I had author and Pastor Jeff Samelson on the show to talk about his book, Walk This Way: Political Engagement for Bible-Believing Christians.
We talked about the responsibilities of a Christian to get involved and not get overwhelmed by political activity.
Be angry and sin not.
How to treat the moneychangers in the Temple without losing your soul.
Transcript:
Our guest this hour is Jeff Samelson. And Jeff is the author
of a book that just came out. It's called Walk This Way. It's not the Aerosmith
song. Walk This Way, Political Engagement for Bible-Believing Christians. And
it speaks to some things that I struggle with. And I found that if I'm
struggling with something, so are others. I used to sit in class and I'd
realize, I'd look around like, I'm not sure everybody's getting this either,
but nobody else wants to ask. So I'd be the guy that would ask. And then after
class, everybody say, oh, I'm glad you said something. Well, that's because I
have a loud mouth. So welcome to the show, Jeff. Tell us about yourself and how
you became the person you are today.
Jeff Samelson
All right, well, people ask me that question. I always say,
oh, I'll make this quick and then I don't. So I'll try to extra hard to be
brief here. I'm a writer and I'm a pastor. Some people might say I have a
unique background. I'm originally from the Chicago suburbs, Libertyville,
Illinois. But I started my adult life by getting a degree in political science.
And then I served as a foreign service officer at the US embassies in Singapore
and Bogota, Colombia. But I'd had a longtime interest in being a pastor. And so
I returned to the US, went to seminary. And with that degree, I was called to a
church in Maryland in the DC and Baltimore suburbs, and I served there for 21
years. I live now in Wisconsin with my wife, Charlene, and I write, I teach, I
preach, I contribute also to a podcast of my own. Well, not my own, it's from
Christian Life Resources. It's called the Life Challenges Podcast. And as
you've kindly mentioned, I've written a book.
Ed Bonderenka
Among all those other things you've written a book yeah we
want to talk about that book too because I've been like I said before we came
on air I've been skimming it because I only got a copy a few days ago and I
actually have a day job now so it's not as easy you know and so your book
starts out if therefore you picked up this book expecting or looking for some
kind of Christian blueprint for electoral victory the secrets to taking control
the state or a plan to make a nation into some theocratic ideal you will be
disappointed yeah you elaborate on that.
Jeff Samelson
Well yeah I am I mean there are a lot of books out there
these days that are designed that way. That is their purpose. And they're
trying to tell you, no, if you're a Christian, this is what you need to do
politically. And then there's going to be another book from another author
that's saying something completely different about this is what you should do
because you're a Christian. And I don't think that's right. It's not
necessarily that helpful. And what I really needed, or I felt that people
really needed to hear, was, okay, you're a Christian. What exactly does that
mean for you at the very basic level? What is it that you need to know? What is
it that you need to understand about, well, I guess the easiest way to do it is
that with this book, Walk This Way, I try to put politics into the context of
Christian faith and life, where it belongs, instead of something that far too
many people are doing or are being told to do, which is taking Christian faith
in life and trying to fit it into politics. And that is the kind of thing that
I often come across when people are frustrated by all these questions. It's
like, okay, I'm A Christian. How does that fit into the fact that I support
this candidate or I'm a member of this party or this is my side. How do I stay
on my side and still fit in some of that Christian stuff that I say is
important on Sunday mornings? And that's got it reversed. And it's not just
that I think there's a right and a wrong approach to this. It's that when you
have the wrong approach to this, when you're not starting from the right
foundation, you're going to be missing out on a lot of peace and confidence and
comfort that God wants you to have and that He gives to you in Scripture if you
start from that foundation that He gives you. So the books begins by
establishing the foundational truths about who believers are as God's children
and disciples of Christ. And then it describes the unique blessings and
advantages Christians have that will benefit them when dealing with politics.
And then the last section, it gives more specific guidance then about how all
this is put together in a believer's life. How the Christian actually engages
with politics practically, faithfully, and confidently. Oh, Ed, your microphone
is muted.
