Christians
and Politics--Sermon (June 28, 2020)
As you know I
almost never do topical sermons and I have no intention of changing that, but
since this Saturday is the Fourth of July and since this is an election year, I
thought I’d make an exception and go where angels fear to tread. I’ll be talking
about “Christians and politics” this morning. Before we start,
LET’S PRAY
So
let’s cut right to the chase. Should Christians be involved in politics? Some
Christians say, “Absolutely not!” Our job is to preach the Gospel and show love
to others. We will only change society by changing people’s hearts—not through
politics. Getting involved in political issues will not only offend people, it
will put up unnecessary roadblocks to their acceptance of the Gospel.
Other Christians
say we must be politically active to preserve our religious freedom and
our country. They would say Jesus calls us to be salt and light in the world.
Salt was a preservative and one way to preserve or slow our cultural decline is
to be involved in politics. Christian advocates of political action would also
point out that even the Bible contains politics.
For example, when
the prophet Nathan confronted King David about his immorality, that was every
bit as political as when Bill Clinton or Donald Trump were confronted about
their immorality.
In Isaiah 22 when
Isaiah denounced the leaders of Jerusalem for tearing down peoples’ homes to
strengthen the city wall, that was a political issue, an issue of property
rights and national security.
When Jeremiah warned
his country to surrender to Babylon that was a political issue. In fact, Jeremiah
was almost executed for treason!
When Ezekiel
condemned the leaders of Israel, in chapter 34, for not taking care of those
who were unable to care for themselves, that was a poverty and health-care
issue, every bit as political as it is today.
In Matthew 17
when Jesus told Peter to pay the Temple tax, that was a political issue since there
was no separation of Temple and state, and many regarded the Temple leadership
as corrupt.
When Jesus told
the people to give to Caesar the things that are
Caesars and to God the things that are God’s, that was also a
political issue since some thought that giving money to Caesar was treason
against God.
When Jesus called
Herod, “that fox” it wasn’t because Herod was sexy! It was because Herod was
devious and corrupt. Jesus was giving a public political condemnation.
When Paul
appealed to Caesar, he was using an established political remedy for injustice.
Finally, when
Jesus and New Testament writers insisted that our allegiance to Jesus comes
even before our allegiance to government, that was not only a political issue, the
Romans may have considered it to be treason!
In my opinion,
however, this issue is not quite as simple as to say either, “Yes,
Christians should be involved in politics,” or “No they shouldn’t.” Pastors,
for example, need to be careful about politics. Pastors should make sure that
politics doesn’t become a hobby horse they ride every Sunday. Those who do that
are not preaching the whole council of God.
Pastors should
also avoid preaching on non-biblical issues from the pulpit. For example, if
the Randolph City Council wanted to change the speed limit on main street from
35 to 25, I may have a personal opinion on that, but it would be inappropriate for
me to take sides and preach on it from the pulpit. It is not a biblical issue.
But there are
some political issues that are also biblical matters. Abortion is one. Gay
marriage is another. Shutting down churches is another. When politics crosses
over into the biblical arena, pastors have every right and even an obligation,
to preach on these issues.
As American citizens,
however, all Christians have a right to voice our opinion on political
issues even if those issues are not biblically related. Theoretically, the
United States is governed by “We the people” and all citizens,
including Christians, have the privilege of making our voices heard and the responsibility
of voting intelligently.
I suspect that when many people say Christians
should stay out of politics, what they really mean is that Christians
should stay out of politics that disagree with their political views.
How involved you
personally get in politics is something you have to decide for yourself. The
body of Christ is made up of many members which have different functions. God
calls people into a variety of ministries and occupations, and some Christians
feel called to work in politics and law. Most people don’t realize how little
religious freedom we would have left in America if not for the ministries of Christian
organizations like Alliance Defending Freedom.
So how do we
decide what issues or candidates to support? This is a case in which we need to
put everything in a broader context. If we just focus on individual issues
first, we will miss the forest for the trees. In other words, those on the political
Left may focus on things like immigration and poverty, which are both biblical
issues; while those on the political Right may focus on things like abortion or
same sex marriage, which are both biblical issues. And we end up in a stalemate.
But there are bigger ideological and theological issues involved.
One of those
bigger issues is the fundamental divide between the political Left and the
political Right. These are obviously broad terms since there are degrees of “Right”
and degrees of “Left,” and not everyone on the Left or Right agree with
everyone else in their camp on particular issues. For example, most people on
the Left are pro-abortion but there are a few on the Left who are pro-life. So
when I talk about Left and Right in this sermon, understand that there are often
many exceptions, but I think the broad categories are still valid. With
that in mind, let’s look at some of the differences.
