I recently went to a dinner that was for a specific function. At that dinner there were many speeches in which people clapped, nodded their heads in agreement, and gave verbal signs of agreement. I personally did not agree with much of what was said. For that reason, I did not show any of these signs of agreement if I wasn’t sure I agreed. As I watched throughout the night, however, I noticed an interesting dynamic. People were talking about other things during the speeches or lost in thought and did not appear to be paying attention to the speeches or at least not every detail. Those same people were offering signs of agreement. This got me wondering about this dynamic, a dynamic I have wondered about before. Do we ever offer signs of agreement with something stated when we don’t even know what was said? Do we offer signs of agreement on a position that we cannot even explain?

“You shall not follow a multitude in doing evil, nor shall you testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after a multitude in order to pervert justice” (Exodus 23:2). Yet how many of us know why we believe and live the way we do? Is there a chance that we are following the current around us? Now this doesn’t mean that we are following every current. There are a lot of currents in the ocean and a lot of crowds to follow in this world. Consider your beliefs and lifestyle and look around you. Is there a crowd going the same direction? Why are you doing the same thing? Is it to follow the crowd?

Sometimes the crowd or a crowd is right. Sometimes we do or believe what is right without knowing why. The danger is if we don’t give careful consideration to our beliefs and actions we may “follow a multitude in doing evil” and may not even realize it. For this reason, Peter said, “You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard lest, being carried away by the error of unprincipled men you fall from your own steadfastness” (2 Peter 3:17).

There are some out there that have bad motives in asking us to question everything. They hope that we question true Christianity and reject it. The better way is to question everything in light of the Bible (Acts 17:11) to determine what is right. We should not toss aside everything that we question. We need to question everything, that is “examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; abstain from every form of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:21-22). We must question everything in order to get rid of the errors, but also to be strong in the truth. Questioning everything can give us confidence in the truth when we see it prove true beyond the testing.

Question what you were taught by your parents, your school, your friends, your relatives, the books and magazines you read, the songs you listened to, the television shows and movies you watched, the job training you went through, the news from any source, and even what you were taught in church. Question it all. Put your trust in the Bible and evaluate all things by it and you will be amazed at how many of the crowds in this world are not adhering to the Bible.

The question is are you following the current. Charles Stanley once described this battle as attempting to swim against the current in a river. The general current of this world is away from God’s desires and if we do not struggle, we will be carried away by it to our destruction. This also reminds me of Finding Nemo. At the end when all those fish were caught in the fishermen’s net, they were in huge danger. However, Nemo convinced all the fish to swim down away from the fishermen’s boat. Because they all swam down they were able to break the rope and get free. If only one, two, or even ten of them would have swam down while the others stayed still or swam up, it would have been hopeless. It is the same scenario for us. It seems hopeless that one person can stop the current of a river, but the more people we get on our side the more we can change our society. Will you join me in committing all things to the word of God and changing our society? Please email me at dannyleveck@gmail.com if you desire to join me.