Christians and Politics. Since the mid-70's, we have heard a constant drumbeat on the question of whether Christians ought to be involved in politics. We have many believers who are convinced that political activism is "one of the most important duties of the Christian. Many of us are not at all so sure about this, seeing our duty as living "quiet lives," to use Paul's language. 1 Thess. 4:11; 1 Tim. 2:2. Still, the debate rages.
Currently, the focus is on the GOP presidential contest, in which there are multiple candidates taking all kinds of positions. It is also a very clear example of how difficult it can be for Christians to play in the world of politics.
If we are active in politics, we are forced to accept a leaders people who hold to things we reject, or who reject what we believe, or whose lives are a mess. Take the two current leading GOP candidates, for example.
Newt Gingrich is a twice-divorced man. Not divorced because of his wive's adulteries, they were innocent for all we know. He is twice-divorced because of his own adulteries. Twice. On two separate occasions, we know he was an adulterer who dumped his wife for a new girl. He very casually says he was "young" then, that he was working hard, and "things happened in my life that were not appropriate." Those things are called adultery and abandonment. They did not "happen," he did them. He has also had a checkered religious history, becoming a Baptist while a graduate student and converting to Catholicism in 2009 because he was impressed with the "joyful and radiating presence of the Holy Father" during a Papal visit to the US.
So, what we know is that he is a serial adulterer who has a very low view of his faith, making a radical change in religion based on a mere impression of one man.
The other top contender is Mitt Romney, a Mormon, who believes that Jews and Native Americans are genetically connected with Jews who came here in ancient times, who believes that God has a physical body and was once a man, and who believes that he will one day become a god with a world all his own, just like our God was once a man and became a god. Aren't these ideas just a little crazy?
Other candidates are no better. Michelle Bachmann left the sound church she was in for years before running, apparently just to avoid being accused of believing what the church believes. Several candidates claim that God talks to them, saying that God told them to run. I do not believe God speaks to people (as if they were Old Testament prophets) anymore and do not want a president who believes that God talks to him or her.
Politics is a dangerous sport for Christians. How much each person invests of his life in politics is a personal issue of individual conviction, but be careful of whom you admire. When you sit before your children and talk of a man as a "great candidate," be careful who you teach them to admire.
Put simply, politics is a world of human beings, run by human beings, and based on the rules of human beings. We have had adulterers as President before (so Gingrich should not feel out of place). We have had Presidents with strange, false beliefs before (so Romney would not feel out of place). God has remained our God in all these things.
In your political activity, do not forget the God you serve. Do not accept the standards of these men or women you support for political office. Do not believe for a moment that their adulteries, their divorces, their odd beliefs, and their claims of God talking to them are justified or true.
It does not bother me that we have currently have a president whose faith is a strange amalgamation of nonsense. It does not bother me to have a president who is not a Christian. It is God who raises up rulers and brings them down and I do not complain of His choices. "The Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever He wishes."
But I will not admire a serial adulterer or hold up a heretic as a hero. He may be my president, but Christ remains my God.
Currently, the focus is on the GOP presidential contest, in which there are multiple candidates taking all kinds of positions. It is also a very clear example of how difficult it can be for Christians to play in the world of politics.
If we are active in politics, we are forced to accept a leaders people who hold to things we reject, or who reject what we believe, or whose lives are a mess. Take the two current leading GOP candidates, for example.
Newt Gingrich is a twice-divorced man. Not divorced because of his wive's adulteries, they were innocent for all we know. He is twice-divorced because of his own adulteries. Twice. On two separate occasions, we know he was an adulterer who dumped his wife for a new girl. He very casually says he was "young" then, that he was working hard, and "things happened in my life that were not appropriate." Those things are called adultery and abandonment. They did not "happen," he did them. He has also had a checkered religious history, becoming a Baptist while a graduate student and converting to Catholicism in 2009 because he was impressed with the "joyful and radiating presence of the Holy Father" during a Papal visit to the US.
So, what we know is that he is a serial adulterer who has a very low view of his faith, making a radical change in religion based on a mere impression of one man.
The other top contender is Mitt Romney, a Mormon, who believes that Jews and Native Americans are genetically connected with Jews who came here in ancient times, who believes that God has a physical body and was once a man, and who believes that he will one day become a god with a world all his own, just like our God was once a man and became a god. Aren't these ideas just a little crazy?
Other candidates are no better. Michelle Bachmann left the sound church she was in for years before running, apparently just to avoid being accused of believing what the church believes. Several candidates claim that God talks to them, saying that God told them to run. I do not believe God speaks to people (as if they were Old Testament prophets) anymore and do not want a president who believes that God talks to him or her.
Politics is a dangerous sport for Christians. How much each person invests of his life in politics is a personal issue of individual conviction, but be careful of whom you admire. When you sit before your children and talk of a man as a "great candidate," be careful who you teach them to admire.
Put simply, politics is a world of human beings, run by human beings, and based on the rules of human beings. We have had adulterers as President before (so Gingrich should not feel out of place). We have had Presidents with strange, false beliefs before (so Romney would not feel out of place). God has remained our God in all these things.
In your political activity, do not forget the God you serve. Do not accept the standards of these men or women you support for political office. Do not believe for a moment that their adulteries, their divorces, their odd beliefs, and their claims of God talking to them are justified or true.
It does not bother me that we have currently have a president whose faith is a strange amalgamation of nonsense. It does not bother me to have a president who is not a Christian. It is God who raises up rulers and brings them down and I do not complain of His choices. "The Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever He wishes."
But I will not admire a serial adulterer or hold up a heretic as a hero. He may be my president, but Christ remains my God.