I tend to be careful about airing my political opinions because it can be so divisive. However, I need to get these thoughts out of my head or I will have trouble sleeping again tonight. These are my opinions. Feel free to form your own.
The cognitive dissonance must be off the chart when professing Christians, who make a big show of being pro-family and pro-life:
1. Are instrumental in electing a sexual predator to the highest office in the land.
2. Feel torn between losing a senate seat and electing an alleged pedophile.
This has flabbergasted me even prior to last year's election, and I continue to be astounded as self-appointed Court Evangelicals1 make a trumpery (yes, I used that word intentionally) of Christianity. But I am also troubled that average professing Christians are more willing to turn a blind eye to what would be condemned in someone of the opposing political party.
At this point, being a "Christian" or an "Evangelical" is rapidly becoming a meaningless cultural marker. It has become less about the gospel of Jesus Christ and more about affiliation with a political party and allegiance to a myth that conflates America with the Kingdom of God. Based on numbers, the majority of Christians in the world are outside of our borders, and quite frankly, God owes nothing to America anymore than any other nation. Any supposed covenant between God and this country has its roots more in Mormonism rather than the Bible.
I firmly believe in God's sovereignty and that nothing thwarts His will. But this should not result in a fatalism or checking discernment at the door. I can't help but wonder if the Trump presidency is being used by God to convict the American church of its idolatry. The longer we look for a savior in Washington D.C. or in any office, the more compromised we will become. God will not be mocked when His holy name is used as an endorsement, which He has not made, to dupe the gullible2. I hope and pray we will wake up and demonstrate in word and deed the difference between a meaningless cultural marker and true Christianity. The former is killing us. We need the latter.
1. This term was coined by historian, John Fea.
2. I heard this quote via Carl Trueman on a Mortification of Spin Podcast. It's painfully true IMO. "Nobody ever lost money by overestimating the gullibility of the American evangelical public." Douglas Groothuis
The cognitive dissonance must be off the chart when professing Christians, who make a big show of being pro-family and pro-life:
1. Are instrumental in electing a sexual predator to the highest office in the land.
2. Feel torn between losing a senate seat and electing an alleged pedophile.
This has flabbergasted me even prior to last year's election, and I continue to be astounded as self-appointed Court Evangelicals1 make a trumpery (yes, I used that word intentionally) of Christianity. But I am also troubled that average professing Christians are more willing to turn a blind eye to what would be condemned in someone of the opposing political party.
At this point, being a "Christian" or an "Evangelical" is rapidly becoming a meaningless cultural marker. It has become less about the gospel of Jesus Christ and more about affiliation with a political party and allegiance to a myth that conflates America with the Kingdom of God. Based on numbers, the majority of Christians in the world are outside of our borders, and quite frankly, God owes nothing to America anymore than any other nation. Any supposed covenant between God and this country has its roots more in Mormonism rather than the Bible.
I firmly believe in God's sovereignty and that nothing thwarts His will. But this should not result in a fatalism or checking discernment at the door. I can't help but wonder if the Trump presidency is being used by God to convict the American church of its idolatry. The longer we look for a savior in Washington D.C. or in any office, the more compromised we will become. God will not be mocked when His holy name is used as an endorsement, which He has not made, to dupe the gullible2. I hope and pray we will wake up and demonstrate in word and deed the difference between a meaningless cultural marker and true Christianity. The former is killing us. We need the latter.
1. This term was coined by historian, John Fea.
2. I heard this quote via Carl Trueman on a Mortification of Spin Podcast. It's painfully true IMO. "Nobody ever lost money by overestimating the gullibility of the American evangelical public." Douglas Groothuis
Spot on!
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