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Conservative/Liberal are not Theological Categories

We wanted to repost something by Jonathan Martin today that struck a chord with us about the theological emptiness of political boxes. It’s brief and beautifully written and we hope you’ll read the entire article here.

For those of you who are weary of the political tug-of-war for your soul, here’s some hope:

And so finally, the people of God are restless. They are intuitively suspect of liberal ideals that have no soul, and conservative ideals that have no cross. They are disenchanted, disillusioned, and disoriented with the options they have been given. And this is great grace. Where the words of the commentators fall flat, the world becomes hungry for the voice of prophets once again. In the cracks, space is developing for the voice that is altogether Other–the voice that will not be co-opted for the sake of the needs of any particular nation-state.

Where right and left are committed to the welfare of the people of a nation, perhaps the time has come again for people who pledge their allegiance to another kingdom. Over against the voices that are committed to build a better America, there are yet people who crave the peculiar treason of cross-shaped love. In being unlike the world, the Church may yet become a people truly for the world, once again.

Grace may yet make us traitors, to nearly everyone but God.

Photo credit: Vaguely Artistic via VisualHunt / CC BY-NC-ND

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