Which Side Are You On?

The other day I read an article on CNN by John Blake that made several accurate observations about how political persuasions tend to see Jesus as on their side. The title asked the question: "Do you believe in a Red State Jesus or a Blue State Jesus?" (Click the title to read). Blake is right about how some will respond to election results. Some will say "thank you Jesus" while others will say "help me Jesus". The author is correct when he says: "...in Christianity, liberals and conservatives choose to see Jesus in different ways. Some liberals see Jesus as a champion of the poor who would support raising taxes on the wealthy, while some conservatives think Jesus would be more concerned with opposing abortion and same-sex marriage." He rightly identifies a huge problem. Whatever our position, we want Jesus on our side. But that is where we get off track. In Joshua 5, The Israelites are approaching Jericho when Joshua encounters the Commander of the Lord's army and asks: “Are you for us or for our enemies?” “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?” (Joshua 5:13-14) Jesus is not on the Red side, nor is he on the Blue side. Jesus is on his own side. The question is are you on his side or your own side? There really are only two sides in the world that a person can be on. We are not free to put Jesus on our own team by repainting Jesus according to our ideological colors. This is where John Blake gets off track. He does not want to believe that Jesus was clear about this matter. 

My four year old has a hard time pedaling his bicycle and gets frustrated with the bike itself. The idea that the problem is user error is unthinkable. Blake claims  Jesus' earliest followers were confused over his teachings and backs up this claim by quoting Molly Worthern from UNC Chapel Hill. Both imply that knowing Jesus' positions on things is next to impossible (which is nonsensical B.S.) The problem was Jesus! If only he had been more clear then we would not have this problem. Yea right!  First, Jesus was very clear about his mission, his teachings were not only clear but further expounded on by his Apostles. The misunderstandings are user error through and through. Truth is we do not want to hear what Jesus really has to say or see what he has to show us. We choose to see what we want to see, whether its a blue Jesus or a red Jesus or a colorless Jesus which seems to be the Jesus both Blake and Worthern "choose" to see. Yes they are as guilty as the Red and Blue people of painting Jesus in whatever color suits their tastes. But we all are guilty of this, myself included. 

The concern over the political color of Jesus is not nearly as much of an issue as the color Jesus paints us. In John 7:7 Jesus said: "The world...hates me because I testify that its works are evil." The red people say he is speaking about the Blue people and the Blue people say he is speaking about the Red. Let's take it a step further just to juice it up. Americans will read this and believe he is talking about Communists, or the Chinese or Al-Qaeda. Let's not forget the well-educated professors of religion and religion journalists of the world - they just dismiss all of the fuss and say we cannot ever know the truth. Notice though all of these positions have one common thread. Somehow Jesus is never a real challenge to them personally? Therein lies the real problem. Who did Jesus come to confront for their evil deeds? Was it the Romans? Was it the religious leaders? Was it the rich? Was it the poor? Was it the outcasts? Was it the social elite? Jesus confronts ALL of us. Jesus testifies against everyone, everywhere that their deeds are evil. According to Jesus, we are all the same color. (Was that unclear somehow?) 

His main beef with us is not what we think it is (whatever you are thinking you are probably wrong!) His main beef with us is described for us in Romans 1. "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools..." (Romans 1:21-22) He testifies that our deeds are evil - even our best deeds are evil. Even the best Philanthropist among us is evil at the core. Jesus' beef with us personally is that we deny his testimony. We say he is not speaking about our evil deeds because we are not evil! We are among the good folks of the world. The red people say, "We're not evil, we're against abortion and gay marriage. God is on our side!" The blue people say, "We're not evil, we're for helping the poor and safeguarding people's rights to live how they choose. God is on our side." Jesus comes and complicates our lives by demanding we admit something we are not prepared to admit. First he makes it clear he is on nobody's side but his own and that the only other option is to be against him. There is no middle ground. He offers all of us an opportunity to agree with him that our deeds are evil, to confess our evil deeds and to turn away from them.  When we do this we are swearing our allegiance to him as our King and Lord. Clear so far?

Two things happen when we do this: first, we see for the first time that the Red and Blue people all had a few things right and many things wrong. We no longer look at the world through red, blue or tie-dyed lenses. We see how foolish we were to try and make Jesus the champion of our cause rather than see he calls us to participate in his own cause of which he is the champion. The second thing is we realize that being in allegiance with Jesus means now the world is against us because we testify that its deeds are evil. We don't do this out of arrogance (at least we're to supposed to) but out of love for we want everyone to know how wonderful it is to be on Jesus' side.