Ed Bonderenka
Thank you. And that's part of his job, like I said. If I
might sum up, or rather quote your book again, because I think it sums up what
you just said and says it rather forcefully at the end. I like this. This is
not a call to arms. If anything, it is a call to the cross, to faithfulness and
sacrifice, not strategy or success. Neither is a call to false or forced
uniting of Christians into a partisan force based on political expediency or
simple grasping of power. It's a call to individual identity, integrity, and
engagement. These are so important to the citizen, not just to a Christian, but
to being a citizen. And I like the last phrase in this paragraph. At the same
time, though, it is an encouragement to Christians not to cede the civil sphere
politics to those without the Holy Spirit. I said something a while back and on
the show and Derek, man, he's so sharp. He caught it, clipped it, and made a
promo for the show. Basically, it goes, I don't have it here right away, but it
says something to the effect of, I don't want to live in a government ruled by
Christians. I want to live in a government run by Christians. I want to live in
a government that I thought he was going to play it the way he came up to the
mic there for a second. I want to live under a government that is informed by
Christian ideals and purposes. God wants us to be free. It's a good thing to be
free. You are a Lutheran. And of course, there are many flavors, and Kamala
Harris notwithstanding, a Venn diagram would be helpful sometimes, for which
one of you guys are in which group of Lutherans. But I know some good
Lutherans, and you were telling me about the synod that you're in, the Wisconsin
Evangelical Lutheran Synod, and I once spoke to a guy named Pastor Richard
Zeal. And he's a local pastor and he hosts the syndicated radio show, Martin
Luther's Evening Prayer. And he reminded me of the Lutheran pastor John
Muhlenberg, the patriot pastor of Revolutionary War fame. So. he was pointing
out to me that at that time Lutherans were willing to stand up and fight when
it was time for the fight and I'm friends with Pastor Christopher Toma who
pastors Our Savior Lutheran Church in Heartland Michigan you work out of a
church called Our Savior also right?
Jeff Samelson
Yes I'm a pulpit assistant at Our Savior in Grafton
Wisconsin.
Ed Bonderenka
Excellent so and he sponsors this the conference, annual
conference called The Body of Christ in the Public Square, which by the way
occurs October 3rd of this year. We talked to him about I think last week or
the week before. And the event has speakers who focus on the topic of the body
of Christ in the public square. What a coincidence, So it's.
Jeff Samelson
Good when there's that agreement there between the purpose
and the names. Yeah.
Ed Bonderenka
Exactly. And so Your book, once again, to reinforce the
thought is, it's not to say Christians should stay out of politics, but we need
Christians in politics, but how do we behave as Christians in politics? Is that
right?
Jeff Samelson
Yes. Yeah, and that's... I think that no matter what side of
whatever issue you're on, I think most people today are, in the United States
anyway, are going to be saying, what, I think there are a lot of Christians who
aren't acting very Christian when they're out in politics. And that's not good,
whether you're thinking about it just in terms of the individual's spiritual
state, because it's not good to be acting in a way that is not consistent with
your faith. or whether you're talking about it in terms of the Christians and
the church's witness to the world, it's not good to be acting that way. As
important as the purposes we may have are when we go into politics and engage
with it, we have a greater purpose as Christians, and that is to live as the
people Christ has made us to be. and that includes the purpose he's given us of
sharing the gospel and being witnesses to his wonderful truth. So therefore, if
we take this attitude of, well, I've got this really important political
purpose to fulfill here, but it's going to require me to set aside some of my
Christian character and principles, yeah, you're looking at that equation the
wrong way.
Ed Bonderenka
Yeah you know I've got this recording of John Adams it's a
very old recording.
John Adams
Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious
people it is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
Ed Bonderenka
I like playing that. I took out all the hiss and pops and
everything from the original wax recording and so up you know I once again I
believe that this country I know that this country was founded on principles
that are derived from Christianity and the Judeo-Christian heritage, if you
want to put it that way. I'm getting at a loss for words sometimes here. But I
believe that our government was given to us by people who looked at what was
happening in theological terms of freedom and our rights are, once again,
guaranteed to us by the Constitution but they're given to us from God so I have
obviously I believe there's a real Christian component to keeping this country
free and keeping it in the way that God delivered it to us which I believe he
did you said something here in that statement I read earlier it is an
encouragement to Christians not to see the civical civil beer oh my goodness
politics to those without the Holy Spirit and I think that's very important
because not just those with the Christian name but those who are actually
living the life and being led by God instead of just people frankly I know
people I used to be one of them went to church and thought that was good enough
called myself a Christian because my parents were but it's another thing to
actually be God is your end-all, be-all, and your allegiance is to him. If he
says something, you'll do it no matter how you feel about it.
