Tim Keller recently wrote the following in a New York Times
editorial: Christians cannot pretend they can transcend politics and
simply “preach the Gospel.”
These words so stun me that I am almost unable to
respond. Almost.
First, let me say I agree with Keller when he says, “To not be political is to be
political.” As the rock band Rush once
said in their song Freewill – if you
choose not to decide, you still have made a choice. So, if Keller means that Christians who
completely disengage from political action and political discourse are making a
statement, I agree with him that they are making a statement.
Yet, his claim that Christians cannot transcend politics by
simply preaching the Gospel terrifies me.
What does humanity need more than to hear the Gospel message of
repentance from sin and belief that Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the
life?” Is Keller suggesting political
action is on par with preaching the Gospel?
Or worse, is he claiming that people can’t be saved unless Christians
engage politically? I don’t think that’s
what he means, but his sloppy use of language here leaves open these possibilities.
His use of Joseph and Daniel as exemplars of political
engagement confirm my suspicions about his sloppiness here.
Dare I say this: Keller’s use of them to make his point is (gulp,
ahem, cough) wrong.
Joseph and Daniel don’t teach any “ought” regarding
political engagement. If anything, what
both teach is that integrity, endurance, and fealty to our Lord are primary;
what surrounds us is secondary. More importantly, neither man “sought” out any
political engagement. Let’s go back and
review for just a moment: Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers, but
because God gave him wisdom and an ability to interpret dreams, Joseph rose to
power through a series of events that could have only been orchestrated by the
very God he served. As he told his
brothers when they came to live with him in Egypt, what you meant for evil, God
meant for good. In other words, Joseph’s
political actions were a matter of God working through him to obtain God’s ends,
not Joseph “deciding” to engage in political action in order to fix the world
around him.
Daniel was, likewise, ripped away from his native land when
the Babylonians overran the nation of Judah.
Daniel was a captive who was forced to live in exile because God was
using that captivity as a means of disciplining his wayward children. Daniel didn’t ask to become a political
figure. When he was caught praying to
the one true God despite the decree of King Darius that people only pray to
him, Daniel was not making a political statement. He was showing his integrity and willingness
to accept the consequences of obeying God rather than obeying man. His miraculous stint in the lion’s den (like
the miraculous walk through the fiery furnace of his cohorts Shadrach, Meshach
and Abednego) was accomplished by God, not by human legislation or judicial
intervention. Moreover, Daniel sought
only to do God’s will, not to fix social ills through political action. He never asked for any political help, although
his obvious close and powerful connection to King Darius might have provided
him with means for doing so.
Keller then argues that Christians should abstain from
identifying Christianity with any political party while urging that Christians
should be engaged in political action. He
is clearly targeting the large segment of conservative, evangelical Christians
who have identified mostly with the Republican party the past 30 plus
years. He argues that if Christians
identify with just one political party it then sounds like one has to be a
Christian and a Republican to be saved (Keller puts a blank in his statement
where I put Republican, but it’s insincere for him to do so, when we know full
well who he is targeting).
This argument is extremely weak. If people are hearing they must be a
Republican to be saved, then either they aren’t hearing the Gospel preached or
they are hearing what they choose to hear.
Often people make claims about Christianity that aren’t true (Christians
hate homosexuals is a current falsehood) not because they understand what
Christianity teaches but because they don’t want what Christianity teaches and
are looking for an out. The hackneyed
“God isn’t a Republican” argument is much more about personal preferences than
it is about what Christianity really teaches.
It’s mostly a cop out for people who don’t want Christ in the first
place, not a real argument against Christianity in the United States.
Keller says Christians are committed to racial justice and
biblical sexual norms then labels the first a “liberal” position and the second
as looking “oppressively conservative.”
Presumably, he’s trying to tie each position to a political viewpoint.
