of Human Rights says
that your human rights are subject to the general welfare of society,
which means that you don’t actually have any human rights. You’re allowed to do what the government thinks is okay
today. But if you step outside what the government says in the UN HDR human
rights declaration paragraph 29.2 29.3, you actually don’t have any inalienable
rights. You only have temporary permissions from the government. That’s the net effect of the UN declaration on
human rights. And this is the document that the general conference approves in some of its statements. We’ve bought
into this idea. And this is how this is what affects our statement here during the pandemic. The general conference
essentially says, “No, you don’t have any individual liberty of conscience on this matter because the governments of
the world have determined otherwise.” that the common good overrides
individual liberty of conscience. With this statement, our leaders made an official declaration to every member
worldwide that your deeply held, prayerfully considered convictions do not provide a valid basis for religious
exemption. They were essent essentially stating that they had the right to override the convictions of the Holy
Spirit upon your consciences here in Canada. That is a claim to authority that has no basis in scripture
whatsoever. In 1 Corinthians 2 um 2 Corinthians 2 uh 1 24 the Apostle Paul
says this. He says I do not mean to imply that we lord it over your faith. Rather we are workers with you for your
joy because you stand in the faith. Now this passage teaches us that church leaders do not have the responsibility
to dictate personal convictions. But it is the privilege and responsibility of leaders um to support
and encourage each believer in their own individual walk with the Lord. True leadership protects the conscience as
the meeting place between every member and their creator rather than seeking to override the conscience. John 10:27
Jesus says this, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me.”
So the role of leaders is not to say to people follow us. The role of leaders is
to nurture in the members their ability to hear, recognize and follow the good
shepherd, not to follow the leaders themselves. We are to follow the good
shepherd, not our human leaders. And in order to do this, we must nurture sensitive consciences uh in order that
we can recognize the voice of the Holy Spirit. So, do you recognize the voice of the
Holy Spirit? Which voice do you listen to?
Do you listen to mainstream media? Do you listen to right-wing or left-wing
shock jocks on the radio and talk sports and stuff like that? Do you follow CNN
or Fox or what you have up here in Canada, its equivalents? Do you follow Jordan Peterson or do you follow KL
Marx? Do you follow um Elon Musk on Twitter and say, you know, what does what does he have to say that’s going to
decide what I think for today? Or are you actively choosing to listen to the good shepherd on a daily basis?
Let’s be honest with ourselves. Whose voice are you listening to when
you drive home from work? Are you put the scripture on the radio on the telephone or on the radio or do you
listen to the local sports channel? When your mind is empty and you’re
sitting in traffic, you know, when you’re sitting in traffic, your mind kind of goes somewhere. Ask yourself, where does my mind go when it’s in idle
mode? Be honest with yourself. It’s probably not a good place. take that as
an indicator for the need for sanctification that we need to elevate our thoughts and think continually upon
heavenly themes. And so this Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them and
they follow me.” Means that the responsibility of leaders of pastors,
many of us here are are teachers. We’re Sabbath school teachers. We’re elders. We’re deacons. We’re deacons. Our
primary responsibility in the body of Christ is to teach those around us to recognize and to understand and have the
courage to follow the will of the good shepherd. But if we’re not doing it in our own lives, how can we model it for
other people around us? So liberty of conscience isn’t just about I don’t want the vaccine. All of a
sudden I’ve become a passionate believer in religious liberty. No, religious liberty is saying I’m choosing to live
for, to walk with, listen to, and uphold my Lord and Savior on a daily basis.
So the core question after COVID for the Adventist Church is whether individual
liberty of conscience is absolute or whether it must submit to the common good as defined by our godless
governments. If the common good overrides individual liberty of conscience, then whoever defines the
common good has ultimate control over your conscience and takes the place of God, which is essentially the spirit of
antichrist. Which is why I said in the pandemic, we aligned ourselves with antichrist in
what we did to our members. So let’s come then to liberty of conscience and wider society. This is the last of our
sections here this morning. And this these are important discussions because people may view um uh followers of
Christ as being troublemakers. Like why do you have to listen to your conscience? Why don’t you just listen to what Dr. Fouchy says or what the the the
public health authorities say? Why can’t you just fall in line with everybody else? Well, there are certain reasons
why liberty of conscience is essential for a flourishing society. whether that society is secular or Christian,
Protestant or Catholic. We already heard this morning from brother um Zurkl uh that when Pennsylvania offered religious
freedom, people flocked to Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania thrived as a state
because they offered religious liberty. So why is liberty of conscience so important for Canada today and for
America today? Why is it so important for so-called secular societies? There are a number of reasons. The first is
this that liberty of conscience has a direct reflection on our inherent natural rights. See, as Christians, we
don’t just stand for tolerance. We stand for liberty of conscience. And this is essential for the exercise of our
inherent natural rights. Each one of us um asks at some point in
our life the big questions of life. Who am I? Where did I come from? Where am I
going? And how do I know where I’m going? These are the big questions of life.