Jeff Samelson
Right.
Ed Bonderenka
Okay, good. We're in agreement.
Jeff Samelson
Go ahead. Yeah, we always want to be careful not to be
looking at other people and trying to judge, okay, this is, he's just a nominal
Christian, but he's a real Christian. We don't, we can't see the hearts that
God can see yet, but we can see is how people behave, the things that they say,
the things that they do. And when we see in our own lives that we are saying
one thing about who we are and acting a different way, that should be a wake-up
call to us. And if you have a brother or sister that you see the same thing
going on, that might be the point where you would say something to them. It's
like, yeah, your words and actions aren't quite matching up here. And there's
no particular reason why we should leave politics out of that. I think, for
instance, of any number of politicians in the history of this nation who have
said, Oh, yes, I'm absolutely a Christian, yes, absolutely, and yet there...
the policies that they champion, the legislation that they sponsor and sign or
whatever, are things that we as Christians would say that doesn't go together.
Those things don't match up. And yet it doesn't seem that anybody, their
pastors, their fellow church members or whatever, are actually engaging with
them in such a way to say, hey, there's a disconnect here. And and that's a
shame.
Ed Bonderenka
Well, actually, actually, it's that that that concept that I
first thought of when I sprung off on everything about nominal Christian was
the fact that there are people who represent themselves on TV and politicians,
you know, and say, yes, I'm a Christian. And like, well, then when you going to
start acting like it or, you know, we're going to show you're you're going to
draw the line and stand with allegiance to Christian principles instead of
going along with the party line. to get along. I mean if they're not killing
babies I understand making concessions to the party line to see that the party
retains the majorities for the that's politics so that you can do the most good
you can but when they say hey we're gonna kill babies or we're gonna mutilate
kids in school and can you stay in our party and support this or just keep your
mouth shut about it now I don't think that's viable in my case you said
something about you know the body standing up to somebody and I'm gonna open up
a can of worms here I taught in a church for years And then I left that church
over some frustration with the pastor and how he was dealing with COVID and
keeping the church shut. And there was an argument about that. And my wife and
I left. We found a church that was open and wasn't insulting to those that
wanted to remain free. And then after a while, we came back to this church and
I was not asked to resume teaching. And that's fine. I was asked to teach in my
home and I did that for a while. And I ended up in the hospital last year and
that didn't work. And so I asked the board when I got to the hospital, hey, our
home is not set right now for teaching this group. Can I borrow one of the
rooms? And it took a while and it came back that no, I couldn't. I couldn't
borrow one of the rooms because it would be seen as an imprimatur on my
teaching for the church. I said, I've done that for 20 some years here before.
Frankly, you guys aren't doing a Bible study. I don't know why you haven't
asked me to take it up. That's your business. But to tell me I can't, why is
that? It turned out there was an incident that I totally forgotten where
another pastor visiting pastor had come in a couple years earlier, couple years
earlier, like, you know, not during COVID. And he talked about the closing of
churches. And it's a small church. And I basically challenged him on closing
churches. And I was passionate about it. I don't believe I was angry about it,
but I was passionate about it. was interpreted by the board that I was angry.
And they actually, instead of talking to me about it, they actually went to the
district and said, how do we handle this guy? And they said, leave it alone.
Let him go. And that sat there for, they didn't say anything for the longest
time. And I finally, when I was told all this, I said, you guys never
challenged me on my behavior you just let it go and and so it's a situation
right now I'm looking for another church and you know and I'm asking pastors as
I go like a will you let the church shut you down whose allegiance do you have
to the state or to the the God who said you know forsake not the assembly of
yourselves together so unfortunately that's the kinda radical guy I am And then
I get very, very strongly opinioned about my walk and my allegiance and how
we're going to let the state walk on us. So yeah, long story, probably didn't
ask for it, but I had the opportunity to tell it because it's exactly what
you're talking about. People who thought I had anger issues thought enough
about it to go to the district body about it and then never tell me they had a
problem with it. and then it affects my my working in the church and we need to
be able to call people out on their behavior and have have the integrity and
the arm yeah the integrity to actually say look up you did this wrong we need
to talk to you about that is that what you were getting at?
