How do we cultivate a politically diverse church?
In my previous article, I described a forum our church held just prior to the national election in 2016. Two members (one a Republican and the other a Democrat) shared how they were going to vote and why, after which we held an informative and amicable church-wide discussion.
Two responses from those who attended caught my attention:
- “I can’t overstate how much I would recommend workshops like this in a church setting.”
- “Churches that do not offer [panels like] this leave members quietly tired and terrified.”
The church culture that made possible such a forum with its positive effects did not spring up overnight. We had sponsored similar forums prior to the national elections in 2004, 2008, and 2012.
For each one, we had chosen the panel participants carefully. They had all been people of character and grace. They also had a good public standing which would assure them a hearing from a diverse audience.
The panel was also made up of people from inside the church community, so as to avoid the impression that we were “selling” something on behalf of outsider politicians. We also didn’t include church officers to avoid any hint that church power and authority were being exercised.
We found that a structure of how we brought the panelists together was effective in laying a good groundwork for civility in the anticipated forums. Prior to every meeting, the panelists shared with each other what they were going to say. Then, they prayed together. The praying together celebrated our dependence upon a God who is bigger than our differences. Meeting together helped to ensure a humanization of the interchange: it is difficult to demonize a person or their ideas when you have had a thoughtful person-to-person exchange over one’s differences before going public.
There was a good bit more to our cultivation of political diversity at church than a number of carefully planned forums. We also relied on a culture that emphasized Bible truth rather than current events to set our weekly teaching agenda. This practice kept before our eyes certain unifying truths— truths about God and ourselves that united us by humbling and reassuring us. The assertions of politics and human opinion, which tend to divide, we sought to avoid.
Here are some of the prominent Bible truths we have stressed. To keep us humble and therefore patient with each other we have emphasized that human wisdom is finite and not as final as we might imagine. We have also reminded one another that our motives are always mixed and that our insights are heavily influenced by agendas that arise in the context of our personal stories.
“Human wisdom is finite and not as final as we might imagine. We have also reminded one another that our motives are always mixed.”
Focused attention on the character and plans of God has also helped. Reminding one another that God alone is infinitely wise has helped us curb our personal dogmatism. Recalling that He is infinitely powerful and good reduces the fear that can so easily lead to anger.
Above all, we have stressed that God loves our world, so much so that he walked and suffered among us and will one day put everything right. Knowing that God has suffered as one of us comforts us in our sufferings. Knowing that God will put things right and that he alone has the power to, makes us patient with the inevitable imperfection of political solutions. Whatever we may accomplish in politics cannot match God’s promised peace and blessing.
In light of these truths about God and ourselves, we have found cause and strength to manage our political differences amicably. Routinely alerted to our fallibilities and living in the comfort of God’s love, compassion, and power, we seemed more content to listen and to argue as if we are all in the same boat.
Another theme in our church’s teaching has helped in tempering our political behavior and ideas. Our church has taught a good bit about idolatry, the tendency in all of us to take the good things of life and make them into the supreme things of life, the ultimate arbiters of good and evil. Our personal agendas are very influenced by these “substitute gods.”
Some of us love politics and put huge expectations on political solutions. When they don’t work out or a political leader disappoints us, our heartbreak and frustration can be so great that they lead to anger, fear, dread, and even disgust. Some put great weight on an ideal version of America as they imagine it used to be or as they hope it might become. But nations, and political solutions of all sorts, will always disappoint us. They are not God: they are fragile, easily broken at times, or stolen away by bad actors. We set ourselves up for fear and anger when we rely on them too heavily.
“Nations, and political solutions of all sorts, will always disappoint us.”
Alerted to this idolatrous dynamic of the heart, we have learned to temper our inducements to political action with reminders that there is no quick fix to be found. We have encouraged patience with one another as we work for God’s good future.
We have sought to weave political and social obligations into church discourse all the time, rather than springing them on our people immediately before a national election when everybody is wound up. Offering election eve advice is a little like asking teenagers to download and listen to a talk on sexual ethics when they are by themselves holding hands on a park bench on a warm summer evening.
Two distinctions have proven helpful to frame our teaching.
One is between the “theocrat” and the “influencer” in all of us. We urge one another to be wary of the “theocrat-within.” It tends to identify a particular group or strategy with God and his strategy. The chief aim of the theocrat-within is to win—whether an argument or an election, what matters is victory. Unless vigilant against this inclination, a person will be less concerned with pure motives and ethical methods. The theocrat-within tends not to care as much about getting the facts right or respectfully listening to an opponent’s point of view and life-story.
“We urge one another to be wary of the ‘theocrat-within'”
We encourage the “influencer-within.” This voice doesn’t deny that Jesus is the King who aims to better the world. But it chooses always to remember Jesus’ method for doing so. The “influencer-within” recalls the picture of Jesus in the Book of Revelation (1:6), in which his sword comes from his mouth rather than his arm. Jesus “wins” not by force but by persuasion—and so, therefore, do his followers. The “influencer-within” sees the opposition not as enemies to be beaten but as friends to be persuaded by argument and example. The person who heeds that voice does all that can be done to come alongside the opposition, to hear them out, and to serve their aims wherever there is a common cause.
Because winning is not the aim, the person who listens to the influencer-within is less likely to be tempted to manipulate the outcome or be infuriated by a loss. The motive of faithfulness drives the conversation. If a wonderful influence spreads in the culture, the person who speaks with the voice of the influencer-within will celebrate. Yet, if nothing changes or, worse, the influencer suffers for a faithfulness to God, then that is okay too. Outcomes are Jesus’ business; ours is faithfulness.
“The ‘influencer-within’ sees the opposition not as enemies to be beaten but as friends to be persuaded.”
A second heat-reducing distinction we have drawn is between moral principles and political strategies. Moral principles are the high commands of God: love God with all you’ve got and love your neighbor as yourself. We have sought to advance these high values and to distinguish them from political strategies. The latter are fallible human efforts to nudge the culture in the direction of moral principles.
Take, for example, care for the poor. We have advocated such a moral principle. But when it comes to implementation, we have taught that there can be honest disagreement over which public policies are the best for doing so. Some say that the preferred strategy is to increase taxes and government spending on behalf of the poor. Others say that government should get out of the way and allow a deregulated economy to expand to everyone’s (including the poor’s) benefit.
We have sought to be a community where we can safely argue with each other over the merits of strategies because we have chosen to distinguish those strategies from the high values that bind us. We help one another see that when we conflate the two, those whose strategies differ from ours become in our eyes second-class Christians, people of diminished spiritual credibility. Our relationships with them grow shallow and wary. But when we choose not to conflate principles and strategies, we are less apt to see the friend with an opposing strategy as the enemy of God, and therefore as our enemy in some essential way. With less at stake, we can keep talking and listening. We can stay together as an honest and safe community.
Lastly, let me call attention to a helpful exercise that we use. We periodically urged our people to meet for a “political cup of coffee” with someone in the church whose politics differs from theirs. We advise the use of six rules of engagement:
- Promise to listen rather than argue.
- Keep your promise.
- Look for common ground in moral principle.
- Agree to disagree where you must.
- Pray for one another where you can.
- Celebrate the God who binds you above your differences by taking the Lord’s Supper together as soon as possible.
We will never agree completely on the politics of how best to love our neighbors. But we have found that we can amicably navigate our differences while making of ourselves the sort of community that draws in angry and lonely friends. Hope you can do this too! Let me know how it goes.
[Originally published on August 26,2020, 5:55AM]
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