Andy Stanley - Talking Points Part 2:- How Christians Should Approach Politics

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
So today we are in part two of this series
called Talking Points. The subtitle is and I came up
with the subtitle, you know, so blame me the perfect
blend of politics and religion, as if there could be
a perfect blend, right. This is a series designed to
make all of us uncomfortable and hopefully at the end,
to make all of us better, because, after all, the
church should be the safest place in the world to

(00:21):
talk about anything, right, And so the church should be
the safest place in the world for us to talk
about politics, although in our churches we rarely talk about politics.
Besides that, you're going to be talking about politics all
year long anyway, So we thought we should jump into
the fray. Now, if you're a Christian, here's the tension,
and this is where we left off last time we
were together. And if you're not a Christian, you get
to sit on the outside and judge us to see

(00:43):
whether or not we do this very well. In fact,
my hunch is this, if we had done better what
we're going to talk about today, you may be more
interested in the Christian faith, or you may have never
abandoned the Christian faith to begin with. So listen carefully
the tension For those of us who are Jesus followers
is this Are we willing or are we even able?
I think that might be the better question. Are we
willing to put our faith filter ahead of our political filter?

(01:06):
Are we willing to be christ Followers first? And Republicans
and Democrats and libertarians and whatever else you might be? Second?
Are we willing to follow Jesus? This is the tough one.
Are we willing to follow Jesus? When following Jesus creates
space between us and our political party, space between us
and our political platform spae or the platform of our

(01:27):
political party, and space between us and our political candidate. Now,
to be clear, I'm not suggesting that you not be political.
I'm not suggesting that you not wade into politics, talk
about politics, or run for office. I think we should
all lean into what's happening in our nation, and for
those of you who feel called to enter the fray,
you should step right in. But what I am suggesting
is that we take what Jesus said that we looked

(01:48):
at last week seriously, that we not allow the political
climate to divide the church, any local church, or the
church in general. Because Jesus if you'll remember the one
thing Jesus prayed for than anything else he prayed for,
In fact, it was the thing he prayed for before
he was crucified, was that his body, his movement, his
ecclesia would not be divided, that we would be one,

(02:10):
that we would figure out a way which we are
to disagree politically because we always will, but at the
same time love unconditionally and begin to pray for unity. Now,
the interesting thing is this, in the first century, there
was something they had in common with what happens in
our culture as well. In the first century, when you
read the Gospels, it's so fascinating. Everybody wanted Jesus to

(02:31):
be on their side. In fact, they would, they would
question him, and they would sort of, you know, sort
of try to pigeonhole him and get him to a
corner to where he would agree with whatever it was.
Their viewpoint was everybody wanted a piece of Jesus. They
wanted him to choose their side. And that's true today
both parties are convinced Jesus would be on their side
if he were to come back to Earth. Today, Republicans
are absolutely convinced Jesus would be a Republican because of

(02:53):
their values. Democrats would say absolutely, Jesus would be a
Democrat because of his care is concerned for people, and
so everybody wants a piece of Jesus. And the interesting
thing is this, if I were given the assignment, Andy,
could you come up with a sermon that would demonstrate that,
in fact, the Republican party and the Republican platform is
in sync with the teaching of Jesus. I could do that.
And if somebody else are to come along and say, Andy,

(03:14):
would you create a sermon that shows that the Democrat
platform and their values is in sync with the teaching
of Jesus, I could do that too. Because when you
interpret the words of Jesus, when you interpret the words
of Jesus through the filter of you, through your political filter,
it's amazing. He's so red, he's so blue. It's amazing

(03:35):
how often he agrees with you. So if you start
with that filter, I mean, there's plenty. And the truth
is both sides quote the Bible and both sides quote Jesus.
The really funny thing is both sides actually use the
same verses. So the question is this, can we put
our Jesus following filter our faith filter ahead of our

(03:55):
political filter. And it's very, very difficult to do as
we're going to today, but I'm going to try to
show you the way forward. Now Tony Evans. Tony Evans
is a famous pastor. When I was in graduate school,
he was one of my professors. And I'll never forget this.
This was during a lecture. And sometimes when you go
to graduate school and you you know, study theology, and
a lot of the professors also preach. And Tony Evans

(04:17):
was at heart a preacher. So this half one afternoon,
in this lecture hall full of students, he was teaching,
and then he kind of got into preaching. He was
in black preacher mode, and it was amazing and we
were like clapping and cheering and that, you know. He
just kept going and he said something. This is almost
forty years ago, and I remember this. He said, Jesus
did not come to take sides. He came to take over.

