;)
Piper on Politics in Church
Posted by David Rogers in Church & Missions
I have wrestled, and am still wrestling, with how we as Christians should address political issues in church. Though I have written here before about The Seduction of Political Idolatry, and have been open about my general wariness of the dangers of mixing politics and church, honesty forces me to acknowledge that there are many clearly biblical and gospel-related matters that have political repercussions. If we were to make anything remotely related to politics taboo in church, we would necessarily be taking a reductionistic and skewed approach to the biblical message.
I believe that John Piper, in the video clip below, does as good a job as any I have heard to date at putting his finger on the problem with converting church into a political rally, and suggesting a biblically-balanced alternative.
I wonder, if the majority of conservative Christian leaders had heard and taken to heart what Piper shares here back in the 70s, when the Moral Majority came full swing, where we would be today in America. Would church members who can tell you the moral report card rating of every politician, but don’t know how to explain the gospel, be more gospel-focused? Would our churches be healthier? Would people in general be more open to hear the gospel and to look to the church for answers to the problems in their life? Would the overall spiritual and moral condition of the nation be better than it is today? I don’t know for sure–God, in His sovereignty, has his timing and plans for everything–but I’d like to think that we would be better off.
The video-clip is taken from a Q & A session with Christian law students at a meeting sponsored by the Alliance Defense Fund. If it works right, the video should be cued at the point in the Q & A session where the question I am discussing here comes up (36 min., 20 sec.). The question and Piper’s answer last about 5 minutes altogether.
The money quote: “My bent is to say that, to the degree that a pastor, for the gospel’s sake, becomes political, he probably in the long run, blunts his gospel power to transform culture.”
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
David,
Thanks for the Piper video. Good call!
David,
Piper is well stated. I like his approach.
Every 100 years we can expect knowledge and understanding expansion to affect how we view things as Christians and as a society. Centuries will become decades as knowledge increases. The thing I see is that God will always see things black and white in each century of our existance. Balancing between them for ourselves is the challenge. Our faith must adjust and yet be solid in the truths and principles of God’s word. Soon we will make full circle and come face to face with the delima that Daniel faced. If our faith follows the changes of the world we will not be prepared as Daniel was and will come face to face with a Judas decision. There is nothing good about politics.
Great post.
Amen! Thanks for this post David.
David,
Good post,….. politics will always be present in the church conversation, and in many places come to reflect the character of that particular body. So to Piper’s point as well…..why would we want to direct someones attention to less than the gospel. Is it good news to be politically correct or is good news of a different substance, namely understanding and receiving the grace that God has brought through the Son, Jesus Christ. Pastors should continually ask themselves when they prepare to exposit God’s Word,….”Is what I am going to say and teach point to Christ and His redeeming power” or “Is the message I am going to bring and teach about getting or remaining politically valid among my friends in order to get a more firm handshake at the end of the service”. I’m certain that if the former is the goal,…the political will be less of an issue, and will get less attention.
Blessings,
Chris
I live about a 55 minute drive from a major battlefield of the American Revolutionary War (Guilford Courthouse) where, according to information I have, one of my ancestors served as a second lieutenant in a Virginia Colonial Regiment and was probably in the second line of battle that day (where the Virginia Colonial Troops were stationed) by General Nathaniel Greene who was following the advice of Gen. Morgan. First the Colonials of North Carolina, then the Virginia Colonials (who were more use to war in astand up battle), followed by the Continentals (the regular troops in the battle). This says that we really don’t have much choice but to be involved in the political scence as it would make our very ancestors appear to have wasted their sacrifices in vain. Also I had other ancestors in that war. A cousin joined the DAR on the basis of another’s service. Thus, we have ancestors and, as Baptist Preachers, we have predecessors. I udnerstand that Elijah Craig with the Committee of Baptists met with the colonial legislators of Virginia and made an agreement that, in exchange for their freedom to practice their faith, the Baptist ministers would encourage the young men in their communities to enlist in the Patriots’ Cause. That means, to say the least, encourage them to enlist in a civil war against a duly constituted government. A friend of mine was a descendant of Elijah Craig, and my grandmother was a Craig who named my son before he was born. I read in a volume of the DAR where there was a whole regiment of Virginia Colonial soldiers, and every one of them bore the last name of Craig.
That means LBJ’s law in the 50s restricting ministers from saying much in the pulpit about politics is a violation of the agreements made before the war really go going. In fact, the IRS violates the Constitutional Rights of Christians every time it gets involved in prosecuting a church for some incursion into the political realm. Baptists earned the right to be involved by supporting the Revolution. The few Baptists who did not support the Revolutionary side and who are of note are so few that I can count them on the fingers of one hand. I think there were some more than the number I found in my researches, but I do not have their names and they were not very well known.
