Politics and religion

Politics. An ugly word. An even uglier topic. It is even more ugly when we incorporate politics with religion. This is a tough subject and will offend many religious people. Let's look at it from Jesus' point of view. Prior to Jesus coming to Earth, the religious "experts" had their beliefs about the Messiah. The believed He would be a great military leader. A big, strong leader who would rid them of their oppressors, the Romans.

The Romans were vicious. They did things to the Jewish people that were horrible. They were the politicians of that time. The ones in control of the government. The Jewish leaders wanted them gone (with good reason). They taught about the Messiah with their opinions as facts. The Jewish people had no reason to question it. They were enslaved and this was their Messiah coming to free them of the horrible leadership.

Not much has changed today. We have religious people incorporating their political views into their faith. I know this will offend many people but Jesus was not and is not a Republican. While He was on the Earth, the religious leaders tried to attack Jesus as the Messiah with their opinions of who the Messiah was in their minds. Jesus would have none of it. He was not there to free the Jewish people from the Romans. He wanted nothing to do with politics. Let's take it a step further. Paul said in Timothy to pray over our leaders. When was the last time you prayed over our President that you didn't like? Many religious people spend their time bashing the President, Congressman, Senators, and more. How about spending that energy praying for them?

Let's take it a step further. Jesus corrects the teaching of the religious leaders about loving your neighbor and hating those who hate you. Still today, we teach only part of the sentence. We only talk about the "Love your neighbor" part. We make that part the most important part. There is no context to the statement. Here is the issue with it. We take that phrase and use our definition of love. Like loving your neighbor means letting them grow their grass higher than ours. Making noise when they want to. Jesus corrected the erroneous teaching in John by saying "Love your neighbors as I have loved you." The part that says as I have loved you is the foundation for the Love your neighbor statement. It is His definition of love, not ours. What does this have to do with politics? Simple. Is someone loving the politicians as Jesus loves us if you are talking bad about them? Tearing them down? Using religion to bash them? Certainly not! In fact, you could do irreparable damage to their thoughts on Christianity when we act this way and justify it with our religion.

Let's focus on the love of Jesus. Love others AS HE LOVES US. Pray for our leaders, no matter if they are Republican, Democrat, Independent, or whatever. Show them the love of Jesus. Do you want to impact our country for Jesus? Change politicians? Be like Jesus. know that there is a much more important mandate from God. To do our part in engaging others with the love of Jesus and softening their hearts for Jesus to change their lives forever!