Christians Who Hate Politics Need to Get (a Little) Involved in Politics
Do you love Jesus but hate politics? Good for you! Your priorities are in the right place. Besides, just look at the people who love politics: Miserable cranks, grasping careerists, and power-mad sociopaths that make James Bond villains look like sensible moderates. Nobody wants to be like those guys.
A lot of other Christians apparently feel the same way you do. A recent survey from George Barna revealed that upwards of 32 million faithful Christians have no plans to vote in the upcoming presidential election because of disdain for both candidates and plain ol’ lack of interest.
And honestly, you do have better things to do, things that are more beneficial to your community, and considerably less icky, than politics. Being a good neighbor; doing your job faithfully; raising your children well–all of these things will accomplish greater good and will ring out through history more than any vote you ever cast.
So, it’s completely understandable for you to eschew the Mos Eisley cantina of politics to focus on your family and community. However, the sad fact of life is that contests are won by people who care about winning. To keep a wretched hive of scum and villainy from running things, ordinary people have to show up and defeat them. American Christians are blessed with the opportunity to do just that, and to shape American politics in the process. We should overcome distaste and disinterest to do something, however small, to take advantage of the position where God has placed us.
Why is politics worth your time? Well, we’re not talking about elections to decide who gets to decorate the homecoming float. Political fights have real-life consequences and award real power that can be used to really wreck things.
For example, whether or not you care about the never-ending fights over tax rates, the government is going to continue collecting taxes and spending money. How and where they choose to spend that money determines the path of our nation. Money spent to fly immigrants into Springfield, Ohio is money that isn’t spent on border security, and vice versa. Money spent prosecuting grandmas who pray in front of abortion clinics is money not spent on… well, anything that makes sense.
Not participating in politics means not holding accountable the people who do this spending. And if they’re not held accountable, do you think they’ll spend money more wisely, or less? Give your teenage son a platinum card and drop him unsupervised in Vegas for a weekend and let me know how that works out.
So ok, you may be convinced that it would be better to put political power and influence in the hands of people who share your values rather than giving it to people who hate you and life and everything. But the problem is actually finding someone in politics who comes within a thousand miles of Christian values. How can you get involved in politics when the idea of supporting any politician makes you feel like you need a shower? We need to look at what we mean by “support” in the modern political context and see how that aligns with our role in the government from a Biblical perspective.
The Bible has a lot to say about our necessary obedience to authorities (Romans 13:1, 1 Peter 2: 13-14, Titus 3:1, etc.), but it doesn’t say much about our responsibilities as voters. This is mainly because, at the time the Bible was written, when common folk joined together to say how they wanted to be ruled, it wasn’t called “voting,” it was called “rebellion.” So we have to do a little exegetical extrapolation to find our place as Christians who live under a government but also have influence on it.
In a small way, every citizen in a democracy is like an advisor to the government. We don’t talk directly to leaders (unless we run a hedge fund or a sexually explicit podcast or something like that), but we use our vote to give the government a little nudge in the direction we want it to go. In that way, we’re a little like Joseph was to Pharaoh or Daniel was to Nebuchadnezzer. There we had godly men who found themselves living in ungodly nations, who nevertheless used their gifts and opportunities to influence government leaders according to God’s will. So our question to ourselves is, how do we follow their example to faithfully use our influence?
If Daniel could’ve picked a more righteous, godly leader, I’m sure he would’ve done so. But the fact that that wasn’t on the menu didn’t prevent him from contributing to the governance of the nation in a righteous way. He didn’t consider his personal integrity to be a reflection of the leader he supported. He just used the wisdom God had given him as best he could to influence leadership, while leadership wasn’t busy out in a field, crawling around on all fours and eating grass, as politicians sometimes do.
Translating that to our modern situation, we don’t have kings imposed on us, but we also don’t get to choose our leaders from among the heroes of the faith. We have to try to choose leaders who, while not spiritual giants, are at least influenceable. We have to work with what’s on the menu, and what’s on the menu will always be fallible, fallen, sinful human beings. That is not a reason for us to opt out of our advisor’s role. On the contrary, it’s all the more reason for Christians to use whatever influence they have to push politics in a righteous direction.
This could simply mean just voting. It could mean showing up at city council or school board meetings, and speaking as the Lord leads you. It could mean getting informed about the issues and trying to inform those around you, though definitely not in a weird or annoying way and never at Thanksgiving dinner. Any little way we can, Christians should be trying to grow and strengthen our influence, not hiding behind the phrase, “I just don’t like politics.”
Bear in mind that we’re not talking about winning great victories or solving great problems through politics, at least in the short term. One glorious day in the future, Christian influence might dominate American politics. One day, political leaders might care more about comments from John MacArthur than comments from the CEO of BlackRock. But that’s not where we are right now by a long shot. All we can do is, election by election, try to nudge our government down a more righteous path. That is why it’s so important for Christians to take every opportunity to do some nudging.
So, my Christians brothers and sisters who hate politics, I completely understand. Politics is an ugly business, and when it’s not ugly, it’s boring and stupid. But we have the opportunity to step into that mess and make it a little less ugly and a little less stupid, although it will probably always be boring. It’s worth doing, and it’s possible to do in a way that honors God without sacrificing your walk with Him. I’m not asking you to hate politics less, goodness knows; I’m just asking you to do a tiny, little bit to redeem that broken tool for the sake of enlarging God’s kingdom.