These are the questions of life that add meaning and purpose to life today.
It’s not what job do I have or how much money is in the bank or is my stomach full? Do I have a nice home? The
important questions of life are the existential questions. Who am I? How do I fit into the cosmos? Do I have
eternity to look forward to or not? Liberty of conscience recognizes the
rights of every individual to pursue those transcendent questions which provide temporal meaning to our lives
today. This right is inalienable given to us by our creator and it is not a
temporary or temporal right given us by our governments. By respecting liberty of conscience therefore and our
inalienable inherent natural rights, governments recognize that our consciences are answerable to a higher
authority than the law of the land. And thus governments will be wise to encourage individual decisions in
harmony with good conscience. A population that is governed by the
Holy Spirit is going to be a very peaceful community, a law-abiding community.
And so if governments um um uphold liberty of conscience for all citizens, it’s going to lead to social
flourishing. When we come to liberty of conscience and civil liberties,
li the liberty of conscience is the foundation for all of our civil liberties within western societies.
Without liberty of conscience, the freedom to think for ourselves in all aspects of life and faith would be at
risk. That is why the US first amendment to the bill of rights enshrines religious liberty as the foundation of
all other civil liberties within our constitution. We heard this morning about Alexis Dtoqueville. Uh I don’t
have the quotes on the screen, but this is what he wrote. I’m quoting. He said, “In America, it is religion which leads
to enlightenment and the observance of divine laws that leads men to liberty. Freedom sees in religion the companion
of its struggles and its triumphs, the cradle of its infancy, the divine source of its rights. It considers religion as
the safeguard of the mores or the social customs and mores as the guarantee of the laws and the pledge of its duration.
So liberty of conscience is the foundation for all other civil liberties that we have in our society because
liberty of conscience enshrines the right of everybody to think for themselves.
There was a bill here in Parliament in Canada a few years ago. Was it C6 mandated pronouns?
And Jordan Peterson shot to global fame over that. So because if you control what I say, you’re controlling what I’m
thinking because you speak out of your what you what what is in your head comes out in your speech. And so if the
government wants to control what you say, it means the government is controlling the the space between the
two ears up here. That’s that’s something you don’t see in any society worldwide that that that honors any kind
of civil rights or liberty of conscience. The next benefit of liberty of conscience is it leads to a
self-governing population. And this was a core idea in the American Revolution that the American do constitution is
designed for a moral people and it cannot work with an immoral people. that the virtue derived from religion is
indispensable for a self-governing family people and for limited government. If you have a self-governing
people, it means that families will regulate themselves. Families will regulate their relationships with their
neighbors. Um, communities will regulate their relationships with other communities. And this means you don’t
need massive government programs of intervention to fix social ills. Liberty of conscience leads to active
congregations. It leads to religious families and other private associations that exercise a moral authority in the
lives of their believers and their members. And that’s essential if we’re to maintain limited government and
enhance self-government. Do you know what the most violent place in America is today?
It’s the high security prisons. You see, the more government regulates your behavior, the less of a human you
are and more of an animal you become. The more you restrict our opportunity to make moral decisions, the less of a
moral being you are. And so if the government is to encourage moral decision-making in its population,
it needs to expand the boundaries of liberty of conscience. But the more the government controls you
and regulates you, the more it makes decisions for you, the less ability you have to think and make decisions for
yourself. And so liberty of conscience is essential for a self-governing population. Virtue and religion are
essential to preserving the moral conditions necessary for political and personal freedom. This leads us to
liberty of conscience and personal flourishing. Liberty is of conscience is essential for personal and family
flourishing. The pursuit of truth, meaning and purpose. Finding our pl place in the cosmos and in the flow of
time adds meaning and purpose to life today. That’s a core component of what it means to be human. So this requires
liberty of conscience for us to pursue understanding, purpose, and meaning within a society that respects religious
observance and religious practice. And liberty of conscience also benefits society because it leads to faith-based
communities. It is the Christian charities and the
churches of North America that do invaluable work for social work and alleviate the needs of the poor in our
societies. When you have communities of faith, they will self-organize and
self-regulate within a shared moral framework that benefits not just the members of that community of faith but
also wider society. So, religious liberty and liberty of conscience means that faith becomes a personal identity
and also is expressed as a social responsibility. So, people of faith tend to be the most generous in giving for
charity. They dominate in the voluntary provision of social services, housing, emergency medical care, emergency
relief, refugee assistance, ministries to the addicted, those with alcohol and porn and gambling etc. and personal
support for the flourishing in society. And so liberty of conscience leads to a
society where we are free to express the teachings of Jesus in looking after the
poor in our society. And then finally, liberty of conscience and social flourishing. When
individuals, families, and small groups flourish under the conditions of religious freedom, wider society will
naturally flourish. The pursuit of truth is not just existential. It is also temporal and guides how we treat our
family members, our neighbors, those we disagree with, those who have no faith, and those outside of our own faith
community. Governments that respect liberty of conscience tend to respect our other civil freedoms as well.
