14 comments

• On his twitter:

  “In Christ, you’re not a little bit forgiven, you’re totally forgiven.”

  There was a video, as well, but that’s funny because I thought God hated me…..

  Yeah, this week has just been rough when it comes to evangelical Christians and their public image (see the recent New York Times video about Uganda). I’m so glad God cannot be diminished by our inability to love.

• Yeah David, in the end it’s not about who we are but who He is!

• Thanks for this post, Steve, Rob and I find it so refreshing. Have you thought of writing for Red Letter Christians?

  It so saddens and infuriates me to see the polarisation of the church in the States – we’re outsiders of course so we can’t completely understand it, but it’s still very sad and frustrating…

• Thanks for the kind comment Christine! Yes, I really think the entire Body of Christ in America has become so politicized people have trouble even seeing straight.

• This is so disappointing. Sad too.

• Hmmm. There is an apparent and, I believe, very real distinction between American concept(s) of “Christian” and what the gospels and epistles lay out as a disciple and follower of Jesus. Regardless of how American’s feel, this distinction is a lot more obvious to those of us who aren’t from the Land of the Free.

  I don’t know Mark Driscoll and don’t really need to, so I don’t know if this tweet was some perverse platform for a backhanded swipe on the president. Perhaps it was. And, if so, your first point, Steve would be correct.

  But it’s your succeeding points that are most disturbing. Is being able to quote extensively from the Bible (with or without a teleprompter) really are measure of whether someone truly knows God? Even if we’re not talking about “knowing” in any meaningful sense; even if we define it as being born again, can we truly say that President Obama has been and is allowing himself to be being born again in every area of his life? Does he really speak and act as one who has the same nature as God? (After all, isn’t that the true meaning of being “born again”? Isn’t it that one is reborn with the nature of God? At least, that’s how Paul and John define it). Is the kind of legislation he has pushed through the kind that is glorifying to God? Are the people he surrounds himself with and listens to people who will turn his heart to Godly things? If not, one has to ask why a man who has “professed his Christian faith and that Jesus is his God” would do such things. Perhaps there is a legitimate answer to this, but the President has yet to provide one from the scripture he is able to so readily quote from.

  The fact that he has professed this Christian faith I find really quite meaningless (see paragraph one). I profess that I am a lover of football, but I rarely watch a game, have little idea who the current players on any team are, and although I find it enjoyable on the occasions when I do see a match, I really have little interest in following it at all. Nevertheless, I am a lover of football. And I would venture that I am probably a lover of football to a similar extent that Barak Obama is a lover of Jesus.

  I do not take his word for it firstly because I have yet to hear a politician who didn’t use “religion” for political gain but, most importantly, because I have yet to see evidence of any fruit of that belief in his life.

  Quoting a few scriptures isn’t terribly demanding – especially if you have your speechwriter pick the nice ones. I haven’t heard too much from the president’s mouth about sin and its terrible consequences on society, I haven’t heard anything about living holy and Godly lives and what impact that would have on the disintegration of the family or violent crime, or self-interest. I haven’t heard much about humility. I haven’t heard him talk about the significance of marriage in relation to Christ and the Church. I hear a profession that isn’t matched by the kind of life that a real follow of Jesus is called to.

  Having said that, I can’t see his heart. Maybe he really is a Christian.

  And maybe I’m really a lover of football.

  Honestly, I wouldn’t have given Mark Driscoll’s tweet a second look. I really don’t care what he thinks. But this whole postmodern regurgitation of “all you need is love” is as myopic as you accuse Driscoll of being. Yes, we are called to pray for our leaders, but I think you’d have been hard pressed to find Christians offering Nero or Domitian the kind of support and respect you expect Christians today to show your president. I have great respect for the office; the man who sits there has to earn it.

  Quoting a few biblical passages, attending a (somewhat bizarre) church, and telling the world you’re a Christian is insincere without a life to match. Instead of posing as some MLK reincarnated or impressing on us his links to Lincoln, perhaps he could try acting in the same humility as the one he professes to follow. When President Obama claims to be a Christian, he should start taking his cues from the Bible he so frequently quotes.
  – Rupricht

  • Thanks for your comment Rupricht. Although I have to disagree on some key points.

    * Are you really comparing Nero to Obama? Nero burned Christians as candles for his garden parties and the other is trying to get everyone covered in healthcare. And Paul’s letter to Timothy was written about the time of Caligula and he didn’t make an exception in praying for him. We are called to respect our leaders as Christians…sometimes it may mean respectfully disagreeing.

    * I rather think that rather than contributing to the disintegration of the family he offers up an example of someone who is long faithful to his wife and raising two beautiful daughters who obviously adore their father.

