On a serious note.

I have returned from the wilderness and I've brought with me a bounty of stories, but those will have to wait. I'll try to get the first in a series on the week out before this Friday, but no promises. Things are getting intense here with deadlines and classwork, but all the more reason to take blogging breaks. Right? Bon. That being said, I want to move on to something a bit more important. I'm rarely serious on this blog, but this entry is an exception. I feel passionate about this subject, and I'm using my blog as an outlet tonight. And so, you have now been forewarned.

I’ve been thinking about the election a lot recently, and really, who hasn’t? The French have certainly been all over the election coverage, even if I didn’t always agree with their biased portrayal of American Politics. Media aside, I do think it’s important to vote, even when your vote doesn’t count for much...like when you vote democrat in a red state (or vise-versa). But I don’t necessarily think it’s important because your vote actually means something individually, but because it is a right long fought for by those who in the past have been viewed as less than human. (And yes, I did vote in the election through absentee ballot)

But I’m not writing this to lecture everyone about voting. The real reason is because of what I’ve been reading on facebook. It’s one thing to have different political views, to show them, to debate over them. There is nothing wrong with that in my book, in fact I think it makes life a bit more interesting, but what I don’t understand is when people try to divide Christ along party lines. Don’t you think he’s more encompassing than that? I mean, if you can’t fit him into a box, what makes people think they can fit him into a political party? And what is more, I am seeing this dividing the body of Christ. Aren’t we broken and divided enough as it is? And are we not reproached for this in 1 Corinthians 3:1-5 where Paul writes:

Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly – mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. You are still world. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men? For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere men?

And so what I want to know is why people think it’s ok to justify their own views on a broken, worldly political system by calling on the name of Christ, especially when so often it means calling their brothers and sisters in the faith “unchristian”? It makes me sick thinking about it. And no, I do not by any means support abortion, but I don’t support the death penalty or war either. In fact, I’m against all forms of murder. Each party certainly has its faults and both are far from ideal, and it’s important to remember that. Yes, Jesus said “do not commit murder,” but he also said “feed the poor,” and in my opinion, both parties fall far short of Christ’s standard. And so why are we dragging down the name of Christ and rubbing it in the mud by superimposing his name, his word, and his saving grace on our own political philosophies?

Derek Webb has this song where he sings:

who's your brother, who's your sister
you just walked passed him
i think you missed her
as we're all migrating to the place where our father lives
'cause we married in to a family of immigrants
(chorus)
my first allegiance is not to a flag, a country, or a man
my first allegiance is not to democracy or blood
it's to a king & a kingdom

(vs. 2)
there are two great lies that i’ve heard:
“the day you eat of the fruit of that tree, you will not surely die”
and that Jesus Christ was a white, middle-class republican
and if you wanna be saved you have to learn to be like Him

And yes, he does single out the Republican Party in the song, but I think the same can be said for the Democrats as well (only one seldom does). The point is that we are called to live lives set apart, but so often we allow politics, and many other things too, divide the body of Christ, feeding the fire of cynicism against Christ and what it means to be a Christian.

No one is worthy to be called ambassadors of Christ, I certainly am not, but as Christians, that is what we are, and I for one think it’s time we stop letting divisions as silly as the politics of a broken world interfere in the way God is moving through his body.