A Message from Ellen 10-30-24
What is the relationship between our faith and our politics? That question seems to be at the forefront of most of our hearts and minds as we face a particularly contentious election season. Many of us have already voted, and I hope that if you have not yet voted, that you will do so! There is a lot of uncertainty about what happens after November 5th and there is much over which you and I have no control. However, I encourage you to focus on what you and I can control. I ask that you all pray for a fair election and a peaceful transition of power. And I remind you that if the polls are correct, no matter who wins the presidency, 50% of our country will be rejoicing and 49% will be grieving. Let your response be tempered by that reality, especially if you find yourself on the winning side.
I encourage you to pray for our nation. The Church’s Sanctuary will be open from 7am to 7pm on Tuesday, November 5th. We will hold brief (15 minute) Communion services at Noon and again at 7:00pm. Or you are welcome to drop by and make your own prayers on a schedule that suits you.
Our New Testament does not know of a time when there was such a thing as a Christian nation. Always, with regards to Scripture, followers of Jesus were a minority without power, and often persecuted by the Roman Civil Government. It was only after 300 years that Christians came to hold positions of civil power, after Emperor Constantine declared Christianity to be the faith of the political realm. Honestly, that did not work out well. And I challenge anyone to point to a time when the political and religious realms have been combined when it did not end in war, bloodshed, and oppression for those deemed to be enemies of the Church. Crusades, anyone?!
Those who seek to dominate the political machines of our nation, using Jesus’ name, need to remember both the bloody history of the Christian Church and to read Jesus’s own teachings again. Jesus said that the greatest commandment, is that “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matt 22:37-40) If Jesus is Lord, then political power is not. Let us pray for our nation – for peace, for prosperity, for justice, and for unity. And let us also pray for Christ’s Body, the Church of Jesus Christ, that we might not hold more tightly to anyone’s hand than we hold to the hand of Jesus. Let us pray together in this critical week in the life of the nation we love.
