Greg Boyd Unplugged
Greg Boyd preached and 1000 members (one-fifth of the total congregation) took their tithes and went home. When the New York Times learned the content of the sermon it left them positively atwitter. Boyd eschewed once and for all any “fusing of faith and politics.” No need to fear church bulletins stuffed with voter guides at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul.
This church winnowing sermon series has given birth to the book The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church.
Attention from Times columnist Laurie Goodstein helped to earn Boyd’s book a ranking of 20 on Amazon. Charlie Rose recently interviewed Boyd at length in order to explore his views and make sense of the contradictory reactions evoked by them.
One phenomenon evident in the Rose interview and the Times piece is the salivating stimulated in the main stream media (MSM) whenever the prospect of an evangelical catfight emerges. Boyd was careful to note how resistant to quick definition the term “evangelical” has become while describing himself as a conservative Bible-believing Christian who believes in the divine inspiration of the Bible and seeks to live under the Lordship of Christ. Left out of the interview and the Times piece was the formal denunciation of Boyd’s denial of God’s complete foreknowledge (including foreknowledge of future decisions by free agents) by an overwhelming majority at the Evangelical Theological Society in 2003.
Boyd comes across very well in the interview; intelligent, non-defensive, sincere—genuine in every way. The main thrusts of Boyd’s argument strike me as very sound. His plea is for a Church that embodies the ethic and purposes of Jesus Christ, who, we would do well to remember, turned the other cheek in the face of his enemies in the most complete manner imaginable—he laid down his life rather than strike back. Jesus also made clear that his Kingdom is not of this world and insisted upon distinguishing the realms of Caesar and God when asked about the Temple tax. Faithfulness to the Savior and His Kingdom will resist the co-opting of his message by any political party or cause. And the lure of political power and its potentially corrupting and compromising pressures in a democracy like ours is real indeed.
But how should such protectiveness of the Church’s message play out in a democracy when the Bible-value-laden believer enters the voting booth. Southern Baptist ethicist Richard Land put it this way: “I don’t think God is a Republican but I do think He is pro-life.” If abortion is an ongoing holocaust (and I believe it is), then how is my opposition to a pro-abortion candidate to be construed as anything more than an act of Christian obedience. Boyd does not want politicians labeled “the Christian candidate” because (and he is right) many issues matter to God and reasonable Christians might disagree on this or that. For Boyd, ethical and political complexity rules out unity and clarity when it comes to directing Christians in the voting booth.
But it was fascinating that the corrupting and compromising fusion of faith with politics only applied to conservative hot button issues. Neither Boyd nor Rose seemed to notice the big elephant sitting in the room at Rose’s mention of the name Martin Luther King Jr. It would be illuminating to learn whether Boyd’s eschewal of the religion/politics fusion extends to certain historic social causes marked by strong Christian leadership and church activism. Say for instance; the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, the Voting Rights Act, the Civil Rights Movement. Yes, we know Ralf Reed is a bad boy, but what about Ralph Abernathy? Dietrich Bonhoeffer felt compelled to plunge into the muck and mire of political intrigue and eventually to join the conspiracy to assassinate Hitler precisely because he was a Christian. Bonhoeffer was appalled when the Church tried to keep its hands clean while secretly hoping that secular operatives would succeed in eliminating Hitler.
Boyd’s protectiveness for the independence of the Church’s prophetic message is right on. But the passive, separationist tendencies of his practical advice may involve a shirking of prophetic responsibility laid upon the Church which must, indeed, separate from the world but only in order that it might re-enter again as Salt and Light.
This church winnowing sermon series has given birth to the book The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church.
Attention from Times columnist Laurie Goodstein helped to earn Boyd’s book a ranking of 20 on Amazon. Charlie Rose recently interviewed Boyd at length in order to explore his views and make sense of the contradictory reactions evoked by them.
One phenomenon evident in the Rose interview and the Times piece is the salivating stimulated in the main stream media (MSM) whenever the prospect of an evangelical catfight emerges. Boyd was careful to note how resistant to quick definition the term “evangelical” has become while describing himself as a conservative Bible-believing Christian who believes in the divine inspiration of the Bible and seeks to live under the Lordship of Christ. Left out of the interview and the Times piece was the formal denunciation of Boyd’s denial of God’s complete foreknowledge (including foreknowledge of future decisions by free agents) by an overwhelming majority at the Evangelical Theological Society in 2003.
Boyd comes across very well in the interview; intelligent, non-defensive, sincere—genuine in every way. The main thrusts of Boyd’s argument strike me as very sound. His plea is for a Church that embodies the ethic and purposes of Jesus Christ, who, we would do well to remember, turned the other cheek in the face of his enemies in the most complete manner imaginable—he laid down his life rather than strike back. Jesus also made clear that his Kingdom is not of this world and insisted upon distinguishing the realms of Caesar and God when asked about the Temple tax. Faithfulness to the Savior and His Kingdom will resist the co-opting of his message by any political party or cause. And the lure of political power and its potentially corrupting and compromising pressures in a democracy like ours is real indeed.
But how should such protectiveness of the Church’s message play out in a democracy when the Bible-value-laden believer enters the voting booth. Southern Baptist ethicist Richard Land put it this way: “I don’t think God is a Republican but I do think He is pro-life.” If abortion is an ongoing holocaust (and I believe it is), then how is my opposition to a pro-abortion candidate to be construed as anything more than an act of Christian obedience. Boyd does not want politicians labeled “the Christian candidate” because (and he is right) many issues matter to God and reasonable Christians might disagree on this or that. For Boyd, ethical and political complexity rules out unity and clarity when it comes to directing Christians in the voting booth.
But it was fascinating that the corrupting and compromising fusion of faith with politics only applied to conservative hot button issues. Neither Boyd nor Rose seemed to notice the big elephant sitting in the room at Rose’s mention of the name Martin Luther King Jr. It would be illuminating to learn whether Boyd’s eschewal of the religion/politics fusion extends to certain historic social causes marked by strong Christian leadership and church activism. Say for instance; the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, the Voting Rights Act, the Civil Rights Movement. Yes, we know Ralf Reed is a bad boy, but what about Ralph Abernathy? Dietrich Bonhoeffer felt compelled to plunge into the muck and mire of political intrigue and eventually to join the conspiracy to assassinate Hitler precisely because he was a Christian. Bonhoeffer was appalled when the Church tried to keep its hands clean while secretly hoping that secular operatives would succeed in eliminating Hitler.
Boyd’s protectiveness for the independence of the Church’s prophetic message is right on. But the passive, separationist tendencies of his practical advice may involve a shirking of prophetic responsibility laid upon the Church which must, indeed, separate from the world but only in order that it might re-enter again as Salt and Light.
posted by Mark DeVine at 4:09 PM
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