There are people who think Jesus is a Republican. My personal feeling is that He probably isn’t a Republican, which is not to say I think Jesus is a Democrat. I don’t think He is a Democrat either. Perhaps, He is an Independent, but, again, that would just be my guess.

 

When Jesus walked the earth, He lived in an extremely political time; the Romans occupied the land, the local Jewish politicians and religious leaders aggressively jockeyed for position and favor and Jesus stayed out of it. Many of those sandal-wearing folks who followed Jesus around wondered why He wasn’t leading a revolution, as they expected the Messiah to do. The trick was that Jesus did start a revolution, but not in the way many expected. He led a revolution of the heart—a revolution that called for self-sacrifice, kindness, patience, forgiveness, and grace.

 

No wonder they crucified Jesus. Have you tried doing any of those things? It’s really hard. Patience and forgiveness? I can totally see how killing a few centurions, burning a palace or two, would be a much more palatable, logical option for them. No wonder those poor, ignorant first-century people didn’t get it. What a relief to know how beautifully we’ve progressed over the ensuing centuries.

 

There are people who share their views on evolution by plastering their cars with stickers. There are people who picket a gay pride parade rather than spend that same Saturday afternoon volunteering in a soup kitchen. There is a certain practicality to the bumper sticker for it allows the bearer to proclaim his opinion without actually have to listen to anyone else, because, as everyone knows, listening to someone who has a differing opinion is a complete pain in the butt. And I’ve found it to be quite difficult to share my thoughts with someone when they’re talking. With a bumper sticker Driver A can state, “Evolution is Just a Theory!” and feel quite comfortable that his neighbor has gotten the message. Of course, there is nothing preventing the neighbor, Driver B, from placing a contrary bumper sticker on his car stating, “Evolution is Just a Theory—kind of like Gravity!”

 

I suppose it’s possible, eventually, that a conversation may break out between these two car owners, I just hope it doesn’t commence while Driver A is prying a Darwin Fish off of the back of Driver B’s car. In the interest of full disclosure I should tell you that my wife once placed a Jesus Fish on the back of our Chrysler minivan. But, and this gives you an idea of her wisdom, she also placed a Jesus Fish on the dashboard to remind her of the one on the back of the car.

 

There are people who go on television to proclaim that the leader of a foreign land suffered a stroke because he made God mad. There are people who blame America’s moral decline on activist judges while excusing our selfish, materialistic compulsions. There are people who feel the division in America is justified and inevitable because they are right and the others are wrong, some of these people write books explaining how uninformed or dishonest the other side is. I wonder sometimes if their books would sell as many if they chose a theme other than us versus them.

 

Now, the big problem I have with people such as these is that I share their faith; they’re Christians and I’m a Christian. Deep in their being they have a love for the Creator and Savior, just like me. We worship them with the same name, we read the same Bible, and so simply to throw them under the bus would be an act of intellectual dishonesty. To be clear, I don’t understand why they’re saying and acting the way they are because we share the same faith.

 

That’s why I’m confused and a little wound up. I wasn’t able to ignore the Rev. Jerry Falwell when he appeared on The 700 Club two days after the attacks on the Twin Towers and blamed those attacks on everybody on his political hit list. Among the ones he blamed were the ACLU, secular humanists, and the gays. I didn’t see the connection between Islamic extremists who express their faith through terrorism and death and Falwell’s comments—which, while perhaps motivated by grief and impotency, came off as opportunistic. The national news media pounced on him, venting just like he had done.

 

I cringed as that quote flew around the country, and I found myself in any number of uncomfortable conversations, “See that’s why I hate Christians, he’s so judgmental and hateful. What do the gays have to do with this?” I had to swallow my tongue. My friends didn’t want to hear about the charity work Falwell’s organizations do, they didn’t want to hear anything about a man they saw as hateful and bigoted. The part that hurt the most was that many take comments like that one and assume Falwell was speaking for all Christians, for Jesus Himself. I don’t understand what Falwell was doing that day; I hope he wasn’t simply using the tragedy for political traction. And because Falwell loved Jesus like I do, rather than simply dismiss someone I disagree with, I’m willing to dig a little deeper, ask a few more questions.

 

But sorting through these kinds of comments from fellow believers has become an all-consuming occupation.

 

I wasn’t able to ignore Pat Robertson when he called for U.S. special forces to “take out” Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Sure, economically speaking, assassination is cheaper than full-scale invasion, but I’m a little hazy on where Jesus would come down on that question. I’m guessing ’He’d say, “Assassination or Invasion? You’re asking the wrong question, son.”

 

Wasn’t Dr. Robertson aware his sound bite would be on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News by lunchtime? Those guys have to fill twenty-four hours of airtime each day, they probably have guy with a tape deck monitoring The 700 Club just waiting for something outrageous to be said. In the past few years, Pat has been particularly reliable. Personally, I enjoyed the prediction that a Tsunami would hit the Pacific Northwest last year. I live in the Northwest so this resonated with me.

