"When Christians Get It Wrong about Politics" Midweek Lenten Sermon by Rev. Jay Dahlvang, Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Mankato, MN

When Christians Get It Wrong about Politics
Rev. Jay Dahlvang, Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Mankato, MN
March 13, 2013
Matthew 22.15-22

As a young pastor, about once a month, I would take the fifty mile round trip to Iron Mountain, Michigan, to a federally subsidized Senior Housing building to bring the Lord’s Supper to a shut-in named Millie Blomquist.  I would pound on the door of her apartment, as she would have her kitchen radio loudly tuned to Rush Limbaugh.  She was about five foot two, and maybe one hundred and five pounds soaking wet, but she was as tough as nails.  Millie told me her story of the drunken, womanizing man she mistakenly married, and how she fled from her little Upper Peninsula village to escape his abuse.  How she landed in Chicago, and rode the bus to work early every day to Bally Manufacturing where she was on the line assembling pinball machines.   An upright piano, took most of the space in her cramped living room, and Millie would bang on the keys, and in a wobbly, screechy soprano, sing the old favorite hymns, some of them in Swedish.  We would end our visits by sharing Christ, this is his body, given for you, Millie.  His blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins.  Do this in remembrance of him, do this and you shall live.   Millie was old enough to be fearless, and the filter that most of us have between what we think and what we say, was not there anymore—it may never have been there.

Among the jaw dropping things that I remember Millie telling me, one day she remarked on another church member in all earnestness, “I have no idea how Donna Cootware can be both such a wonderful Christian woman and a democrat at the same time.” There really is, I think, finally only one sin—and it is as old as Adam and Eve.   And it seems that when we are faithful in obeying this commandment, all the others fall into place.  “You shall have no other Gods,” the Lord said to Moses.  Martin Luther told us this means, we are to fear, love, and trust God above anything else, including, yes, our politics.

All of our sins are rooted in putting, anything, any one above God.  This is demonstrated in our gospel reading.  In one of those there really are no right answers to questions like, “Have you quit drinking and driving?” those seeking to trap Jesus pose a political question to him.  Is it right for us to pay the tax to Caesar or not?  The Israelites were not thrilled to pay a tax required by an occupying Roman regime.  So does Jesus tick off his own people by saying yes we need to pay the tax to these pagan oppressors?  Or does Jesus allow his agenda, God’s agenda, to be hijacked both those who would paint him as an insurrectionist, a rebel by saying no?
     
As much pain, decline, and divisiveness our Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has endured over its twenty-five year existence, it is still a church of red pews, and blue pews, and purple pews.   It is still a place of welcome for Democrats, Republicans, and Independents.  I get nervous when we start talking politically in our church.  And it is not because I think we should be apolitical,  wishy-washy, or that our faith should be politically inconsequential.  No, the reason is the answer that Jesus offers the Pharisees.  Give to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar, and to God that which belongs to God.     What belongs to God?  Well, everything belongs to God.  Everything—including our politics.

The great British apologist CS Lewis observed that almost all crimes of Christian history have come about when Christianity is confused with politics.  Lewis states that the problem with Christians changing the world with politics is that we set our sights too low.  When we aim for the earth, we get earth, Lewis said.   When we aim for heaven, earth is thrown in.   So rather than staking our political claims, and then using our religion to prop it up, what might we be as a church, what might we be as individuals, if we start with our faith, and apply it not only to our politics, but to every aspect of our lives?  What happens as we hear Jesus’ word, and really do give to God that which belongs to God?  

Like Martin Luther King did who showed us that when people are denied their humanity on the basis of their skin color, we not only are judging them, we are judging the God who made them.  Like Dietrich Bonhoeffer did, when he showed us that the faithful response to a bully whether he picking on the vulnerable on a school bus or sending tank brigades into Poland is courage and faith, even if it leads to a martyr’s death.  Like Abraham Lincoln did, as his cabinet member warned of the threat the defeated south would pose to the war weakened union, by saying, “Mr. President, now is not the time for mercy, we must destroy our enemy!” To which Lincoln replied, “Do I not destroy my enemy when I make him my friend?”  

I loved Millie Blomquist, but I disagreed with her about Donna Cootware.  The great gift of our church has been meeting Democrats and Republicans and Independents, guided and empowered by the Holy Spirit to give to God what belongs to God.  There are two claims the Apostle Paul teaches us, tells us, that could be the guiding statements for your church and mine as we live together in our differences, as we do mission and ministry together in the name of Christ Jesus our Lord. To the Romans he writes, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”  To the Galatians he says that in Christ, there is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male nor female.  In Christ there is no longer Liberal or Conservative.  In Christ there is no condemnation for Democrats or Republicans.

As we grow older, and our number of days lessens, much of what we value, our health, our freedom, our family and friends are taken away.  But it is also true, that as we prepare ourselves for the life to come, oftentimes those things we are not so pleased to possess, those things that possess us, our prejudice, selfishness, and contempt our taken away as well.  Job said “Naked I came into the world, and naked I depart.  The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away.  Blessed be the name of the Lord.”  Martin Luther wrote, “In my sin, in my death, I must take leave of all created things.  No sun, moon, stars; all creatures, physicians, emperors, kings, wise men and potentates cannot help me.  When I die, I shall see nothing but black darkness, and yet that light.  The Savior will help me, when all have forsaken me.”      

As Millie Bloomquist aged, she began to forget.  Her family made the difficult decision of moving her to a nursing home, to a memory care unit.  There when I would go and see her, her radio was silent.  We didn’t talk politics, I’m pretty sure she didn’t even know the name of the President of the United States.  But we would have communion, this great, simple meal that Jesus gives us, this is his body, Millie, for you.  His blood—your sins are forgiven, do this in remembrance of him.  And it was hard to visit with her, have a conversation with this once tough and opinionated lady, because she didn’t know what to say, and I didn’t know what to say, but I would ask her if she would want to sing with me. And in that failing, broken voice, she would sing, “Children of the heavenly Father, safely in his bosom gather, nestling bird or star in heaven, such a refuge ne’er was given.”