Over the last few years, the Lord has been walking me through an obsession with the political. One could say an addiction to all things political. He has been graciously showing me how I had made an idol out of it; that even while I gave lip service to placing Him as king of my heart, I had placed politics as the thing to which I gave my first attention to, even above family and friends. I am grateful to a heavenly Father that shows me how to place things in proper order.

Before I continue let me unpack some of the things that I’d like to share with you. First, I want to say that politics, like religion, is something we all have an opinion on, and for some it is a thing they lack no compunction to share about. Yet for others, it’s something they are cautious about sharing; for them there is a sense of having to justify what they mean. They may need do a lot of explaining to have others understand the complexity of a thing. It is in this last group where I fall; I see too much of the interconnectedness between all of the various assorted things we do, say, and think. I do believe that politics, rightly placed, is a vital part of the human experience. Put simply, it’s a set of negotiated rules and habits that allow public life to happen. The issue isn’t so much as the thing itself, but where we place it in our affections and in the hierarchy of our attention.

We live in highly divided times. As a student of American history, after surveying our current political landscape, I would tell myself that at least we had not yet begun to see our rhetoric become physically violent as things were in the early 19th and 20th centuries. That only worked for so long, as we have seen over the last 10 years this has definitely changed and there has been a marked increase in the level of political violence in our country. Here in 2024, we as believers live in the same space as the world. Even amongst the church, those things on which we differ, I believe, have supplanted the thing, Christ Jesus, that is our unity.

The Westminster Catechism of 1647 begins with the question, “What is the chief and highest aims of man?” This question asks us to define our first priority and what direction our lives be aimed. The answer given, “Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God, and to fully enjoy Him forever.” This answer has its roots in the shema, found in Deuteronomy.

“Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love Adonai your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These words, which I am commanding you today, are to be on your heart. You are to teach them diligently to your children, and speak of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up. Bind them as a sign on your hand, they are to be as frontlets between your eyes, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.“ 

– Deuteronomy 6:4-9 (TLV)

This is as much a spiritual statement as a political one. The following scripture (and throughout all of scripture) are instructions to what end we are to direct our lives, to “love the Lord your God,” in recognition because He first loved us and desires relationship with us.

In Deuteronomy, the subsequent passages outline what we know of the Mosaic Law, the complete laws for living, social life, and religious observation. In Rabbinical Judaism, that number is over 600 laws which must be observed. Quite numerous. This side of Christ’s fulfillment of the law we are left with a far simpler guide for living. This is found in Matthew.

Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”

– Matthew 22: 37-40 (NLT) 

Here, Christ is echoing the shema, giving us the order of things which is first to love our Lord. Then, and even qualifies us by placing it on the same level of loving our Lord, to love our neighbor as ourselves. This is political. If we are to live in a society, regardless of the diversity of opinions and thoughts, we must love others as ourselves. According to Jesus, this includes our enemies:

“But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you!”

– Matthew 5:44 (NLT)

Equipped with this, our politics is radically changed. No longer can we see our opponents as enemies to be conquered. It is simply not our fight.

I must offer the requisite caveat here that I am not talking about the practice of pacifism. There are those in our midst whom the Lord has equipped to do battle; to be truly engaged in the political arena (and sometimes, the actual battlefield). He equips some to handle these hard challenges. It seems the Lord has given them an extra measure of grace or ability to be obedient to these commands even while properly recognizing threats. I’d also like to further add that this does not mean we will never be called to act. The Holy Spirit moves each of us in and out different seasons as to when we are to act or not act. But it is with absolute certainty that this will never compromise those first things.

In this election year and beyond, I want to offer some wisdom on how to deal with those we will encounter with great differences of political opinion. Beware, some cliches lie ahead. This does not mean that they are to be taken frivolously. At the heart of our current conflict is an enemy that seeks to destroy humanity. The philosophical tool that our enemy uses to recruit is Marxist at its core.

Marxism is a gnostic cult that seeks to refashion existence according to something other than how it has been created. It places man on the throne. It uses sophisticated language and complicated schemes to seduce the intelligent and common. It relies on grievances to stir up emotions. Within its system of thought there is no room for grace and mercy; only criticism. The tactics of this cult rely on reactions. It relies on their opposition to act with fear, clamp down on freedom, or simply act in accordance with its system by not showing grace and mercy.

Take a look at the countries where Marxists were successful and you will see that the old regimes quickly turned tyrannical themselves as they tried to stop them, which led to their own collapse. The countries that have successfully held off the push still permitted the Marxists to exist in the open and subjected them to the court of public opinion. Here, they faced ridicule and have never been able to amount to much of a threat. Where they did find a place is in the same space in which minds are encouraged to explore reality and to play with ideas….our colleges and universities, amongst the intelligentsia. This has been well expounded elsewhere and is not the focus of this article. I only bring it up to show that the threat, while it appears to have left the confines of this space, still only exists mostly in our education system. While it has made inroads into other areas of society, it doesn’t last in the face of the reality of our existence. This is because it is not the framework in which God fashioned reality. 

All that said, our enemy is not fellow humans. It is Satan, it is sin, and it is death. These have already been defeated by Christ on the cross. If the victory has already been won, then what are we to do?

Well, it is to love the Lord our God, with all of our being, and then love our neighbors, including those who oppose us. It is for us to show them grace and mercy, to place them above ourselves. To see them with the eyes of Christ. It is to see them as His precious creation. Yes, they are afflicted with the condition of sin and need wake up to the truth of Christ’s victory. They are not His enemies, and therefore they that cannot be yours. When confronted with their lies, be sure to act first with love, not to react without grace and mercy. Give truth only in the spirit of grace and mercy.

All of us have been born for this very age. We are fully equipped to handle those who oppose us. We are fully equipped to take care of the least of these. We are equipped because Christ has equipped us. To do anything outside of what we’ve been equipped for leads to disorder. It also makes us our place opinions as idols that come before God and others. I encourage you, my brothers and sisters, to keep Christ first and all else will fall into its proper place.