trees

When the psalmist writes in Psalm 146, “Do not put your trust in princes, in mortal men, who cannot save.” is he saying that we are to take no interest in politics and government?  That we should trust God to mystically and magically work it all out?     

Paul, in his letter to the Roman church, wrote, “Let every person be in subjection to the governing authorities.  For there is no authority except from God and those that exist are established by God.” This scripture is sometimes used by Christians to justify supporting all governing leaders (more often the ones that agree with their political viewpoint).  But in Rome, Christians bore no responsibility for who was in power. Most of the time the Christians of that empire had little recourse except to submit. That’s why their later willingness to be executed for not bowing down to Nero and other diabolical emperors was a daring act of civil disobedience.     

It occurs to me that when Jesus said that we are to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, he was not saying that we should say God is in control and that we bear no responsibility for whatever comes to us from our governing authorities.  Jesus was saying that we should rely on God OVER party allegiances to guide our actions and outcomes.  We should work hard to bring about the kind of just government that looks like this:  “Blessed is the one who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry, sets prisoners free, lifts up those who are bowed down, watches over the sojourners, upholds the widow and fatherless.”    

I wrote a while ago that one of the voices I trust is Rev. Timothy Keller. In his teachings on the wisdom of God from Proverbs he writes:

     “If a group of people in a city truly live righteously…they will be of such benefit to the
     public good of the whole city that the entire city will exult…their relationships would
     be marked by justice…in civic life they would be the MOST generous with their assets,
     the MOST concerned that the poor and immigrants be lifted out of poverty… IN
     POLITICS THEY WOULD NEVER BE VICIOUS… they would be known as peacemakers,
     doing EVERYTHING they could to broker relationships and maintain peace among
     various communities and groups within the city.” (emphasis mine)

Rev. Keller doesn’t side with either the conservative or the liberal, with either moralism or relativism, but implicit in his comment is some political engagement by people of faith.  He writes, “Our understanding of the Christian faith does not allow us to disengage.” 

Tim Keller has taught me to believe that all human beings are fools if they put their trust in political solutions ALONE for the broken systems of modern society.   Brokenness needs to be healed in our hearts.  But in our democracy, we are given a vote and a voice.  We are called to a kind of activism that BLESSES our communities and nation.

So how do we start to engage?  Psalm 1 says, “Blessed is the man… who is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.”  We sink our roots deeply into the grace and mercy of God.  We listen to voices that challenge where we’ve placed our trust, that do more than confirm what we are already too sure of, that cause real soul-searching.  We humble ourselves to put our feet into the mud by the flowing stream of God’s love. We think of the trees.  Might God be inviting us to plant ourselves by the stream of living water, like a tree, and to BE living water for our communities, our country, our world?

Love,

Liz

“For Christians true freedom is to be exercised for the flourishing of one another.”
                                                                                                Rev. Marc Choi