Every political season, someone is disappointed then they request one of the aforementioned things, and our pastors say, “No.”
I’m wondering about other Covenant congregations? How do you handle politics in or around weekend worship?
There is an excellent article by Scot McKnight that just posted on Out of Ur. Naturally Scot reframes our political hopes in terms of Christian Hope. Here’s an excerpt:
Where is our hope? To be sure, I hope our country solves its international conflicts and I hope we resolve poverty and dissolve our educational problems and racism. But where does my hope turn when I think of war or poverty or education or racism? Does it focus on November 4? Does it gain its energy from thinking that if we get the right candidate elected our problems will be dissolved? If so, I submit that our eschatology has become empire-shaped, Constantinian, and political. And it doesn’t matter to me if it is a right-wing evangelical wringing her fingers in hope that a Republican wins, or a left-wing evangelical wringing her fingers in hope that a Democrat wins. Each has a misguided eschatology.
How does your church handle election politics?
I have not ever pushed issues in and around elections, not because I’m so highly principled but because I don’t want to risk a fight. I blogged about this side of our pietism that leads to quietism to protect the peace of the community instead of addressing what I might think are clear moral wrongs (or rights as the case may be). But in my heart of hearts, I love some red-lettered republicans and some blue-sleeved democrats. I’m not a strident voice and I know they each love Jesus, but consider the other party so wrong as to question the integrity of their faith. Find me a door!!
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09.30.08 at 10:44 pm
In response to the Scot McKnight quote:
But where does my hope turn when I think of war or poverty or education or racism? Does it focus on November 4? Does it gain its energy from thinking that if we get the right candidate elected our problems will be dissolved?
No, I wouldn’t go that far. But McKnight almost makes it sound like any political involvement is a waste of time. I believe November 4 is an important time and place in which we all try to advance the pre-eminent Kingdom politics by understanding local politics and voting accordingly.
Not thinking that local politics is all we have to do, but understanding that it plays its role, we have a responsibility to use our voices to guide our nation’s moral choices. Church leadership can serve in a prophetic role to help the people we lead understand God’s concern with the matters at hand.
That being said, at the moment I am a quietist when it comes to what we say about local politics in church. But I do wish we didn’t have to be because good honest wrestling with the issues ought to be possible apart from heated emotional commitments to one basic ideology or the other. I don’t hate the members of the other party. I’d like to meet one who is a spiritual Christian, will love me as a brother in the Lord, and discuss with me his or her philosophical, theological, or whatever reasons, for why they are more aligned with one party than the other.
I know my convictions and my understanding of Scripture do lead me to believe that one of the two major parties just happens to be more aligned with what I perceive to be Biblical values. I also hope I am open minded enough to be swayed by good Truth. And I am deeply interested in pursuing that.
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10.01.08 at 7:33 am
The challenge to me in Scot’s comments resolves around his statement that “our eschatology has become empire-shaped, Constantinian, and political.”
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10.01.08 at 9:34 am