Politics In Church: The Bad, The Ugly, The Good

 

Of the many divisive issues that regularly hit the church and Christianity the one about politics in the church is a major one, particularly in the last 10 years or so. It's not only an issue in the Church of God movement but across the board in most Christian churches. It also has had a huge impact on Jewish synagogues, Mosques, and other religious bodies around the world. It's not something unique to Americans but we have pushed it to the extreme and made politics into a religious movement all by itself with politicians standing in as God's representative and political stances as representative of true faith and virtue.

Two different viewpoints in the Church of God movement hit my mail today. One from Seth Forrestier and the other from Lonnie Hendrix. What makes this unique and controversial in the Churches of God/Armstrongism is that the church claims to be apolitical with many of the churches telling members not to vote and to refrain from all political ideologies. Yet, in certain groups, like Church of God International, certain speakers cannot shut up about politics and have turned Sabbath services into a political shitshow at times.

This blog and others regularly push their buttons in regard to theology and beliefs, but when you dare to criticize their political stances, Holy Hanna you had better be prepared to be pummeled! Blaspheming the Holy Spirit is a minor sin compared to criticizing their political stances.

Hendrix had this to say about the ongoing Church of God International sabbath campaign rallies:

CGI Pastor Adrian Davis continues to find new ways to insist that he and his allies have a Divine commission to discourse on political and cultural topics. Most recently, he has presented a three-part series of sermons titled "The Joy of the Lord." Now, the title of the series sounds innocent enough - it even gives the impression that Adrian may be returning to a religious theme in his messaging, but nothing could be further from the truth! 

 

In the third installment in the series, Pastor Davis offered an elaborate apologetics for the church's messaging about political and cultural issues. As usual. his message was wide-ranging and long-winded (80 minutes plus). Unfortunately, not only do Adrian and his allies see themselves in the Bible, but they also equate their political messaging with Christ's commission to carry the Gospel to the world. Hence, for him and his allies, any criticism of their messaging is adversarial and constitutes genuine persecution of them and their organization. 

 

In this connection, Davis even had the audacity to compare the pushback that their messaging has received to the stoning of Stephen! He said that just as God had given Stephen a message which enraged folks outside the Church, the message which God had committed to them has enraged the outside world and invited them to isolate and persecute them. Now, for most of us, there is NO equivalency between someone being crucified or stoned and someone being criticized or ridiculed for their messaging. Davis, however, seems to see no distinction between the two!

Sadly, it took the pandemic to bring out the real nastiness in the church with brethren on both sides of the issue. I have tried to stay away from the pandemic and political posts here, but have let a few in over the last couple of years. We have all seen the shitshows they produced, at least from the comments I let through. Some of the vilest and filthy things have not been posted here, and it is shocking to see the kind of things that come out of "converted" true believers' mouths who claim to be followers of the faith once delivered.

Hendrix continues:

In a not-so-subtle allusion to the recent pandemic, he went on to criticize his brethren that "have done everything they could to hold on to this life," and he urged all TRUE believers to remain calm and carry on. For Davis, his anti-vaccination and political messaging is the equivalent of the word of God and testimony that Christ and his disciples were preaching. He said that "God wants those who will not back down." The good pastor then went on to note several "red flags" that real Christians should avoid - like anything related to the "Globalist agenda (WHO, United Nations, WTO), climate change, global, vaccine mandates, and social justice! Funny, I don't remember anything about Christ or his apostles devoting any part of their messaging to those topics! 

 

For Davis and his allies, however, the notion that these things have absolutely no connection to Christ's moral teachings, example, or message about the Kingdom makes absolutely no difference to them! The pastor went on to discuss the destruction of the United States by this administration (Biden) and declared that they are evil! And, just in case anyone doubted that that was an appropriate designation, he invited his audience to have a look at Biden's policies (which he went on to enumerate as abortion, vaccine development, forcing vaccination on children, opening the border, trafficking children, and pedophilia. Davis finished by lamenting the fact that Americans are ignoring all of those horrors and were instead focused on inflation (keeping gas prices lower by draining their reserves). Of course, one continues to wonder why the Canadian pastor of an ACOG is so concerned about what's happening on the political and cultural front in the United States! 