(04:39):
But he said it a lot better than I just did. Okay,
it was so powerful. I never forgot that. And he's
absolutely right. Jesus came. Jesus came to introduce the Kingdom
of God to earth. The Kingdom of God values the
upside down kingdom where those with the wealth and the
power leverage their wealth and power and resources for those
that have less power, less or less resource. That the

(05:02):
Kingdom of God, where the King laid down his life
for his subjects, rather than demanding his subjects lay down
their lives for him. The Kingdom of God that was
so broad and inclusive that he said in everybody is
invited to participate in it. But the Kingdom of God
will always perhaps I think this is the case, but

(05:23):
this is just my opinion. The Kingdom of God will
always in some detail and at some level conflict with
the kingdoms of men. And the Kingdom of God will always,
at some level, in some detail conflict with your political
party and the platform of your political party and our
political candidates. There's always going to be attention. And this
is why it is absolutely foolish. It is so foolish

(05:45):
for the Church to ever be divided over a candidate
or over a political party, because at the end of
the day, no political party is probably going to line
up with the Kingdom values of Jesus, although each party
has a little bit of it, even though that's just
for some of us to acknowledge, But again, it's foolish
for us to be divided because we're supposed to be
kingdom people first and political people second. But that's very,

(06:10):
very difficult to do. So here's what I'm gonna do today.
I'm going to give you a template, a very simple
template to help us understand where agreement ends and diverse
opinions begin. To understand where agreement. Because we're supposed to
be one, we're not allowed that. We shouldn't allow any
political party or candidate to divide the you know, the
Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. So I'm going to
try to give you a little template to help us

(06:31):
all understand where does agreement in and diverse opinions, especially
diverse political opinions begin. So to start with the Apostle Paul,
who you know, we talk about all the time. The
Apostle Paul steps under the pages of history, as you know,
with somebody who hates Christians. He was a Pharisee, he
was brilliant, super educated, becomes a Jesus follower, and he

(06:53):
had the distinction of being a Roman citizen. So he
had all of this background, all of this stuff going
on in usse Paul and two of his letters, gives
us a phrase that I think gives us a great
starting point for putting together this template. And he uses
a phrase that perhaps you've never seen before because he
only uses it twice, and the letters that survived antiquity,

(07:13):
and the phrase is this he refers to the law
of Christ. The law of Christ. Now, the law of
Christ as we're going to discover. Was his shorthand for
Jesus' new covenant command that we talk about all the time.
When Jesus gathered with his disciples for the Final Passover,
he said, guys, I'm giving you new command. This command
is going to be a substitute for all the other
commands you had six hundred and thirteen, you had Torah,

(07:35):
but I'm giving you a new command because we're establishing
a new covenant. And as you probably know, the new
command was simple. It was, you are to love one
another with a caveat, as I have loved you. This
isn't just a love fest. You are to love one another.
This isn't one way. This is two ways. You're to
love one another as I have loved you. And then
he said this, by this, by this unique brand of love,

(07:57):
by this unique brand of new covenant love. Everyone will
know you're my disciple. If you love one another. It's
a two way thing. It's a community thing. It's a
family thing. It's an all skate, it's an everybody in
there loving one another, but not just loving one another.
Any way you want to love one another, you are
to take Jesus would say, you are to take your
cues from me. So the apostle Paul takes that idea

(08:20):
and he pushes it through all of his letters as
the uniting ethic for all Jesus' followers. And this phrase,
the law of Christ, is the phrase he uses to
take his readers back to that night and back to
that big idea, the kingdom ethic, the marching orders for
anyone who's a follower of Jesus. Here's a couple of examples.

