American Politics and Christian Faith: The Confession of Evangelical Conviction (Part Two)

I’m intrigued by “Our Confession of Evangelical Conviction,” a document signed by well-known evangelical leaders that aims to address the current social conflict and political confusion by making seven affirmations:

1. We give our allegiance to Jesus Christ alone.
2. We will lead with love not fear.
3. We submit to the truth of Scripture.
4. We believe the Gospel heals every worldly division.
5. We are committed to the prophetic mission of the Church.
6. We value every person as created in God’s image.
7. We recognize godly leaders by their character.

I’d like to look at each of the statements and evaluate them in light of current polarizing politics in America.

 

TWO: We will lead with love not fear.

We affirm that God’s saving power revealed in Jesus is motived by his love for the world and not anger (John 3:16). Because God has lavished his love upon us, we can love others (1 John 4:19). We acknowledge that this world is full of injustice and pain, but we are not afraid because Jesus Christ has promised to never abandon us (John 16:33). Unlike the false security promised by political idolatry and its messengers, the perfect love of God drives away all fear (1 John 4:18). Therefore, we do not employ fear, anger, or terror as we engage in our mission, but instead we follow the more excellent way of Jesus which is love (1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13).

We reject the stoking of fears and the use of threats as an illegitimate form of godly motivation, and we repudiate the use of violence to achieve political goals as incongruent with the way of Christ.

Here are the Scriptures referred to (in the NIV):

• For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)
• ¹⁸ There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. ¹⁹ We love because he first loved us. (1 John 4:18,19)
• I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world. (John 16:33)
• ^12:31 Now eagerly desire the greater gifts. And yet I will show you the most excellent way. ^13:1If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,^[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing. ⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. ⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. ¹¹ When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. ¹² For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. ¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13)

 

As USAToday reported the day after an attempt was made to assassinate Donald Trump, “Trump spoke with Fox News and decried statements from Democrats calling him “a threat to democracy.” “Their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to save the country, and they are the ones that are destroying the country – both from the inside and out,” Trump said, referring to Harris and Democrats as “the enemy from within” and “the real threat.” We should ask former President Trump, “Will your rhetoric about Harris and the Democrats being the enemy within who will destroy our country cause someone to shoot at them?”

This has definitely been a season of political demagoguery, the “appeal to people that plays on their emotions and prejudices rather than on their rational side.” The use of fear as a vote motivator has been a consistent part of Donald Trump’s modus operandi, his normal method. But as Gideon Rachman of the Financial Times notes, however, “Democrats will appeal to a different set of fears. Their key themes are likely to be abortion and authoritarianism. Harris…will claim that Trump threatens the fundamental freedoms of ordinary Americans.”

Deseret News has reported:

For the last nine years, researchers at Chapman University have surveyed a representative sample of Americans, asking them about 90 fears and related behaviors. “Americans live in a culture of fear,” writes lead researcher Christopher D. Bader, describing “moral panics about immigration and gun control to anxiety about terrorism and natural disasters.” …It perhaps shouldn’t surprise us that the highest fear of all was “corrupt government officials” (60%) in an age of widening political fears and polarization.

Politicians are playing on those fears. Objectively speaking, most of the fear-mongering has come from the right. Christians, however, should be the most immune to these motivations, “because Jesus Christ has promised to never abandon us (John 16:33).” We, as the confession of conviction asserts, should “reject the stoking of fears and the use of threats as an illegitimate form of godly motivation.” Whether it comes from the left or the right, it is not a godly form of motivation.

But what if there is evidence for the fears? Giving a reasoned, evidentiary exposition of the thing to be feared should the other candidate win is not necessarily appealing to the emotions and prejudices, though it can be depending on what you are giving evidence for. But much of the rhetoric used by the candidates lacks evidence. Trump’s “They’re eating the dogs” allegation, proven by seeing someone assert it on television, is hardly sufficient. There may be things to genuinely fear, but the bar for proof must be high. Fear-mongering does not concern itself with solid evidence.