A word for my fellow Christians:

You may know that I have had concerns about Christian nationalism and civil religion for some time–and its many incarnations in many political movements. In reality the seed of this concern goes all the way back to my childhood. That’s a long story for another time–but this is nothing new for me.

I am uncomfortable for the United States but more importantly for the Church when our government and politicians engage in civil religion celebrations and mixes terms like “sacred” in when talking about places in DC. I want to give our country due respect and be patriotic, but I serve a higher King and so does every Christian. Let me talk about the particulars here.

No matter how much politicians talk religious talk, or pray, or share their spiritual experiences, we cannot allow Christianity to be co-opted by the left or the right or the center or the green party or the libertarian party or whatever factions or parties exist in whatever country you live in and even have appropriate patriotic feelings for.

Yes, it is okay for me to see people pray, or sing Christian songs at a rally or at an official government event. I wouldn’t advise it, but it’s not necessarily wrong inherently. It is a reminder to me that while many of my friends are atheists or a part of other religions, the dominant historical religious persuasion of my country is generally Christian (although with a civil religious mixing and matching of faith traditions in a way that is clumsy and imprecise in my observation, even starting from the Founding Fathers of the US who are some of my favorite biographies to read–I have about 50 I’ve devoured.)

They key is that when they do these things, it doesn’t make their political acts Christian–it more often weakens Christianity, or makes it seem like the Faith is put on top of things as a sort of icing on a cake to make it more sweet to the masses, or to “borrow credibility” from religion to make them seem more legitimate. I am generally skeptical of people who do this overmuch whether it comes from someone wearing a red tie or dress or a blue tie or dress, if you catch my meaning.

When a former president in the US shared his recovery from alcoholism and his embrace of faith through it, that was meaningful for me to hear. When a first lady of the US shared that she came back to faith after losing it when her son died, that is meaningful to me. I am thankful for those stories, even tear up about them, and I am grateful for their transparency and testimony. I’ve heard countless stories by supporters of personal spiritual experiences or backgrounds of those who are elected to office. The Spirit comforts and convicts powerful women and men. God moves in the halls of power!

But those examples don’t make their offices or their practices and certainly not their policies inherently CHRISTIAN. That is the error. An American might find it unlikely that any political party is in total alignment with them. As a Christian I am quite certain that no political party, nor one politician, is likely to be in total alignment with me. How likely is it if any of the above will be in total alignment with God? Christians have a higher citizenship than any partisanship can ever accomplish. A Christian always has a qualified secondary allegiance to any flag, much less allegiance to any party.

If we lose our distinctiveness from partisanship, Christians, wherever the political winds blow this year or in another 4 years or another 40, or 400, then we lose our saltiness.The only people God has chosen was the people descended from Israel, and we who follow Jesus are grafted into that vine alone, not any other ethnicity, people, tribe, tongue, or country. “There is no one holy like the Lord…” 1 Sam 2:2, so I don’t look to monuments and buildings for the holy. We will not find the sacred and holy vine in the capitals of DC, Buenos Aires, Paris, Cape Town, London, Ottawa, Tokyo, Mexico City, Bangkok, Wellington or wherever earthly power resides. We find it in Jesus, and through Jesus we can become holy, not by policies, politics, or power.

I want God’s will on Earth as it is in Heaven, but not by letting political movements USE the church for their own aims. This is true for the last POTUS, it is true for the current one, it will be true for the next one. We must refuse to be used.

So let us not be deceived by politicians of any slogan or button or platform. Let us not be shamed by our peers who have been lured in by a heavy coating of sweet religious icing on a donkey or elephant cake either. Yes, there are policies Christians should be applauded in their advocacy for, and there are deep evils in our nations around the world that Christians should be encouraged to work against systemically. Justice matters–and we can reform the people for God’s glory, not our own or for “our side.” Likewise, there are some who disengage from politics and they should not be shamed for avoiding it all together so as to focus on other eternal aims. Many Christian traditions do this, historically including many in my own, and that is admirable too.

This, I think, is the way forward, instead of letting the pendulum swing from one political movement to the next. The only movement I’m interested in is the one that became simply known as “The Way” in the countries of the Eastern Mediterranean 2,000 years ago. That’s the movement I would die for–the one that was birthed when ordinary people spoke in the tongues of the nations, foreshadowing not only the rapid spread to the ends of the earth, but even gave a taste of glory to come when every knee will bow, and every kind of tongue will confess, and every ethnicity from every nation will rejoice in a higher joining.

The others movements are all temporary, and so let’s not let the temporary use and abuse the eternal.

So be encouraged. This too shall pass. Whatever angst you have, whatever struggle pains you about the world… in the scope of your eternal soul it will be over in what will someday seem like the blink of an eye to you.

I want to talk about that more in the days to come. Soli Deo Gloria.