Snowballs in Hell
It’s January 2020, and hell is freezing over. Not only
do I find myself agreeing with Beth Moore, who recently called nationalism a
sin (https://www.lightworkers.com/is-nationalism-a-sin/),
but also with David Platt, who wants us to distinguish between Americanism and
the gospel.
It seems that the Church
is in flux these days and nobody is quite sure what to make of it. The Gospel
Coalition finds itself endorsing works by Paula White (https://julieroys.com/leading-evangelicals-endorse-prosperity-preacher-paula-whites-new-book/)
while some conservative theologians find themselves relegated to the ends of
Christendom. What is happening? What can explain some of these developments?
The big and divisive event
seems to be the election of 2016 which exposed some theological fault-lines in
the Evangelical Church that were previously hidden. Many found themselves supporting
Donald Trump while others found themselves on the opposite spectrum. Beth Moore,
stated that Evangelicalism as we knew it died in 2016 (https://capstonereport.com/2019/12/27/beth-moore-is-still-bitter-about-donald-trumps-election/33675/). While some view this as evidence of Moore’s
bitterness about the election results, it seems that she is on to something.
Evangelicals find themselves
locked in an argument about the very nature of their identity. What does it mean to be an evangelical? Do we
know? Did we ever know? Does one have to support President Trump in order to be
an Evangelical? Or does support for the President indicate a lack of
theological integrity? Or does not supporting the president indicate that one
has compromised the gospel and caved into the liberal agenda?
As we approach the
election cycle for 2020, we cannot imagine that these disputes will go away,
but will get more intense. As we join
sides and argue amongst ourselves as to the future of the country, we need to some
self-reflection and some analysis before we continue. This year will see (probably) a slew of books
about politics and election. Tremper Longman has already published The Bible
and the Ballot (2020) just in time for the election. One can expect that Wayne Grudem’s Politics
According the Bible (2010) coming back into the debate. We might even see a
call back to the political theologians of the past: to St. Thomas and John
Yoder as we enter into a full on debate not only about the country, but about
the future of the church as well.
For us to understand
each other…and ourselves, we should go back to the questions that N.T. Wright
asks of 1st Century Judaism. His five questions are (1) Who are we?
(2) Where are we? (3) What’s wrong? (4) What’s the solution and (5) What time
is it? By asking these questions we can begin to understand how we see ourselves,
but more importantly how we evaluate others around us.
So I invite us to spend
some time over the next few weeks to look internally as to how we answer these
questions. I will be referencing my own
understanding of the Evangelical Church so we can see how we might answer these
questions and grow more in our understanding of one another.
