Grace to you and
peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ. Amen
We believe that
we are Children of God, created, redeemed, and sanctified.
And as children,
heirs of the promise.
That promise is
summed up in these words from Ephesians:
God put this power to work in Christ when he
raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly
places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above
every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. And
he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things
for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
To be children of
God, and to acknowledge Jesus as Lord of all creation, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above
every name that is named, is to make a bold statement about the status quo
in this world.
At the level of
our faith, we are no longer citizens of this world, subject to the authority of
earthly rulers and powers, but subject rather to the reign of God.
Having said that
I should acknowledge that Paul does exhort us in Romans to be subject to the
governing authorities.
However in
Phillipians it is also written that “our
citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ.”
We live, you see,
as citizens of a foreign land, aliens and sojourners in this land, whose sights
are set on the Kingdom of God that is promised, and are not content with the
status of the world in which we live.
The Spirit of God
is a restless spirit, that leans into the future, God’s future, and claims the
promise of what could be and what will be.
H. Richard
Niebuhr wrote about the relationship of the Christian to the world in his book,
Christ and Culture.
Christ against
Culture. For the exclusive Christian, history is the story of a rising
church or Christian culture and a dying pagan civilization.
Christ of
Culture. For the cultural Christian, history is the story of the
Spirit's encounter with nature.
Christ above
Culture. For the synthesist, history is a period of preparation under
law, reason, gospel, and church for an ultimate communion of the soul with God.
Christ and
Culture in Paradox. For the dualist, history is the time of struggle
between faith and unbelief, a period between the giving of the promise of life
and its fulfillment.
Christ
Transforming Culture. For the conversionist, history is the story
of God's mighty deeds and humanity's response to them. Conversionists live
somewhat less "between the times" and somewhat more in the divine
"now" than do the followers listed above. Eternity, to the
conversionist, focuses less on the action of God before time or life with God
after time, and more on the presence of God in time. Hence the conversionist is
more concerned with the divine possibility of a present renewal than with
conservation of what has been given in creation or preparing for what will be
given in a final redemption.
Is the Kingdom of
God a very present reality, or out there, somewhere in the future?
And what does
that mean for our life in the here and now?
One of the things
we do as Christians is to relegate Christ and his reign to the future.
The Kingdom of
God will one day be, but is not now.
It’s coming.
We hope for it.
Jesus will one
day reign over all.
But not today.
Today we live as
citizens of an earthly kingdom.
When we do that,
we strip Jesus of the power and authority with which the Father has clothed
him.
And we. . . can’t
do that.
WE don’t have
that authority.
But that’s not to
say that we don’t often submit ourselves to earthly authorities, and declare
our allegiance first and foremost to them.
When I look at
the politics of this world, I’m convinced there are two basic viewpoints that
govern our convictions and guide our actions.
Roughly, these
worldviews correspond to the division between liberals and conservatives, but
not entirely.
But in general,
people fall into one of two camps.
The ‘conservative
camp’ rallies around slogans such as “Make America Great Again”, and underlying
that is a conviction that there once was an ideal time, and our challenge for
the present is to reach back into our history to reclaim that which we once
had, but lost somewhere along the way.
The ‘liberal or
progressive camp’ believes that we are on a mission to make the world a little
better, in every way, every day. It’s a
belief that the future will be better than the past.
Using a Biblical
image, one group wants to return to the Garden of Eden, the other yearns for
the City of God.
The question is
where do we find our hope?
One looks back to
the nation of our childhood and hopes that we can return to that former time,
often forgetting the challenges that we faced then.
The other looks
forward to an idealized future in which we overcome the old challenges and wake
to an ever better day.
Are your best
days ahead of you or behind you?
That’s the
question that underlies the politics of our day and which shapes our world
view.
But the more
significant question is whether the government under which we live has the
capacity to fulfill the hope that we cling to.
And related to
that, is the question of the Kingdom.
And our
citizenship.
And who is our
Lord and God.
For all of the
differences that plague us, one thing most everyone can agree on is that things
could be, should be, better than they are.
But who will make
it so?
And when?
Put another way,
just ask yourself this question.
“Does your hope
for the future lie with the government or the Church?”
I’m not sure that
I want to trust either of those as earthly institutions, as both of them have
too often been flawed, becoming as much a part of the problem as they are a
solution to it.
Perhaps the more
pertinent question is a simpler question.
“Who is your
Lord?”
And what does
that mean for your life?
When you look to
the future does your hope lie in earthly rulers like Barack Obama or Donald
Trump?
Or in Christ, who
is Lord of all creation and far above all
rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named?
Of course, as
Christians we have no choice but to say that Christ Jesus is our Lord.
That’s who we
are.
And yet, which
authority do we submit to?
Do we live our
lives as ‘good citizens’ of the United States?
Or the Kingdom of
God?
When Jesus speaks
of the Kingdom, he says:
But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies,
do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who
abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from
anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to
everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for
them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
There is nothing
more contrary to an earthly Kingdom, than that first sentence: “Love
your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray
for those who abuse you.”
As a nation we
kill our enemies.
We punish those
who hate us, and shun those who curse us.
And, of course,
we protect ourselves against those who would abuse us.
We celebrate our
victories over others, and avoid at all cost showing any sign of weakness or
defeat.
If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer
the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even
your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your
goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to
you.
When we hear such
words of Jesus, most of us would conclude that an ideal such as this is simply
not wise or practical with respect to governing our country.
“If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer
the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even
your shirt.”
We may consider
ourselves to be a Christian nation, but most of us would say that’s no way to
run a country.
But just maybe,
Jesus, whom we declare to be Lord of All Creation, knows something about life
in the Kingdom that we don’t.
One final note:
When I get
dismayed about the state of the politics in our land I find myself wishing that
there was an option to be a citizen, not of this country, but of the Kingdom of
God.
Pipe dream.
But actually,
not. We are called to live as citizens
of the Kingdom of God, heirs of salvation, and Children of God.
We acknowledge
one Lord and Father of us all.
That’s the life
of faith, a life of being a sojourner, an alien resident of this land, but a
citizen of the Kingdom of God.
It is to look
forward in hope to the fulfillment of that Kingdom, while at the same time
living our lives under the reign of the one true King.
Our God.
Amen
