“In responding to the national election results, Stewart Clem asked a question in the title of his recent article; “What’s next for American evangelicals?” He then later proceeded to write, “As a Christian ethicist, I’m especially interested in the ways Christians seek to gain and use political power.”
Mr. Clem clearly has an acute misunderstanding of what it is to be a Biblical evangelical Christian. Biblical evangelical Christians know that they have personally sinned against their Creator by breaking the foundation of the moral law which is to love God heart, soul, mind and strength and their neighbor as themselves. And they know that God requires perfect obedience. But by faith they see the Son of God in the flesh, Jesus, as the one who not only perfectly obeyed God’s laws on their behalf, but also suffered eternal death for them on the cross, which is the debt due God because of sin. And they embrace Jesus.
Further, they believe that He bodily rose from the dead, which was the proof that God accepted His finished work of atonement. In this way and this way only, God justly forgives them and they are given new hearts such that they are new creatures in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17,21) and they wholly follow Him. As someone has written, “they possess what they profess.” They are also entitled to eternal life in the new heavens and the new earth which will be inaugurated at the time of the return of Jesus Christ, when all will appear before Him for judgment. Those who have not only professed, but have taken up their cross to follow Jesus in this life will be welcomed into eternal life.
Never had Jesus ever asked or commanded his disciples to be a pollical party or power. Pilate saw Jesus as a political threat to his rule, but Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight…” (John 18:36). Rather, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said of Christ’s followers, “The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool.”
Yes, we are citizens of this country and we are patriots. We see ourselves as “subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God” (Romans 13:1). As such, our highest authority is God, and what He has revealed in His word, the Bible. But when God’s authority comes into conflict with man-made governmental authority, we choose to “obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). Biblical evangelical Christians, from the Roman colosseum to this day, have been slandered, persecuted, tortured and martyred for doing just that. This anti-Christian secular sentiment is present and increasing in America today.
A Mr. Coy Roper wrote, “My impression is that those who emphasize that America is a ‘secular’ nation seem to believe that it’s all right for you to be religious, as long as your religion is neither seen nor heard. I doubt that’s what our Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote the Constitution.”
In fact, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.” Another founding father, John Adams wrote, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
As such, Biblical values that most Biblical evangelical Christians will continue to support include; religious liberty including the 1st amendment non-establishment clause, sanctity of life at both ends of the life cycle, God’s created order regarding marriage and gender, the rule of law, free speech, the right to bear arms, free enterprise, secure borders, legal immigration, fair trade deals, a strong military, limited government, and judges that judge and don’t legislate from the bench.
What will we do next? The same things we have been doing for the last 2000 years. The Apostle Paul wrote, “We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God” (2 Corinthians 5:20). Our hope is not in a nation, a political party, or an individual, but in God and the gracious salvation secured through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, “whom having not seen (we) love. Though now (we) do not see Him, yet believing, (we) rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory” (1 Peter 1:8, parenthetical inserts mine).
Mr. Clem clearly has an acute misunderstanding of what it is to be a Biblical evangelical Christian. Biblical evangelical Christians know that they have personally sinned against their Creator by breaking the foundation of the moral law which is to love God heart, soul, mind and strength and their neighbor as themselves. And they know that God requires perfect obedience. But by faith they see the Son of God in the flesh, Jesus, as the one who not only perfectly obeyed God’s laws on their behalf, but also suffered eternal death for them on the cross, which is the debt due God because of sin. And they embrace Jesus.
Further, they believe that He bodily rose from the dead, which was the proof that God accepted His finished work of atonement. In this way and this way only, God justly forgives them and they are given new hearts such that they are new creatures in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17,21) and they wholly follow Him. As someone has written, “they possess what they profess.” They are also entitled to eternal life in the new heavens and the new earth which will be inaugurated at the time of the return of Jesus Christ, when all will appear before Him for judgment. Those who have not only professed, but have taken up their cross to follow Jesus in this life will be welcomed into eternal life.
Never had Jesus ever asked or commanded his disciples to be a pollical party or power. Pilate saw Jesus as a political threat to his rule, but Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight…” (John 18:36). Rather, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said of Christ’s followers, “The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool.”
Yes, we are citizens of this country and we are patriots. We see ourselves as “subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God” (Romans 13:1). As such, our highest authority is God, and what He has revealed in His word, the Bible. But when God’s authority comes into conflict with man-made governmental authority, we choose to “obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). Biblical evangelical Christians, from the Roman colosseum to this day, have been slandered, persecuted, tortured and martyred for doing just that. This anti-Christian secular sentiment is present and increasing in America today.
A Mr. Coy Roper wrote, “My impression is that those who emphasize that America is a ‘secular’ nation seem to believe that it’s all right for you to be religious, as long as your religion is neither seen nor heard. I doubt that’s what our Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote the Constitution.”
In fact, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.” Another founding father, John Adams wrote, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
As such, Biblical values that most Biblical evangelical Christians will continue to support include; religious liberty including the 1st amendment non-establishment clause, sanctity of life at both ends of the life cycle, God’s created order regarding marriage and gender, the rule of law, free speech, the right to bear arms, free enterprise, secure borders, legal immigration, fair trade deals, a strong military, limited government, and judges that judge and don’t legislate from the bench.
What will we do next? The same things we have been doing for the last 2000 years. The Apostle Paul wrote, “We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God” (2 Corinthians 5:20). Our hope is not in a nation, a political party, or an individual, but in God and the gracious salvation secured through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, “whom having not seen (we) love. Though now (we) do not see Him, yet believing, (we) rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory” (1 Peter 1:8, parenthetical inserts mine).