An Opinion Piece

by DC

I'm working on a different post that actually has something to do with capitalism, but I'll briefly continue the recent trend of posting generally about Christianity and Politics. I promise I'll come up with something more "on-topic"(?) next.

Years ago, I remember sitting at Fazoli's with Eric the Red debating this very topic: As Christians, how should we be involved in politics? It is clear that in a democracy we should vote our conscience and that as Christians our conscience should be in accordance with the spirit of God. Things become murkier when it comes to more than that. Should we be campaigning for candidates that we think uphold Christian ideals? Should we be lobbying for laws that are in accordance with God's commands for our lives? I don't think that Eric and I came to a conclusion that day, but the questions have lingered in my mind since then.

I don't claim to be an expert on how the scriptures relate to this topic, but I have come across a few things that I'll share and let you respond to. I think it would be great if you could provide specific biblical support in your responses. I'll see if I can do the same in this post.

For now, I'm ignoring the old testament because I was unable to find anything that related to how the common man should interact with the government. There were lots of things that leaders could take away, but that's not the question I'm looking at*. Instead, I will turn to the new testament.

There's a famous quote from Jesus: Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's (Matthew 22:21). We could discuss and debate the nuances of the exchange for days, but one thing is clear: Jesus differentiates between what we should do for our government and what we should do for God. But that still doesn't tell us whether we should make use of the government to do things for God, just that there is some difference between obeying the law and obeying God.

The new testament is filled with verses like this: To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ's law), so as to win those not having the law. (1 Corinthians 9:21) I'm referring to the middle part that differentiates "the law" from "God's law". Here's another one: Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law. (Galatians 3:25) This one refers to the old testament rather than "the law of the land", but I think the analogy holds that following a set of rules is not what God really wants.

This second point doesn't directly address the question of how Christianity and government should fit together, but it does cause me to question whether writing a set of rules that we must follow is really what God wants from us. Clearly we should be doing good things, but should those good things be forced on us? These verses seem to indicate that this may not be what God has in mind.

I'm also struck by a third sub-question: Does God want us to dictate what other people do? Clearly we need to be aware of what other Christians are up to so that we can support them in living a Godly lifestyle. There are instructions in the bible about how to approach fellow believers that are sinning and so forth. One place that talks about this is 1 Corinthians. When reading it, I came across this verse: What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. (1 Corinthians 5:12-13a) Though the context deals with other Christians, it is clear that God isn't calling us to make everyone conform to "Godly policies". He'll take care of that.

I won't dwell on this one, but it is clear that Jesus spent at least some amount of time helping the poor, but it was not a primary part of his ministry. Unfortunately, I don't think we can generalize from what he did. I think Jesus saying things like the poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me (Mark 14:7) show what I mean.

Although there is certainly wiggle room in what I've presented, these verses seem to back up the idea that we should not be turning our religious convictions into laws, but instead they should rule our individual and group (church) lives.

I know that Joe's response to this would be "That's great, but I only care that the poor get medical care, not whether God is explicitly calling Christians to get that legislation passed. The poor will only get the medical care if the legislation is passed. Clearly God cares about the poor and wants us to care about the poor too." To pre-respond, I'll suggest that this could certainly be the case, but it ceases to be a question of what God wants all Christians to do (help those in need) and instead becomes a political question that has nothing** to do with God (how do we best balance the various needs and goals of the country?).

I'll end with a link to an article that's on the same topic, but from a different perspective.

*Please note that I didn't do much in-depth thinking on the lessons we can take from the old testament and I would love to hear what Nina or some other old testament enthusiast would bring to our attention. Probably enough there for another whole post - if only I had spent the time to research it.

**Yes, yes, everything has something to do with God. You know what I mean.