(08:40):
He writes this in his letter to Christians living in Corinth.
He says, though I am free and belong to no one,
I have made myself a slave. Strong language, especially in
a day and age when there were slaves everywhere. You
couldn't go anywhere without seeing a slave. I have made
myself a slave to everyone, to everyone. Why Paul law
to win as many as possible pauses. Look, I'm on

(09:02):
a mission. I don't have much time left, and I
did a lot of damage to the church, so I'm
trying to make up for lost time, and I'm willing
to do anything short of sin to convince gentiles that
God has done something on their behalf in the world.
He continues to those not having the law, talking about
the law of Moses the Torah. For those not having
the law, that's gentiles. I became like one of those

(09:25):
not having the law. In other words, I became a
gentile in order to reach gentiles, even though I'm Jewish.
This is the extreme to which he's willing to go,
but then he qualifies it. He says, though I am
not free from the law of God, to which a
Jewish reader would say, Wait a minute. You just said
you're not under the law. You're not going to act
like somebody under the law, but you're not out from
underneath the law of God. What are you talking about.

(09:47):
So you've pulled out from underneath Torah, but somehow you're
still under the law of God. Paul saying, yeah, I'm
still under God's authority. I'm just not under Torah. And
then he tells us what law he is under? And
here our phrase, he says, but I am under the
law of Christ. There it is so, I'm no longer
under the law of Moses, but I'm still under God's authority,

(10:10):
because I'm under the law of Christ. And what is
the law of Christ. You are to love one another
as I have loved you. In his letter to Christians
living in the Roman province of Galatia, he says this.
This is a little bit more descriptive. He says, carry
each other's burdens. When you see somebody who's burdened financially,
somebody's burdened with kids, somebody's burdened with work, somebody's burdened

(10:30):
with a physical ailment that has gotten tripped up in life.
You are to carry one another's. And again, this isn't
each other thing, This isn't everybody's in This is the
body of Christ functioning like the body. Carry each other's burdens.
And if you do look at this, if you'll do that,
you are fulfilling. And here it is again the law
of Christ. And what is the law of Christ. You

(10:50):
are to love as I have loved you. You are
to love one another as I have loved you. So
if you have a concern for someone or I should
say this way, when the can concerns of others concern you,
When the concerns of others concern you and you act
on it, you are fulfilling the law of Christ. You
are doing what Jesus told the disciples to do. And again,

(11:10):
the New Testament marching orders for those of us who
are Jesus followers. So here's the thing. As Jesus followers,
all of all persuasions, regardless of your political persuasion. If
you're a Jesus followers, the law of Christ, that is
your marching orders, and the law of Christ should inform
over time as we grow as Christians our conscience. That

(11:33):
our conscience should become hardwired into the law of Christ,
so that when we do something that is in contrary
so loving as Christ loved us, it should bother us.
It should ding our conscience. But not just our conscience personally,
it should ding our collective conscience. That we should all
be as a group, as a body, we should all

(11:54):
be disturbed, irritated, or convicted by some of the same things.
We should all be disturbed, irritated, and convicted when we
see injustice, to disturbed, irritated, or convicted when we accidentally
disrespect someone or accidentally don't give them what they deserve,
or we see somebody in culture being disrespected. When we

(12:14):
see people undermining their own future, undermining their health, undermining
their relationship with their kids, undermining the integrity of their family,
or the integrity of society, we should be moved by that.
We should be moved to action. It should bother us.
It should ding our conscience. Whenever we see somebody expressing
autonomy that undermines their family, autonomy that undermines the health

(12:35):
of a community, that should bother us. Anytime we are
somebody within the balands of Christianity, whenever we see them
violating this law of Christ, it should bother us. Collectively,
our conscience should kind of go off. And when we
see that outside the church, it should bother us as well,
and then we have to be measured in our response.
But our collective conscience the thing that just kind of

