tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16523623227158315172024-03-13T04:05:06.524-07:00Can Republicans and Democrats sit in the same pew?Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-51116118466696096642012-10-03T15:20:00.002-07:002012-10-03T15:20:47.905-07:00Is it OK to Legislate Morality?
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Here is another question I recently received:</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1)</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When talking about Christianity and politics you
will always seek to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is
God’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How can a Christian decide which of
God’s values should be enforced by law and which should be enforced by other
means?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">This is a very good question calling for a great deal of
careful thought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We should note first that
everybody legislates morality—even the atheist—for morality expresses the
values we hold dear and laws are the codification of those values.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the really important and interesting
question is not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">whether </i>we should
legislate morality, but rather <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">which</i>
morality we should seek to legislate—your question.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">First, some of God’s laws go straight to the human heart and
are, for that reason, unenforceable by human law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These should remain off the books.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am thinking, for example, of the first and
the tenth commandments (“You shall have no other gods before me” and “you shall
not covet”).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are other <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>divine laws that address human public behavior
and need enforcement for the purposes of limiting human selfishness and
cruelty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“You shall not kill”, “you
shall not steal”, “you shall not bear false witness,” and possibly “caring for
the poor and marginalized” all belong to this category.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Christian and the non-Christian can often
find common ground in these areas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
even here it gets tricky: Abortion in my view is a form of killing that should
have laws written against it—but what precise form should they take (what form
of the law is likely to pass, what should the sanctions be for breaking the law
when so many don’t view the unborn as a person, and what provisions should be
made in the case of rape and other special circumstances).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How about killing in a war if the war is not
a just one (and who decides whether a war is just or not)?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or take the command against stealing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What constitutes stealing, and what sorts of
stealing should we write laws about (Are excessive interest rates
stealing?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are certain executive salaries
outside the range of what is fair and just and therefore a form of stealing
from share-holders and employees?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who
decides?).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Even trickier are laws that pertain to marriage and sexual
behavior.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christians may agree, for
example, that gay sex and therefore gay marriage are wrong, but they may in
good conscience disagree on the best way to advance the cause of traditional
marriage in our culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some may
earnestly believe that legislation is not the way to go, that it will only
drive gay people from the church; others may be convinced that legislation is
the way to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And how, even if
Christians all agreed that gay sex should be forbidden by law,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>would such laws be enforced?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">So the answer to the “which law” question is nuanced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christians should think and talk about the
question, refining their thinking and knowing that they may well have to live
with the fact that they will come out in different places on the question in
particular instances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For this reason, I
believe that pastors, speaking on behalf of Christ from the pulpit, should be
very reluctant to dictate on the question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As private citizens, not speaking for Christ, but simply talking about
their own view in informal conversation, they can and should speak their
mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-62702203042421607322012-09-20T11:01:00.003-07:002012-09-20T11:01:25.884-07:00Utopians on Their Knees<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;"> Another blogger recently put to me the following question:</span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div>
<div class="msonormalcxspmiddle" style="text-indent: -0.25in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;"> In your book, you call some Christians ‘secret
utopians.’ How is that contrary to what Christ promoted and how can our
prayers reveal that aspect of our lives?</span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">Christians
ought to be utopians in one sense. We believe that Jesus is ruling at the
right hand of the Father and it is only a matter of time before his kingdom
becomes fully manifested on planet earth. This hope animates us, or
should, in all that we do in our public discipleship. What I mean by the
term ‘secret utopian’ is something different. The secret utopian is the
person who thinks that we can ourselves bring in God’s good society by our own
efforts and strategies and is therefore driven to make it happen and fearful
when the ‘bad guys’ seem to be getting their way. This sort of utopianism
can show up in bitter and impatient praying—“God, get rid of that
Senator!” It can show up in the failure ever to thank God for one’s
leaders or to pray humbly for them, understanding how very difficult it is to
govern given all the frustrations and temptations of office. It can show
up as well in triumphalistic praying: “Oh God, thank you that your man is in the
White House!” The praying of the proper sort of utopian (the one I
mentioned first) will be earnest, grief-stricken, humble, and hopeful:
earnest because we know that no human being or group of human beings can solve
our nation’s deepest problems, grief-stricken because this is our country and
we are responsible for what is wrong with her, humble because we ourselves can
only guess at what the best solutions are, and hopeful because we know our
Father hears us, his triumphed in Jesus, and will in the end put everything
right.</span></div>
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Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-21022405071334507172012-09-12T14:08:00.003-07:002012-09-12T14:08:21.823-07:00Dealing with Political Panic<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">Well the conventions are over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is easy to be cynical about the hoopla but
I choose not to be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I look at Syria and
remain deeply grateful that we can still have clash culturally in this country
without bloodshed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do not want to take
this for granted. Nevertheless we still get too angry with each other, even in
the church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That anger is often the
result of fear, and fear arises more often than we think from idolatry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Below are my answers to some questions a
blogger recently put to me on the subject. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="msonormalcxspmiddle" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">1) Why are Christians so prone to panic during the political
process and how can we avoid panicking?</span></b></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">I think
Christians are prone to panic, at least in part, because they have made an idol
out of political solutions. Idolatry happens whenever we put our deepest
hopes in anything created—whether it is our vision for America, or a particular candidate,
or a particular law we hope to see passed, or a particular platform we hope to
see established. There is nothing wrong with having a vision and a
strategy for seeing that vision advanced. The problem arises when
we put our deepest hopes in such things. And anger, fear, and panic are
good signs that we have. Christians need to see that making an idol of
political solutions is more than frustrating for them (idols have no life in
themselves). It is deeply wrong, for it is false worship (“Let all be put
to shame…who boast of idols”—Psalm 97:7). </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">We can avoid
panicking, or we can at least reduce our panicking, by repenting of our idols
and renewing our trust in God. As part of the process of repenting we may
find it helpful to note how weak political power actually is: Very few
people get to exercise it, and when they do, they discover huge obstacles to
exercising it in a democracy like ours where Congress can hold up legislation
for years. And more than likely their power is short lived—as Democrats
discovered in the 2010 mid-term elections.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="msonormalcxspmiddle" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">2)</span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-size: 7.0pt;"> </span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">Could you explain what you meant by “the idol of too much hope” in
politics?</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">Some
Christians just want to be left alone. But others have rightly discovered
that in our democratic system they have a voice. We have discovered,
rightly, that we need to exercise our voices in the public square.
We have more hope when it comes to exercising political influence than do many
people in our world, both now and down through the ages. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">The problem as
I see it is when we put too much hope in the political process. Politics
is made up of people, and people are weak, fallible, and self-centered.