Liberty of conscience around the world has a strong correlation with political liberty, economic freedom, freedom of
speech, and wider societal outcomes such as health outcomes in society. Strong
liberty of conscience within societies worldwide, repeated research has shown leads to less armed conflict, better
health outcomes, personal higher income, higher personal income levels, and better educational and social outcomes
for women within those societies. As Samuel Adams wrote in 1778, religion and
good morals are the only solid foundations of public liberty and happiness.
So what do we say in conclusion today? Liberty of conscience 101.
There are many reasons why we stand for liberty of conscience. Even if you just use an egalitarian argument or an
utilitarian argument, if you have a secular neighbor who doesn’t believe in religion, you can still argue why
liberty of conscience is a profound blessing to Canada and why the absence of liberty of conscience would lead dark
Canada into a new dark ages. Martin Luther King said this. He said, “The church must be reminded that it is not
the master nor the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of
the state and never its tool. A wise teaching from Martin Luther King.
Societies are changed. Hearts are changed not because government make mandates but because Christians live and
shine for Jesus and win people for his kingdom. It’s because we live the authentic Christian life and we show
people what it means to be transformed by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. that can never be comp compelled. You
know, we I was grew up on a farm in Ireland and I know this when you have cattle, you drive them from behind. You
can’t lead cattle. You drive them from behind with a with a prod. But if you have a flock of sheep, you can never
lead sheep from behind. You can only lead sheep from the front. Sheep will follow the shepherds, but if you walk in
front of your cattle, they won’t follow you. You have to drive them. And so the church is to be God’s representatives in
a dying society and in a dying world. My last quote is this. The church may be a visible institution
today. We are the SDA church in Canada up here. But the true church of God is
comprised not of institutions but of faithful disciples. They will live out their faith in Jesus
Christ within a local community of disciples of Jesus. Sister White says this, my favorite Christian author. She
says, “God has a church. It is not the great cathedral. Neither is it the national establishment. Neither is it
the various denominations. It is the people who love God and keep his commandments. Where two or three are
gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them. Where Christ is, even the humble few, this is Christ’s
church. For the presence of the high and holy one who inhabitth eternity can alone constitute a church.
So, I want to challenge you today if we’re going to stand for liberty of conscience in Canada.
There’s many things we could do. We could march in the streets. We could create websites. We could create lobby
groups and pressure groups. But it comes down to this. you in your private room
at home, communion with your heavenly father, talking with him in prayer, learning to
listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit, daily feeding upon his word, living for
God in the quietness of life. The best single thing I can do in my life to
promote liberty of conscience in my community and in my in my nation is to live out the teachings of Jesus on a
daily basis. It is not to compel. It is not to criticize. It is not to coersse.
But it’s to be a champion of the teachings of Jesus. When people see me and they see how I live with my wife and
with our children, it’s my prayer that they will say, “I want to live in the same way. I want to know how life is
different for this family as opposed to the rest of the families in my neighborhood.” If people see Jesus in
us, they will be drawn to the savior of the world and their lives will be transformed along with their
interpersonal relationships. This cannot be compelled or coerced. It happens when
we are born again and ask Jesus to be our Lord and Savior. And it’s my prayer that as we live here in Canada in a
secular nation that is promoting a godless ideologies all around us. When I
arrived yesterday in the airport, there was a Canadian flag and a pride flag side by side at Canadian customs.
In in a nation that is promoting godlessness, this nation needs a manifestation of the
character of God like never before. And that will win people through the love of God and the grace of the Holy
Spirit and the presence of our heavenly father. So shine for Jesus. Walk with
walk with Jesus in your personal lives and allow the presence of Jesus to shine through you because we are ambassadors
of Christ to the nation of Canada. And in so doing, people will be one for God’s kingdom. Amen.