Jeff Samelson
Yeah the beginning of John the John's gospel there is a John
sets up a contrast between Moses who was as a lawgiver and Jesus who brings
grace and truth. And one of the interesting things about the Gospels is that
you don't see anywhere Jesus giving a new set of commandments or anything like
that. And I've often said that the closest we get to that closest we get to
something where Jesus is saying okay this is what you have to do is in Matthew
18 where he says if your brother sins go to him individually if he repents
great if not go back with two or three others if he repents great if not then
you take it to the church and yet That is the most clear statement of procedure
for the New Testament church that there is. And yet it is the one that is so
frequently overlooked, if not ignored, because it's difficult.
Ed Bonderenka
I got up in front of the body a few weeks ago. I got up in
front of them and I said exactly that. I says, I read Matthew. And I said, this
is how you're supposed to deal with things. I said, nobody dealt with me like
that. But now I have gone to the board and I have basically told them this is
how I feel about it. This is how I think they're wrong. They haven't responded
to me. So now I'm in front of you, the body, and I'm calling them out according
to Matthew 18. And unfortunately I didn't hand it well. I got angry and just
walked off. I didn't explain my position because I just couldn't. I just had to
be quiet. You know, I had to walk away. So we got a minute left. So we're going
to take calls after the break too. I've trusted there are people who want to
castigate me or support me or are more interested hopefully in your book and
the topic. We're going to get on to this. We're going to get more into your
book here instead of my personal life. So folks, Derek, we've got 30 seconds.
It's time for the music. There we go. Come on back after the break, your
American heritage.
Well, welcome back to, of course, Your American Heritage. And we're talking to,
should I refer to you as pastor?
Jeff Samelson
Sure.
Ed Bonderenka
Okay, Pastor Jeff Samuelson. I should also say author Jeff
Samuelson of Walk This Way, Political Engagement for Bible Believing
Christians. And I'm looking to have some phone calls here and Derek, open the
phone lines, please, and give us the number. 734-822-1600 Oh look at that, Joe
from Wyandotte. Hey Joe, welcome to the show.
Joe from Wyandotte
Thank you, yeah I'd like to give both your reactions to the
following that I stand with you Ed, as I often do, in that anger is a natural
human emotion. It is not a sin, as I discussed in my Christitutional Politics
Books series. Jesus Himself, God made flesh, got angry, He upturned the tables
in the temple. Now I don't wish to put words in Jesus' mouth, I wouldn't
presume to do that, but it isn't reported in the Bible. I would believe He
would have further than said, I took my anger too far. Destruction of property
is not proper channeling of anger. Potential disturbance of the peace is not
proper application of your anger. We have to channel not just anger, but all
our emotions constructively, but expressing in uncertain harsh tones of our voice
expressing our anger is perfectly fine it's you know not unless a few assault
or especially in anger murder and innocent anger is fine.
Ed Bonderenka
Alright Joe I am going to let Jeff have first stab at this
but I have a response to and I think he might have a similar response to Jeff
you're my guest.
Jeff Samelson
Okay, it's absolutely true that anger in itself is not a
sin. But as with all emotions, there is a difference between a righteous anger
and an unrighteous anger. Similar thing would be with jealousy. We always think
of jealousy as simply as absolutely a negative thing, but there is a proper
kind of jealousy too. So we have to make that distinction. With Jesus, he was
the sinless, perfectly righteous son of God. So we know that any anger that he
displayed was perfectly right. It was on the righteous side, both in terms of
the feeling of it and in whatever he did as a result of it. So we have that as
kind of a guide or a standard that we can look at there. What we're looking at
in terms of our personal relationships and things, the difficulty is because
we're sinful human beings, it is next to impossible for us to feel anger and
not at least in some way sin in connection with it. And that's why there is so
much in the Bible, particularly in the letters of Paul, about self-control,
about staying in complete control of ourselves. Not that we don't feel
emotions, but that we make sure that we don't let them take control of us and
lead us to do things or say things that are sinful or for that matter even, and
this is something that my own wife will talk to me about sometimes, the look
that we have on our faces can even be crossing the line there. And so we want
to keep the negative. We want to keep the sinning aspect out of it. And that, I
think, is the thing that's the problem with politics for so many of us as
Christians today, is that we're feeling angry and we're not even sure that it's
a righteous anger a lot of the time, and we're not sure what to do with it,
even if it is a righteous anger. And so part of the purpose of my writing of
the book is to try to help us work through those issues. It's like, okay, why
am I upset about this thing that I just heard about on the news? Is it because
this is actually something that is going against God's will and therefore is
bad for my nation, bad for my community? Or is this something that's just kind
of ticking me off because it's not what I personally like? It's not what I'm
comfortable with. It's not what I grew up with or something like that. And we
need to learn as Christians to differentiate these things so that when we are
acting on our anger, when we are upset about something that moves us to action,
we know that we're doing it for all the right reasons and that they are godly,
Christ-like reasons.