(12:57):
sets us back, that moves us to apology, moves us
to action. That it's all tied to this idea that
you are to love other people, respect other people, recognize
the dignity of other people. The way Christ said that
I did for you, that I left heaven for you,
that I am not afraid of guilt by association. If
Jesus had been concerned about guilt by association, he would

(13:20):
have stayed in heaven. Right. So look, he's saying, I
want you to take your cue about how you treat
other people and how you treat each other from me,
because according to Jesus, if you want to set policy,
what's good for people, that's what's good. What's best for people,
that's what's best. So the law of Christ should inform

(13:41):
our collective conscience. Let me give you a couple of
quick examples, because as simple as that is, this is
a powerful, powerful, powerful dynamic. In fact, this dynamic shaped
Western culture. You hear me say that all the time,
but it's absolutely true. For example, once upon a time,
all over the world, everyone in the world, every village,
every town, every kingdom, it was self evident, which means

(14:05):
it was obvious. It was unquestioned. It was like duh,
it was like why are we even talking about this?
I mean, it was just so obvious. Once upon a time,
it was self evident that some people should be owned
by and controlled by other people that the whole idea
of slavery, that people owning people was so self evident

(14:25):
it was not a moral issue. It was not even
a question. It was just the way of things. It
was just the way of things. In fact, fourth century BC.
Aristotle a philosopher, a Greek philosopher, and a Greek philosopher
was their responsibility was to make everything make sense in
the world. We're gonna make science make sense with the
way that people act, the way that people behave. We're

(14:46):
gonna try to make it all work together. So there's
one holistic understanding of how the world works. And so Aristotle,
here's what he wrote. He said, for that some should
rule and others be ruled is a thing not not
only necessary, it's expedient. He's talking about slavery. It's not
only as slavery necessary, it's expedient. I mean, there's just

(15:09):
no way that the world would work without some people
ruling over and controlling and dominating and owning other people.
From the hour of their birth, some are marked out
for subjection and others for rule. I mean, I mean,
the idea of doing away with slavery, it's like, that's
not even a question. That's like saying the sun's not
going to come up. I mean, it was just obvious.

(15:31):
But fourth century AD, after Christianity had taken hold and
begun to take hold of the Roman Empire, Saint Augustine,
a fourth century Christian bishop, said, no, slavery is the
result of sin. And suddenly a brand new idea is
born from this brilliant mind. In a world where there's

(15:52):
still slavery was just a permanent part of the landscape everywhere.
Suddenly it begins to dawn on Christians as early, in fact,
earlier than that. But you know, this is Augustine, you know,
he's famous guy, Sant Augustine. He said, no, slavery isn't expedient,
Slavery isn't a part of nature. Slavery is the result
of sin. And as early as the fourth century eighty

(16:12):
Christians began having misgivings and began to see the discrepancy
between what the scriptures say about people being made in
the image of God and loving as Christ loved us,
and the you know, the horror of slavery. One more example.
Once up in a time it was self evident, it
was obvious. It was like nobody questioned it that in fanticide,

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or in the Roman world they call it exposure, that
it's in fantaside, was good for society. In other words,
it was the right thing to do. In fact, there
were certain community laws and social laws in certain parts
of the Roman Empire where you were required to allow
your baby to die. And in some cases it was
because a girl. It was a girl, you didn't have
a boy yet, or you just didn't want a girl.

(16:53):
You could just you could expose your child. And the
way it would work. You just take your baby and
you place your baby outside the walls of your village,
place your baby on the edge of a forest. You
place your baby down by the river. Then you go home.
And legally you were not culpable for allowing your child
to die or killing your child, because the fates would
decide the fate of your child, so you were innocent.

