I’m getting political in this post. Well….sort of political anyway.
In this post I’m going to attempt to cut through the hyper-partisan culture we live in with some logic. Once again, I must emphasize that I’m attempting here. I make no promises that I’ll succeed in doing so, but I can’t just sit by anymore and watch the partisan venom spew from people. I also can’t capture all that I’m trying to say in a simple Facebook status so I’m taking to my soapbox known as Coffee Theology and Jesus to throw my tiny opinion into a massive ring. This post also might be more of a rant than a post…whoops.
Here’s what drives me crazy, people on both sides of the aisle (read Conservatives and Liberals) are so incredibly biased that they refuse to see any good in the other side.
I grew up listening to a lot of conservative talk radio. Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh are the two talk radio juggernaut who dominate the radio waves and feed the conservative machine with daily rhetoric. It really does impress me that these guys say pretty much the same thing for 3 hours a day 5 days a week and somehow find ways to dress it up in new words. Yes Sean we get it, Obamacare is going to ruin the country, Obama is ruining the country, anything Obama says is wrong and a lie. See Sean? I just summed up your three hour show in a few words.
Liberals don’t exactly fair much better either. All one needs to do is to turn to MSNBC to see the complete opposite venom being spewed. We know the talking points: gun control, pro abortion, welfare, expanding certain government programs, cutting certain government programs that conservatives like blah blah blah.
The irony about both of these parties? Neither of them really want freedom at all. They just want victories that secure more control for their party.nThe inconsistencies on both sides of the aisle are glaring and no one is willing to point out that maybe their side isn’t right on everything.
Instead we live in a talking point culture that thrives on rhetoric and a media that overall panders to their audience instead of reporting straight facts. I mean it’s no secret that the Fox News slogan is “fair and balanced” when in reality is should be “we are pandering to a conservative audience and we know it “. MSNBC is the opposite side. So what do we have? We don’t have two news networks, we have two entertainment networks that spin news stories to pander to a certain audience. *Sigh*
Anyway I digress. So what does this mean for the Christian? Because when it really comes down to it I care much more about how Christians respond to this than I do any other people group. Why? Because Christians claim to follow the Bible and claim to follow and believe in the same resurrected Jesus as I do. Therefore, I am much more critical of Christians because that’s who I identify with and I think frankly, that too many Christians have bought into the lie that to be a Christian means to also hold mainly conservative views
In the Bible there’s no such thing as a “Christian conservative” let’s not forget that.
I can’t emphasize this next point enough. If we claim that our worldview is from a Biblical perspective then we must be consistent in that perspective. Do you know what James says is true religion? Here’s what James says:
“Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. 27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. 27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”
Instead of letting the whole Bible shape our worldview, we have allowed politics to shape how we view the Bible. Do you know how many people I see on my news feed who claim to be a Christian call our president a clown? An idiot? A dumbass? Call liberals stupid, dumb, retarded? (their words not mine). I mean these are people who in one breathe praise God and in another breathe curse men. Hmmmm…sounds familiar doesn’t it? Oh yeah I know why! Because James as an answer for that too
“With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. 10Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. 11Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? 12My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.”
Nailed it.
Sure we want the government not to tread on us, yeah we want lower taxes, but you know what? The Bible says the opposite of that. Jesus tells us to pay our taxes (and don’t forget he was telling his people who were being oppressed by a government to pay the massive tax to Caesar) and Jesus tells us that for us to understand His kingdom we must lay down our rights.
I’m tired of allowing certain politics to influence Christians to be incredibly selective in how they apply the Bible. I’m tired of hearing people try to explain how yeah, Jesus says to love our enemies, but we have a right to bomb other countries and kill civilians. I read Jesus telling us to love our neighbors and I hear the Church tell us to take care of yourself, that the poor are lazy and don’t want to work so don’t help them out because it’s their fault anyway. Ironically Jesus never puts such a stipulation in the Bible when it comes to those with less than us.
Jesus doesn’t give exemptions to loving our enemy, loving the poor, and forgiveness. But we have instead bought into the political lie that somehow these things are conditional. Thank God (literally) that Jesus’s forgiveness is not conditional, thank God that Jesus didn’t tell us to pick ourselves up by our bootstraps first and then he will save us. But this is how we treat other humans. This is how we treat other people made in the image of God.
I could go on, and on and on….but I won’t. There’s enough stuff here to write a book about so I won’t belabor the point of this post. Here’s the question I want Christians to ask themselves;
Is my allegiance to Jesus first or is it to country and political ideologies first?
This is the time to check your views and compare them to the book we claim is the word of God. If we really believe that, then our views must match what’s in that book, not the other way around.
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-TW