First, regarding basic human nature: As a broad
generalization, people on the Left, and even many on the Right, tend to think
human nature is basically good. The implication is that if someone is not good,
something else is responsible—Maybe their parents, or poverty, or racism, or
sexism, or homophobia, or environment, or lack of education —anything but human
nature. The way to fix these problems is bigger government, more and more
regulations, and more and more control.
By contrast, the
farther Right you go, the more likely you are to encounter people who believe
that human nature is not basically good. For example, our founding forefathers
were very skeptical of human nature which is why they created checks and
balances, and a Bill of Rights in our Constitution.
For many on the Right, if someone is not good,
a person’s environment may certainly be a significant factor, but the problem
is ultimately human nature which means that the individual is
responsible for their actions.
This divide on
human nature even extends to cultures. Many on the Left tend to think that all
cultures are basically good and that no culture is superior to another. One
implication of this thinking is the idea that war is never the answer, because
if we just negotiated long enough, we would eventually address legitimate
grievances and come to a solution—because all people and cultures are basically
good.
The Right, on the
other hand, thinks some cultures are morally superior to, for example, cultures
that oppress women and children. The Right, therefore, believes that war is
sometimes necessary because some cultures and tyrants are just plain evil,
making compromise impossible.
This divide on
basic human nature also extends to government leadership. People on the Right tend
to believe the cliché that ”power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts
absolutely,” so the Political Right thinks government should be limited,
both in size and in power to ensure that it does not become tyrannical. As I
said, this is why our founding forefathers put checks and balances in our Constitution.
Those on the Left
see government as the solution, not the problem. The larger and more powerful
the government, the more able the government is to enact socialist ideals of
righting wrongs, correcting inequities, enforcing equality, and creating a more
perfect society.
So the issue of
basic human nature affects much of the way we see the world—and this is a biblical
issue. Jeremiah writes that “The heart is deceitful
above all things and desperately wicked….” John says that anyone who
says he is without sin is a liar. Paul says that “All
have sinned and come short of the glory of God,” and that “there is none righteous, no not one.” Paul says we
are dead in trespasses and sins and that the god of this
world—Satan—has blinded the minds of
those who do not believe. Jesus, Peter, John, Paul and the Old
Testament prophets called everyone to repentance—implying that all people need
to repent of their sinfulness.
Theologians call
this “total depravity.” That doesn’t mean people are as bad as they could be or
that they never do good things. It means, among other things, that apart from
Christ, people tend to be self-centered rather than God-centered, and even when
they do good things it is often from selfish or less than pure motives.
By the way, I’m
not suggesting that Right-wing politicians go around thinking about total
depravity. Most of them probably don’t even know what it means. But Right-wing
politicians inherited the idea of the sinfulness of man from our country’s
deeply Christian roots, coming especially from men like Luther, Calvin,
Spurgeon, Edwards, Whitefield and Wesley. There is a rapidly increasing number
on the Left who strongly reject these Christian roots and truly despise Right
wing Christians who still hold to these values.
Anyway, where you
stand on human nature can affect a wide variety of political issues. Those on
the Right who believe in the basic depravity or sinfulness of human beings are
on much more solid biblical ground than those who believe human nature
is basically good.
Second, the Left and Right tend to disagree on the
whole issue of morality and ethics. Generally speaking, many on the Left
believe that evil is relative to the individual or determined by society. By
contrast, those on the Right tend to believe that good and evil is determined
largely by Judeo-Christian values passed down in the Bible.
So when applied
to the family, for example, the Left insists that gender is a social construct
and that the family can be any loving group of people. The Right insists
on the Judeo-Christian teaching that the ideal family consists of
children raised by one man and one woman who are married and faithful to each
other. Both sides agree that there are other family arrangements, of course,
like single-parent families, or extended families, or couples without children,
but the Left would expand this to include unbiblical ideas of same sex
families, or transgender families, or polyamorous arrangements in which
multiple men and women live and have sex together.
Another
implication of the Left’s relativism in morality is seen in their view that the
value of an unborn child is determined by the mother. If the mother wants the
child, it is a baby. If the mother does not want it, it is simply a blob of
tissue that can be cut out like a tumor and discarded. To the Right, that life
growing in the womb is biologically human and should be afforded all the rights
and protections given to any other innocent human life.