 

Davis declared, "The truth is the truth, and we stand by it." Indeed, he implied that anyone who has any problems with his messaging is in danger of receiving the Mark of the Beast! In other words, Davis and his allies are determined to stick with their political/cultural messaging, and no amount of criticism from within or without CGI is going to detour them from proclaiming it. Unfortunately, CGI continues to provide a platform for Adrian Davis and his allies. Hence, we are forced to conclude that they share the conviction of Davis and his allies that all of this political and cultural stuff is an integral part of preaching the Gospel to the world! Sad - so SAD! CGI's Political and Cultural Gospel (or Bad News)

This viewpoint that politics do not deserve to be part of the culture of the church is one taken by many churches of the world. they too see how divisive and sickening it is at times to their members. Yet, there are others who believe that as politics invades our lives it also affects the church and how the church reacts to certain things.

Seth Forrestier says this:

We had some friends over a few weeks ago, and we were playing a Reverse-Q-and-A game. In response to one particular statement, nearly all of my friends stood on the Strongly-Disagree side and all of their reasons really struck me. 

 

The statement was ‘Political Issues should be talked about at church’. 

 

I, as a skeptic and part-time contrarian was on the Strongly Agree side, all alone. 

 

As you can imagine by my mentioning the story at all, I’m still of the same opinion, but I also COMPLETELY agree with all of my friend’s reasons for taking the opposite position. 

 

While playing this game, I was the only person on that side, so I had the first round of explanation. I said that I believe political issues should be talked about even more at church because ALL things that pertain to life have a way of becoming political. 

 

In response my friends said a few variations of, ‘if you want to define political things that broadly, you’re muddying the idea’. 

 

When they gave their reasons, for their position it was because in most cases preachers are not qualified nor competent to speak authoritatively on political subjects.

I do have to agree with this point. Not only are many COG pastors not fit to be discussing theology, but politics is way beyond their understanding. That's why you will see many COG members in these congregations tune out during services when these rants start and also will NOT read official church materials that contain these same rants.

Forrestier continues:

I cannot disagree with that sentiment, quite frankly most preachers are NOT experts in politics and probably shouldn’t bill themselves as experts in political issues based upon their real or supposed prowess in matters of religion.

Yet, even though I agree with my friends’ position I STILL believe there SHOULD be more talk of political issues in church.

Today I want to take this unusual opportunity to monologue to a captive audience and explore the topic of competence.

I want start with an assumption that I believe most of you share, that is that in some form or fashion, though varied; We (the people of God) are Called (separated, destined) to be a Kingdom of Priests, or Kings and Priests. (Some sort of authoritative group of servant leaders). I kind of want to see a show of hands on that, because I can adjust the starting point if need be.

Do we all roughly, accept (translations and specific meanings aside) that proposition?

When I was young, I was one of those kids that listened in church, I remember a good deal of the messages I heard as a 6 year old onward. One thing that has always stuck in my head, not as a red-flag per-se but as a major curiosity was the doctrine that at the resurrection God will give His people the abilities to do the jobs He prepared them for. This was a universal doctrine in all the churches I was raised in. This was taught in most cases as, ‘worldly education can never give you what you need to be Godly’, and ‘no amount of worldly education can prepare you for what God has in mind for you to do’. 

 

This doctrine was always malleable though, and quite often used in cross purposes to bring about obedience to a myriad of ideas.

I was taught there’s no reason to learn politics because God’s government is different. I was taught there’s no reason to politically fight against abortion because, I quote, “God doesn’t care about the abortion problem in the world, He cares about fixing the sanctity of life in the Kingdom’. I was taught there’s no value in a university education about psychology because it’s all just gobledy-gook and man’s feeble attempts to understand man. I was told there was no need to pursue an education in things that pertain to The Kingdom of God because everything I would need would be given to me when I got there.

As I said, this wasn’t a red flag to me as a 6 or 7 year old, but it always sat on a shelf in my mind glowing and unable to be ignored.

The church has always taken the road that the knowledge of the church is far superior to that of the world and that our focus is not upon the day-to-day concerns of the world but upon a glorious kingdom to come when all of the problems of the world will be fixed. That is why so many COG's have historically never helped in their communities or with their neighbors. Thankfully, a small percentage of COG members bucked that idea and have put their faith into action for decades in the world around them. 

Forrestier continues:

Later in my 20s it began to bother me. In my 20s I started my own business and began hiring people and it occurred to me in several different ways, that what people bring to the table is VERY important. 

 

I got to see the difference between experience, and the willingness to learn. I got to see the difference between “I’ve hung gutter for 3 years” and “I’m a fast learner”.
They are not the same.

It was taught to me, and probably to some of you that we are not and cannot be good enough for God, and there’s an idea that’s extremely pervasive in Christianity, as a whole, that man cannot please God. No doubt there is a scriptural basis for the concept, but the application gets so far outside of context that Christianity believes some very strange things about what man can and cannot do.

One thing the COG has been really good at is making church members feel they are never good enough. God is always just inches away from casting them in the lake of fire. Anytime the church faced an issue or trial it was the member's fault.

