Guiding Principles For Political Involvement Series

Guiding Principles for Political Involvement

Series: Engaging Politics...Together.

July 26, 2020 – Brad Bailey

Intro

Well.... good morning to all those gathering online this morning... who may be connecting on demand.

I imagine that we all feel some effects of this season of pandemic unsettledness becoming more extended. We are living in a time of change that none of us could have initially imagined. As I shared last week... I have been seeking how God may be speaking to us about how best to live well when we are in the middle of change...and then how to move forward into what is ahead. And that will be our focus starting in a couple weeks.

But today we are continuing our short three weeks on Engaging Politics ...TOGETHER. Our pastoral leadership felt that it was timely to engage this topic now. As one of our youngest adults expressed to me... it’s hard to separate the pandemic from politics because the pandemic has become such a political issue... and as we move towards a national election...the political drama is now the front page and front stage of all news and media.

So last week we began with the question: Where is our central hope and allegiance?

We looked at how Jesus entered the human drama in the midst of very polarized and politically division times. And he invested the message and ministry of the redemption of creation into twelve lives... which included some who would have loathed the political position of the other. And what made such a team possible ...was his declaration that God’s kingdom was at hand. Initially they could only imagine that God was providing the long awaited king who would restore their earthly nation of Israel. But Jesus explains that his kingdom is “not of the world”... the kingdom of God is God’s right to reclaim and rule over everything.

So they begin a process in which their primary hopes and allegiance became defined by a new kingdom.

And only when WE transition our primary hopes and allegiance to God’s kingdom will we engage our political world well.

Only as those who give their primary hope and allegiance to the kingdom of God... can we keep our expectations and disappointments in perspective...because we understand that any kingdom or nation in this world...is still of this world.

Only as those who give their primary hope and allegiance to the kingdom of God, can all other earthly identities that will seek to define and divide us... become secondary.

Only as those who give their primary hope and allegiance to the kingdom of God, can we get beyond judging who is good and bad...and offer the grace for sinners to be united with God.

Only as those who give their primary hope and allegiance to the kingdom of God, can we be anchored in the living hope of what is to come.

Only as those who give their primary hope and allegiance to the kingdom of God... can we be the priests and prophets of another kingdom.

And so we do well to begin with the question: Where is our central hope and allegiance?

But this may lead us to wonder... Does this imply that we should not care about the kingdoms of this world? What about our citizenship in earthly realms?

As we heard last week...when the religious leaders tried to trap Jesus with a question about whether the people should pay taxes to Caesar...the Roman emperor...

“Jesus said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." - Mark 12:17

Jesus was saying: If the coin is something Caesar made and it bears his image... it belongs to him...but you yourself are made by God and bear His image...so you are not to give yourself to anyone but God. With these words Jesus speaks a word of warning. To those who may become consumed and controlled by political hopes... you may be giving more to the Caesars and Rome’s of this world than you should. You belong to God.

But it is also important to recognize that with these words... Jesus does not deny that we have a responsibility to what is involved in the governing of earth.

And the Apostle Paul affirms that there is a God-given significance to earthly governing and our earthly citizenship. In the book of Acts, we see the Apostle Paul not only acknowledging the concept of his Roman citizenship but also actively appealing to it. [1]

And he speaks of it’s God-given role as a potential good. In writing to those in Rome he says that

(The governing authority) is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. Romans 13:4 ?