Our power, if we ever get any, is short-lived, our political solutions are
imperfect (often with unintended consequences); if we succeed in passing a good
law this time around the likelihood is that it will be reversed by the ‘bad
guys’ the next time around. Thinking that there exists a ‘magic bullet’
politically is, for these reasons, naïve, and it sets us up for disappointment,
frustration, and anger. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: black; font-family: Calibri;">Ironically,
those who put too much hope in politics often end up so disillusioned that they
withdraw into the ‘safety’ of cynicism. The Christian who properly
moderates his hope in politics is more likely to stay active, as he should,
because his deepest hope does not lie in political success. He knows that
God is in charge of results, while he is “in charge of” faithfulness—patiently
and humbly seeking to move things in the right direction.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br />Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-79222052572123856222012-03-01T15:30:00.001-08:002012-03-01T15:38:09.704-08:00Prayer moderates the utopians among us--and the cynics too<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">A final blog on prayer and politics.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">One of the reasons Christians tend to fight with each other over politics is that we are often secret utopians. We say we trust in Christ, but we really trust in ourselves, or some human solution, to make the world a better place. We keep hoping for and believing in the “silver bullet”—the candidate, the policy, the platform, the Supreme Court configuration—that will fix things. And when we find that someone else’s silver bullet differs from ours, we don’t trust him anymore—even if he is a fellow believer. Or we keep clinging to the mistaken notion that America is God’s chosen nation, positioned to make things right in the world: if we can just get America “right” we will put the world to rights. And when we find someone with a different vision for what it means to get America “right” we demonize him. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Prayer reminds us that utopianism, together with the stridency that often accompanies it, is mistaken. For when we cry “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven,” we are appealing to God to do what we cannot do. We are acknowledging the selfishness, blindness, and weakness that drag at us, and will continue to drag at us, until we ourselves are made whole by the coming Lord. We are choosing, in short, to be realists about human solutions. And this realism makes us patient with each other. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">To say that prayer makes us realists is not to say that it makes us cynics. To the contrary, it fills us with hope and that hope keeps us engaged. For prayer reminds us not only of what we cannot do, but also of what Christ most certainly will do. And that guaranteed future motivates us to represent him as best we can while we wait for him, even when our efforts are imperfect and seem ineffectual, even when those efforts are not completely in sync with those of other believers. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Someone has said that today’s cynic is yesterday’s idealist. And this makes sense. For when we begin with the premise that we have in ourselves the full solution to even one small problem, we are bound to be disappointed. And that disappointment will make us either angry or despondent. But the praying Christian begins with a different premise. He looks past himself to the wise God who died and rose to put all things right, and that focus keeps him both humble and hopeful.</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-15117995140594653812012-02-16T16:20:00.001-08:002012-02-16T16:25:07.402-08:00Some more advice on political praying<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">One of the reasons that praying about politics turns down the political heat is that it reminds us that God is in charge. When we remember this, we end up clinging a little bit less desperately to the people and policies that we believe in. And when that happens we are a little less likely to demonize ‘the opposition’, a little more likely to be civil, a little more open to discussion and compromise—all of which are necessary if our form of government is going to work.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">But how, more specifically, do we pray? Paul gives us some guidance in 1 Timothy 2:1-6, part of which I quoted in my last blog. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Notice first—we are to pray for </span><i><u><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">all</span></u></i><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> who are in high positions</span></i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">In the midst of giving a commencement address, a speaker asked everyone to rise. He then said, “Those of you who do not know the name of your state governor, please sit and remain seated.” Some sat down. Then he said, “Those of you who do not know the name of at least one of your state’s senators in Washington, please sit.” A larger number took their seats. He continued, “Those of you who do not know the names of <i>both</i> your state’s senators, please sit.” Lots of people sat down. He next asked, “Those of you who do not know the names of your district representatives in your state government, please sit.” By that time, all but a handful were off their feet. Then the speaker observed, “Friends, if we do not know the names of these people, how can we be praying for them?”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">We could all broaden the sweep of our political praying.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Notice what Paul then says about the content of our political praying: …</span><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.</span></i><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> </span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The most important thing, it seems, is not that a certain law will pass or a certain person will come into power, or that a certain kind of America will take shape. It is rather that, whoever governs, he or she will govern in such a way as to allow the church and its people to thrive. The heart of our political praying is, strangely, that the <i>church</i> will be robust in its love, freedom, and holiness. This means, I might say in passing, that we should be wary of any who use religion politically to divide the church. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Why Paul’s odd priority? Why is the health of the church at the top of Paul’s ‘political prayer list’? He tells us in what follows. It is because the church is the one place on earth where people get to find the deepest source of social binding—the one God through his one mediator. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I don’t think that Paul’s advice on prayer in 1 Timothy 6 is exhaustive. I am not suggesting, in other words, that all we need do is pray for a robust church—since, if we have a strong church, we will have lots of converts, and, presto, a Christian America. I don’t think it is that simple (Nor do I think that God has promised us a Christian America). </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">What I am suggesting is this. Whatever else we pray for as we pray for America, we must pray for the churches of America. The church is God’s chief political strategy—the place where love and truth come together by the power of the Spirit, where the true Ruler and his cross are known in the breaking down of the ‘dividing walls of hostility’ that are the hallmark of man made political solutions. When we do not pray for the church, we lose sight of her and stop loving her, and we fall into the folly of thinking that there is another, better, more lasting place to find the harmony we long for. There isn’t. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The church shall never perish! Her dear Lord, to defend,</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">To guide, sustain, and cherish, is with her to the end;</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Though there be those that hate her, and false sons in her pale,</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Against or foe or traitor she ever shall prevail.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">--Samuel Wesley. </span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-37892092376101519092012-02-01T15:01:00.000-08:002012-02-01T15:01:27.850-08:00Should we actually thank God for politicians?!<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Everybody has been commenting that the campaigning between Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Romney for the Florida primary was particularly brutal.<span> </span>I wonder whether it would have been different if the two men and their super PACs had been praying for each other.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Listen to the Apostle Paul’s recommendation for political praying.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people—for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. (1 Timothy 2:1)</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">How odd that Paul would counsel people to pray <i>with thanksgiving</i> for leaders in the world he knew, a place of political despotism. But he did, perhaps partly because the fragile church was often wrongfully accused of revolutionary aims and needed for its survival to show its good intentions. But surely Paul had other reasons. He saw government as God’s gracious way of controlling the socially destructive impact of sin. He also had the wisdom to see that, for all its imperfections, the Roman rule brought the sort of order and stability that made mission work and evangelism possible. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"></span><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Pollsters tell us that Americans are bitter and cynical about their political leaders. And primaries tell us that political contestants are bitter towards each other. One imagines that if any praying gets done at all, its tone is frustrated and content judgmental: “Lord, change that man or get rid of him! Lord, send a firestorm on those self-serving bureaucrats!” </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">We err when we pray this way. It makes the already difficult task of governing in our age even more difficult. Many in government work hard at doing what they genuinely feel best in settings that invariably require compromise and draw flak. Many of the best-qualified people never even enter politics because it is so thankless and difficult. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Those who govern us need our encouragement at least as much as our criticism. When we thank God for our leaders, when we call to mind in prayer the good things they do and the efforts they make, we find ourselves behaving more charitably toward them. This change in us fosters a climate in which they find it easier to govern more responsibly. By contrast, negative praying tends to feed the cynicism we are naturally prone to, and cynicism discourages our leaders.</span></div><div class="MsoBlockText" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; text-indent: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoBlockText" style="line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; text-indent: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Such a dynamic may be more difficult to envision in national politics than at a local level (we are far more likely to rub shoulders with the members of our district’s school board than we are with our state’s senators). But I believe that it can happen at any level. Do not underestimate the power of attitude. It cannot be legislated, but it is often more powerful than any law.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-25573084752203217642012-01-24T12:34:00.000-08:002012-01-24T12:34:19.180-08:00Something Only Prayer Can Do<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">The <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">South Carolina</st1:state></st1:place> primary was pretty interesting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Quite suddenly Mr. Gingrich is in the running again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For some of those who are outraged over Mr. Romney’s 15 % tax rate this is wonderful news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For some of those who are outraged at Mr. Gingrich’s marital infidelities it is depressing.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Outrage drives many of us during an election year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It might be outrage over taxes or the decay of the family or abortion or something else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it rises as an expression of our hope that there really is, deep down, a moral order to things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The cynics among us laugh at this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For them there is no moral order, or (if there is) it is either not discernable or it is of no real interest to politicians, whose every decision (cynics say) is controlled by polls rather than principles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Should a Christian be a cynic or an idealist?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Probably a little bit of both.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know I am both.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am with the idealists when it comes to my confidence that there is an underlying moral order to things and that, one day, it will be fully vindicated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I am with the cynics in some ways as well (though I do think I am cynical)—for a couple of reasons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First I sometimes share the cynic’s discernment problem—say for example when it comes to deciding about economic policies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My second reason runs deeper.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have my doubts about the lasting impact of policies or candidates—even really good ones.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">What our country needs most deeply can neither be legislated nor voted into office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We need the sort of self-policing that comes from a widespread sense of accountability to a divine Person who sees and measures everything we think and do—what an earlier generation called an Awakening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Think about it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Regulating financial behavior may have some value but there is no way of regulating greed out of the human heart: there will always be any number of financial wunderkinds who can find their way around regulations. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let me put things positively.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the people of a land genuinely fear God, they are less greedy (and therefore more generous), less predatory and promiscuous in sexual matters (leading to a diminished felt need for abortion), more faithful in their marriages (with happier and less wayward children), and more responsible towards the environment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can probably think of other benefits.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">I am not suggesting we stop trying to write good laws or to get good people in office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nor am I encouraging us to be revivalist utopians.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No matter how broadly and deeply a genuine fear of God might reach in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">America</st1:country-region></st1:place>, we will still have to await the return of Christ for things to be put fully right.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">I am simply trying to persuade the church to keep praying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I said last blog, praying is something any Christian can do, a great consolation at those moments when we feel that the issues are beyond our understanding or control. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And praying is something we must do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the church does not obey Jesus and pray, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” who will?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Praying is not ‘feel good’ behavior, a way to avoid the depressing fact that we have no real influence over the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is obedient behavior—which should be reason enough to do it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is powerful behavior.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This we do not yet fully see—but one day we will.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-48912345509306451832012-01-13T15:10:00.000-08:002012-01-13T15:10:15.630-08:00Something we all can do during the primaries<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Now that the field is beginning to narrow in the Republican race for the nomination, the gloves are off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Claiming that Mr. Romney was brutal to him in <st1:state w:st="on">Iowa</st1:state>, Mr. Gingrich has decided to answer in kind as the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">South Carolina</st1:state></st1:place> primary approaches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The cynic in me smirks and plans to watch the brawl from a distance—not a stance I am proud of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The better man in me remembers that Jesus commands me to love my neighbor as myself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This means for starters that I have to love Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Romney, whom I must labor not to turn into mere media figures—the incarnation of the few sound bites I manage to hear from them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then I have to move past them to the people in my neighborhood, and then the people of my country and the people that my country has an impact on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I start thinking this way, I begin to understand why it is so tempting to be cynical.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I were to really care, I would be overwhelmed: The world out there is too big—the issues too complex—the forces at work too powerful—the personalities too subtle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">I sometimes wonder if the ardent true believer among us is just the flip side of the cynic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In neither case is there a willingness or an ability to deal with how complicated everything and everybody actually is.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-hyphenate: none; tab-stops: -.5in;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">What do we do?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no single answer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We all have different callings—different gifts, different types of opportunities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if we are Christians there is one thing we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">all </i>can do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>T<span style="letter-spacing: -.15pt;">he shut-in who can’t get out to the polling station can do it, as can the twelve-year-old who is not old enough to vote, the conscientious citizen who has studied an issue carefully and is still confused about it, the civil servant who is dismayed by the corruption and inefficiency in the department where he works, the soldier on the battlefield, the official in the State Department struggling with how best to respond to an international crisis, the missionary who is being thrown out of an Islamic nation whose government has just turned radical, the national believer who is on trial for her faith, the young black who is pulled over on the highway for racial reasons. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We can all pray.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Not only <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">can </i>we pray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">must</i> pray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the church does not pray for “God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven,” who will?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just how we pray is the subject for another blog.