by Jeremy A. Brown

In the famous words of the singer Marvin Gaye, "What's Going On?!" Not only can Americans see it, but the world can see that something has gone awry in America. Things are not what they once were in America. There is political unrest, riots in the streets, people fighting about masks, or whether they will take that Covid-19 vaccine, and so on. The chaos is not just affecting mainstream America, but it has infiltrated the churches and even divided households against each other. The churches have not been able to assemble as they usually would, and some of the ones that are congregating have split regarding whether they should or should not make the wearing of masks mandatory. Families and longtime friends have ended relationships due to disagreeing over our current political chaos; the Democrats hate the Republicans, and the Republicans hate the Democrats. It's official and not hard to see that America is a "house divided!" What does the Bible say about a house divided, and how can Bible-minded Christians resolve these tense situations?

I recently read the book Politics Industry by Katherine M. Gehl and Michael E. Porter. This book describes how this constant division in politics has spilled over into every facet of American life. According to the book, over the past 60 years, our political system has gone from being made up of 80 percent moderates to about 17 percent moderates in the year 2020. A moderate is someone who sees both perspectives and can come to a compromise that benefits all parties involved, but we do not have that anymore today. You are either extreme left or extreme right, and this has affected us at every level. It is even in our churches, where people are fighting about whether the wearing of masks should be mandatory! How come we cannot see the simple middle-ground solution: those who want to wear masks can wear masks and sit in this designated area, and those not wanting to wear masks can sit in that designated area (Matthew 5:9). The Churches of God also fight over which church has God's true Word. The Bible states it plainly in Matthew 12:22-28 that a kingdom, city, or house that is divided against itself cannot stand. Just like we see in our society today, neither side wants to come to a middle ground; it is either you come over to my viewpoint or nothing shall be done (Ephesians 4).

Right now, it doesn't seem that we are heading anywhere near a middle ground in our society or in the churches as more and more events are happening to deepen the divide. The Bible does give us a message on how we should handle division and the divisiveness we see today. In Titus 3:10, Paul instructs Titus to give a divisive person the first try and then a second try, but reject them after that. We should not have anything to do with entertaining divisiveness. Just as John 13:35 says, if a person is showing love you will know they have God in them. This hate and divisiveness do not come from God; it comes from Satan (Romans 16:17-18).

Presently, we see everyone believing and doing whatever they want irrespective of what the facts show (Judges 21:25). Despite everything appearing to be going wrong, God always provides us with hope. In 2 Chronicles 7:14, God says we should humble ourselves and pray and fast; then God will hear us from heaven and heal our land.

We need to make sure we are taking everything to God in prayer and humbling ourselves through fasting, seeing that our society and churches seem to be deteriorating even faster than any of us could have once imagined (Revelation 22:12).