the Breakdown

So I'm sweeping my floor on a Saturday afternoon and I'm having one of those recurring inner dialogue moments, so why not blog about it. I've been thinking about the pharisees and their political agenda, not so much the specifics of it but the fact they had a very strong one. The Pharisees were basically a group who believed that ritual keeping was going to be a chief way the Kingdom of God was brought about. (not sure they used the term "kingdom of God" but the idea applies) That in and of itself is not a bad thing, we all have rituals and traditions we adhere to. The problem with the Pharisees wasn't so much that they were all about the law while they really needed to be about grace, a valid critique to be sure but not the main one. (it seems strange to me that this would be the issue since the Pharisees weren't familiar with the Christian notion of grace we have today) If I'm understanding them correctly the Pharisees were basically a group of people interested in their own agenda, not so much God's agenda. Jesus seems to blast them for following rules they made up along the way and missing the point of so much of God had already told them...love God and people...rules and agendas must serve that end, not the other way around. 

Ok, fast forward to today. Certain christians are acting very much like Pharisees concerning politics. There has been a group of people who created a political agenda and said that if that agenda were realized then we would be a Godly nation. For example, gay marriage. Conservative Evangelicals (not necessarily a bad thing to be by the way) have said gay marriage is undermining traditional marriage, going against God's plan for families and just plain bringing us down. They created an agenda around this issue and have been working that plan for some time. I have no problem with the conservative political view on this issue except when it's used as litmus test for the sincerity of people's faith. I mean if you don't agree with that all the faults laid at the foot of the homosexuals then somehow your not a christian to a lot of conservative evangelicals. The issue with this type of agenda has been it's narrow focus on certain ways of being Christian and certain ways of expressing that in the public arena. This, to me, sounds an awful lot like the Pharisees. A focus on rules and a certain political agenda made up by people to decide who's in and who's out in Christianity. 

My hope is that all this silliness is behind us in trying to use politics as a test for the sincerity of our faith. (although I doubt it is, I still have hope) I believe political stances are important and, in some cases, need to be strong. We must influence politics with our faith but we can't judge others because of their different opinions. Feel free to debate, persuade and fight for your view but not at the expense of ostracizing and hurting others faith. This might help us to understand a bit better what Jesus meant when he said in Luke 17 that it would be better to "tie a millstone around your neck, and be thrown into the sea, than to trip up one of these little ones".