Ed Bonderenka
All right my turn hold on Joe so so of course is be angry
and sin not and so you might get angry and it might even be the wrong anger but
sin not and one thing I've been helpful I read this book by watchman knee
called a normal Christian life turn my life around and fortunately I only read
it like about a year into my walk with God and up he says that basically The
Christian life is not normal, it's super normal. And if you're going to live
the Christian life, you let God live it to you because you can't do it. You
find yourself, like Paul said, oh wicked man that I am, who will save me from
this body of sin? Some way of quoting that, I think I got it close. And so
basically Watchman he points out that you realize you can't do this, so you ask
God to do it through you. And I was about to slap somebody once And just after
reading that, I mean, I had my hand up in the air and everything. And I just
realized, oh, God spoke to me. Yeah, too far.
Joe from Wyandotte
Too far.
Ed Bonderenka
Yep, that's too far. You don't love this person. And I said,
oh, jeez, you're right. What am I supposed to do here? And oh, you love this
person through me. Most miraculous thing I've ever seen in my life. I can only
tell it to you. I can't, you can't observe it. But what was going through my
head right then, I'm glad I read the book, did not slap her. and it's not my
present wife either and I just everything went away God loved her through me
and I just the emotion the love was there and it's a shame I couldn't maintain
that my entire first marriage but I didn't hit her.
So the other thing is when we look at Jesus and what he does
We can't say, and I'm not saying this was said, but we can't say Jesus did it.
He's the son of God. He can do whatever he wants to do. We need to analyze what
he did, why he did it, and the constraints he did it under. And one of those is
you mentioned in a text to me during break that he actually might have been
guilty of assault. And so Jeff and I were talking about that, and Jeff thinks
he was just going, driving the animals, And I think I always pictured it since
I was a kid in church when it was read to me that he was actually chasing the
money changers themselves. But either way, think it in these terms. Whose house
was it? Did he walk into a random marketplace? No. This was the temple of who?
God. Who was Jesus? God. It was like somebody comes into your house and they're
selling stuff. You have a right to pull a gun on them and say, get out of here.
Did I get that right?
Joe from Wyandotte
Now, yeah, I didn't say a fault. I wouldn't go that far. But
disturbing the peace, yes. Destruction of property, potentially, yes. both
potential crimes. But I also go into in my books, pride is not the sin. It's
pridefulness or hubris. I should be proud of little Johnny hitting the walk-off
home run at Little League. I should be proud of little Sally getting always on
her report card and expressing my pride in her and how great she's doing. I
should take pride in a job well done at work. hubris to demand the boss fire everybody
else and you collect their salary because nobody else's workforce you're the
only person on the planet falls anything around here.
Ed Bonderenka
Okay, once again, that's why it's good to have a good
concordance with a Strong's Dictionary and find out, you know, how that word
was used in context in other passages, and that's what we have linguists from.
I am not a Greek scholar, nor a Hebrew scholar, nor the son of a Greek or
Hebrew scholar, but I have books, and that's why it's good to find out what did
that word pride mean when it was used. Thanks for calling, Joe.
Ed Bonderenka
Thank you, brother. I want to ask Jeff for his take on what
I said about the temple.
Jeff Samelson
Well, yeah, that's one of the interesting things. The chief
priests and the Pharisees were eager to find something that they could arrest
Jesus for and get him off the board. Notice that he was never arrested for what
he did in the temple. Neither time, because he did it twice, once at the
beginning of his public ministry and once at the end of his public ministry.
And that kind of suggests that they understood that there was truth to his
accusation there that this was something improper. And it was. Where this was
happening, where they were doing this buying and selling and changing money,
was called the Court of the Gentiles. And it was the place kind of outside the
temple proper where non-Jews could go to worship the Lord. And so by filling it
with all this commerce, they were making it impossible for Gentiles who wanted
to come and worship the Lord to worship the Lord. They were crowding them out,
which was why he made the comment about, how dare you turn my father's house
into a market? Because this was supposed to be a house of prayer for all nations,
not just for the Jews. And they were messing that up, to put it mildly.
