Unto Caesar and Unto God

It is all too easy to confuse politics and faith. It is all too easy to allow one to influence the other without noting the separation or which is calling the shots. In the aftermath, we look at the results of our preaching, teaching, and voting and are not exactly sure whom or what to blame.

For believers in Jesus Christ, we are supposedly following Jesus and Jesus' teachings. Unfortunately, we often do nothing of the kind. Without our even recognizing it, we often fall into the trap of allowing faith to be a euphemism for belonging to a religious club. We surround ourselves with religious phrases and icons but never really allow the actual teachings of Jesus to make an impact on our lives.

You see, Jesus calls us to things that are difficult to accomplish, even when we want to do so. He calls us to love our enemies. He calls us to visit the imprisoned. He calls us to befriend sinners. He calls us to forgive those who would hurt us, even when they respond by hurting us the same way 77 times in the same day. He calls us to carry our cross. He calls us to take the part of the stranger, poor, beggar, enemy, and injured without regard to how it might impact our own well-being.

Instead of taking Jesus to heart, we reinterpret his words to make them more convenient. We take the challenge to give generously to the poor as meaning that we should take our leftovers to a family in need. We take Jesus' words about loving our enemies to not include those we fear, be they Black, Latino, or Muslim. We take Jesus' words about feeding the hungry to mean serving at the soup kitchen once a month as a church in which a handful participate. We take Jesus' words about making disciples of the nations to mean five bucks in the offering plate for world missions.

We also take Jesus' words an relegate them to the sphere of what happens at the church's sanctuary or fellowship hall. We try to protect the rest of our lives from Jesus' interference. We don't let the gospel attach itself to our politics, unless maybe in relation to a single issue. The problem is that when we do that we fail to assess what Jesus' words on caring for all persons in need really mean.

Instead of allowing our political views to be influenced by how Jesus taught us to live, we do the opposite. We take our traditional political views and use them to frame our religious lives. You see, as evangelicals, especially in the South, we have inherited a political tradition that has kept people of color at arms length for generations. I was taught in Mississippi that Black people could not come to church with me. I was taught that I could go to work with them, but not have them over for a meal. I was taught that missions to Latin America was great, but that Latinos were not any more welcome within the structures of the church here than Blacks.

Over the last 25 years or so, I have seen some changes in those attitudes, but not enough to say we have gone from not following Jesus to following Jesus. I've heard concerns over whether Latinos up for service as deacons were in the US legally or not. Jesus makes no such distinction. Jesus simply tells us to love our neighbors the way God has loved us and to welcome them with open arms. Instead of given preference to what Jesus would call us to do, we have most often listened to what our political parties would tell us to do. That is a problem.

When we can ignore Jesus' teachings because they do not coincide with our political views or party platforms, we are not following Jesus. We are simply "Taking the name of the Lord in vain." Being a people of faith has repercussions in our political lives, simply because the lordship of Jesus demands the submission of every aspect of our being.

Within the church, it is not, and should not be a question of liberal, conservative, Republican, or Democrat. It should be a question of what Jesus tells us to do. While we do get a sense from Jesus that we should obey laws or be willing to pay the consequences, the only direct command we have in terms of relating to others is to love them. By love, Jesus means we are to care for their needs as though they were our own.

Thus, caring for strangers, people of color different from our own, nationalities different from our own, religions and religious perspectives different from our own, and political persuasions different from our own are not issues in any shape, form, or fashion. Politics should not keep us from following Jesus, unless, of course, we were never following Jesus in the first place.

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© Copyright 2017 Christopher B. Harbin

http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/
My latest book can be found at: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1520737602/