10 Values
You and I do it every day. In fact, we do it a hundred times a day. It is inescapable because we were designed to do it. What we desire, what we choose, what we decide, how we react, what we place our hopes and dreams on, what we commit ourselves to, where we feel disappointment and anger, where we persevere, and when we quit are all determined by this. It causes us to be divided and it makes us assemble into tribes. It causes us to idolize some people and pity others. Every day, in more ways than we tend to be aware of, we assign value to things. Every day we act, react, and respond based on what we think is important and what we have decided is not. We are all value-oriented, purpose-oriented, importance-oriented, goal-oriented human beings. Everything we do and say, we do and say in pursuit of what is valuable to us. Between the “already” and the “not yet” we all live with a values struggle. Different value systems tempt and tug at us. And we will never understand the importance and struggles of values until we understand that this is not just a battle of competing value systems but a struggle of worship.
I am blown away by the depth of insight found in the pages of God’s word and how radically different its analysis of the problems of life is. We find nothing like it anywhere else. The Bible offers us a deep and penetrating analysis of human beings and why they do the things they do. Its analysis is far from being simple; it is layered and able to deal with the complexities of human motivation and behavior. We would do well not to abandon the diagnostic splendor of Scripture for other analyses that fail to get at the heart of our dysfunction. When it comes to our personal operational systems of value, the Bible has a lot to offer. And this topic is important for this book because underneath toxic reactivity are deeply held, thought-engaging, and reaction-shaping values.
The values that drive the way we react are not so much rooted in instilled family values or cultural values systems, although they are very influential, but in something deeper and more determinative: worship. This statement requires definition and explanation. So what is worship? When most people think of worship, they think of formal, visible, gathered religion. They think of a Sunday morning service with all its familiar traditions. But a vast percentage of our worship takes place outside of Sunday morning formal worship. The worship that actually shapes and directs your life is informal, often unnoticed, and takes place in the regular spaces, activities, and relationships of your daily life. Whether you know it or not, you never stop worshiping. The most self-consciously religious person and the most avowedly irreligious person share one thing in common: they both worship every day in places where they might never think that worship exists.
To understand how this can be, you have to understand that worship is not just an activity that some people give themselves to. No, worship is a fundamental identity that all people share. To be human means you are a worshiping being. Your heart, being the control center of your personhood, was designed by God to be a worship center. In others words, our hearts are always being ruled by something. You and I are always living for something. We are always living in pursuit of something that we think will deliver life (however we define it) to us. Jesus captures this worship dynamic with the word treasure (Matt. 6:19–21). A treasure is something of value that is worth seeking, possessing, enjoying, and celebrating. Embedded in Christ’s teaching are three “treasure principles”:
1. Everyone lives for some kind of treasure.
2. The thing that is your treasure will control your heart.
3. What controls your heart will control your words and behavior.
You may be wondering what this has to do with the socially dysfunctional mess that social media has become. Here it is. You will never fully understand that mess until you understand that it is driven by treasure. Certain values drive the toxicity that darkens our digital conversation every day. Whether they know it or not, people post in pursuit of treasure because that’s who human beings are and that’s what human beings do. You could argue that everything we do and everything we say, we do and say in pursuit of some kind of treasure. If you’re arguing your friend into a humiliating corner, you are doing so because winning is a more valuable treasure to you at that point than relationship. If you’re working so much that you have become an absentee father and husband, then it may be that material success is a more valuable treasure to you than family. If you are scanning porn sites on your work computer, then sexual pleasure is more valuable to you than being a trustworthy and faithful employee. If you are eating your way into obesity and poor health, then the pleasure of food is a more valuable treasure to you than your physical well-being. And if you troll people on social media, then the clickbait takedown has become a more valuable treasure to you than gentle, patient, kind, and merciful love.
The Bible makes it clear that there are only two categories of treasure. Jesus says that your heart is captivated by either treasure on earth or treasure in heaven (Matt. 6). The apostle Paul says that you are either worshiping the Creator or worshiping the creation (Rom. 1). Everything we do or say is shaped, driven, and directed by one of these. God designed our worship orientation to drive us to him in love, service, joyful submission, and satisfaction of heart. Sin causes us to turn from God and give our hearts in love, service, and submission to an endless catalog of God-replacements, asking the created thing to give us the contentment of heart that only God can give. This means that everything you say or post is shaped by a heart that is ruled either by God or by something in the creation. You and I always say what we say and do what we do in pursuit of something.
