If I were to entitle this post anything else, I suppose it would be something like, “The Last Will and Testament of a Young Republican.” That’s right; I was once a Young Republican a long time ago. But things are different now and it doesn’t have anything to do with age. Now before my “Lefty” friends out there get all excited, you need to know that I’m not defecting to your political party either. Rather I’m pressing the cancel button on the whole system as far as my involvement goes. While this doesn’t mean I’m never going to vote on issues I believe in, it does mean a drastic and purposeful decision to refrain from direct political involvement and commentary. Even on my Face Book page I’ve listed the “Kingdom of Heaven” for my political views. As followers of Christ we have to keep in mind that we’re part of His eternal Kingdom which supersedes the greatest Kingdoms of men. But is this stand of total avoidance too radical? After all, it would seem from the scripture that politics is a freedom issue. We even noted in Part I. of this series that we can’t separate the sacred from the secular and this would apply to politics as well. Yet considering the transitory nature of this realm, I do believe that this is an issue that Christians should seriously wrestle with. As for me, I’ve drawn the line in the sand to abstain and here are at least four reasons why. Read the rest of this entry »
Posts Tagged Christians and Government
Tonight the President of the United States is slated to give his annual State of The Union Address. I’m not sure which one will be more fun to watch; his speech or the bantering on Face Book that will follow. When it comes to dialogue on politics, it’s interesting to see all the Christ following friends I have who sit on opposite sides of the political aisle. They claim allegiance to Christ, but are polls apart in politics. But that will be part of our discussion next week when we wind this subject down and look at some of the personal reasons why I don’t swim in this pool much anymore. It is also worth noting that Jesus actually spoke very little about politics even though Conservatives and Liberals claim Him as their guy at times. In fact, we see virtually nothing of Jesus giving a commentary on the Roman government of his day. That’s because the mission of Christ is beyond that of any temporal regime. Yet we noted in Part I. that as citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven we’re not to cloister ourselves away from society, but rather to influence it. So what does the Bible say about our relationship to the Kingdoms of this world? Here are some pointers we should consider and while my list below is not exhaustive, it’s something to start with. Read the rest of this entry »
Town Hall Meeting anyone???
Aug 17
Yesterday while driving back from a preaching assignment I spent some time running the dial and came across a talk show detailing some of the big headlined Town Hall meetings across the US. If you haven’t picked up a newspaper or watched any of the media coverage recently, you might not know about the stories of the rebellious town hall meetings that have been erupting over President Obama’s health care reform. Some of the meetings were calm and orderly. But for others there was yelling, speaking out of turn, and even some evictions.
As for my opinion of the health reform, I tend to lean towards less government as I lived in the former Soviet Union for a while and have seen the “ills” entailed within an atheist socialistic system. But I wasn’t present at any of the town hall meetings. I didn’t watch any of the CNN stories, nor did I follow my elected leader’s websites for the latest on Obama’s strategy. Instead, I listened to it for the first time on talk radio and after a few minutes I actually CHANGED THE DIAL. Read the rest of this entry »
