5 Things I Want To Say After The Election

After the surprising results of this most recent election I felt the need to say a few things in response:

*First, I did not put any hope in Presidents before the election, and I certainly place no hope in them now that this election is over. Jesus is still my Lord and my guide.

*Second, this election serves mainly as a mirror held up to the face of the Evangelical Christian church in America. Now we know what evils may be excused in the pursuit of political favor - lust, greed, pride, racism, sexism, and everything in between can apparently be overlooked as long as you promise Christians the power they crave most. We have a lot of work to do to make the Christian church more like Jesus.

*Third, many are confused by the fact so many Evangelical Christians vocally and enthusiastically supported a man who admitted he had never asked God for forgiveness, bragged about sexually assaulting women, attacked the parents of an American soldier who died in combat, insulted an American war hero because he was captured, called for banning Muslims from entering the country, mocked a disabled man, bragged about not paying any taxes for years, scammed people with a fake university, owns gambling casinos, and created a non-profit foundation that was shut down and is now under investigation for fraud.

*Fourth, our goal now should be to show those confused people that while we love everyone as Jesus does, we do not applaud these sorts of behaviors. We should work to make it clear that we are following a leader who honors women, embraces people of every religious background, and who is not proud but humble, self-sacrificing and kind. Apologize if necessary. Let the contrasts be evident and clear. There is no one like Jesus. We hope in Him alone.

*Finally, let us continue to demonstrate the beautiful Gospel of Jesus without becoming entangled by the slime of politics. Our focus is on Jesus. Our mission to love others as He loved us. There is no room in our hearts for tribal thinking. We are not primarily Americans, or even Baptists or Methodists, or Republicans or Democrats or Libertarians. Our identity is fully and completely found in Christ and in Him alone. In Christ there is now therefore no nationalism, no sexism, no man-made division, but we are all one in Christ Jesus.

Above all, Jesus is Lord. We have to move beyond that bumper sticker slogan and begin to actually live out of that profound reality in our daily lives.

We are not looking for a nation of our own. We are citizens of another country that is from above and not built by human hands; a country whose founder and builder is God Himself.

Let's continue to be ambassadors of our King to a people who have, mostly, never seen Him or heard His message, yet oh so desperately need it now more than ever before.

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Pulpit Freedom Sunday?

You may have already seen the ads and heard the discussions concerning Pulpit Freedom Sunday. If not, this is basically an initiative to challenge pastors to preach “bold, Biblical truth about candidates and elections from their pulpits on October 7^th, 2012.”

Several people I know have Tweeted this out and urged Christians to show it to their pastors and have them accept this challenge. I discovered it when someone sent me the link and asked me what I thought. Here’s what I think:

The major issue at stake here is the tension between Church and State, enabled primarily by the tenuous stability of the 501(c)3 status granted to the Church by the State. If you go to the website for Pulpit Freedom Sunday you’ll get that idea right away.

See their website here>

See, pastors of corporate, tax-exempt Churches in America are fearful of speaking about political issues from the pulpit because, theoretically, it could jeopardize their tax exempt status with the Government. So, the best they can do now is to drop very large hints about which candidate God wants you to vote for, and hope you get the drift.

But, now, thanks to the bold people behind Pulpit Freedom Sunday, you can sign your name to a pledge and go ahead and flat out tell people who to vote for without fear (theoretically) of losing your tax-exemption status.

As an outsider to this tax-exempt reality, I have a different perspective.

See, our house church is not tax exempt. We don’t have a bank account. We don’t issue giving statements. No one receives a salary. We have no 501(c)3 status, and we don’t ever want one.

Not because it gives us the freedom to talk about politics, far from it. In fact, the irony is that our church family has nothing to fear from the occasional hour-long Sunday morning conversation about politics and the election. But we choose not to waste our time on things like this.

Instead, we’ve made a conscious decision to focus all our time, energy and passion on Jesus. When we get together on Sunday morning, or on Thursday evening, we could easily and freely converse about the candidates, argue over the issues, expound on the merits (or lack thereof) of political parties or campaigns, but why would we do that when Jesus is sitting right in our midst?

We want to hear Jesus speak to us, and surprisingly He seems more concerned about our lack of love for one another, or our need to forgive, or the importance of spending time with Him in prayer, or the hardness of our hearts towards the poor.

So, this Sunday, while hundreds (maybe thousands) of Christian churches around the nation will be hearing sermons about why they should vote for the Republican candidate, or why God wants them to re-elect the incumbent Democrat, we’ll be doing our best to hold hands, knit our hearts together in love, and submit ourselves as fully to Christ as possible so that we can hear His voice and be changed into the people He wants to make us into.

We’re fairly confident that God is in control of the electoral process and that He will establish the Government of our nation – and every nation – just as He promises to do in Romans 13. Where we need to focus our attention is on the Governing authority of our own hearts and lives. We need to surrender the territory of our hearts to a King who is able to rule in love and with unlimited power.

 

We must not become distracted by who is governing mere nations “out there” for the next four years, but become fully obsessed with the King who lives forever and who will rule our hearts forever.

People, I believe, are fully capable of deciding for themselves who to vote for, or not to vote for, or if they should participate in the process at all. Telling them what to do is not my job. It's not your job. But, as a Body, our mission is to surrender everything to Jesus and allow Him to have His way in our lives.

The best thing we can do for this nation, as followers of Jesus, is to humble ourselves and pray and repent of our own sins, and to seek His face. The fate of this nation is not in our hands, it's in God's hands.

I am Keith Giles and I approve this message.

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