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let me say this much here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the Bible is to be believed, praying is the most powerful and strategic thing we could ever do for our country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">We may assent to this—but I don’t think we really believe it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How much time (how many actual minutes—count them) did you spend last week praying for the country, praying for President Obama, praying for the candidates in the race for the Republican nomination, praying about whatever issue is really exercising you at the moment? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Some of the Freudians among us might say that politics (like everything else) is just sublimated sex.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wonder if politics isn’t rather sublimated prayer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We fight politically because we do not know how to pray politically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Think about that.</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-81051864991151080792012-01-03T10:11:00.000-08:002012-01-03T10:11:10.407-08:00A New Year's Resolution for the Church<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">This New Year is also an election year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I write things in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Iowa</st1:place></st1:state> are humming as Republican candidates face their first formal electoral challenge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Interestingly enough for our discussion on this blog, the news media are reporting that the Evangelical opinion is divided on which Republican candidate is the best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Does this promise, I wonder, even further fragmentation in the church—not simply between Christian Democrats and Christian Republicans, but even among the Christian Republicans?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who knows.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">Political disagreement among Christians is bound to happen—even among Republican Christians.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And to my way of thinking this is OK.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It proves that we are thinking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we are really wrestling with the complex issues before us, we will not all agree on the best strategy for nudging our country in the right direction.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">But there is one thing I hope very much that Christians can all agree on--one thing I would like to recommend as a suitable New Years’ Resolution for the church during an election year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is this: That in the midst of all the important and valid political discussion of 2012, we will not be diverted from our essential tasks.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">There are certain things that simply will not happen if the church does not do them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are (1) praying for God’s kingdom to come, (2) evangelizing and discipling the nations, and (3) caring for the poor and weak in Jesus’ name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To do these things right calls for an enormous expenditure of time and energy—much of which can be siphoned off during an election year if we give the wrong sort of attention to power politics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">Notice I say “power politics”—by which I mean the politics of election, and by which I mean to remind us all that “politics” in the broader sense (politics as the science and practice of learning how to live together) is a major concern of the gospel and continues whether or not we are campaigning in the narrow sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the church stays on target—when she keeps her priorities properly—she actually contributes in the most powerful way imaginable to the improvement of politics in this broad sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when the church allows herself to get politicized—pushing hard for this or that “man made” solution, she actually robs her neighbors of their greatest social and political need—namely the new heart that the grace of God at the cross alone can bring.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: .25in; mso-hyphenate: none;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">Let me put it this way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Societies change most dramatically as people change, one by one, from the inside out, rather than by the imposition of rules and restraints from the outside in or from the top down. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes, of course, those restraints must be imposed. That is why God established our government, and why we respect it and the process we are engaged in this year: Without God’s rule through our government, our natural selfishness would reign uncontrollably and make living together impossible. But a greater glory shines, and a better society thrives, when people voluntarily come to bow with joy before the King of kings and this heartfelt allegiance spills over into all of life. Renewed by the indwelling Holy Spirit, who writes God’s moral law on the heart (see Ezekiel 36:25–28), people need less and less the fear of governmental sanctions to make them live as they should. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-hyphenate: none; tab-stops: -.5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-hyphenate: none; tab-stops: -.5in;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -.15pt;">Who is responsible for advancing this powerful and strategic solution to society’s woes? Clearly, it is the church. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So let’s stay focused.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Someone (was it Casey Stengel?) has said, “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let that be our 2012 New Year’s resolution.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-hyphenate: none; tab-stops: -.5in;"><br />
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</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-40410103312613609112011-11-30T15:27:00.000-08:002011-11-30T15:27:35.637-08:00The Biggest Idol of All<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I mentioned last blog how depressed I was by the failure of the Congressional Super Committee to make any progress. I had friends who just laughed cynically over the whole thing: "What did you expect, Charlie? It's congress!" </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I get it--but I don't want to cave in to cynicism. I don't think the Christian should. </span><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I think it is too easy to say that the Super Committee log-jam happened <i>simply</i> because each member was trying to save his or her political skin. I am sure that that was part of the picture, but there were also sincerely held and conflicting ideals in the mix. </span><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Being an involved citizen (or congressperson) is a little like being married. It is living 24/7 with somebody besides yourself (in the case of politics, lots of somebodies). This would be fine if nobody but you wanted to be at the center of things. Unfortunately, everyone else is just like you in thinking that his opinion, his candidate, and his strategy for making things better are all the best. This is where the heat in politics comes from most deeply: everybody wants things to go his way. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span></span><span></span>Given this analysis we can see where the solution to political heat must begin—and continue. Each of us must surrender the throne he has wrongly assumed. He must surrender it first to God, by sincerely trusting God for the outcomes he seeks, and second to his neighbor in service. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Doing these things will not mean that we will no longer have any heartfelt disagreements—even in the church. Nor does it guarantee that, if you serve me, I will in turn serve you (people spurned Jesus’ love and they may well spurn yours). Nevertheless if you do your part, you will find the heat in you dropping down a notch or two. For your sense that all is well will no longer depend on getting things your way. “Winning” will no longer mean getting your candidate or policy in place; it will mean doing the right thing and leaving the results in God’s hands. You will find yourself more able to back down when someone insults you. Winning a school board debate won’t be quite as important as it once was, since your ego will no longer be invested in the outcome, and for that reason compromise will be easier. When love begins to replace winning for growing numbers of citizens, life together becomes more tolerable.</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-63025319102211572062011-11-22T12:49:00.001-08:002011-11-22T12:49:49.644-08:00Political Log James, Idolatry, and the Golden Rule<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">In the last few blogs I have been saying that idolatry is the reason we get so angry over political differences.<span> </span>We commit idolatry whenever we shift our deepest hopes and allegiances from God and to something (or someone) else—say a candidate or a political strategy or an ideal—like privacy at all costs.<span> </span>Idolatry is an addiction, a habit of the heart, pulling at us like gravity.<span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>We have a very difficult time shaking it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Why did the congressional super committee just fail?<span> </span>There are lots of complex reasons I am sure.<span> </span>But if we could see down to the foundations of the heart we would see idolatry at work.<span> </span>And I am not just picking on those twelve.<span> </span>Had I been given the misfortune of sitting on that committee I would have been as susceptible as any of them to the forces of my heart’s misplaced affection—political ambition, fear of people, or something else. <span> </span><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The beginning of the way out of idolatry, and of the log-jams it creates, is a trust in God that is sufficiently strong to warrant living aggressively by the Golden Rule.<span> </span><span> </span>We are not very good at this.