Reaffirmation of What God has Been Saying to Me

I current live in Los Angeles. I’ve only recently become acquainted with your work. Last week I read “The Case for Christ” and had begun doing a bit of research on the people Lee Strobel interviewed. As a result I happened upon the various interviews that you had done regarding “Myth of the Christian Nation”, and from there I heard your sermon series “The Cross and the Sword”.

I’ve been a Christian ever since I was in elementary school and grew up in a Christian household. My parents are probably what you would think of when you think of a typical political conservative. The church I grew up in is also what you would think of when you think of politically conservative. And even from a young age I had serious issues with this…not that liberalistic thinking was correct but that Christianity had a political party at all.

When I was 19 or 20 years old California had a proposition on the ballet to recognize Civil Unions among couples from different states. I’ll never forget the political fervor created in our church. Small ballets were handed out stating the proposition, the phone number and email address of our senator, and how evil of an idea this was. During my college youth group a younger man who was running for city council was given some time at the beginning of the sermon to talk about his platform and why we should vote for him, which mostly consisted shooting down this proposition.

Never before had I been so inclined to stand up in the middle of his speech and say how wrong this was. Not only for singling out homosexuality but for using the church as a political tool. My stomach stills churns over that moment.

The youth groups at my University were not much better. During college everyone wants a piece of your time and energy for a cause and they are willing to do almost anything to get it. And unfortunately, the Christian college ministries were grouped with the masses as one more activist group.

The reason that I’m saying all of this is because when so many people around you are committed to this idea that we need to take America back for God or to create a “Christian Nation” it’s hard to know that you disagree with them. And when you do openly disagree with your brothers and sisters in Christ they assume that there is something critically wrong with your faith.

When that happens it’s difficult to shake the feeling that there is something wrong with your own faith, that somehow you are missing an important component of what it means to be a Christian.

Being the analytical person that I am I naturally re-evaluate my life to try and see if I’m becoming the person that God wants me to be, and yet I still thought that polarization and deionization of people among different political beliefs was not Christ-like.

I cannot express my thanks to you for having the courage to claim in a public forum how wrong this political idolatry is. That sermon series has reaffirmed what I believe the Holy Spirit has been telling me for years. I know that saying this has cost you. But, as I’m sure you already know, these things need to be said.

Every morning I listen to my local Christian radio station to which they dedicate the good majority of their day towards political causes. They demonize their opponents and say this is the Christian way of thinking. My biggest concern in all of this is that others, like me, will be afraid of saying anything against the Christian political media because they will be criticized not just as an individual but as Christian. But I truly thank you and am grateful that you continue the pursuit of being Christ-like. My hope is that finding your sermon online will be as incredibly strengthening to people as it has been for me. I will recommend your sermons to many.