One of the biggest mistakes that Christianity makes is the idolatry of strength. When we praise strength, desire strength, or want ‘strong leaders,’ we walk away from the way of Christ. Following Jesus means letting go of what this world considers strength. We should live according to how Jesus taught us.

To be a follower of Jesus means being someone who is a living example of God’s love. This means taking seriously the words of scripture. These words tell us that it is the meek, the mourning, and the persecuted who are blessed. We are meant to forgive those who persecute us. Love those who hate us and pray for our enemies, and give generously without fanfare or acclaim. It means being patient and gentle and kind, it means having self-control and putting others before our own needs. Following Jesus means lowering ourselves rather than raising ourselves. It means daily carrying our cross.

The cost of discipleship is not found in fighting. It is not in standing up for our beliefs. And it is not in going on demonstrations and shouting at people in the street. The cost of discipleship is found in our willingness to live a life that challenges the norms of the world. This lifestyle is radically different. This commitment genuinely costs us. It places us in a position of vulnerability and weakness. We believe in a crucified God who allowed themself to be weak. They emptied themself of their power and glory. We should not presume to be greater than what Christ became. The opposite of these things is the idolatry of strength.

The Idolatry of Strength, Power and Prestige

The idolatry of strength is not a new thing. In Luke 9:54, the disciples James and John asked Jesus a question. They wanted to know if they should call down fire from heaven upon a Samaritan village. This village did not want Jesus to go and preach. Despite following Jesus, they did not understand him and still thought they were meant to be acting like Elijah.

In Matthew 20: 20-28, James and John’s mum asked Jesus for a favour. She wanted her sons to sit at his left and right in Heaven. She did not understand what Jesus throne would be. The place set aside for the left and right hand of Jesus was for the thieves on the cross. She imagined Jesus as a king crowned in glory and splendour like King David or a Roman Emperor. Instead, Christ’s throne was two pieces of wood and three iron nails.

In Luke 22: 50-51, Peter attacks a person with a sword to try and rescue Jesus, but Jesus rebukes him and heals the person he had hurt.

Christianity Becomes Powerful

By the end of the fourth century Christianity had become the religion of power. Emperors put people to death while claiming to follow Jesus. The weak Christ that died on a cross began to be depicted as a Roman senator or Emperor, robed in power, crowned like a monarch. In the 9th century Alfred the Great forcibly converted the Norse invaders, and Charlemagne the first Holy Roman Emperor told the Goths that they could convert or they would be killed. Then in the 11th century the crusades began with wide scale slaughter being done in the name of the Prince of Peace. In the 12th and 13th centuries supposed heretics were burned and hunted and killed.

We get to the 15th century and the Spanish Inquisition began. In the 16th and 17th centuries hundreds of innocent women were killed, accused of witchcraft. In the 18th and 19th centuries indigenous populations were tortured and killed in acts of genocide and mass cultural destruction in order to ‘civilise’ them including converting them to Christianity. Poverty was decreed to be desired by God where the rich man and the poor man were both where God had ordained them to be. So-called muscular Christianity wanted to make holy warriors out of men. In the 20th and 21st century the dignities, rights, and freedoms of women, of ethnic and sexual minorities, were oppressed and threatened in the name of ‘Christian’ values.

The Idolatry of Strength Is the Failure of Power in the Church

We have seen ‘pastors’ and church leaders get caught out in sexual misconduct, in abusive behaviour, and in desiring power and control above all else. People for whom power, being in charge, goes alongside subverting the freedom and autonomy of those deem as being less than themselves. Inevitably, women and minorities suffer the most from those ‘Christians’ who think that strength is next to godliness, and that being abusive is actually being assertive. The people who think that we need a more masculine Christianity in order to reach a certain group of men who do not find church attractive or for them fail to understand or take seriously that the ‘traditional’ (pagan) virtues of masculinity have been responsible for an immense amount of suffering and oppression.

The Early Salvation Army

The early Salvation Army did not create a new kind of muscular Christianity. It did not get involved in the idolatry of strength. Even with the military images and war-like songs, the Army did not succeed because it offered a new ‘manly’ form of Christianity, or even one based on strength. The early Army redefined and turned upside down the common cultural assumptions of strength and what it meant to be a man. The Army said that all the things you think define strength, whether it is wealth or power or drinking or fighting or sex or success, are all actually signs of weakness. They are what happen when you give into temptation, when you are ruled by sin.

Actual strength comes in Holy Spirit given self-control to resist temptation and overcome sin. The spiritual battle is the realm of Christian endeavour, to win control over our hearts and minds, not over the people around us. The strength to resist that temptation came through complete surrender to Christ, not through strength of will or personal ability. The true test of strength for a believer was the depth of their dependency on the grace of Christ.

Subversive Christianity Undermines the Idolatry of Strength

Christianity is a religion of subversion which destroys cultural expectations, undercuts our assumptions, and refuses to align itself with the ways of this world. In John 18, Jesus explains to Pilate that his kingdom is not like the kingdoms of this world, because if it was, then his followers would be fighting for him. Christianity is rooted in Mary’s prophetic vision of a saviour who tears down the rich and the powerful and who raises up the poor and the broken (Luke 1:46-55). The way of Jesus does not belong to the powerful, to the rich, to the rulers, to the strong or the fighters. The way of Jesus is so costly precisely because it undercuts the pagan nonsense that says that strength is good and power is useful and that physical capacity has virtue.

