I saw this video yesterday and felt it perfectly highlighted the growing frustration that I feel. An inner conflict that pits my red blooded Americaness with my claim to be a follower of Jesus. In this video I see an artist expressing the same conflicted frustration when he looks at us. Is God synonymous with American? And why does it seem that many of my deeply committed Christians friends don't seem to see or hear this issue? Why does it seem that to mourn the continual comparison or judgment makes you feel like you are somehow anti-American?
Francis Schaeffer said:" Christians may be at times, "cobelligerents" with the left or the right but never allies. "If there is social injustice, say there is social injustice. If we need order, say we need order...but do not align yourself as though you are in either of these camps:You are an ally of neither. The church of the Lord Jesus Christ is different from either--totally different." (The Church at the end of the twentieth century)
When I receive these kinds of emails below, from sincere, committed Christians, I get concerned about wether we are really clear on what Francis envisions, or what I believe the Bible calls us towards:
"PSALM 2008-2012
Obama Is My Shepherd,
I Shall Not Want.
He Leadeth Me Beside Still Factories,
He Restoreth My Faith In The Republican Party.
He Guideth Me In The Paths Of Unemployment.
Yea, Though I Walk Through The Valley Of The Bread Line,
I Shall Not Go Hungry.
Obama Has Anointed My Income With Taxes,
My Expenses Runneth Over My Income,
Surely, Poverty And Hard Living Will Follow Me All
The Days Of My Life.
The Democrats And I Will Live Forever In a Rented Room.
But I Am Glad I Am an American,
I Am Glad That I Am Free.
But I Wish I Was A Dog
And Obama A Tree."
It's this kind of political rhetoric that I think disengages honest, level headed discussion and pushes the political debate into flaming posts and responses. I also think it actually pushes undecided voters into one camp over the other.
I seriously pray that a third way emerges for "Conflicted Conservatives" in the future. One that doesn't promise a political savor or a nanny state but a merging of the best of both dominant political parties at the present.
I pray it though, not only for us Christians struggling with finding a platform to stand on but also for America's place in the world and the churches witness before the powers.
3 comments:
those of us who aren't americans can barely grasp the relationship between religion and politics in the united states. most of the world would never assume that god endorses certain political ideologies, especially those of capitalism and libertarianism.
you have a weird country....
Scott,
Well...thats the challenge of growing up among and within this idea. It feels really like coming awake from my own private MATRIX. You think it is weird from that point of view...imagine what it feels like to have the collective tube pulled from your own brain!
I would say that God does NOT endorse the murder of an innocent unborn child. I realize many don't want to hear that and don't even think about what it means any longer.. they just conveniently put it in the "PRO-LIFER" bucket.. but injecting a mother's womb with a saline solution so the fetus inhales it and is poisoned does not seem like something our God would endorse. Period.
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