Well, what I vowed I’d never write about on this blog...I am
now writing about. Politics. No single word dredges up more loathing and eye-rolls than politics. Except maybe religion. No, I’m not joking. I really am going to
do a series on politics. As a person of the Christian persuasion, writing about
things Christian is second nature. Writing about things political in nature will
make this series about as pleasant as running through a minefield with clown
shoes on. One mention of politics and there is immediate polarization
and nearly guaranteed polemic or argument. At best you’ll get a heated debate.
At worst you’ll have emotive meltdowns and violence. Two things not conducive
to communication.
Communication that is necessary for the transfer of the Gospel.
It's actually quite simple with me…its always about the Gospel. It’s the first, it’s the last
and its everything. Everything for me falls out from that. It is my point of origin
and point of departure. Where I fall in with how you think depends if your thinking
is aligned with Scripture and the Gospel. Where I fall out with you is when your thinking is misaligned with Scripture and the Gospel. I always joke when I teach or
preach in church ... if I ask you a question in the congregation and you yell out,
“The Gospel!”, “Jesus!” or “Scripture!”
you’ll usually answer my questions correctly 95% of the time.
The political atmosphere is toxic. Too emotionally charged
and too far apart. At least too far apart to communicate clearly and logically.
This makes a bad environment for one to live out their faith without compromise.
Alignment to either side runs the risk of permanently alienating the other side
over non-essential issues. Hostility and over-emotiveness breeds rancor and allows
people to quickly devolve into dehumanizing rhetoric and name-calling and epithets.
Snowflake.
Libtards. Trumpsters. MAGAbots. Trumpettes. Blah blah blah.
Aligning to one side or another in this political charged
atmosphere creates a guilt by association. Conservative and Christian are inextricably
linked together in the American lexicon because of the work of Ralph Reed in
the 1980’s. His brainchild is the Christian Coalition. It might single-handedly
have done more damage to tarnish Christianity than Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart
and Harold Camping combined. People cannot see Christians as anything other than
conservatives now. I am neither Liberal or Conservative. In today’s environment,
this immediately erects an impenetrable incommunicable wall.
So, bottom-line, no communication, no Gospel transfer. The
sides are so far apart there is no transfer of ideas or words. That’s bad. The
Gospel is based in words. If something I'm doing inhibits conveyance of the Gospel, I shouldn’t be doing it as
a Christian.
So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of
Christ. Romans 10:17
I could literally stop my series here and be Biblically justified...but I won’t. I’ll make a more nuanced
argument.
Thank you SO much, Andy! :)
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