Paul writes:

⁹ But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

A different kind of strength

The Christian idea of strength is not based on power, compulsion, or competition with others. The Christian idea of strength comes from our utter dependence upon grace out of our understanding and acceptance of our weaknesses. We do not become strong through Christ, we are able to depend on Christ’s strength for us. But Christ’s strength is not one that destroys or acts in competition with others. Christ’s strength was the strength that battled in Gethsemane on his knees in prayer with tears and suffering. It was the strength that let him forgive those who were torturing him. It was the strength to go to the cross willingly and lovingly. Christ’s strength is loving and gentle, it is transformative and patient.

Christ may have been blunt. He could definitely put people in their place. But that was moral strength, the truth of his conviction, not any kind of coercive or threatening strength rooted in power or control. When Christ drove out the sinners from the Temple, it was not an act of sudden violence, a loss of temper, or a display of power. It was a set piece act of prophetic theatre. He took the time to make a whip by plaiting leather together. That takes ages. He drove people out without actually hurting them. He was enacting the role of Messiah in cleansing the Temple, but doing so in a way which prepared himself to die.

Strength is really fear

So much of what we think of as strength is actually grounded in fear. Fear of being replaced or minimised. The fear that our culture or our nationality or our people are going to be reduced. Or fear of losing our own power and privilege to the extent that we don’t even recognise that someone else being given the same rights and opportunities that we have doesn’t take away from us but only enhances us.

That is why I reject the supposed ‘masculine’ Christianity and the call for a strong Christianity from people like Tommy Robinson and the groups that act in a similar fashion. They are acting out of fear, and scripture tells us that perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18). They are idolators who do not follow the way of Christ but who have subordinated the Christian Gospel for their own purposes and their own desire to maintain their power.

Christianity can never be a religion of strength. We cannot give in to the idolatry of strength. Christians cannot and should not want to be ‘strong’ or ‘powerful’ or to have the kind of virtues that pagan philosophy preaches. The virtues based in warrior culture and autocratic power can never be aligned with the suffering saviour who willingly allowed himself to be crucified for us.

What does it mean to follow Jesus? Rejecting the Idolatry of Strength

Jesus himself tells us:

³ “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ⁴ Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted. ⁵ Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. ⁶ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. ⁷ Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. ⁸ Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

⁹ Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. ¹⁰ Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.….

⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour^[i] and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? ⁴⁸ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5:3-12, 43-48)

Cost of Discipleship

The phrase ‘cost of discipleship’ comes from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s book reflecting and exploring the beatitudes. For Bonhoeffer, the cost of discipleship comes in our willingness to actually put the beatitudes into practice rather than the things we want to do. It is easy to be a Christian if you don’t take the words of Jesus seriously. It is easy to be a Christian if you want to be strong. Its difficult to be a Christian and actually follow Jesus. There is a cost to that. Jesus said that his disciples will be known by the way they love one another, not by how strong they are (John 13:35). What does it mean to love?

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (1 Corinthians 13: 4-7)

Being a disciple has a cost

The cost of being a disciple comes from being able to accept our weaknesses and our dependence upon grace and then submitting ourselves to the way of Christ. Trusting in Christ’s strength for all that we do so there can be no boasting in our successes or achievements but only in the grace and strength that Christ provides for us. Our weaknesses are our crown of thorns because it is through them that Christ will reveal the power and mercy and love of God most fully. The God we worship divested theirself of their power and glory and submitted to death and torture. We worship a suffering and crucified God. Who are we to want to be more than that?

When we want give in to the idolatry of strength, we walk away from the cross. Strength in the way the world knows is it is an incredibly dangerous idol that needs to be rejected. We don’t need strong leaders. Instead, we need leaders who know their weaknesses and are dependent on Christ’s grace. We don’t need strong disciples, we need disciples who are identified by their loving, patient, gentle, kind, and meek spirit. Together, we need a church which does not claim space for itself or that worries about its survival but always and only points to the suffering saviour.

God will meet our needs

Maybe when we can let go of the idolatry of strength we will be able to honestly sing together:

He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater;
He sendeth more strength when the labours increase.
To added affliction He addeth His mercy;
to multiplied trials, His multiplied peace.

His love has no limit; His grace has no measure.
His pow’r has no boundary known unto men.
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus,
He giveth, and giveth, and giveth again!

When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
when our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
when we reach the end of our hoarded resources,
our Father’s full giving is only begun.

If you want to keep up to date, sign up to My Theology Corner Newsletter for a weekly lite-bite theology hit. Get short-form reflections from topics on the main blog and or on other interesting topics from that week.

https://chrisbutton.substack.com

If You Found This Interesting, Give One of These a Go…

Batman Is The Problem With the Church – Why Pastors Have to Stop Wanting To Be A Hero

Crucifying My Shame

Trauma and Fragmented Discipleship

The Cross and The Traumatised God

Who Am I? Unknowing Myself in a Dietrich Bonhoeffer Poem from Prison

Turning God into an Idol – We Really Want to Worship Superman

Fight Manfully Onwards: The Early Salvation Army and Changing Approaches to Masculinity

Dangerous Leadership: the Problem of Leadership for the Church

Church Pioneering Does Not Depend on ‘Pioneer Ministry’ – rediscovering the Ordinary Pioneers

William Booth Wouldn’t Want Me and That’s Ok – Why I Am a Salvationist

Please Like and Subscribe