Once again, Keller’s argument fails. As my Dad would have said: crapola. My Dad was as conservative as they come, but
he taught me and my sisters from a very early age that people are people no
matter what they look like. He was
committed to treating everyone fairly and decently, regardless of their
ethnicity. Galatians 3:28 says that
there is “no Jew or Greek” in Christ. I
take this to mean that at the foot of the cross we are leveled in God’s eyes
because we are all sinners in need of a savior – we’re all in the same position
in relation to God – regardless of our skin color or ethnic origin. This is true racial justice. My very conservative Dad would have suggested
his view was the truly conservative position since it places a high value on
the individual as having meaning, value and purpose regardless of
ethnicity. In other words, Keller’s
dichotomy is false. That is, unless
Keller means something else when he speaks of “racial justice” as he equates
this with a “liberal” viewpoint. I
suspect he does mean something different, but I don’t know what he means by
such vague use of the phrase.
Keller claims Christians are then “pushed toward two
options” which he labels withdrawal and “package deal politics.” He defines “package deal politics” as the notion
that one must take all of a political party’s views or none. This simply doesn’t match the reality of
politics in the United States. Neither
the Republican party nor the Democratic party is monolithic. John McCain is now being lionized by
Democrats when just eight short years ago they hated him and called him by any
vicious name possible to avoid his election as president. Many Republicans have made clear their
distaste for the current president who happens to share their brand name. Keller’s shameless use of a false dichotomy
further weakens his already deceptive and poor argumentation.
Finally, Keller gets to his real point: “Jesus forbids us to withhold
help from our neighbors, and this will inevitably require that we participate
in political processes.” Of all things,
he uses the parable of the Good Samaritan to argue this point. Um, Tim, in case you didn’t notice, the Good
Samaritan didn’t do anything political at all.
He used his personal resources
to help someone in need. He didn’t
appeal to the local government for help.
He didn’t rush to the local constable or seek legislation or appeal to
the Roman occupiers. He acted out of
compassion and mercy, as an individual. Keller’s argument here is not merely sloppy
exegesis, it’s deplorably misusing the text to suit his own preconceived idea.
Continuing his assault on biblical truth, Keller urges that
Jesus lost “power and glory” by coming to earth. No, Tim, he didn’t. Jesus showed us that power and glory are not
what we think they are, which isn’t the same as “losing” it.[1] He was still absolutely God while on the
cross: the same triune God I have always
presumed you worshipped, Tim. He told
Pilate that if he wanted to, he could call on an army of angels to save
him. He told his disciples he was laying
down his life of his own choice and would take it back up again. There is absolutely nothing about Jesus
losing power and glory in this story.
More importantly, Jesus never sought use of the political authorities
for any purpose, as if his authority as the God of the universe were somehow
insufficient, undermining the primary thesis of Keller’s article.
Finally, and ironically, by Keller’s way of thinking, the
Amish must not be Christians since they don’t engage politically. The Amish are from the Anabaptist tradition with
which my own denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, shares roots. This tradition goes back right to the beginning
of the Reformation, through the theology of Menno Simons, a Dutch Reformer who
broke with the Catholic Church around 1536 (we get the term Mennonite from
Simons). Simons was a pacifist who urged
significant, if not total, separation from the state. Thus, according to Keller, Simons must have
been sub-Christian in light of his unwillingness to engage in political action. Wrong, again, Tim.
For such a supposedly smart guy, Keller offers weak
argumentation, poor exegesis and no appreciation for church history. Christians don’t need to engage politically
if they don’t want to do so. It’s a
matter of conscience.
Worse, though, this editorial implies the Gospel isn’t
enough. I’m reminded of the scene from
the movie “Cool Runnings” where John Candy tells Derice, the captain of the Jamaican
bobsled team, “if you aren’t enough without a gold medal, you’ll never be
enough with it.”
Tim Keller – if the Gospel isn’t enough without the politics,
it will never be enough with it.
[1] This
gets one perilously close to the kenosis view of Jesus, which falls outside of
orthodoxy, as it claims Jesus gave up some of his divine attributes while on
earth.