Since the Left
sees morality as relative, they tend to see government as the source of
human rights. Left-wing government determines what rights people are entitled
to. By contrast, those on the Right, following our forefathers, believe that we
are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights—whether
government agrees or not.
The Left
generally approaches morality and ethics as if God did not exist. The Right
tends to see morality and ethics through a Judeo-Christian lens, even if they
don’t always live up to that standard. With regard to morality and ethics, therefore,
the Right is on much more solid biblical ground than the Left.
Third, regarding world affairs: For those on the
Left, the international ideal tends to be globalism—a world governed by an
organization like the United Nations in which no one country is superior. This
fits with their view that all cultures are basically equal and good. The Left, therefore,
welcomes illegal immigrants, generally believing that national borders are an
obsolete relic of the past to be abolished in order to form a more perfect global
union.
For those on the
Right, the survival of independent nations or “nationalism”—is essential to
prevent any one nation from ruling all others in global tyranny. The Right, therefore,
welcomes legal immigrants but insists that the borders be controlled to
keep out criminals, drug cartels and terrorists.
Christians on the
Left point out that the Bible demanded that foreigners or immigrants, be
treated with justice, fairness and love. Many on the Right agree but do not
believe this precludes nations from establishing immigration laws. In fact, the
Right would argue that to allow criminals, drug runners and terrorists into our
country is not compassionate, but evil.
These
disagreements on international affairs are actually just another implication of
the human nature debate. Since the Left sees human nature and cultures as
basically good, the solution to humanity’s problems is to unite under one
global government that can enforce social justice and equality.
The
Right’s concern about human nature leads it to be skeptical about the
possibility of one big happy global family and is concerned that a one world government
will turn tyrannical. Since it will be global, there will be no nations left to
resist.
As
we saw, the Bible teaches that human nature is not fundamentally good. Those on
the Right are on much more solid biblical ground on this issue.
Fourth: Regarding society: The Right tends to think
of society’s most important divisions in terms of good and evil. The Left, following
Marxism, divides humanity in terms of classes, like rich and poor, workers and
managers, oppressor and oppressed, white people and people of color.
Following Marxism
and socialism, the Left generally believes that the way to create a better
society is to abolish inequality. One of the primary roles of the state,
therefore, is to create and enforce equality—as determined by the state, of
course. The Right believes that the way to create a better society is to
develop moral character, promote freedom, and to create opportunities for everyone
to prosper.
Marxism is an
atheist philosophy and the Right thinks it is naive at best and dangerous at
worst. It simply never works in real life. Once prosperous countries like mineral-rich
Venezuela are destroyed by this philosophy and Christians are almost always
persecuted under it.
Regarding rich
and poor, the Left believes that government has the responsibility for taking
care of people through welfare, food stamps, and various aid programs. The
Right believes in helping people who can’t help themselves but tends to
believe, with Paul, that those who will not work, should not eat—or at
least should not be supported with taxes from those who do work.
With regard to
race, the Left believes that one’s race is highly significant, and that racism
is one of the main problems facing African-American communities. The Right
believes that one’s race or skin color should be no more significant than the
color of someone’s hair, and that the breakdown of the family and lack of
fathers in the home is the primary problem facing African-American communities.
The Left tends to
see “Nature” as being of equal or even greater value than humans. Some on the
far left even see human beings as parasites on the planet. The Right tends to
see nature as created for the good of human beings. On each of these issues,
the Right is on much firmer biblical ground than the Left.
Finally, people on the Right are generally conservative,
that is, they want to conserve the Judeo-Christian values that historically
undergird Western Civilization. More and more people on the Left think that Western
Civilization and Judeo-Christian values are evil and want to completely rebuild
America from the foundation up.
On all of these
broad issues, I would argue that those on the Right are on much more solid biblical
ground than those on the Left. Having said that, let me talk about several
specific issues that are core issues for me when I am considering a candidate.
The first one, in
no particular order, is religious liberty. This comes from the idea that our
ultimate allegiance belongs to God alone, and not to any government or
political party. The people of God must be free to worship God and
practice our faith. We see this when the prophets, and Daniel and Shadrach,
Meshach, Abednego, and the Apostles stand up to and even defy their
governments. As Peter said, “We must obey God rather
than man.” Christians must be free to practice and share our faith
and we must oppose candidates who would restrict that freedom, for example, by limiting
it to “freedom of worship.”
