Dear Evangelicals,
Jesus Christ is everything Trump
wouldn't have anything to do with!
A couple days ago, a friend of mine posted to his social media, a photo of the text message he received from the Trump Campaign.
The message was short and concise and for me three words stood out. LIBERALS, TEAR DOWN and JESUS.
What was portrayed by the campaign message was a raging movement which was expanding at an alarming rate in the wake of George Floyd’s death. As the protests have persisted, so have the demands grown and shifted. From defunding the police to tearing down statues of historical figures in America. Now, the conversation has moved on to Jesus Christ because protesters are enraged at his racial depiction as being white. Underneath all of these, it seems there would be no stopping what the next target could be or what should be “off-limits” to protests.
Personally, I do not see a problem with the Trump Campaign’s messaging about a need to defend. To tear down or not to tear down statues is a good argument to have any day. However, for an argument to make sense it must at least be put into the test of context. The problem is when you do so with this one, alarm bells begin to go off.
Let me break this down further.
People generally tend to defend what they love and in the rare cases where they do so maliciously, it is usually for the purpose of serving a much personal long term need that is bigger than the consequence of losing that object or person in the short term. I am not saying that Trump or his campaign are guilty of the latter or the former, but the reality becomes a little less fuzzy if you lay the argument of the messaging (to defend Jesus) side by side with the messenger (Trump) then you probably have your answer.
Let's talk a little more about Jesus and Trump.
Jesus Christ faced persecution even before he was born, leading him to seek refuge in Africa lest his gospel be stopped in tracks by a king desperate to hang on to power. The fact he was saved because he sought refuge in another land afforded him the chance to go on to perhaps become the most popular Christian described in the good book. It is no secret he lived the early years of his life as a refugee in faraway Egypt. In today’s world, Jesus would be a DACA recipient if Egypt were the United States and Israel was Mexico. And yes, you can bet your 401(k) on the fact that Trump was never going to let him in and for all the account of history, the power drunk king Herod would have killed Jesus even before he had the chance to inspire the writing of the good book that Trump propped for the now infamous photo.
Further, If we go by the several accounts in the good book, the tone of Jesus’s skin was described mostly as bronze in color. A few other times it was described as olive. However, because we can all agree he was Middle Eastern or at least an Arab man, I would steer off the controversy of whether he was white or colored. When we combine one and two, we have a Jesus Christ who is not only a poor Refugee with a potential to burden society but also one of Arab descent. On top of that, he’s got colored skin. I can tell you without a shred a doubt, that his profile does not exactly fit into the kind Trump envisions for America.
By all accounts, Jesus knew his own personal history. It is therefore no surprise he often talked about the need to help, to love one’s neighbor as one’s self, to feed the hungry, to help the needy. But it does seem to me that all his teachings are clear to Evangelicals until there is a financial or humanitarian cost to taking them seriously. Suddenly, they become very polarizing and then we begin to pick and choose.
I have always thought that we do ourselves more than a disservice when we mix religion and politics only when it is convenient. It comes with the good, the bad and the ugly and if being a Christian is hinged on being a good person, then we owe ourselves and society the moral obligation to re look not only the messaging but also the messenger who intends to defend Christ on our behalf.
And if we determine that Christ wouldn’t have had a chance at life with the messenger, then is the messenger really the one we should trust about his claim to defending Christ or are we simply just being used to serve a Political need?
Comments
Post a Comment