 

Pat isn’t really a fortune-teller in the boardwalk gypsy kind of way, but he does an annual retreat where he meditates and prays and God gives him the straight stuff. I believe God talks to us, I believe that God puts things on our heart and we do our best to translate the message or comprehend it properly. Personally, on the few occasions where I felt God has spoken to me, the message has been so vague or simple that only later did I fully grasp the profundity of the encounter. So when Doctor Pat is told by God a big wave is going to whack my home state, I’m skeptical about the level of detail in such a message—but that’s only based on my personal experience.

 

The biblical word for this kind of give-and-take with God is prophecy. Interestingly, when an Old Testament prophet foretold a prophecy and was wrong he was stoned to death. Should be easy for me to throw Pat under the bus, right? Wrong. Pat is also the guy who has used television to deliver the Word, not all of it whacked, to millions who may not otherwise have heard it. His affiliated non-profits (there’s a pun in there somewhere, but I’ll let you do the math), including Operation Blessing did enormously important relief work in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

 

Again, I’m conflicted, especially when I consider all the stupid, opinionated things I’ve spouted through the years. The difference, I suppose, is that my stupid comments have offended and alienated friends and family, who eventually will forgive and forget. Pat manages to say plenty of silly things live on national television and, besides, I’m supposed to love Pat—even if I don’t agree with him. Can you love someone and still throw them under the bus? There must be a Scripture verse somewhere on that covers this.

 

I wasn’t able to ignore Dr. James Dobson when he claimed that gay marriage could mark the end of Western civilization, that polygamy and men marrying dogs would come next. I wondered if the “slippery slope” analogy is where Jesus would go with that complicated legal issue. I also wondered if Jesus would care about the end of Western civilization. And by Western civilization, I mean our American privilege, our comfort, my cozy, do-whatever- I-want-buy-what-ever-I-want way of life. I know Jesus cares about each and every heart, but many empires have risen and fallen since Jesus walked the earth, I can’t imagine protecting our castle is what Christ had in mind.

 

But Dr. Dobson has written a couple of excellent books on raising children that were helpful to my wife and me in raising our boys. Through the years, I’ve spent many hours listening to his radio program on topics like family dynamics and have been truly blessed by those shows. Again, there’s the rub. I’m not going to sign on with Dobson on his Culture Wars Cruise through America, and I’m concerned that too much preaching to the choir will alienate those whom with we’re called to love and share. I don’t know what to do with this dichotomy, but the queasy feeling in my stomach isn’t going away.

 

Over the past couple election cycles I’ve watched the division grow sharply between Christian and non-Christian, conservative and liberal, blue-stater and red-stater. And, hey, I’m fine with good old-fashioned politics. But I have to say I was not sold when religious leaders told me how to vote. None of them know how Jesus would vote, if he would vote. Oh, sure, they’ll tell you why they think Jesus would vote with them, but nobody knows. I could tell you Jesus would like the Beatles more than the Rolling Stones because the Fab Four wrote so many songs about love, but I don’t know. Perhaps Jesus would be a big fan of the blues based Stones because the music expresses the sadness, pain, and emptiness that only Jesus can fill. Maybe Jesus loves the blues because it’s honest and the desperation is a call for help, it’s the musical equivalent of the dirty, sick, undesirable loners Jesus came to love. Check one for the Stones? We can’t really know, can we?

 

The sweeping “values voters” win in 2004 brought a round of gloating and heavy handed, myopic policy demands and a lot of talk about how God had decided this election. Now, while some of the candidates I supported won, some didn’t. Some of the ballot measures I supported won, some didn’t. I was watching our democratic election process through a different filter than some of my outspoken brothers. I found myself getting irritated that they were so sure God had delivered these election results. “Well”,” I thought, He didn’t deliver all of my desired outcomes. Does that mean I’m less holy than you? Does that mean I’m wrong and you’re right? Does that mean you have God on your side and I’m out in the cold? I could only imagine how someone outside the faith must feel when they heard this kind of rhetoric.

 

Then something hit me, These guys don’t have any idea how they sound. The negative association with Christianity is being helped along because we don’t know how we sound. Christianity is turning into a bad word with dubious meaning in American society because we don’t care how we sound to those who don’t agree with us. There are many believers who, and they have their reasons, feel like we must “Take Back America from the Godless Secularists.” There is this pent-up aggression that has exploded in this country and is manifesting in an ongoing collision of faith and culture. Some have joined the fray out of deep-seeded religious beliefs, some out of political convictions, for some it’s good business, and some—as we’ve seen—have good old-fashioned agendas such as the quest for power and money.

 

All of that is as American as a McDonald’s hot apple pie and baseball’s free agency, but there is some question in my mind where Jesus fits into this whole thing. That seems like a good place to start: Are we trying to fit Jesus into what we’re doing, as people, as a country? Or are we trying to fit into what Jesus is doing?

 

As believers, I think we simply don’t know how we sound to others; what’s worse, we don’t care ‘‘’cause we’re right anyway—and to add injury to insult we won’t listen. What if, with all our talking, people aren’t actually hearing what we intend? If we listened for a minute, we might understand how “I want to preserve the traditional institution of marriage” comes across as “I hate gay people.” So what if we don’t think that’s what we’re saying, if that’s what others are hearing what’s the difference? I can’t be concerned with whose fault it is —I can’t accept this communication breakdown. Should the burden be on my lips or their ears? I guess it depends on if I really want to have a conversation or if I simply want to be right.