<span> </span>Many activist believers, for example, have sought to redress the anti-Christian bias in textbooks, or to make public school facilities available after hours for Christian meetings (often with good results), or to pursue litigation in defense of Christian conscience, or to expose the anti-Christian bias in the academy. These are, of course, all worthy undertakings, as far as they go. If Christians do not blow the whistle on anti-Christian bias, who will? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The difficulty, as I see it, is that we often do not go far enough. Our active interest in the freedom of conscience often extends only as far as we have felt <i>our</i> rights and freedoms as Christians being threatened. Assuming that you desire prayer in public schools (I realize that Christians differ on the wisdom of doing so at all), would you do so with as much fervor if you lived in Honolulu, where praying would as likely be to a Hindu deity as to Christ, as you would if you lived in Memphis, which is in a heavily Christian part of our country)? Perhaps not. Sadly, in our valid concern over the decay of faith in our society, we may find ourselves advocating action that marginalizes the faith of the lonely Jewish kid in the otherwise Christian fourth grade classroom in rural Mississippi.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Do you see the problem? Christians are, or appear to be, religiously self-serving when it comes to their engagement with public life. We can make such an idol of the freedom of our <i>own</i> conscience that we become blind to the fact that freedom of <i>every</i> conscience is a Christian principle worth fighting for. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">One need not be a religious relativist to acknowledge this. The Jesus who claimed he was the only way to the Father never forced anyone to believe him. He has no place in his kingdom for coerced disciples, but says instead, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). In a day when so many angrily assert their rights, Christians have a remarkable opportunity to demonstrate a totally different mindset, the mindset of a statesman—one that firmly defends the <i>non-Christian’s </i>right to believe as he or she does. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I am not suggesting that we cease bringing what we believe into the public discussion. Nor am I suggesting that we cease believing that Jesus Christ is the Lord of all. But I am suggesting that we trust his Lordship enough to obey him when he commands us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. If we want our voices to be heard in the public debates, we will also want the voices of our Muslim, secular, and atheist neighbors to be heard. We will look for ways to say, in effect, “I think you are dead wrong in what you believe, but I will go to the wall for your freedom to argue for it.” We will see as equally worthy of legal consideration the rights of a Caribbean cult to sacrifice chickens in Miami and the rights of a fundamentalist church in rural Ohio to start a school. With a love undergirded by confidence in Christ’s ability to promote his kingdom in any setting, we will resist the temptation to be selfish in our religious advocacy, concerned only to defend our turf from our enemies. We will always have an eye on the common good.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">If the Golden Rule should apply in the broad world of public life, should it not also apply in the narrower world of church life? Should not Republicans, Democrats, and Independents be able to worship together under the same roof? And should they not be able genuinely to listen to each other, and to disagree without blowing the church apart?<span> </span>Should they not want to?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Living by the Golden Rule is not easy. It provides no clear-cut answers for how to hold to and advance our deep convictions while also honoring the neighbor who disagrees with us, whether that neighbor is an atheist or a fellow believer. The Golden Rule offers no blueprint for building a safe and godly America (which should be OK, since we have decided not to worship America—right?). <span> </span><span> </span>The Golden rule, rather, charts a path for us, a path whose end we cannot see, full of difficult turns (complex thinking), steep climbs (the hard work of listening), and sudden descents (humble apologies). But it is the path that Jesus commands and for that reason we should follow it. Most important, the Golden Rule gives to us the antidote to the self-protective and community-compromising worship of ourselves and our views, for by taking this path we demonstrate that we are worshiping the true God, the God who is big enough to vindicate what is true and real in his own way and in his own time. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-72352582257489019982011-11-09T15:33:00.000-08:002011-11-09T15:33:17.288-08:00More idols that stir up political heat<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I said last post that the heart of the matter in political heat is the heart.<span> </span>That is to say, we often disagree so furiously with each other because we have allowed something other than God to be our heart’s first love.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I was deeply moved by the election of Barack Obama in 2008. I did not endorse everything he advocated, but I was nevertheless happily amazed that our country chose to elect an African American—and that such an unprecedented change in power had occurred without violence (a rare thing in world history: John McCain admirably championed that peace when he silenced the bitter voices of his own constituency during his concession speech). When I saw the President-elect’s daughters on the victory platform on election night and imagined that they would soon be in the White House, not as guests, but as hosts, I could not help but weep. But in the midst of all the euphoria, I was also troubled by the nearly messianic status that Mr. Obama had come to enjoy. “He is only a man,” I kept saying. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">What drove the adulation, I think, was idolatry—undue reliance on a political leader.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">We do the same sort of thing when we rely too heavily on a particular movement.<span> </span>When the Christian Right rose to power in the 1980s, many Christians who had heretofore been inactive politically began to discover that they could affect the national agenda. And with that discovery came a tendency to expect too much of political solutions to the nation’s deepest ills. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">There is nothing idolatrous about political activism or about advancing skilled politicians whom you feel will push things in a good direction. The idolatry arises when we begin to think that things will be so much better if “we can just get <i>this law</i> enacted,” or “we can just get <i>this person</i> into office and <i>that person</i> out of office,” or “we can just mandate <i>this book</i> for the history curriculum and <i>that book</i> for biology.” Certainly leaders and policies make some difference--<span> </span>but not as much as we sometimes think, given our sprawling polity and selfish hearts. How easily (and unfairly) we tend to blame elected officials for the social ills of our time, as if greed, family problems, uneven pay scales, failures in education, and inner-city violence were simply the government’s fault. Those in office bear responsibility and their decisions affect our lives to some degree, but such scapegoating, which appears with a vengeance during election years, reflects an unrealistic and idolatrous reliance upon the machinery of government. We often grow to hate certain administrations and figures because we once loved them too much. Just think of the astonishing political reversals in the 2010 midterm elections.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">If some of us tend to make a god out of public empowerment, others among us tend to make a god out of privacy. Or, perhaps, at different times we tend to make gods out of both. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Think about privacy. In certain areas of life we passionately want to be left alone to make our own way. My observation is that we do this whatever end of the political spectrum we occupy. From the left we cry foul whenever religion finds its way into our relationships (“Religion has no right to impose a particular view of marriage on me!”). From the right we cry foul when Uncle Sam finds his way into our wallets (“Congress has no right to impose such limits on my income!”). Those on the left assert the “right” to terminate a pregnancy with as much fervor as those on the right assert the “right” to bear arms. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The issues may be different, and may carry different weight, but what awakens the passion in each case is the threat, either perceived or real, to personal freedom. And the passion increases in direct proportion to how fervently we believe that that freedom is essential to our lives—the degree, in other words, to which we have permitted it to occupy a godlike place in our hearts.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The worship of privacy may be more of a problem inside the church than we think. <span> </span>We may feel safe and even comfortable “going public” about our politics at church, but that may be only because there is no risk that doing so will invite any challenges. After all, we may have chosen a church where our private convictions risk no violation because everyone agrees with us. This happens, incidentally, on both the left and the right, and we must examine ourselves before being critical of others about it. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">More discussion of idolatry next blog </span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-50083540403826649172011-10-27T13:00:00.000-07:002011-10-27T13:00:55.891-07:00Why do we get so angry at each other?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I was recently talking about this blog with a young couple in my congregation.<span> </span>The husband reported that politics tends<span> </span>to get him pretty worked up and he agrees with my suggestion that he has at times allowed it to become more important to him than the church.<span> </span>The wife reported that she runs away from politics in the church because the heat—or the possibility of heat –upsets her.<span> </span>With a wry smile she said that one of the reasons she chose to be a missionary in Africa for a number of years is that she wanted to get away from fights in the American church.