Let me give you the bottom line and then explain it. If we have worshiped our way into this toxic mess, then to solve it we will have to worship our way out. What you do, what you say, how you see your world, how you assess situations and people, what you think is right and wrong, how you respond when feeling wronged, how you make choices and decisions, and how you evaluate how you’ve acted and reacted are all shaped and controlled by what you worship. Whatever has control of your heart, whatever is most important to you, whatever you’ve determined you can’t live without, that is, whatever you worship will always be exposed by how you conduct yourself on social media or in your everyday relationships at home, work, church, and in the public arena. So, if you are a regular part of the toxic reactivity that has stained these arenas, the way out is not some new set of social-media or personal-relationship rules. The way out is not reaction management; no, it’s worship realignment.
Perhaps the Christian social media landscape is what it now is because we don’t love God as much as we say we do. Perhaps the way we react and respond to one another exposes the reality that we don’t actually love what God loves or value what he values. Perhaps what we want, what we think we deserve, or what we think someone else deserves is more important to us than God’s holy call and honor. Perhaps, at street level, our allegiance is to another kingdom rather than his kingdom of righteousness, truth, and love. Perhaps we want to be king rather than loyal servants of the King.
You see, the meanness, rapid judgment, character assassination, cruelty, vengeance, and dismissal that lives on Christian social media is not first about breaking God’s rules; it’s about breaking relationship with the one who created these rules for us. Consider the Ten Commandments. You will keep God’s commands, you will value what he values, and you will love as he loves only when love for him and a desire for his honor is what effectively and functionally rules your heart. Your values are always formed by what you worship. Your choices are always shaped by what you worship. Your behavior is always directed by what you worship. Your words, digital or audible, are always controlled by what you worship. The culture of reactivity is a relationship/worship problem, and confessing this is the only way lasting change will ever take place.
Let me give you one example of what it would look like if God were in his rightful place in our hearts, so that we valued what he values. Consider with me Galatians 5:22–26:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.
This passage is a brilliant, clear, insightful, and transformative example of what God values. The passage begins with the word but because Paul is making a contrast between the fruit of the Spirit and the works of the flesh. As I stated earlier, he calls these character qualities fruit of the Spirit because they are only possible for us because of the power of the Holy Spirit living within us. Jesus lived as we could not live, died in our place, and rose victorious over sin and death so that you and I would not only have eternal life but also a new identity and new potential. That potential is made possible by the gift of the Spirit, who convicts of sin and empowers us to live in a brand-new way. God values the things in this passage so much that he was willing to make the most valuable and costly of sacrifices, the sacrifice of his Son, so that we could have these things in our lives. This means:
God values love.
God values joy.
God values patience.
God values kindness.
God values goodness.
God values faithfulness.
God values gentleness.
God values self-control.
The central question of this book is: In the situations, relationships, and social media interactions of our daily lives, do we? Is God so in control of the thoughts, desires, and motivations of our hearts that we value what he values, we love what he loves, and we want what he wants? What would it look like if every word that came out of us, personal or digital, were formed by us valuing what God values? How many things would we never post or say? How different would our reactions be to those who disagree with us? How different would our responses be to those who we feel have wronged us? How different would our defense of the truth be? How different would our responses be to those who we think are enemies of what is right, good, and true? How different would our responses be to people of different races, ethnicities, cultures, social class, position, or gender? How different would our goal for our words be? Here is the point. When you really do value what God values, by grace you are being rescued from you. You are being protected from all the dark reactive instincts that are the result of remaining sin. And when you are being rescued from you, you respond to others in brand-new, beautiful, and God-honoring ways.
This is why Paul concludes this passage the way he does. If you value what the Holy Spirit is working to produce in you and through you, then you will keep in step with him, that is, you will go, in all of your relationships, where he is going. This means:
The larger context of the passage is freedom, the freedom that only the grace of the gospel can ever give you. Grace frees you from your bondage to the idolatry, impurity, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, divisions, and envy of your former life. And grace not only frees you to live in a brand-new and much more beautiful way, but it also empowers you to do so. If this is so, then why would we not want to go where the Spirit is going? The only answer is because we don’t value what God values, because other things have replaced him in our hearts. Humbly confessing our functional idolatry is the first step in the change that is so desperately needed not just in the surrounding culture but in the Christian community as well. As we confess, we must remember that our problem is not just the control of evil desires in our hearts. The desire for even a good thing can become a bad thing if it becomes a ruling thing. It is good to want some control in your life, but if your heart is ruled by control, you will destroy your life and relationships. It’s good to want to be happy, but if happiness rules you, you will be endlessly demanding, frustrated, and angry. It’s good to want to know right and be right, but if being right rules you, you will be critical, unapproachable, judgmental, and unlivable. It’s good to want relationships, but if your heart is ruled by the acceptance of others, you will be entitled and demanding or paralyzed by fear of man. There is no other safe lord over your heart than the Lord of lords. And there is no better way of living than to value what he values.