There is most certainly a distinction made between the physical and the spiritual in the biblical texts, but does that mean that nothing man can do is good enough? Does the fact that Flesh and Blood cannot enter the Kingdom mean that nothing man can do is good enough to please God, more importantly does that mean that our physical and worldly education, talents, experiences, strengths and weaknesses are immaterial to God’s plan?

The talents of church members have never really been appreciated. If you had a worthy talent coming to Ambassador College you were sent to work in an area that was the opposite of what you were good at. It was all meant to humble you instead of celebrating your worthiness. Anyone who has ever put their faith into action and done good in the world around them knows that their actions have a direct impact upon God bringing forth the Kingdom, one person at a time.

Forrestier goes on to quote Hebrews 11, the faith chapter. He states:

How many Actions were associated with, as the definition of Faith there?

How passive does Faith look in that account? Now, was God just using people as tools in all those cases?

I might be fraying the topic a little bit right here, but we’ll get it all back together soon.

Unless we ignore the words in Hebrews 11, Man’s actions CAN be ‘good-enough’ for God, and the things that are ‘Commendable’ by God are Actions by man.

After some family antidotes, Forrestier continues with the stories of certain Biblical personalities:

Back to Moses, he was just a normal passive guy, right? No! He was a prince... He grew up in a palace that reigned over 6 to 8 million people. He was trained in how to manage large groups. He knew what that looked like. 

 

You could say to this example, ‘that was God preparing him’… fair enough, I accept that and as I will intend to show, it even proves my point. There was worldly education in political and physical things that were necessary for God to use and be pleased by Moses.

What about Samuel? Samuel was quite the character in the old days. I have a tongue-in-cheek favorite scripture in which Samuel ‘hacks’ Agag, a king, to pieces before the Lord at Gilgal and delivers the Clint Eastwood worthy line ‘as your sword made women childless, so will your mother be’. This man was a Kingmaker, he was even an accepted authority ABOVE the king of Israel. He alone was the man-in-charge of ‘foreign policy’! What was his background? 

 

Well, from his childhood he was trained by Eli. There wasn’t a man in all of Israel at the time who knew the writings of God as much as Samuel. He was educated by MAN, Eli and carried out POLITICAL exploits that pleased God.

What about Esther? This is a very not-G-rated story, the account we have is rather muted in its expressions, but the content should not be overlooked. Here is an entirely political situation in which a woman, by being TRAINED by a group of… professionals… used her newly acquired, and apparently exceptional, Human and Physical skills to save an entire race of people… Let that sink in for a moment… as an aside, could a man have done that Job? Also, could that have been done without training, I don’t mean to be crass, but really??

What about Paul? The scene is this: There’s a paradigm shift in the world, Judaism’s time as a torchbearer is over and a new and better covenant is made. Now there’s a need to spread the ‘gospel’, this new covenant needs to be proclaimed throughout the world good enough so that people from now on will know about it... who is most able to do that? Some passive guy who just ‘believes’? NO! The guy who gets so much of the credit is Paul, pray tell, where did he come from?
He was trained… not just trained but educated personally by the most prestigious institution of religious teaching of the time. Not only that, but He was also a practicing member of the Jewish ruling community he was quite literally a religious politician, and the equivalent of a religious lawyer. It is specifically BY this education that he was able to reach the audience he did. If Paul had not been educated in, well versed and experienced in the political system he would have not made it out of Antioch. It was his education that afforded him his audience. It was because he was credentialed that his message was even considered. It was his Experience in his trade that supported him Economically and it was his training and prowess in Jewish and Roman law that opened the doors. It was his ability to speak about the depths of Greek philosophy and make connections to God. It was his Education that gave him and audience.

What I see all of these heroes in the bible have in common is that they were competent. They had or sought the training, they had the experience, training and education necessary to deal with the issues of their time.

Forrestier continues a little later with this:

Here’s where this comes back to the present. We see all these old stories and we read them, and we see that God was present, guiding the situations and we then view the characters as something other than human like us. We see them as heroes who did God’s work. When we do that, we do a major injustice to these men and women and to God. We also exempt ourselves from all responsibility to be competent by say, ‘yeah, well that was God doing all the work’. That perspective was never afforded to any man! All the heroes of the bible were men and women who woke up every morning with the same ignorance about the present and the future that we do, they didn’t know! What they DID do was act, and act in the best way they knew how and in the long run, it’s recorded that GOD COMMENDED THEM for it.