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Often the only reason churches don’t explode is that Christians of differing politics have already split from each other. Evangelical blacks (who tend to be Democrats) don’t as a rule worship with evangelical whites (who have tended to be Republicans—though that is changing). Evangelicals who are closely linked to academia and are more likely to be Democrats tend to drift from evangelicals who are closely linked to business and are more likely to be Republican. <span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Why are we so divided? Why do we disagree so much?<span> </span>Why is the heat in our disagreements so often indistinguishable from the heat in the broader culture?<span> </span>Aren’t we supposed to be different?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">One reason, well documented by sociologist James Hunter, is that many Christians have joined the broader culture in the mistaken assumption that public life is the same thing as political</span><span class="MsoCommentReference"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 9pt;"><span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"> life.<span> </span>For this reason we tend to think that the only, or best, way to change the culture is through politics. But politics is intrinsically coercive, using power (rather than persuasion) to bring about change. And forced change tends to turn up the heat in public life; it tends to polarize people, transforming ideas into slogans, discussions into shouting matches, and the opposition into demons. This is the case even when Christians are involved; perhaps more so since Christians tend to feel that they have a mandate from God in their efforts. Christians need to rediscover that “public” is much larger than “political.” </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">But why do we seize on solutions, political or otherwise, with such polarizing energy? There is more to the problem than too narrow a definition of public life. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The heart of the matter is the heart. Our hearts tend to drift away from their proper center in God. We are, in other words, idolaters, prone to setting our deepest hopes and identities in things other than God. And these false hopes are so fragile that we become angry and afraid when they are threatened, as they so often are by politics. For one reason or another people of differing politics threaten the leaders, strategies, or ways of life that we have come to rely upon too heavily. If, for example, we have built our lifestyles and future plans around a largely deregulated economy, we will tend to become angry (even infuriated) over a political administration that pushes hard for regulation. If on the other hand we have built our lifestyles and future plans around certain governmental social benefits, we may find ourselves growing nervous and angry—even furious—over a political administration that aims to remove or diminish entitlements. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">The most immediate and perhaps the best thing any of us could do for America is to take Psalm 97:7 to heart (<i>All</i> who worship images are put to shame, those who boast in idols”), searching our lives and attitudes carefully and repenting of our complicity in the idolatries of our time.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Think for example of the economic woes of 2008–2009. Many Americans rejoiced to see Bernard Madoff, architect of a $50 billion Ponzi scheme that ruined the lives of many, brought to justice. But how many of us were prepared to admit to our own headlong pursuit of money? Mr. Madoff was a hero as long as he was producing money for us; he became the villain only when he didn’t. At the heart of the financial meltdown was what one of my church leaders (himself an executive in one of the firms that came near to collapse) called a “tsunami of debt.” Certainly greedy bankers and lazy regulators were key players in this, but vast numbers of us contributed to the problem. How many of us were not drawn into the worship of the “good life” that the world of easy credit offered? How many of us spent far beyond our means simply because we thought we could get away with it? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">“Pick your poison” a friend of mine says regarding the idols available to us. Some of us may feel free from the worship of money. But what about other obsessions: celebrity mongering (a recent survey indicated that a distressingly high percentage of teenage girls would rather be “the personal assistant to a famous singer or movie star” than a U. S. Senator or the president of a great university), or sexual addiction (pornography seems to be as much a problem for the church as it is for the rest of the culture). We pour money and energy into sports, into body image, into professional success, and into the acquisition of power. We grow angry at anyone or anything that threatens our freedom to spend as we please or to express ourselves as we please because we have become worshipers of unbridled freedom.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">More talk next post on idolatry</span></div><div> <hr align="left" class="msocomoff" size="1" width="33%" /> <div> <div class="msocomtxt" id="_com_1"><span><a href="" name="_msocom_1"></a></span> <div class="MsoCommentText"><br />
</div></div></div></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-48754525602870697182011-10-20T14:18:00.000-07:002011-10-20T14:18:08.750-07:00Why do we disagree politically?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</style> <![endif]--> <div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;"><span></span>I recently witnessed a debate between the co-authors of a new book entitled <i>Left, Right, and Jesus.<span> </span></i>They are both Bible loving evangelicals.<span> </span>One is a young black woman, the other an older white man.<span> </span>One (I will let you guess which) comes out on the political right—the other on the other side.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">As I listened I was reminded of Abraham Lincoln’s famous words in his Second Inaugural Speech:<span> </span>“Both [sides] read the same Bible, and pray to the same God…”<span> </span>But recollecting Lincoln didn’t make me cynical. Lincoln was no interpretive nihilist.<span> </span>He plainly believed that some readings of the bible on the slavery issue were better than others.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Interpretational nihilism is a trendy cop out—a lazy person’s excuse for not thinking hard.<span> </span>On any issue some interpretations are better than others—say Bonhoeffer’s versus Hitler’s interpretations of the value of Jews.<span> </span>Nevertheless it is very important to notice that two Bible loving people can come to very different places in politics.<span> </span>They can do it with a high degree of integrity.<span> </span>It is happening all the time these days, and we need to respect it in each other.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Why the differences?<span> </span>Because the way we see things, including the way we read the Bible, while it may not be completely controlled by our backgrounds and experience, will nevertheless be influenced by them.<span> </span>One of the reasons we get so angry with each other is that we don’t realize this, or we do realize it but refuse to admit it.<span> </span>We confuse the infallibility of the Bible with the infallibility of our interpretation of the Bible.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">And why do we cling so stubbornly to our interpretation of the Bible when it comes to politics?<span> </span>I am sure there are many reasons.<span> </span>But one of them is that politics is more important to us than the church is.<span> </span>If the church had its proper place in our hearts, if it occupied the place in our hearts that it occupies in the heart of Jesus (who died to save and make us one), we would be bending over backwards to give each other the benefit of the doubt, working double time to submit our own interpretations of Scripture to the scrutiny and critique of the brothers and sisters who disagree with us, looking for common ground. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">I am happy to report that the co-authors in the debate I saw were gracious towards each other.<span> </span>They sparred a bit, scoring points here and there, to applause from their different constituencies in the audience, but there was good will between them.<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">We need such good will.<span> </span>We need more meetings of this sort.<span> </span>Christians on both sides need to be sitting together in the same room listening to each other.<span> </span><span> </span>The church needs to be different from the world, animated by a unity that is higher and deeper than that of party.</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-69688487397698552622011-10-12T12:25:00.000-07:002011-10-12T12:25:49.686-07:00Anger, panic, and politics<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</style> <![endif]--><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">One of the reasons we get so politically angry with each other inside and outside the church is fear.<span> </span>This makes no sense.<span> </span>Panic does not rightly belong in any believer’s heart. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Consider Psalm 97. Verse 1 says, “The <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span> reigns, let the earth be glad; let the distant shores rejoice” (Psalm 97:1).<span> </span>Notice that “reigns” is a political word. It describes a king exercising dominion over his subjects, the ancient equivalent (roughly) of saying, “President so-and-so sits in the Oval Office.” Of course verse 1 says much more. We elect American presidents for a brief time. Their “reign” is neither permanent, nor absolute, nor flawless, nor worldwide, whereas God’s is all four. His rule causes the “<i>earth”</i> to be “glad” and the “<i>distant shores”</i> to rejoice.”<span> </span>Psalm 97:9 declares his absolute sovereignty over all authorities, whether seen or unseen: “For you, <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span>, are the Most High over all the earth; you are exalted far above all gods.” What an encouragement! </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>When we bemoan the moral and social disintegration of American culture (whether we moan from the left or the right) we are often right. But when we speak to one another or to our own hearts in such a way as to stir up fear and panic, we are wrong. Our God reigns, and therefore we need not—we must not—be afraid as we exercise our civic responsibilities, no matter what seems to be going on around us.