(17:13):
And this was just the way it was. If a
man suspected that his wife was pregnant by another man
when she had the baby, you took the baby and
you exposed the baby. If the baby had a birth defect,
you exposed the baby. If you didn't want another little girl,
you exposed the baby. There were really no rules other
than you couldn't take the baby's life yourself. This was
just this was just the way of things. This was

(17:34):
self evident. But Christians from the very beginning disagreed. And
Christians from the very beginning condemned exposure, and condemned and fantaside.
And they would eventually go out into the edges of
the forest where children were often left, and down by
the river, and they would bring these children into their
own small homes with a little bit of food they have,

(17:56):
and begin to raise these children themselves. Why the Old
neither the Old Testament nor the New Testament rewarded it
or encouraged it. Right, scripture didn't require it, So why
did they do it. There was no verse that says,
here's what you're supposed to do. It's because love required it.
As they began to understand what it meant to be

(18:17):
made in the image of God, where they begin to
understand the law of Christ, we are to love others
as we have been loved. And to think about it,
we were like little babies that were adopted into the
Kingdom of God. We had no clue what was going on.
While we were still sinners. Christ gave his life for us,
and suddenly there was a tension around Well again, it
was just an expected tradition or expected practice all over

(18:37):
the Roman Empire. Then they began to rescue these babies,
and as Christianity began to take a hold and began
to make inroads into the Roman Empire, and as the
Empire's conscience began to be affected by the teaching of Christianity.
In the year three eighteen, after embracing Christianity, Emperor Constantine
declares infanticide a crime. Why the change, because suddenly it

(19:02):
became a conscious issue. Why did it become a conscious
issue because of the teaching of Jesus and the unity
of the church around the teaching of Jesus. In the
year three seventy four, Emperor Valentinian made exposure. Just setting
your baby somewhere to die a capital offense. You could
lose your life if your baby lost its life because
of your neglect. This was amazing. But when the law

(19:25):
of Christ, when the law of Christ informs an individual
or a village or a city, or a nation's conscience,
things change. And there has been so much changed even
in our nation because of this very same dynamic, because
it's so brilliant. Jesus single New Covenant command was so powerful,

(19:46):
it was so ahead of its time, It was so
modeled and baked into the Crucifixion and the Resurrection that
it is trans cultural and it is transgenerational. It sits
at the epicenter of the Kingdom of God. Values will
never go out of day. It doesn't have a shelf life.
We are forever and ever every generation to do for
others what God through Christ has done for us. And

(20:09):
that kind of ethic and that kind of morality is
to inform our conscience, and as we have influence in
the world, to inform the conscience of people who aren't
even in the church and could care less about the church.
This is why, this is why the church is so important,
because part of our responsibility is to be salt in light,
and being salt in light is we are to be

(20:30):
the conscience of the nation and shape the conscience of
the nation. It's also why we cannot be divided. We
dare not be divided, especially over political issues, especially over
candidates that come and they go, political parties and platforms
that come and they go, and they change, and so
it is incumbent upon us to figure out how to

(20:52):
be one as Jesus prayed we would be one in
spite of our political differences. And that leads us to
the third part of our template, and that's this, The
law of Christ informs our conscience, and to an informed conscience,
we are to incorporate knowledge and wisdom. And let me
explain why this is important. One of the great advantages
of the human race is we are able to collect

(21:15):
information and pass it to the next generation. Okay, I've
had several dogs. They're all equally dogs. None of them
came in going Okay, I got this because my mama
taught me and her mama taught her. Okay, they just
can't do it. They're just they just they're dogs, right.
Animal kingdom, which is wonderful, but humanity, because of writing,
writing allowed one generation to gift the next generation with

(21:36):
everything they've learned, which gifted the next generation with everything
they've learned. So consequently, every generation is smarter than the
generation before. And with knowledge comes extra wisdom and extra insight.
And so as people of the twenty first century, as
we think about what does it look like to live
out this kingdom ethic, we should add to our informed conscience,

(21:56):
the knowledge of science, the knowledge of psychology, and the
wisdom that comes with understanding how our world works and
understanding how we're made. So all of this works together.
Another way of thinking about it is this. If somebody
ask you where do babies come from? Your answer to
that question is determined by the age of the person asking. Right,

(22:17):
when a four year old ask, you don't lie to them,
but you give them an answer. You accommodate to their capacity.
When a fifteen year old ask, you would say you
should know by now. Okay, So if a twelve year old,
in other words, every age, if a twenty five year
old is asking this, you know this question in a
graduate and graduate school context, in other words, we don't lie,
but we always accommodate to the capacity of the person asking.