So, what are you going to do? It’s so common to say and to hear “if God wanted me to pursue this or that He’d make it happen” … Is that true? I say no, that’s not how it works, at least at ground level. Do you have an opportunity to become competent in a field? Are you turning it down because it’s not religious? Are you not interested because it’s not perfect and maybe there’s some problems with the curriculum?

One of the things that grinds my gears the most is listening to religious people in scientific or political debates. One of the most nails-on-a-chalkboard debates was Ken Ham, the young-earth-creationist against Bill Nye, the Plays-a-scientist-on-tv-guy. Two ideological blockheads who each dogmatically believe in their own rainbow-colored unicorns. Each arguing nonsense and ignorance in the name of their respective religions. Each of them entirely incompetent in the others’ professed field.

Go back sometime and read about William Jennings Bryan and the Scopes Monkey Trial. This was about evolution being taught in school. As you might have guessed, he lost, and Christians still sound this absurd and convoluted today. Jennings Bryan skewered himself as a complete fool and he took Christianity down with him. His arguments among many other faults, made Freedom of Speech only apply to those who shared his view of Right and Wrong. Which by the way, is the same argument that folks like Matt Walsh make which is why they sound so good on their own platforms but fail miserably in actual public discourse.

So often religious speakers are like this! I hear it all the time, a minister giving a sermon talking about how the Greeks worshiped their gods for instance, and they are COMPLETELY wrong. The minister absorbs or makes up some entirely false idea and preaches as if the Greek people worshiped Zeus like the Muslims worship Allah or the Christians worship God. They speak incompetently in many cases because they were taught that to learn about pagan religion is dilute yourself with error. When the reality is that Paul was only able to speak convincingly to Greeks BECAUSE he know enough Greek Philosophy and Poetry to argue competently with educated Greeks and Romans!

This is precisely why my friends in the Q-and-A did not want to hear ministers talk about politics from the lectern, because in large part people who consider themselves religious authorities are incompetent in political understanding!

The same goes for Child-rearing, Economic planning, which car manufacturers make the most reliable cars, or whether or not to buy bitcoin. Not everyone is competent to teach about such things from a position of authority, and a ‘biblical understanding’ is not a super-piece credential.

To these points, I agree with my friends’ sentiment on that point, what I disagree with my friends’ position is what to do about it.

I started by asking if we all subscribe to the basic notion that we are called to eventually be in some sort of authoritative office. If we believe that as we say we do, we will never be among the class of heroes in the bible by being still and passive and waiting for go to move mountains for us… because that’s not how those people received their commendation either.

The notion that worldly education, even in completely human subjects is not important is not consistent with the stories in the bible.

Each one of here is on a unique path, our lives consist of complex and diverse experiences, and perhaps that IS God moving you and positioning you but if that is the case, it’s not God using you like a yellow pencil… I don’t suggest this analogy won’t break down if taken too far, but it’s something more like chess. I say chess because the player doesn’t control WHAT the pieces do, the pieces control what the pieces do, and the player simply moves the pieces accordingly.
In chess, much like in these biblical stories, not all pieces can make the same moves… and in order to play the game, the player NEEDS certain pieces and the moves they can make. Think, Pharoah, Noah, Moses, Judas, Paul, Esther, Jonah, etc.

It looks to me, like history of God’s people has been like God playing chess with billions of people who just want to be pawns. They only want to move one space and only straight ahead. Maybe, these heroes in the bible stories stand out because the castles, like Abraham took 8 spaces to the left like they were intended to, and the bishops moved, like Paul, all the way across to the opposite corner when no other piece was qualified to be in that position, and maybe the Queens, like Esther, yielded to what would be illegal moves for other pieces in order to overthrow the opposing kings.

Take a look at the world around you, there is endless trouble. Things are wrong, things are broken, people are broken, things are upside down… Who is going to fix that?? Do we not have story after story in the bible of men and women we now call heroes and great that did not sit around and wait for God’s kingdom to come… they VERB-ed like the men and women in Hebrews 11. They got up and left their comfortable positions and did the best they could with the tools they had, and WE EXIST BECAUSE OF THEM. Go back some time and look at the characters in Jesus’ lineage explain to me how they were something other than normal, fallible humans. 

Tell me how a Prostitute ended up a necessary ancestor of Jesus because she broke what WE would consider a sacred law about lying. Explain to me how Phineas stopped a plague from killing thousands MORE Israelites and garnered God’s own praise for spearing two people who were causing the problem?! These stories aren’t anomalies, like we are often prone to argue, these are among the stories of the people of God for a reason.

I’m of the opinion that the stories in the bible are in large part a collection of stories that contrast people who are passive, still and willfully ignorant to those who do the best with and act with what they have.