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Consider the damage panic can bring. First of all, panic impairs judgment. If we give in to the voice that cries “Act now, or our great country will be forever lost!” we will find ourselves demanding easy and quick solutions to our nation’s problems, when in fact there are no such solutions. Christians, more than any others, should know that no candidate, no platform, no party has all the answers. But fear makes it easy to forget this.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Panic breeds impatience not only with political process but also with people. It easily leads to browbeating and to polarization even in the church, the very place where God expects us to model the one community that will outlast all others. How quickly and tragically we accuse and demonize one another when we are afraid. <span> </span>It is easy to demonize the rich and powerful (“take back Wall Street”), neglecting to note that some of the very rich are very generous.<span> </span>Our hearts break over the killing of millions of unborn children, but are we really right to label every pro-choicer an advocate for murder and every woman who submits to abortion an accomplice in murder? What of the young woman who has been persuaded that the child within is not yet a child? What of the person who votes pro-choice because she cannot see how the legal battle against abortion will succeed rather than because she is pro-abortion? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Because panic cries “Do something right now, before it is too late!” it dehumanizes us in our dealings with each other. For me to understand my neighbor’s motives and reasoning takes time, the very thing panic cannot stand.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Panic can be used to justify falsehood. Some people, fearful of a religious takeover, have lifted Jefferson’s “wall of separation” idea out of its historical context and used it, dishonestly, to justify the silencing of the religious voice in every public place and discussion. Promoters of creationist literature, fearful of the impact of the teaching of evolution upon their children, have sought to sneak their material into a Pennsylvania public school by doctoring the terminology of their manual without substantially altering its content. Still others, fearful of the secularization of schools, have promoted “stealth candidates” with a hidden agenda (say, school prayer). Such subterfuge usually backfires, causing the opposition to retrench even further. Worse, when employed by believers, it dishonors the God they claim to serve by using ungodly means (lying) to advance an allegedly godly end. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>The worst thing about panic is that it displeases God. Fear is a matter of the heart, and our reigning King cares deeply and especially about our hearts, since it is from them that everything else issues (see Matthew 12:33–37; Mark 7:20–23). God cares about <i>why</i> we do something at least as much as he cares about <i>what </i>we do. Psalm 97 reminds us that, deep down, the fundamental tone of our lives must be joyful confidence in God’s sovereign reign, not fear: “The <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span> reigns, let the earth <i>be glad</i>; let the distant shores <i>rejoice....Rejoice in the <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span>,</i> you who are righteous, and <i>praise</i> his holy name.” (Psalm 97:1, 12). When I choose political and social action because I am afraid, even if I can justify that action from Scripture, I am denying God at a deep level. I am acting from unbelief. I am taking his majestic name in vain.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>The next time we find ourselves driven by fear, or we hear a message that urges us to act out of fear, consider Jesus. Our Lord saw the desperate evils of life far more clearly than we ever will, and yet he never panicked. In <i>The Waiting Father </i>Helmut Thielicke wrote:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: -0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>What tremendous pressures there must have been within him to drive him to hectic, nervous, explosive activity! He sees...as no one else ever sees, with an infinite and awful nearness, the agony of the dying man, the prisoner’s torment, the anguish of the wounded conscience, injustice, terror, dread, and beastliness. He sees and hears and feels all this with the heart of a Savior...Must this not fill every waking hour and rob him of sleep at night? Must he not begin immediately to set the fire burning, to win people, to work out strategic plans...to work...furiously...before the night comes when no man can work? That’s what we would imagine the earthly life of the Son of God to be like, if we were to think of him in human terms....But how utterly different was the actual life of Jesus! Though the burden of the whole world lay heavy on his shoulders...he has time to stop and talk to the individual...By being obedient in his little corner of the highly provincial precincts of Nazareth and Bethlehem he allows himself to be fitted into a great mosaic whose master is God...And that...is why peace and not unrest goes out from him. For God’s faithfulness already spans the world like a rainbow: he does not need to build it; he needs only to walk beneath it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: -0.5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 11pt; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">There is more to say about anger.<span> </span>Stay tuned.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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</div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-51555581354072524432011-10-04T13:51:00.000-07:002011-10-04T13:51:30.966-07:00Some of the things we fight over in the church.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</style> <![endif]--><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">We are bound to disagree over politics, not just in the culture but in the church as well. I bump into this reality all the time. One such occasion occurred in early 2009 when I had two very different appointments back to back. The first was with a leader in my church who wondered why we did not talk more forcefully about abortion and homosexuality. He wondered why we were more likely to speak out on trendy New York City issues like justice and mercy than to speak out and even act on the issues he was concerned about. He wondered why, for example, if we were prepared to sponsor a march against hunger, we were not also prepared to sponsor a protest in front of an abortion clinic.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I met next with a Christian graduate student at Columbia University. She told me that she had begun to drift away from Christian community because, as she put it, “I am beginning to find that the people I agree with theologically are the people I disagree with socially.” The issues for her were, interestingly, the same as those mentioned in my first appointment—abortion and homosexuality, but especially the latter. She was in a different place on those issues. She was not gay herself, but she had a number of close friends who were, and her love for them made her feel at odds, given her prior church experience, with the Christian community. She was confused about what the Bible had to say about committed homosexual partnerships, and she was struggling over what she would do if she became convinced that the Lord forbade them. We talked about many things—about the false choice the culture often presents (one either must completely accept the gay lifestyle or one must admit to homophobia), about the tendency in the evangelical world to elevate certain sins over others (homosexual sin over heterosexual sin; or sexual sins over other types of sin, like greed or gossip), about the fact that there are different legitimate strategies for nudging our culture in the direction of sexual health (California ballot initiatives being only one of them), about the difference between struggling with sin and embracing sin, and about the difference between homosexual inclination and homosexual behavior. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">I came away from the second appointment thankful and perplexed (more later on my perplexity). I was thankful that this young person had felt comfortable talking to me, for I am “the church” by virtue of my role as a pastor. I could not help but think that she approached me because our church did not, in its public face, fit the stereotype that she had begun to react to. We were committed, as she discovered, to a traditional view of marriage (heterosexual, monogamous, lifelong unions), but we were also keen to keep our “front door” open, so that people like her and her friends would feel comfortable coming in for serious and honest discussion. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">We are bound to disagree, not only over issues, but over which issues to “go public” on. Committed Christians, sometimes in the same church, sometimes in the leadership of the same church, can easily find themselves at odds with one another on these sorts of issues. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Such tensions arise not only between us but within us. I mentioned that I came away from the second appointment perplexed. The graduate student’s struggles reminded me of how confused people are, especially young people, even church-raised young people like her, about God’s way of wisdom when it comes to sexual matters. I found myself asking if our church’s relative public silence on the issue was in fact the best policy. Certainly it helped keep our front door more widely open than it might otherwise be. It certainly gave rise to an important and nuanced discussion with one particular person that might otherwise not have happened. But what about all the others out there? What about those in my own church who might need a lot more guidance than they realize? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">How do we sort these (and other) matters out so that the church stays together? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Stay tuned?</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-54352353729628320632011-09-21T11:54:00.000-07:002011-09-21T11:54:01.845-07:00Should Christians even care about politics?