Politics

Before I write on this topic I will start by saying that I am young, I have never preached from the pulpit, I have never been in church leadership. This is from the perspective of one who is on the receiving end. 

 The question of politics from the pulpit. Something I have often been challenged with. If Christians are only ever taught what the Bible says, and it never manifests in their lives via fruit, then I think it's safe to say we are missing the mark. And if you bear fruit in this modern age, that fruit will in some way be growing to a political end. When the State became strictly secular, our lives as Christians became political. 

How does a Christian bear fruit in a world in which politics has infiltrated every public space without being 'political'? In a time when Man and Woman, Sympathy and Empathy, Privilege (Which is simply another word for a blessing from God), Creation, etc. are political fighting grounds, Christians will slide into nominalism.. and then to secularism if we are not to some extent guided. When I say guided I mean these are topics that need to be discussed with our brothers and sisters in Christ, and those appointed Overseers should have a lot to say. 

What I have found is that many do not have a lot to say. Politics is a private matter.  

When did 'Christian' come to mean 'Niceness'? If truth is not kind to someone should we suppress it for their sake? 

I find it quite telling that Christ was not drug to the cross and crucified because he was so 'nice'. He was not killed by the people because he strode around telling everyone to love each-other. He was killed because he told them 'How' to do it. He was a troublemaker. He was killed because he was political. The God of the age was Caesar. The Gospel message was that Caesar was not king. Ergo, that man you are bowing down to is a phony. That thing you are serving is empty. That truth you have come to believe is not truth. 

Douglas Wilson addressed this topic well in his book 'Empires of Dirt' that Todd and I just wrapped up reading. He spends a chapter addressing questions about what a Christendom might look like, and he addresses the conundrum that some find themselves in on this topic of politics and the pulpit. 

To this extent, blaming public Christians for being "too political" is like blaming Noah's ark for being "too wet". Abortion and Sodomy were sins long before they were constitutional rights. If a minister preached against them a thousand years ago, he was preaching against moral failings, and he was not being political. He was being public, but not political. When I do it, I am preaching against moral failings too, but I am also being political. What changed? It wasn't the Decalogue. It wasn't the history of the Church or the history of preaching. It wasn't the nature of the gospel. It wasn't me. Rather, it was the nature of the idol being challenged--and this idol aspires to omnipresence. 

We are told, ad nauseam, to keep our morality out of politics. It would be more to the point to tell the idol-mongers to keep their politics out of morality. Public morality need not be political in the sense we are discussing. Public morality need not be a matter that concerns the legislature. But if the legislature concerns itself with everything, then any faithful Christian expression will immediately be concerned with the political.  

The legislature surely concerns itself with everything, and therefore we should be concerned. 

There are sheep who are indeed wandering and lost, not sure wether to wear this flag, or say that pronoun, or vote for that birthing person, and the Christian faith has something to say about that - Christian pastors should also have something to say about that.  

To go hand in hand with what was said above, the goal is not to create enemies of anyone who disagrees with the Christian faith by being 'political'. The truth will do that without needing our help. We should be more concerned with 'opening eyes' then providing light. We in fact cannot be the source of any light, for that only comes from above, we can however live in such a way, such a truly loving way, as to open the eyes of those who have them shut in a dark world. For when eyes are opened in the dark, they yearn for light.