I want to end with a couple of political issues of our day and propose an alternative way in which we might address them.

Abortion. Abortion is among other things, a political issue, and none of us here are politicians. There ARE, however, some of us here who are midwives. There are also, some of us here who are citizens with the legal right to participate in politics. (which Paul did) There are some of us here have ways of helping people affected by the existence of our current abortion policies. Perhaps, we can drop our unbased and often obnoxious claim to authority on the subject and instead speak about it in terms of ‘what can we do with what we have to make the most impact?’ WHILE we’re doing that, maybe we can learn about politics enough to understand what’s going on behind the scenes.

LGBT issues. I don’t believe any of us in this room are actively a part of that group, but some of us here have connections by way of friends and family. I don’t believe that any of us in this room are biologists by trade, or phycologists for that matter, so maybe we shouldn’t teach about the subject as if our personal understanding of the Old Testament gives us credentials that trump all others. Still, it’s an issue that affect us all, so maybe we should instead talk about the subject in terms of, ‘what can we do with what we have and what we know to help the most people in the best way?’ Perhaps we could read books, and listen to folks who study the issue, not with the intent of believing everything we’re told, but with the intent of understanding just what it is we’re battling. So, So, so often Christians talk about Satan, and how we should know his devices and yet, how many of us know any specifics of what’s happening in this discussion? We blame everything on Satan so blindly that we throw our friends and family into the fire with him, meanwhile, here in reality, there are actual physical things we can do to help those in need of relief from the torture, whether internal or external they live in if we would only learn about it.

How about Technology Like Bitcoin and 5G or the effects of Social Media, or Prognosticating the future political climate... You get where I’m going...

Maybe in these issues, like so many other pressing issues is LEARN ABOUT THE PROBLEM! Perhaps we should devote some time to becoming competent in the subject material. That DOES NOT mean, and I AM NOT suggesting you go out and adopt another lifestyle and see how it fits. What I mean is, maybe talk to those friends and family members who are affected by subjects like these, and actually have a real series of conversations about WHY and HOW they are affected. Then, after learning WHAT the problem is maybe we’ll be a little more qualified when we attempt to spit-ball solutions.

At the same time, if you find yourself as I several times lately, in an inexplicable scenario, don’t turn away from the opportunity to become competent in a new subject matter. If you find yourself in any strange or inexplicable circumstance, don’t pass on the opportunity to learn.

So many of my peers turned down opportunities to go to college or university, or to get married, or to take a job path because they were constantly being taught that the end was near, that worldly education was futile and that God would magically give them all the skill they needed when Christ returned. Don’t let that be us; and let us not be the ones who train our children to be yellow pencils and devoid of a broad education.

The Heroes of the Bible NO DOUBT had God participating in the events of their lives, but that WAS NOT known to them at the time! They were just normal human people like you and me who had some skill set, or experience or talent, or conviction and USED it the best way they could muster. 

 

If we actually believe that the same God is with us, we should ACT by our faith the same way they did before us.

Esther 4:14, Think about this in terms of chess pieces if you will. Also think about the weight of this statement, this is a young woman he raised as his own daughter, this is not a flippant statement to a stranger. 

 

14 For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”

Now, Let’s go to Matthew 22 

 

The Parable of the Wedding Feast 

 

22 And again Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying, 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son, 3 and sent his servants[a] to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”’ 5 But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. 7 The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ 10 And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.

11 “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. 12 And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”

If there is any symbolism in the chronology of this parable (feel free to disagree), we today would certainly not among the first invites, and if you're curious about wedding garments, in Revelation the white garments are explained as 'the righteous acts of the saints'... isn't that exactly what the authors of Hebrews credited God's commendation of the saints on?

There is a great big world out there, there is a LOT of work to be done, and God WILL HAVE IT DONE, if not by us, then someone else. Could it be, would you consider, is it possible that perhaps we were prepared with what we have for such a time as this?

Seth Forrestier – 11-16-2022   Sermon Notes: Such a Time as This

One thing is for certain after reading Forrestier's sermon, the church needs more men like this instead of men like Adrian Davis, Bob Thiel, Dave Pack, and Gerald Flurry. It's time the divisive men are pushed to the wayside and men like Forrestier take over.

If the Kingdom of God is so important as the church claims it should be eager to share that vision and bring that vision into reality in small steps to those around us. That is what will draw people to the church and to God, not endless drivel about Mayans, which political party is right, Germans, prayer rocks, and endless failed prophecies. All the COG seems to do anymore is turn people off. Maybe it is time for new adventurers to take over and head in a new direction because what we have done in the past and presently are doing is NOT working.