Why I'm a political pariah - Wrapping it all up

Okay, so when I said "tomorrow", what I really meant was "next week". I need to get this done so I can go back to the carefree, happy days of blogging I used to know.


Anyhow, when I last wrote, I said that the aim of both Christian right and left to "legislate God's kingdom to earth" was flawed on its face, and self-defeating. Let me expand on this point. Laws are designed to modify behavior, and while I don't go as far as some of my like-minded political brethren, you have to acknowledge that law is generally coercive. However, laws are powerless to change hearts, which is the true shift needed to effect the kind of kingdom that both Christian left and right seek. The New Testament screams it loud and clear - the Old Testament law was powerless to eliminate sin. Why then, should we suppose that human laws would be any more successful than God's law was with these particular aims?

Laws treat symptoms, and leave the disease running around unchecked. As noble as the Christian left's ideal of creating more financial equity is, taking from the rich and giving to the poor does not address the human problem of greed. In fact, in my opinion, it compounds the problem, because in my experience, when you take something from someone that they don't want to give up, they just cling tighter to the rest of their stuff. And the right's desire to legislate certain personal moral issues (prayer in public schools, etc) is also self-defeating, because forcing someone to do something they have no desire to do on their own is more likely to push them away than draw them towards it.

While I don't think the church should completely shy away from the political discussion, I have to admit I often look around and see politics as something of a red herring (much like communism - a cookie to the person who gets that reference) that the enemy uses to distract the church from its real mission. Let me flesh this out a bit. The example I come back to most often on this is abortion. Let me be completely clear before I start - I am against abortion, or at least abortion as birth control. I absolutely think it should be illegal. All of that being said, there's something I often wonder. I wonder what the abortion rate in this country would look like if the Church and its members had spent all the time, money, effort, etc that have gone into the political quest (which to date has been fruitless) to re-criminalize abortion and instead used it to minister to teenage mothers, to sponsor and promote adoptions, and to generally care for those who find themselves in the situation of an unplanned pregnancy. Let me be equally clear - I know there are plenty of people who do this, and many who do so along with their efforts in the political arena. However, it's undeniable that a lot of Christian resources have gone into the political fight. What would that look like? I can only speculate, but I have to think abortion would be viewed differently in this country. I can almost guarantee one thing however, and that's that "evangelicals" who oppose abortion would be viewed in a much different light. The end result of all our strivings in the political arena has largely been a kick to the air, wasted resources, and the creation of a very negative caricature of people of faith who oppose abortion. The same can be said of the Christian left - what if the money, time, and effort devoted to pursuing the cause of the poor in the political realm was spent actually caring for the poor (again, of course there are people who do this, and who do both).

I will say, however, that I have a special concern about the aim of the left towards government wealth redistribution. While I believe that the church in Acts where there were no needy people is the ideal, I have to also note two things. #1 - The government certainly had no part in making that happen, and #2 - it wasn't even a mandate with in the church, it was something the people chose to pursue. Remember Ananias and Sapphria? The story makes it clear that their sin was not in holding money back for themselves, but in lying about it to gain favor from the people. With that being said, I have to come back to the "two kingdom" piece. Creating a bigger government with higher taxes by definition takes resources from God's kingdom and hands them over to man's kingdom. I have no problem with the church coming alongside the government and working with it where our interests align, but I have a serious hesitation towards willingly handing over our resources to them for those purposes. A secular government has no mandate to maintain the priorities of the church for which those resources were given, and isn't likely to give them back if those priorities change. Jesus told his followers to feed and clothe the poor, and I just don't see that He had in mind for us to abdicate that responsibility to the government.

"Give to Caeser what is Caeser's, and to God what is God's". Well, in today's world, we have a say in just how much Caeser demands. To me, it just seems right that, as citizen's of God's kingdom, we should elect to have Caeser demand as little as possible, so that we have more left over to give to God.