Posted on 06/09/2021 7:54:57 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
In his book Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis points out that God reveals political ends in the Bible, but he is not as specific about the means to achieve those ends. We are supposed to feed the hungry, but we are not told how we should provide the meal. We are supposed to pursue justice, provide for widows and orphans, and fight oppression, but we are not told about the best form of government to do all of that.
This is why Lewis warned against trying to establish a Christian political party or to say any party represented the Christian position. His fear was, if that happened, you would have a political party with basic disagreements on key policy issues, or there would be a group of Christians maintaining that they represent all Christians on matters on which the Bible is not clear.
Our challenge is to think biblically about our politics rather than thinking politically about our faith. That is growing more and more difficult in today’s politics that are driven by passionate outrage.
In 2011, about two weeks before I was sworn in as governor of Tennessee, I went to visit my predecessor, Phil Bredesen. We sat in his office, which was soon to become my office, amid the packing boxes and last working papers of his eight-year term. I was there to get any advice he wanted to give me as we prepared to take his place. His advice was ageless: “The governor should do those things that only the governor can do.”
As governor, you face an endless list of people and issues competing for your time. Every week we had a scheduling meeting where our scheduling team brought me a notebook full of requests for meetings. In addition to the myriad requests to speak or attend an event, there were legislators to meet with, communities to visit, businesses to recruit, forty thousand state employees to lead, and in-office meeting requests to consider. Deciding how to use the limited amount of time is one of the most difficult challenges for anyone in elected office. That is why Governor Bredesen’s advice to me was so good. It is incredibly easy to fill up your calendar and your agenda with things other people feel you should do but don’t really help advance your purposes.
Similarly, the church should seize this time to be about the things that only the church can do. Nathan Hatch, the president of Wake Forest University, says, “This is the opportunity—for the church to be the church, to return to the task of religious and moral formation, to build communities that bind people together, to instill a deep conviction that life can actually have transcendent purpose and is not all about individual wants and desires, and if you will, a life in which that transcendent purpose radiates into the world at large.”
So how can the church be the church? We can realize that our battle is not with people who disagree with us politically or with the culture that seems to be against us. Our battle is to bring meaning and love to a world struggling with meaninglessness and despair in a way that has rarely been seen. Today’s climate of meaninglessness is so severe that a new term, “deaths of despair,” has been coined to describe the mounting numbers of deaths due to suicide, alcoholism, or drug overdose. Drug overdose deaths are increasing. College campuses are dealing with what is almost an epidemic of depression. Fewer and fewer people report having more than one or two close friends. Our world increasingly longs for the words of grace and truth that only the church can give.
I believe every Christian is called to be in the public square in some way. Maybe it is in elected office, or it could be to serve as an informed and caring citizen and voter. We would be weakened as communities and as a nation without the faithful presence of believers. But the danger comes when those believers see their faith as a means to bring about the political ends they want.
The church, the body of believers, has a key role in the political process. But that role has to be marked by humility and reflection. It also has to be marked by a commitment to be more faithful to the Word of God than we are to either political party. In the words of Gary Haugen, founder of International Justice Mission, the church should be using our influence to “bless the world out of love rather than cursing the world out of fear.”
When it comes to the public square, the church has to move from a fear of what we are losing, to a deep desire to share the “hope that is in [us]” (1 Peter 3:15).
Any Christian charity with a 25% overhead would be shut down and its leaders in prison. How are we supposed to think it's Christian to make corrupt government leaders richer with the 25% overhead when we can help the needy as the church with much more efficient means?
To me, the Gospel of Matthew is very political. It starts - Jesus is born, then immediately, Government (Herod) tries to have him killed. From there Its “game on” - Christ and his Kingdom vs. secular powers.
The two will always be in some kind of conflict. Christians need to grasp this.
“Our challenge is to think biblically about our politics”
Statements like “Our challenge is to think biblically about our politics” are empty phrases when the author provides nothing of what they thing that means.
More to the point, “charity” where government seizes from one to give to another is akin to if old Ahab had taken Naboth’s vineyard for a vegetable garden to feed the poor of Samaria. Had he done that he’d be a hero to the modern Left.
Proverbs
Teach proverbs
1. How much better to get wisdom than gold! To get understanding is to be chosen rather than silver (16:16).
One interaction that stands out as one of the most remarkable Gospel passages involves Jesus Christ and a Roman centurion. I’ll have to find the exact quotation, but it’s clear that the centurion has basically told himself: “Soldiers listen to me because I tell them what to do. But THIS dude tells the seas to be calm, and tells people to rise from the dead … and these things actually happen. I ain’t worth a damn thing compared to THAT.”
Great example!
Matthew 8:8 The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”
10 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith.
I think Biblically about everything.
as a Christian, i read this (because of the CS Lewis mention), and am profoundly disappointed.
not only does this guy (a past two term gop gov of TN, apparently) get CS Lewis completely wrong about politics and religion, but has managed to write something that is completely incoherent on it’s face. what a waste of words.
thank God i never voted for this guy.
for instance, how idiotic is this statement alone:
“So how can the church be the church? We can realize that our battle is not with people who disagree with us politically or with the culture that seems to be against us.”
does he even have any clue what Jesus’ ministry ultimately did to change the Roman Empire and it’s “culture?”
It’s worse than that. Much of the 75% goes to NGOs who siphon off up to 90% in admin costs.
Our battle IS with those who disagree with us politically. They oppose practically every moral edict of the Bible. They war against our religious fabric, and they seek to persecute those who shed light on the opposition’s immorality and crimes. Everything the opposition stands for is antithetical to what our side stands for- what we stand for is what makes us th8e party/movement that we are. What the opposition stands for is what the evil one stands for, or pushes rather. The evil one is diametrically opposed to God, good and righteousness. And that is what we fight against, not just here in the US, but all Over the world
Paul fought the government, stood up for his rights as a citizen, and wasn’t afraid to face the political factions and the anti-christian religious factions of his day.
well said, brother Bob. wish you could tell that to Haslam.
because these obligations are imposed as personal not government obligations.
Agreed
RE: not only does this guy (a past two term gop gov of TN, apparently) get CS Lewis completely wrong about politics and religion, but has managed to write something that is completely incoherent on it’s face. what a waste of words.
Can you elaborate further as to which part of his article you find incoherent? Thanks.
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