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This is so fascinating, your heavenly father, God accommodates to
the capacity of his people. So when we look at Genesis,
we see God accommodating to the capacity of an ancient ancient,
ancient pre science, you know, pre tile and all never
took a warm shower group of people. Right. When Jesus

(23:00):
manifests himself, he says, the kingdom has come and I
have come as the king son, I've come to dwell
with you. He explains God, but he explains God in
a way that the Old Testament it doesn't quite explain God. Well.
People's capacity has changed, things have changed, and in every
generation our knowledge increases, our insight increases, and God's ability
to help us understand how he made the world and

(23:21):
how the world works increases. And as Christians, and this
is kind of a tension point. As Christians, we should
be on the forefront. We should never resist science, we
should never resist discovery. We should be the most curious
people because our faith is tethered not to an interpretation
of a text. Our faith is tethered to an event

(23:42):
and history, the resurrection of Jesus. So we don't need
to fear new and we don't need to fear science.
And every once in a while a generation comes along
that kind of gets in a running gun battle or
spitting match with science, and it's so foolish. So we
should incorporate into our informed conscience is the knowledge and
the wisdom that comes with this age that's been handed

(24:04):
to us by the people that came before. So the
knowledge and wisdom combined with an informed conscience. That is
what we should use, and that's what we should leverage
to determine which policies and platform and legislation we support.
So let me go through it one more time. The
law of Christ, if you're a Jesus follower non negotiable,
an informed conscience. Over time, as you learn more and

(24:26):
more and follow Jesus longer, your conscience is going to
be shaped according to the law of Christ, knowledge and wisdom.
This is a bit intuitive, okay. This is why when
your children get sick, you don't call me. You call
the doctor. Once upon a time, when the children got sick,
they called the priest. But now you don't call the
priest anymore. You call the doctor. Not because you don't
believe in the healing power of God, but because we

(24:47):
have accumulated knowledge and wisdom in terms of how the
human body works. And as Christians, we don't see any
conflict between those two things. And I'll pray for your child,
but you don't even call for prayer, right for the
most part, because you go to the doctor, understands how
the body works, and off you go. So we naturally
and intuitively incorporate knowledge and wisdom into our thinking but
here's the rub. All that is kind of yeah, I

(25:11):
didn't you know, Andy, I knew that I didn't think
of it in those terms, But no new information yet.
Here's the rub when it comes to this, When it
comes to this, there will always be disagreement among Christians.
When it comes to this, there will always be disagreement
among Christians. And the reason we will always disagree here

(25:31):
and this is where we have work to do. And
this is where I hope that you'll be willing to
move and that you'll be willing to be a little
bit open minded. The reason that we will always have
work to do here is this, because where you stand
depends upon where you sit. Where you stand, where you

(25:51):
take a stand depends upon where you sit. This is
you may have heard this before. This is called Miles law.
It was named for Rufus Miles, who is a part
of the Eisenhower, Kennedy and the Johnson administration. And this
was his statement, and to kind of tease it out,
here's here's what it means that our cultural context, that's
where we sit, where you live, who you're related to,

(26:14):
how much money you have, what you know, your cultural context,
where you sit determines your perspective in life. It determines
what you see, what you experience, how you see it,
and how you interpret it. And this is true for
all of us. This is why if I could kind of,
you know, push on you a little bit. This is
why most of you don't see any conflict between your

(26:36):
faith and your politics, none at all. You are loving
this series because you have some friends who need to
hear it, right, But you're good. It's like, yeah, amen,
if this was an amen, church, Amen. Any people need
to put their faith first and their politics second. And
that's why I'm a Republican because when I put my
faith first, clearly the Republicans are right, Amen, into your right,

(26:56):
I'm with you, one hundred percent with you. I got
my faith first. That's that's why I'm a Democrat. Right maybe,
but probably not because your political views, you know this,
they weren't shaped in a vacuum. And pausing to recognize

