There are many Christians today who believe that America is God's chosen nation and therefore must be defended as such. They also tend to identify with an idea of "rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism." This is not just right or left wing thinking. Christians like to interpret the scriptures for themselves and too often refrain from critical thinking. They want to decide for themselves which parts of the Bible to emphasize or ignore, not realizing that their reasoning is deeply formed by their historical and cultural circumstances. Gender also plays an important role in interpreting the scriptures, since for many Christians God most definitely is male and only men are the protectors of the faith.
Pastors today too often find themselves on the front lines of these conflicts. Many have resigned their positions, and some have even left the ministry. There is too much warring going on in their churches, and unless they are willing to be submissive to the strongest element in their churches, they are branded as liberals and leaning too far left. Pastors caught in these conflicts often find that they are not receiving any loving and supportive communications from their churches; instead, they often find small groups meeting secretively to form opposition and to find a way to remove him or her from the pastoral office.
Bob Fryling, a former publisher of InterVarsity Press, declares, "The key issues in these conflicts are not doctrinal, but political. They include the passions stirred up by the Trump presidency, the legitimacy of the 2020 election and the January 6th insurrection; the murder of George Floyd, the Black Lives Matter movement, and critical race theory; and matters related to the pandemic, such as masking, vaccinations, and restrictions on in-person worship." People lose friends over these issues, and churches too often split, not because of doctrine, but because of what their members believe politically and about various other issues.
As Mark Labberton, president of Fuller Theological Seminary, has said, "Too many Christians have 'domesticated' Jesus by their resistance to his call to radically rethink our attitude toward power, ourselves, and others. We live in an era of acute anxiety and great fear. As a result, too often Christians end up wrapping Jesus into their angry and fearful distortions. We want Jesus to validate everything we believe, often as if he never walked the face of this earth. What we are witnessing can be explained 'more by sociology than Christianity.'"
Peter Wehner concludes his article by pointing out that many Christians today see the world divided between us and them, the children of light and the children of darkness. They forget the Sermon on the Mount, the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus' barrier-breaking encounters with prostitutes and Roman collaborators, with the lowly and despised, with the unclean and those on the wrong side of the 'holiness code,' and with the wounded souls whom he healed on the Sabbath. Instead, they tend to rephrase the Beatitudes to say, "Blessed are the politically powerful, for theirs in the kingdom of God. Blessed are the culture warriors, for they will be called children of God."
I fully realize that much of the information I have put together for these articles is controversial, but it is impossible to ignore the concern and insights of these proven pastors, theologians and religious leaders -- almost all who have a conservative track record. Of course, there are countless acts of kindness, generosity and self-giving love being performed by Christians every day in our churches that must not be forgotten. It is important to lift up those people and encourage them. But we have a problem of diversity in our country today, and its roots have gone deeply into our religious lives as well as our community living.
The biblical instructions regarding sharing the Lord's Supper tell us to "let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup" (I Corinthians 11:28), and I suggest that this is a good challenge for all of us as we explore our church life. Do we see Jesus in our church? Are our church's teachings grounded in biblical teaching or controlled by our culture and political diversity? Are we able to see a positive attitude toward reaching people for Jesus and a better life in our churches? Is the focus of our worship upon God or something else like music, drama or performance? Be assured, the way you see your church is also the way the world sees your church. Forget the labels and find your roots in God and His son, Jesus, who came to earth to both redeem us and show us a better life.
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Robert Box has been a law enforcement chaplain for 29 years. He is a master-level chaplain with the International Conference of Police Chaplains and is an endorsed chaplain with the American Baptist Churches USA. He also currently serves as a deputy sheriff chaplain for the Benton County Sheriff's Office. Opinions expressed in the article are the opinions of the author and not the agencies he serves.