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Perhaps the best way to avoid splitting churches over politics is to keep Christians out of politics.<span> </span>Isn’t this what Jesus wants?<span> </span>Didn’t he say to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.”<span> </span>Isn’t the world lost and destined for burning?<span> </span>So why should we get all worked up about political stuff?<span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">So goes the thinking of some people.<span> </span>But such thinking is deeply flawed. Consider the discussion with Jesus over paying taxes to Caesar.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">They sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right to pay the imperial tax to Caesar or not? Should we pay or shouldn’t we?”</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. “Why are you trying to trap me?” he asked. “Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.” They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>“Caesar’s,” they replied.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.25in;"><i><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span>Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” And they were amazed at him. (Mark 12:13–17)</span></i></div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">A brilliant parry of his enemies’ efforts to trap him, Jesus words in Mark 12 offer profound and revolutionary insight into the believer’s relationship to government. Note first that Jesus openly talked about tough political issues. </span></div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Paying taxes to Caesar infuriated some people. The Jews of that time lived in Palestine under a foreign government, parallel in some ways to the French during the German occupation in World War II (or to Afghans living with foreign soldiers in their streets—a less comfortable parallel for Americans to contemplate). Though cryptic and influenced by the ulterior motives of his opponents, Jesus’ comments nevertheless took seriously the practical social problem presented by the question. </span></div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Jesus’ readiness to talk politics reminds us of his claim to rule the whole of life. He means to reign not merely over our private worlds—the world of family, close friends, personal devotions, and so on—but our entire world, including our political life. </span></div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoBodyText2" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Notice that Jesus answers the political question with a command, not just a suggestion: “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” Our Lord requires appropriate allegiances of us. He does not permit us to treat political questions as non-questions, matters that we can take or leave because they are irrelevant to our obligation to him.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Jesus is the Second Adam, the Messiah who has come to reverse all the damage brought upon human experience by the first<span> </span>Adam.<span> </span>Revelation describes him not only as the Lamb of God, but also as he Lion of Judah—the ruler.<span> </span>To follow him is to be part of his reign—and that has to mean that everything, including social and political life, matters.<span> </span></span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-69717918555621949332011-09-06T13:10:00.000-07:002011-09-06T13:10:27.388-07:00Should Christians divide over politics?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Leading up to and following the 2004 election, Woodland Hills Church, an evangelical mega-congregation on the outskirts of St. Paul, Minnesota, caught national attention when it lost twenty percent of its membership because pastor Gregory Boyd refused to endorse a Republican agenda. He refused to do this not because he was pro-choice or because he sought to defend gay marriage (he was conservative on these issues). He did it because of his understanding of the role of the church. “When the church wins the culture wars, it inevitably loses,” Mr. Boyd preached. “When it conquers the world, it becomes the world. When you put your trust in the sword, you lose the cross” (Laurie Goodstein,<i> New York Times, </i>June 30, 2006). Despite the fact that Rev. Boyd took six sermons to explain himself, one thousand members of the congregation left. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;"><span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Why, we must ask, did this exodus happen? I suspect that if the thousand had been polled regarding their view of Christ, the centrality of the cross, and the doctrine of the Trinity, they would have been on the same page as the four thousand who stayed. This means that it had to be something else—a lesser thing from God’s perspective—that led to the division. No doubt the reasons from person to person varied in the details, but the fact remains that twenty percent of a church “walked” because of politics—despite the fact that Jesus prays that we “may be one” as he and his Father are one, so that “the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:22, 23). </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria; letter-spacing: -0.15pt;">Much is at stake here. If the crucified and risen Messiah cannot hold Democrats and Republicans together under the same roof, if he cannot enable them to work through their differences, then he is not much of a Savior—he certainly is not the Messiah of the world. Stories like Woodland Hills “prove” that in the final analysis, we are a social organization just like any other social organization—united by the same sort of bonds that unite other human groups, and apt to dissolve for the same reasons that other human groups dissolve. This is more than unfortunate. It is disobedient, a betrayal of our Savior, the cause to which he has called us, and the purpose for which he died. It proves that we have allowed our vision for America to capture our hearts more deeply than God’s vision for us as his ambassadors. And the effect is to compromise the power of our testimony to the world. </span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-65419522619557549992011-08-30T13:18:00.000-07:002011-08-30T13:18:35.944-07:00Can Christians be activists without hating each other?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><img src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/video_object.png" style="background-color: #b2b2b2; " class="BLOGGER-object-element tr_noresize tr_placeholder" id="ieooui" data-original-id="ieooui" /> <style>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Two weeks before the 2008 national election my church in New York held a church-wide forum featuring a discussion of some of the contents of this book followed by presentations by two congregation members, one who was planning to vote Republican and the other who was planning to vote Democrat. After declaring how they were going to vote, the panelists spent some time explaining their positions and then entertained questions from the congregation. Their gracious tone, their thoughtful engagement with Scripture, and the nuance of their thinking demonstrated that the church (even an evangelical and reformed church like ours) really can be a “big tent” where people can deeply disagree and yet still love each other and worship together. It held out some hope for the role of the church in a country whose public debates have become so rancorous that the attempted murder of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in January 2011 at a meet and greet event in Tucson felt almost inevitable.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">So much has happened in our country since the turn of the century. We have had eight years of a Republican administration, led by a president of strong evangelical faith. We have entered a war with Iraq whose initial goals were met quickly but which has lingered with much loss of life all around. <span> </span>We have continued to fight in Afghanistan, with heated debate over the value and goals of the mission. We have entered the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. We have seen, with astonishment, the election of an African American to highest office.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Along the way we have seen the rise of a new generation of evangelicals whose political engagements and interests have been broader than those of its predecessors, so much so that many in this new generation have contributed to the election of a Democratic administration. This shift has not been easy for the church. It has led to fissures, name-calling and distrust between evangelicals—vividly illustrated by the explosive political split of a mega church in sub-urban St. Paul at the time of the 2004 election.<span> </span>Discord has deepened in the rightward swing of the 2010 midterm elections and threatens to be as wide as ever in the election of 2012. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">But I am convinced that the broadening and subsequent confusion among evangelicals has also been good for the church, because it has forced believers to try to understand each other. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">I remain convinced that Christians have the resources to do what the world cannot do—to disagree and be engaged politically without polarizing. But I am also convinced that this will not be easy, unless, of course, Christians abandon all concern for the world, an option that is not open to us. Jesus commands us to be salt and light, to pray for our neighbors, and to contribute to their welfare. The moment we begin seriously to love our neighbors as ourselves we will find ourselves disagreeing with each other on how best to do it. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">This blog, a prelude to book I will be publishing in February 2012 (<i>Body Broken: Can Republicans and Democrats Sit Together in the Same Pew?—</i>New Growth Press), aims to keep Christians engaged with the world without derailing or exploding the church.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Cambria;">Stay tuned.</span></div>Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1652362322715831517.post-41938359344628545492011-08-24T13:52:00.001-07:002011-08-24T13:52:34.762-07:00Can Republicans and Democrats sit in the same pew?Yes!! But it will take some work.<br />
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Stay tuned.Charlie Drewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18421265957616493148noreply@blogger.com1