We have as much right, for example, to take a stand upon an political issue like abortion or sodomy or some other issue and to say it is wrong or right to support or oppose a candidate upon the basis of his or her stand on the issues. We are even required by God’s word to take such stands even if it means persecution. Isaac Backus’ mother, for example, was sent to prison for refusing to pay religious taxes that supported the Congregational Churches, and she believed churches must support themselves and their own ministers and ministries. How about some people bold enough to take the bull by the horns on the issues of our day. Abolitionists did in the days of slavery. Every one conveniently forgets John Brown and many others who were full fledged believers. We also forget the Baptists’ Friends of Humanity who were hounded out of the South by the Proslavery forces. Likewise we have forgotten that the Baptists like Richard Furman who was a wonderful believer in many respects and who put his life on the line for our Revolutionary principles was also so foolish as to advocate that Baptists would fight in defense of slavery. The price we paid for such folly was over 630,000 or 650,000 casualties (and I mean killed on the Battlefields of the Civil War). In addition, we as southerners were still paying for the Civil War as late as the fifties. A lady whose father shipped peaches north on the railroads told me he paid a taxes on those peaches. Only the Southern states paid such taxes back then, apparently, an imposition by the conquering North. Somewhere I read or heard that a cannon ball from Fort Sumter smashed through the FBC of Charleston and buried itself in Dr. Furman’s grave, but later I read that he was not even buried there. We can ill-afford to stand on the side lines, seeing what Southerners, for example, have paid for poor exegesis and an unwillingness to take a stand for what is right. Just recently I saw on the internet where someone was willing to rehash the old arguments that the Scripture really did not condemn slavery. No, what it did was gut it, by making a slave who was converted to be a believer’s brother or sister. And How can one hold his own loved ones in slavery? It is the implications, brethren, the implications.
Just down the road a mile or two from where I now live is a tombstone in a family graveyard where it is recorded that the individual had died during the time of Second Manasses due to disease and that he had been excommunicated from the Mt. Pisgah Baptist Church for opposing the treating of Colored Slaves as equals in church membership (I suppose this referred to calling them Black Brother or Black Sister…followed by their name). My Doctoral Dissertation proposed at Columbia University was going to underscore the fact that African American Believers were tremendous Christians who left such a heritage that it is still with us to some degree today. Martin Luther King, Jr., was aware of Arnold Toynbee’s idea that the renewal of Western Civilization might well come through the African Americans. My researches, unfortunately, only preliminary, did point in that direction.
In any case, we can’t afford to take a laid back position. We do need to be careful lest we misrepresent the cause of Christ by fooolish and ill-advised methods, but we are liable to answer to God for a failure to advance His cause in every area of life. One which I think really needs to be addressed is in the area of education and the intellect. We need people willing to pay the price to do the research and experimentation becessary to establish the validity and reliability of the Christian positions on many issues. In so doing we will address the vociferous voices of the New Atheism. Having been one in my youth, I almost cringe at the failure on the part of many believers today to realize and to apply themselves to the task of dealing in depth and detail with the issues wherein we differ with the advocates of such follies.
David:
I had about a 15 minute conversation with a staffer with BGEA, Billy Graham headquarters in Charlotte this morning about what is happening in Alabama with Deacon Gov Bentley and Eunie Smith of the Eagle Forum’s “Draconian” immigration law to use the word of former Duke Chaplain and Now UMC North Alabama Bishop Will Willimon.
Eunie, her Eagle Forum and late husband Albert Lee Smith worked in sync with your late father in the SBC takeover. That is a matter of history.
And Alliance Defense Fund’s Charles Pickering of Mississippi was generally in your Dad’s corner on the Peace Committee and campaign against the Baptist Joint Committee for Public Affairs.
Upshot real life drama is yesterday in a story in the Bham News, your Dad’s successor Steve Gaines former Church was the location of an 80 participant protest against FBC Gardendale’s Scott Beason, Eunie Smith’s man in the State Senate.
Mark Noll had a fascinating review in the June 6 New Republic print issue this year focussing on the religious political world view of the likes of Ed McAteer and others that shaped your Father’s time and circumstances.
I commend it and the books read to both you and John Piper. And I would hope you would follow the discussion on Alabama Immigration law at SBC Trends of Baptistlife.com/forums
David:
Mark Noll’s June 6 New Republic review of Dochuk and Williams recent books on evangelicals and politics is must reading for you; Piper as well.
As much interest as you have devoted to the topic, and your family history hope you do it soon.
And make a point to look at Randall Balmer’s upcoming review at Journal of Southern religion (online) on same books
On occasion David Miller and David Rogers have wandered into the SBC Trends discussion at Baptistlife dot com/forums. I( hope they will take a look there at the Billy Graham, Jeffress and cults discussion, at the heart of this interesting political moment.
It is one I think Randall Balmer and his friend Mark Noll will find most intriguing. Whether Piper engages or dismisses the subject will be interesting as well.