I want to propose six street-level examples of what it means in our current cultural climate to value what God values.
Values That Counter a Reactive Culture
The gospel is of greater value than politics. If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, politics should not form your foundational worldview; the gospel should. If you are a believer, politics is not what should give you your identity; the gospel should. If you are a believer, political power should not give you hope; the gospel should. If you are a believer, you should give your life not to any earthly king but to the King of kings. In this moment, politics and political power have become too important, too central, and too life-shaping; they have become a seedbed of much division, acrimony, and reactivity in the Christian community.
Relationships are of greater value than dominating the conversation and winning the day. The gospel is entirely relational. Christ purchased for us peace with God and, through that peace, peace with one another. The gospel teaches us that our walk with God is not an individual pursuit but a community project. Second only to the command to love God above all else is the command to love your neighbor as yourself. The problem is that so much of our contact with one another, so much of our ongoing conversation, and so much of our debate of the issues of the day are no longer personal but digital. In this arena, people become dehumanized; they become post, clicks, or likes. Because we lose the sense of flesh-and-blood relationships that necessitate commitment and carry consequences, we allow ourselves to behave on social media in ways that are antisocial, not recognizing the value of our relationships with one another.
God’s honor is of greater value than your comfort, appreciation, and respect. So much of the toxic reactivity that greets us every day is the result of a self-focused, self-aggrandizing, and self-referencing way of looking at and experiencing the world. It is me in the center, and the offenses that grieve, anger, and motivate me the most are perceived offenses against me. It is an entitled and demanding way of living that never produces personal happiness or relational peace. The gospel of Jesus Christ is meant to produce in you a heart-shaping awe of God that makes his glory the thing that then directs everything you do and say. Self-glory always destroys community and is a sad substitute for the true peace and happiness that is to be found in living for the glory of one infinitely greater than you.
Unity is of greater value than individualism or tribalism. Sadly, sin causes us to be better at division than unity. Sin causes us to confuse unity with a demand for uniformity. Sin causes us to think that we can do individually what can only be accomplished in community with others. Sin causes us to divide into little issue/theology/affinity tribes, often treating those outside of our tribe as if they were the enemy. The very nature of social media is that it makes it all too easy to succumb to these temptations. Perhaps the evangelical church has never been more divided and more at war with itself than it is right now. In Jesus’s final prayer, he argues for the value of our unity with one another (see John 17). He argues that our unity with one another is meant to be a powerful argument for the gospel. You cannot read Scripture without concluding that this unity is not a luxury but essential for our continuing growth in grace and our ongoing witness to the world.
Love is of greater value than even the most subtle forms of hate. More than once people have reacted to something I tweeted with accusatory, character-judging, and dismissive responses. These kinds of responses do not come from a heart of love. They do not lovingly encourage me to reflect, reconsider, or repent. They are the words of judgment and dismissal. Sadly, they are posted by brothers and sisters in Christ, who are bound together with me in a unity that only the Holy Spirit can create. Together we are to be known for our love for one another. The subtle hatred of disrespect, dismissal, mockery, cancellation, and judgment never produces good fruit. When someone yells at you, you defend yourself; you don’t open up your heart. Only love has the power to break down my defenses, creating a safe place for me to take an honest look at myself. And love assures me that you are for me and will be with me even when sin and disagreement get in the way.
Character is of greater value than position or power. One functional idol in the current Christian culture is power. For the purpose of political power, we will compromise our character and close our eyes to the character flaws of the leaders we’ve attached our hopes to. In his word God listed the qualifications for leaders in his church. The entire list is a character list, with the exception of one skill set (the ability to teach). God’s call to every believer is “Be holy as I am holy.” Holiness forever trumps power. Holiness forever trumps position. Holiness is not only God’s call; it is what his grace works to produce in us every day. There are too many Christian bullies on social media. There are too many bully leaders in the church. No Christian community can remain healthy if the quest for power and position motivates us more than the beauty of godliness.
This chapter was a hard and convicting one to write. Writing it has reminded me that I am a man in constant need of Scripture’s values-clarification. Things can rise in value in my heart way above their true value and, when they do, for that moment they replace my Lord and his call as the functional motivators of what I do and say. You can’t examine the toxic reactivity that is so harmful to the church and to our witness to the world without concluding that we have a values problem, and that means we have a worship problem. But we can talk candidly about these things because the grace of Christ frees us from hiding and denying. There is no sin, weakness, or failure that hasn’t been covered in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Because of this we can look at hard subjects with hope, courage, honesty, and humility, assured that when we do, we are greeted with both forgiving and empowering grace. May we examine the worship of our hearts and the values by which we live, confessing where needed and committing ourselves to strive to keep important in our hearts what God has said is important.