Remember those pictures from the 80s, where if you stared just right, a different picture would emerge? I feel like I’m playing that game all day when I try to look and find reality and specifically, how the church in America is engaging with the world right now.
I don’t recognize this world, and I’m having a hard time recognizing so many of my friends and family in the church. Some rapid and sad changes seem to have taken place over these past months.
It seems as though the idol of political identity and national allegiance and rugged individualism has become so grotesquely swollen, that its led many to forsake the ‘unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace’
Gone are the days when we can agree to disagree within the church.
Now one side is equated with evil, one side with good
One side is equated with being God’s anointed, while the other strictly does Satan’s bidding.
Some will even go so far as to subtly suggest civil war or death is necessary in order to have righteousness & justice prevail.
We have fever-pitched, patriotic prayer services to try to move the hands of heaven into doing what WE have declared to be right and just.
And now we have even decided that we must further insulate and huddle up and control the narrative by pushing out up to the minute information on which news outlets and Social media outlets are intertwined with the Deep State and must be written off as falsified garbage that only serves the agenda of the Cabal that is set to usher in the New World Order.
What??
Does most media have bias?
Yes. Absolutely.
But here’s the thing: Christians, of all people should know the scriptures well enough that we are able to DISCERN what is happening, and act accordingly without looking for a steady stream of news to tell us how to think and live.
The bible literally says we have been given the Mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16)!
We have access to everything through the Spirit, there is no “special knowledge” that’s available to some, not others (that’s called Gnosticism). I fear we have accidentally become pagans and gnostics, without even realizing how far we’ve been led astray.
Our mandate is clear, regardless of what you hear on NPR, or Fox News or MSNBC, or now, the flavor of the moment, Newsmax TV.
Our mandate is to make disciples of Jesus Christ, in and of all nations.
PERIOD.
So why do we live as though our mandate is to preserve “Christian America”? Jesus NEVER told us to do that.
(Quick caveat: many people point out that I often pick on the conservative side of things, which makes me seem like a liberal. I’m not. I’m just most often in relationship with church people, and our natural bent, at least where I live, is to dive headlong into the conservative side of things and lose our bibles while we are trying to scroll, scroll, scroll in order to find the “right” conservative news network who will rage against the Fake News!)
Do you really feel like you’re better able to partner with the Kingdom of Heaven, which will still be going strong 10 billion years from now, if you post your political opinions on Parler instead of Facebook or Twitter? Is that really what we are giving our lives to?
I know the temptation is strong. The stakes feel incredibly high. I too, get sucked into this nonsense.
Part of what has led us here was the growing problem of lives lived in a very detached way. We have forsaken incarnational living for homes and lives that offer us our menu of options, unencumbered by the inconvenience of doing life closely with other people. And COVID slammed the gas pedal to the floor on that whole process, and over the last 8 months, we have stopped seeing humans as the full, living, breathing people that they are, and instead we view each other through the curated series of photos and opinions and memes we share on our socials.
That, is toxic.
I realized this over the summer when I spent time with someone I hadn’t seen in years, who really drives me nuts on facebooks with the constant stream of political opinions. But after spending time with this person IN THE FLESH, I was reminded, “Oh yeah! I really like her. She is interesting and wise” and we talked about politics zero times in our in-the-flesh conversations.
But we’ve largely stopped doing that, by choice sometimes, but definitely more so because of COVID.
We have a choice, friends and family.
Are we going to give our lives to finding internet rabbit holes where our cognitive distortions can be propped up by others who accidentally believe the same lies we do? Or will we do the hard and holy work of seeking to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace?
(Photo by Ave Calvar on Unsplash)
I’m begging you to consider and just take a second to do a soul assessment.
If you counted the minutes of your day, and thought about how many of those minutes are devoted to thinking about and discussing the news & politics, as opposed to thinking about and discussing loving God & neighbor, what would that balance sheet look like?
For me, some days are better than others. It is REALLY easy to get sucked into the drama and political theater of the day.
I’m praying for the Church, that we would remember our calling and commission, to each other and to the world.
I don’t have much hope for the Left & Right in our country coming to a place of unity. But if you identify as a follower of Jesus Christ, it’s not only possible, it’s the very thing that Jesus said would make Him famous in this world. Let’s do it!!
“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”- John 17: 20-23 (words spoken by Jesus)
“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” -Ephesians 4:3-6 (words spoken by the Apostle Paul)