(27:18):
this and pausing long enough to incorporate this into your
thinking is what it means to be mature. And oh
my goodness, do we need a little bit more maturity
in the political discussion in our nation right now? Right? Okay?
So yeah, I go. That was a golf club. I know, amen,
don't get me going right. In fact, pausing to recognize

(27:41):
this is the way forward. Pausing to recognize this is
how the extremes, if they're mature, are willing to move
toward the middle. Now understand, I'm not suggesting that we
all get in the middle and we have a kumbai
Ya moment and we all become some new party. We
all agree on anything. Let me say it again, that
fourth line that I had up here a minute ago.
There's always going to be disagreement when it comes to policy,

(28:01):
platform and legislation. And that's okay. As long as we
are mature enough not to allow it to divide us.
And if we're mature enough not to allow it to
divide us, we will be better for the conversation. It's
a step toward political unity, and it's a step toward
unity in spite of I should say political diversity. So
political views and values. You know this, Political views and values,

(28:22):
like all of your views and values, are shaped by
a variety of things, most of which we had or
have no control over. And if we can acknowledge this
and take a deep breath, we all learn something and
we don't change what we believe, but we gain understanding
in terms of why other people act the way they

(28:42):
do and believe the way they do, and we won't
experience division. Here the thing, here's some of the things
that impact the way you think and believe politically. Right
where we live, how we were raised, where we were educated,
if we were educated, what we've been told, what we've seen,
what we've experience, and what we've seen others experience. These

(29:04):
are the factors. And these are just a few. These
are the dynamics that shape our political viewpoint. Perhaps the
best evidence of this is if you think about your
parents' political viewpoints. If I were to say to you,
why do you think your dad was Republican? Why do
you think your mom was just absolutely committed to be
a different why? You would have an answer, and you
would relate it not so much necessarily to their theology,

(29:25):
but to the world they grew up in. And the
same is true for you, and the same is true
for me. And that doesn't mean that we have dismissed
the significance of our faith, not at all. It's that
when these two things come together, we have a tendency
to use one to prop up the other. We all do,
but what if? What if? Especially over these next few months,

(29:47):
we were able to step back and begin to view
it just a little bit differently, not change what you
believe or who you vote for, but to just see
it a little bit differently again, because where you stand
depends on where you sit, and recognizing this allows us
to open our hands and open our minds and open

(30:10):
our hearts without changing our political viewpoint. But beware, when
you start down this road, you may change some of
what you think and even some of what you believe.
But that's not the goal. That's just an unintended consequence
or an unintended outcome. So, putting it all together, here's
what looks like law of Christ and form, conscience, knowledge

(30:32):
and wisdom, policy, platform and legislation. Now that's not dynamic,
that's just kind of an is. So I want to
spend the next four and a half minutes making a
suggestion in terms of what we do with this and
what we do about this. And this isn't complicated, and
this isn't new, and this isn't anything you haven't heard before.
But sometimes you just got to say what everybody knows,

(30:54):
so everybody remembers to do it three things so simple.
Begin to listen. Listen, and specifically listen to people who
don't experience the world the way you do. Listen to
people who don't experience the world the way you do,
not just the haves and the have nots, the Christians

(31:15):
and the not Christians, young and old, black and white,
gay and straight, married and single, new citizens, old citizens,
people who've been in the military, people who despise the military.
Begin to listen to people who have experienced the world
differently than the way you have. And number two, once

(31:36):
you start listening, learn something. Okay, don't just well, I listen,
but I'm not gonna think. No, learn listen. Come on,
we're Christians again. Our faith is tethered to an event.
We don't need to be afraid of new information. We
don't need to be afraid of new knowledge. We don't
need to be afraid of new opinions. Be curious. I
stole this from Sam Harris, my favorite atheist. Pay attention