Having said that,
the current Democrat party platform says, “We support a progressive vision
of religious freedom that respects pluralism and rejects the misuse of religion
to discriminate” (p. 17). What that means in practice is that Democratic
National Committee does not believe that Christian schools, colleges, charities,
missions or churches should have the right or freedom to exclude people who reject
biblical behavior or beliefs. But Christian organizations cannot survive as
Christian, if they are forced to include people who, by their beliefs and
behavior, undermine the organization. For example, how can you have a Christian
school or college in which the teachers and leaders are openly immoral?
Chai Feldblom,
the head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under President Obama, said
that when religious liberty conflicted with sexual liberty, she couldn’t think
of any case in which religious liberty should win. Unfortunately, her position
is not a fringe position in the Democrat party.
By the way, my
position on Religious Liberty also means I will support politicians who believe
the Constitution should be interpreted as originally intended and not as a
“living breathing document” subject to reinterpretation depending on current
culture. When the Constitution can be reinterpreted to fit contemporary
culture, our First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion can
easily be perverted into what Democrats call, a “progressive vision of
religious freedom” in which religious freedom is restricted and Christians
are actually discriminated against.
A second issue is
abortion. It is an undeniable scientific fact that the fetus growing in a mother’s
body is human life. That human life is not part of the mother. A mother simply does
not have two sets of DNA, two brains, and two hearts. That little infant in the
womb is a separate and innocent human life and the Bible absolutely prohibits
the killing of innocent human beings—especially just for the convenience of the
parents.
By the way, this
is a public policy issue and a biblical issue—It is not an attack on women who
have had an abortion. God is a merciful and forgiving God and he will forgive all
those who repent.
My third issue
has to do with Israel and antisemitism. Genesis 12:3 and Numbers 24:9 teach
that God will bless those who bless Israel and will curse those who curse
Israel. That blessing was handed down from Abraham through Isaac to Jacob aka
Israel. Many theologians believe that blessing applies to the church, and that
is true, but it also still applies to ethnic Jews.
In Romans 11:1
Paul rhetorically asked, “Did God reject his people,”
Paul answers, “By no means!” In Romans 11:2
Paul couldn’t possibly be more clear when he exclaims, “God did not reject his people” and the context is
abundantly clear that Paul is not talking about Christians, but about his
fellow Jews who still reject Christ!
So if we are
going to be biblical, our foreign policy should include support for the Jewish
state of Israel. This does not mean Israel right or wrong. Paul, Jesus, the
prophets and Moses were all critical of Israel when Israel sinned. But it does
mean we support Israel’s right to exist and help defend her.
God’s blessing on
the Jews also means we should strongly oppose antisemitism which,
unfortunately, has been growing significantly on the Left. I would not support
any politician who is anti-Israel or antisemitic. And by the way, I would not
support any politician who I thought was a white or black supremacist either.
The fourth issue
has to do with crime and justice. Leviticus 19:15 says “Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or
favoritism to the great…” Social justice, however, is the
idea that you put your thumb on the scales of justice to favor historically
oppressed groups. So for example, some thought that O.J. Simpson should be
given special consideration since he was part of a historically oppressed race.
But that’s not justice and it is not biblical!
Regarding crime, First
Peter 2 and Romans 13 insist that governments have the God-given authority to
punish criminals—even to the point of death. I support politicians who believe
in and will enforce law and order. I oppose politicians who would allow people
to loot, destroy property or even “peacefully” shut down freeways.
Fifth, regarding
the issues of poverty and government assistance, I agree with Paul that those
who will not work should not eat. The Government should not be enabling
people who are lazy—and that is what we have done. I have no doubt that Lyndon
Johnson had good intentions with his “Great Society” program, but the
unintended consequences was to produce a whole generation of people who feel entitled
to government handouts. Ultimately, that program was destructive, not
compassionate.
On the other
hand, in Ezekiel 34 God strongly condemns the leaders of Israel for not taking
care of those who could not care for themselves. The United States is not
Israel, of course, but I think the principle applies. Governments should help
to care for those who cannot care for themselves—including the mentally and
physically disabled and children.
My ultimate allegiance
is to Jesus Christ above all else—not to any political party. There are corrupt
and anti-Christian politicians in both parties. Almost all Democrats, however,
are firmly on the Left, and even many Republicans lean Left on numerous issues.
I am convinced that generally speaking, the political Right is on much
more solid biblical ground that those on the Left.
LET’S PRAY
