Last Sunday the pastor preached on politics. The church is not the state, and the state is not the church, he reminded us. But he wasn't talking about the separation of church and state -- far from it. Let me see if I can get it right... The state needs the church, and the church knows the people better than the state. I think that is very interesting. I like it. The church knows people better, and it's our job to remind the state what the people need. Pastor Chris also spoke of the blue-red divide, and how Christians in each camp rely on Biblical principles to guide and justify their positions (and I wish I could better remember his descriptions of the reds and the blues). But the point, he said, was not your political hue or even your preferred candidate. We need to remember that our next president, whoever that may be, will not be the salvation or the damnation of our country. The church can't put its hope in a president, because that's not what we're all about. Our hope is solely in Jesus and the kingdom He will establish -- the church is the beginning of that kingdom! But we-the-church are not the American state, or any other state.
Just to remind myself: The state needs the church. The church knows the people better than the state. The church must speak the truth to the state, and this means involvement. A vote is a way of speaking. We might vote red, we might vote blue. But we don't hope in the blue candidates or the red ones. We don't place our hope in the state. We're not part of the state. Our hope, our identity, is God's kingdom.
Good stuff. Been thinking about it all week. I get frustrated with politics, mostly because it's so darn near impossible to know the truth about candidates, about what really happened and who really said what and what they really mean and intend. Maybe my role in politics is not to figure out what's right and wrong (the state will never get it all right!) but to listen well so that I can speak well. I like the image of being in the church and speaking to the state, but not hoping in it. This gives me some freedom and rest in my political interests. Less fear. More love.
So my remaining question: What if the state official is a Christian? What principles guide the Christian president? He is the church, and he is the state. Any thoughts out there?
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On your last question - I think you stop short of expecting anything special from a "christian president" - just like in my own life, the decisions to be made run the chance of having to choose church over state or vice versa. Backing up to what you've already posted (good stuff, by the way), you put your hope in God and the kingdom that is being built, not in the office or system governing. Something like that.
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