(31:56):
to the frontiers of your ignorance. I love that. Pay
attention to tell myself that all the time. Andy, don't
turn away, don't refuse to read that book, don't turn
that off just because it disagrees with your worldview, pay
attention to the frontiers of your ignorance. Be a student,
not just a critic. You're you're an amazing critic, without
one single lesson amazing, You're just an amazing critic. Right,

(32:17):
I mean, some of you mute the television so you
can do your own commentary. To your family, they love that.
It's like, dad, thank you. If we know what you think.
Could you turn the volume back up? Right? I mean,
we love it? But would you would you pause? And
would you become a student not just a critic? Otherwise
I push at you a little bit. Otherwise you're gonna

(32:40):
discount every bit of information. You're gonna discount anything that
doesn't fit perfectly in your current flawed worldview. If you
don't listen and you don't learn, if we don't listen
to each other and learn from each other, we will
discount anything that doesn't fit perfectly within our flawed world view,

(33:05):
and we quit learning. And when you quit learning, something
bad happens on the inside. And you're better than that,
and we should be better than that. Let me put
it this way. If you're a Democrat, your Republican brothers
and sisters, aren't crazy. They're not. If you're a Republican,

(33:28):
you're Democrat. Brothers and sisters, they're not crazy. Nobody's crazy.
They just sit in a different place, so they see
the world in a different way. And as long as
we catch ourselves saying, I don't know how anybody could
believe that You've just confessed something about you, not them,
I don't know how anybody can believe that, Well, then, Andy,

(33:49):
you don't know something. Learn it. I don't see how
anybody could behave that. I don't understand how anybody could
behave that way. Well, there's something I don't understand. I
don't know why anybody would react that way. Well, there's
something out understand. So why wouldn't we, especially within the
Body of Christ, take time to understand? Because everybody's behavior

(34:10):
makes perfect sense to them. Everybody's response makes perfect sense
to them. Everybody's viewpoint, everybody's politics makes perfect sense to them.
And when we don't understand, it's because we don't understand.
In fact, if you're a Republican, you need to know
that Democrats are really just like you. And if you're

(34:32):
a Democrat, you need to know the Republicans are just
like you. They're taking a stand based upon where they sit.
Last thing, third l word love. Never please, never ever
ever burn a relational bridge over a political view. Never
ever ever burn a relay. Well these say, well they

(34:53):
started the fire, Okay, well they started the fire on
they're into the bridge. Don't and like, don't start a
fire on you're into the bridge. Never burn a bridge,
a relational bridge, because of over a political view. Because
this goes back to Jesus commandment, This goes back to
the Cross, This goes back to the epicenter of what
we believe is Christians. The you besides you is more
precious to God than your potentially flawed view of you

(35:16):
that you changed ten years ago of you that you're
going to change five years from now. Do not burn
a relational bridge over a political view. That you beside
you is more precious to God than your potentially flawed view.
While you and the person you're burning the bridge down with,
while both of you were yet sinners, Christ died for
both of you. How dare I? How dare I burn

(35:41):
down a relational bridge with someone for whom Christ died?
And how dare you do the same thing? If you're
a Jesus follower. So come on, let's listen, learn and love.
And again, like I said last week, I know you
can't help but think this, Andy, this's so naive you
really think that's gonna make any difference. You just remember this.

(36:05):
Once upon a time there were a handful of Jesus
followers crushed between an empire and the temple, and they
gave to Caesar what was Caesar's, and they gave to
God what was God's, their lives. And now the empire
is no more, the Temple is no more. Rome's most

(36:27):
famous emperor is nothing but a footnote in the story
of Jesus of Nazareth. Kingdoms colm, kingdoms, go, empires rise,
empire's fall. Jesus said, I'm gonna build my ecclasea and
nothing is ever going to stop it. And he did,

(36:48):
and we've been invited to be part of it. And
it is still the way forward. And our responsibility, especially
in a season like this, is to show our divided
nation and our divided world war what it looks like,
and that it's even possible to disagree politically, to love
unconditionally while we pray for unity. Because at Cavalry, at Calvary,

(37:16):
at the cross, we lost our right to do anything
less than that. So listen, learn and love, and don't
miss Part three of talking Points