My stars, the presumptions you make! The main one calling yourself a "Biblicist." It looks to me like an example of ugly pride. What does making public declarations of faith (faith being in this nation a PERSONAL thing, unlike in the Middle East) have to do with high personal standards? Tell me -- how is requiring that a person treats his fellows honorably NOT having "high personal standards"??
What Christians in your mold do is TURN PEOPLE OFF. You are not helping Jesus, you are only massaging your own ego and telling yourself and others that you're doing it in His name.
So-called "biblicists" disgust me because of their smarmy presumptions of superiority. About the only thing worse are people who reject the basic Judeo-Christian Ethic, which is the whole reason for Western Civilization. Not "declarations of personal relationships with God," but the ethic, striving to follow the ethic.
Self-righteous people like you do more harm than good in the political spectrum. Jesus hung around sinners and tax collectors and won many hearts and saved all of us, as His example does to this day. YOU, however, would deign to judge loudly and harshly any politician who doesn't do what YOU would have him do. You hurt the cause of both conservative politics and Christianity; you don't fool me, though you surely fool yourself.
No, Christianity in the Gospels and the Book of Acts was a very, very public thing. The Apostles of our Lord all preached in public, in the places of both Jewish and heathen worship — publicly — out in the open — where their message was not very well welcomed. It was to masses. They were hated by as many as loved them. NO, they were were hated by many more than those who loved them.
Reading the Book of Acts will show you that the disciples took the message of Christ to the highways and byways, the synagogues, where they their message was scorned, and the open public heathen places of idolatry. Read Acts chapter 17, for example. The Apostle Paul didn’t go their to “make friends and influence people.”
The command of Christ to his disciples and thus to all believers is to go to the whole world with the Gospel — NOT to hide it under a bushel — not to keep quiet about it.
John the Baptist didn’t keep quiet, told the king what his sins were, and lost his head over it. John didn’t just keep it a personal thing. Jesus later told the crowd that John came to them in the way of righteousness and they didn’t receive him. John was commended by the Lord.
Jesus didn’t save us by being an example of keeping anything to ourselves. Jesus didn’t do anything in a corner. He didn’t die as a martyr or MERELY as an example, but as a propitiatory, substitutionary sacrifice for SIN — mine and yours and the whole world’s. It was very, very public when He died at Calvary. The message of what happened there was commanded to be preached to every creature, every nation.
Christianity can be found no where in Scripture as an antithesis to Islam in regard to the method of its propagation, as you suggest with your words, “... faith being in this nation a PERSONAL thing, unlike in the Middle East.” Please study the Book of Acts, and you will realize this. Then when you consider what the Lord commanded with regard to its propagation in Matthew chapter 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, Acts 1 and many other passages, it will be seen that no believer can obey Christ by keeping their faith merely personal and quiet.
Christ told plainly that the disciples would be hated of all nations for His name’s sake. But they wouldn’t be, if they just kept their mouths shut, everybody would just get along. It is the public bearing of the message of Christ — the preaching of the Cross of Christ (not religion) as the only remedy for man’s SIN nature and his SIN practice.
The difference between Christianity and Islam in this context is that Islam says, “Convert or we’ll kill you.” Christianity, yes, biblicist Christianity, says, Christ died for your sins and He is the ONLY Hope of forgiveness and everlasting life,” and people hate and persecute Christians for telling the truth.
Stephen didn’t threaten anyone with violence in Acts chapter 7. Stephen told the leaders of Israel that God doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands, and he preached Christ as their only Remedy. The leaders of Israel stoned Stephen.
Paul didn’t threaten anyone with violence in Acts chapter 17. He told the idol worshiping Gentiles there that God doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands. They mocked Paul. Earlier in the same chapter, Paul’s preaching brought about a very public uproar, so serious that he had to escape the city where he was and head for another (Berea). A very public ministry indeed.
The “Great Awakening” in New England (Edwards, Whitfield, the Wesleys, others), not long prior to the Revolution was very public in its methods and in its affect. I believe that it can be said that it prepared the colonies spiritually for a war for independence and for the founding of a new nation.
No one has ever shown me a verse in Scripture teaching that Christianity is a merely a private matter and not to be openly proclaimed. You said, "...faith being in this nation a PERSONAL thing, unlike in the Middle East)..." I am very glad that Dwight Moody (Congregationalist), Sam Jones (Methodist), Billy Sunday (Presbyterian), J. Wilbur Chapman (Presbyterian), Mordacai Ham (Baptist), Billy Graham and many others like these men didn't believe that. Public preaching of the Gospel is a part of American history and heritage -- a very rich part of it.