Assimilation Is Impossible

“And Haman said unto king Ahasuerus, There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people; neither keep they the king’s laws: therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them.” (Es 3:8 AV)

 

No matter how much one backslides, they cannot hide the fact of their relationship to the LORD.  Israel is now in Babylon.  They are under the control of the Medes and Persians.  Ahasuerus is king and his steward is one Haman.  When Haman leaves the palace for home, he traverses before Mordechai, Esther’s uncle.  Being a Jew, Mordechai refuses to bow in obeisance to Haman as he would before a king.  This angers Haman.  Haman makes the above argument to the king as means to exterminate all Jews from the kingdom.  Note, however, the reasoning behind this desire.  It is because the laws of the Jews are different from the laws of all other nations.  Even those laws they hold in common.  Namely, to worship someone in authority.  Now, when we consider the Jews had been in captivity for decades under the laws of a pagan kingdom, one would think every vestige of Jewish law would have dissolved.  But it didn’t.  What made the nation of Israel different remained.  They backslid in a foreign land, yet still retained enough of their identity to make them different.  In other words, a backsliding Christian can reject the tenants of his faith only to a certain point.  No matter how backslidden he gets, he cannot remove all of Christ.

One cannot get away with hiding what he truly is.  I have lived in the Northeast, the Southeast, and the Mid-west.  Each has a distinct culture.  There are subcultures within those cultures.  There is urban culture.  There is a suburban culture.  There is a rural culture.  What one is can be easily determined.  When I lived in the southeast, I tried to assimilate the culture as best I could.  I learned to eat grits.  And liked them!  I learned to eat catfish.  I learned to play gospel bluegrass.  I learned to like cornbread dressing.  I learned to laugh, a lot!  I learned who was related to who.  I learned better ways to say things that might be an offense to some.  I learned to use words like “ya’ll”, “you’uns”, “reckon”, “fixin’”, and “figure”.  I learned sayings like, “blow the soot out of ‘er”, or “smarter than a white pig”, or “having a come-a-part”.  Most importantly, I learned the proper use of the phrase, “bless her/his heart”.  There were times when I incorporated a southern-style accent into my speech.  However hard I tried to assimilate, I was never able to fully convince anyone I was from that area of the country.  Something would give me away.  Like finishing my words that ended in ‘ing’ by pronouncing the ‘g’.  Or referencing the forecasted temperature by the high of the day rather than the extreme of the day or night temperature.  Or not drinking a whole lot of sweet tea.  No matter the effort, the south simply could not eradicate all the Yankee that was in me.

The believer who thinks he can hide among the world, no matter how much he tries to be like them, will never be like them.  The world will push to a point the child of God cannot cross.  He will be tempted to reject all evidence of a relationship with God only to have to deal with a conscience made alive by the Spirit.  They will ask him to do something that his conscience will not allow.  At that moment, the laws will differ and his cover will be blown.  Not only has the child of God rejected God, but now the friends of the world have rejected him!  It is better to live for God than to live against Him only to find out that doesn’t work either.  The world will never accept a partly compromised Christian.  And that is the worst you will ever be.  But there is a God who will love You at all times.  All you have to do is to come to Him.