    * I’m not sure where the “postmodern regurgitation of ‘All you Need is Love'” figures into this post. I have gone to lengths to say where I disagree with the president even to the point of not voting for him.

    * There is not a person alive who could live under the public scrutiny the President of the United States lives under and not come up wanting in many areas. It is for that reason I choose to give him some extra grace in keeping with Paul’s encouragement to Timothy.

• * Are you really comparing Nero to Obama? Nero burned Christians as candles for his garden parties and the other is trying to get everyone covered in healthcare. And Paul’s letter to Timothy was written about the time of Caligula and he didn’t make an exception in praying for him. We are called to respect our leaders as Christians…sometimes it may mean respectfully disagreeing.

  No. The reference was made because there was an implied connection in your post between praying for rulers and your 150% support for the president. I don’t see that those two things are related nor indeed need to be. My point was that it is possible to pray for rulers but still oppose them.

  Paul’s reason for praying for rulers was so that “we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.” By way of illustration, policies that require a registered minister to marry homosexual couples in his church (the kind of laws the U.K. is now considering) would make it very difficult for that minister to live a godly and dignified life if such a union was contrary to his conscience. That minister may feel justified in opposing such a law, praying for it to be rescinded, or praying for the removal of those who drafted and passed it…so that he might live a godly and peaceful life.

  I have no desire to compare Obama to anyone, least of all a malevolent tyrant. I do not believe he is one. Neither do I condone the kind of vitriolic rhetoric so often spewed from the mouths of well-meaning but often self-righteous Christians. In the same way that I doubt Mr. Obama’s faith, I have doubts about some of these. Hence the first paragraph of my first post.

  Nevertheless, my point remains that prayer for our leaders does not necessarily equate to believing whatever comes out of their mouth (as Dietrich Bonhoeffer would readily avow). Americans have an odd adoration for the office of President. He assumes almost demi-god status. When he travels somewhere, crowds throng to see him; when he speaks they hang on every word, applauding with great approbation, not because he is loved (as the British monarch is) but because he is believed to be great and powerful. Such an attitude should give any Christian pause.

  I am quite willing to pray for him, but I am not so naïve as to believe that he is my brother in Christ merely because he claims to be, especially when his life shows so little Christlikeness.

• Rupricht, Just to clarify I did not mean to suggest that my 150% remark should be connected to Paul’s call to prayer. It was that as and American citizen and as our duly elected leader I will support him, I did not VOTE for him… but I will support him and then I will support the next guy who is president whether I vote for him or not. Support should not be seen as unthinking support for every policy. I oppose many things this administration has done…but my body language and tone I project is (hopefully) always of love and respect…as my Lord asks of me.

  I think you have to be careful about claiming who and who is not IN by our notions of Christlikeness. It is about what Christ has done not what we do. I’m sure if my life, or yours, was held up to the same scrutiny at President Obama’s others would have enough evidence to question our Christianity…but again, aren’t we blessed because the focus is on Jesus and not us?

• OK, I think I understand the tone, despite the fact that you now seem to equate your formerly gung ho 150% support with a kind of generalized love and respect. I’m not sure what these translate to in concrete terms, but I think I understand your general meaning.

  Now let me clarify. I don’t look on Christianity as some kind of in/out club with me as the bouncer at the door. There is no way one of us can truly know a person’s heart. And for all I know, the president may well be a believer. However, by the same token you have no way of knowing whether Mark Driscoll is wrong in his assessment.

  My comments about Obama’s lack of witness are not really dissimilar to your own thoughts on salvation:

  “Change your direction….Then be submerged in his character and likeness (i.e. take on his name) ‘transformed into the same image from glory to glory’ (2 Corinthians 3:18)”
  [Pt 4 of your series on salvation]

  Do you really see a man submerged in the character and likeness of God; being transformed into the image of Christ from one glory to the next? I’ll make allowances for the enormous pressures of work and the relentless public scrutiny; nevertheless, that’s a fairly large stretch for any imagination.

• OK, I read your post on 1 Cor 13 after I posted that, and think I better understand what you mean. In that regard, my comment last night about your support for the president was unfair. My apologies.
  – DRS

• Rupricht,

  I realize in stating 150% in my support for the president as opposed to saying 100% would seem like an over enthusiastic endorsement of the president’s policies. I was trying to make a point but can see where it could be misunderstood. Cheers…

• I went through the article, but was touched by the exchange (between Steve and Rupricht) in the comments. How I wish such maturity is displayed among majority of Christians when they disagree on “Christianity”. Thanks guys, I pray I do same.

• Thank you for writing this article. God bless you. You are speaking truth despite how hard it maybe to swallow for many brothers and sisters in Christ.

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