Ed Bonderenka
Good point. Thank you. I really appreciate that point on
that. You know, when it comes to the anger thing, and one of the reasons I want
to read your book and I'm reading it, is because, and I mentioned this off air,
there are times over the years, and I consider myself a born-again Christian,
led of the Spirit of God mostly, often enough, that I will be watching somebody
on TV and just basically wish that God would strike them down right then and
there. I see them as a threat to my family, to my life, that if they get their
way, I'm going to end up in chains. And I see it as kind of like self-defense
mode that I can ask God to be my hitman. And then I have to realize that's
wrong and repent. You want to speak to that?
Jeff Samelson
Yeah, it's, I think generally anytime we get that specific
about something like that, it's going to be something that we have to repent of
because we're letting the wrong emotions run things and we're not letting God
be God. When we read the Psalms, especially if you start at the beginning and
work your way through instead of just picking one out here and there, you get
to what are called the imprecatory Psalms and it can be very difficult because
you read, it's typically David, I don't know offhand if any of the Psalms that
aren't attributed to David are also classed as imprecatory, but they're
basically saying, These are my enemies, Lord, smite them, stop them, whatever.
But one thing we, and so we know that those prayers to a certain extent are
proper for a believer. But we also notice that he's never getting particularly
specific about them. He's never saying, John's a real meanie, please make sure
that he chokes on his bagel in the morning. It's nothing really like that. And
just from my own life, I don't have any personal enemies like that,
fortunately, that I feel the need to pray imprecatory psalms against. But I
find myself sometimes in the evening, particularly as I'm going to bed and saying
my prayers, and I'm thinking about things in the world, things that bother me.
And I will find myself sometimes saying, okay, God, please do this. And I find
myself getting fairly specific about this is what this political leader needs
to do. This is the world leader that needs to be removed from power or
whatever. And then I have to stop myself and say, who do I think I am dictating
to God what is the best thing to do? Now, on the one hand, that's not so bad.
At least I am praying specifically. for something that concerns me. And it does
say in Romans 8 that God, the Holy Spirit takes our groans, our prayers, and he
fixes them. He makes them into what is actually the thing that's important to
be asking for. But at the same time, I've got to remind myself that God's the
one in charge and he knows infinitely more than I do and he is infinitely wiser
than I am. And sometimes it makes a lot more sense then for us to just say,
Lord, here's this problem. It's really on my heart. I have some ideas about what
would fix it, but you know better. Please take care of this. And whether we're
talking about a war on the other side of the world or we're talking about
something that would see that's going on in our local city politics. Or for
that matter, your neighbor who's throwing his leaves onto your side of the
lawn. take your concerns to him, let him know how you feel about it, and then
trust him to work out the details.
Ed Bonderenka
I like that. you've mentioned imprecatory prayers, and
that's been a subject of discussion here before. I had Pastor Doug Giles on.
He's the author of Psalms of War, and the rest of it is the subtitle, Prayers
That Literally Kick Ass. And he's a trip. He's A Texas pastor, but basically
this is during the Biden administration, during lockdowns and threats to us.
And Yeah, there's a fine line, I don't know how fine the line is, but there's a
line, you got to walk there, once again, be angry and sin not. God is not your
hit man, but you can pray to God for your defense. In other words, if you feel
like God, I'm sorry, if you feel that you need the protection of God and your
country needs, pray for your nation. Pray that, like I opened up this show
with, you know, like pray that these people are removed from power. that
doesn't mean, have them have their mouth filled with worms while they're
speaking to you, which is something that happened to one of the Herods in the
book of Acts. And I often wondered when Obama was giving some of his speeches,
like when he tells the United Nations under his administration, The seas will
recede and the storms will abate. They're like, whoa, if anybody's mouth ever
needed to be filled with worms, like happened in the book of Acts, because when
Herod was basically speaking like he was God, you wonder, why don't we see that
more often?
Jeff Samelson
Yeah, must be 15 years or so ago, maybe even more than that.
There was a church, I'll just say a church that is not known for holding to
biblical positions. If I remember correctly, they were having a meeting there of
church leaders and it was struck by lightning. And there was an initial
emotional reaction among faithful Christians like, yeah, that's doing it, God,
that's teaching them a lesson. But then every time something like that happens,
they say, why doesn't he do that more often?
Ed Bonderenka
More consistently.
Jeff Samelson
Yeah. And we just have to realize that, okay, well, maybe
that thing that happened wasn't necessarily a sign of God's judgment. Maybe
that's, he let that thing happen for some other reason. And again, we just have
to trust that God's got his reasons. He'll handle these things as he will. And
the most important thing is we don't know what he's doing behind the scenes.
And that's one of the things I think that also can bring us a lot more peace
when it comes to politics, that just trusting that God's got it in his hands.
We can't see what he is doing. That was one of the things I I mentioned that my
congregation was out in the DC suburbs and we had a lot of people who worked
for the government, who were in the military, or worked for government
contractors, and there are a lot of people with top secret and higher security
clearances in the congregation. And I think they felt a little more comfortable
with me because I had a top secret security clearance at one point. But in the
time after 9-11, I had a few conversations with people who were involved in
stuff. I'll just put it that way. And they assured me that, oh yeah, there's a
lot that's been going on that nobody's going to hear about. Things that were
stopped well before they got anywhere. And that's good to hear as a citizen,
you want to hear that. But then we apply that to the situation with God. Think
about all the things that he's stopping before they ever get anywhere. The
things we look at a situation, oh, that's really bad. Well, maybe God
intervened before it got really, really, really, really bad. And we don't know
that. So he's already showing us grace and mercy by not letting it get even
worse than it was. And so maybe we shouldn't complain about the not so bad
thing that we actually ended up with.
Ed Bonderenka
Yeah. I regard the United States as not an institution of
the church, but I see it as a nation stood up by God for his purpose. It's
almost undeniable. My friend Bill Federer's book, Miracles in American History,
they give the evidence for that, that God's hand has been on this country and
on the formation of this country and the protection of this country over the
years. That does not make us a modern Israel and it doesn't mean we can't go
wrong. In my point of view it's, well even Israel went wrong and they went in
captivity and they were God's chosen people. and so my point is that I think
there are things we have to do to work to preserve this country in the way that
God wants it to go not necessarily the way we want to go in the way that we
want to work towards God's purposes we find that if we work towards God's
purposes then we'll find ourselves living in a pretty good place like people
have in the past and so know it's that doesn't mean we want to set up a
dominion movement or a new apostolic reformation where you know the Christians
run everything and from the Bible as the type of Sharia law we certainly don't
want Sharia law running everything anyhow but we want biblically informed
people in positions of power so that the nation is led and guided appropriately
you have any comment on that yeah well.
Jeff Samelson
I find it helpful when you're dealing with questions like
this is to imagine you're not an American. Imagine you live in a country like,
I don't know, Pakistan or India or maybe some place that doesn't have an
official religion like Singapore, which I know fairly well. You still want your
Christianity to guide your politics. You still want the the decisions that are
made by your government, the policies that they have to be as godly as
possible. And so to the extent that you are able to act politically, to engage
with things, that's what you're going to be working for. And if that's true in
a situation like that, that in a nation that doesn't have the Christian
heritage that the United States does, then it's going to be that much more true
for living here in the United States. in Romans and in First Peter, it's made
clear that God is the one who set up the government. That doesn't apply only to
the United States. That applies to every government that there is. He's the one
who gives the rulers their responsibility. And since in a democracy, to a
certain extent, we are the rulers, we've got responsibilities there. to punish
the evil and to reward the good and to advance the good. And so that's
something that we have a calling to as Christian citizens.
Ed Bonderenka
Well, that's a good point. We have a responsibility. We are
the rulers. Bill Fetters pointed that out a number of times. And as a
consequence of that, if we sit home in the midterm elections say I'm not
interested in voting, we call ourselves a Christian, we are derelict in our
duty both towards ourselves, our family, and towards God because he's given us a
responsibility and the ability to direct the direction of this nation and
whether we stay a righteous nation or not. Well, we've run out of time. We've
been talking to Jeff Samuelson. He's the author of Walk This Way: Political
Engagement for Bible-Believing Christians. And I'm enjoying reading it. You
should, too. Thanks for joining us, Jeff. I appreciate it.
Jeff Samelson
My pleasure. Thank you so much for having me.
Ed Bonderenka
All right, thank you. Thanks, Derek, for producing.
