When God’s Grace Is Not Enough
It’s an understatement to say that we’re on edge in these few final days before Election Day. Regardless of your political persuasion, you’ve probably felt victimized and underdogged at some point during this absolute dumpster fire that we’re calling 2020. It came as no surprise when I saw a local blogger, in the ever-positive, sunshine-and-chai-latte way that local bloggers can be, post this:
Who you vote for does not change how much you are loved by God.
The blogger is certainly not the first to apply this salve to a wounded Christian, longing for reassurance and comfort. I can certainly understand the sentiment, and have to say I’d love to feel the warmth of these well-intended words.
Unfortunately, I’m here to say that such reassurance and comfort are hollow. When I responded to this person and explained why relying on God’s grace to comfort a conflicted voter created a false equivalence, the blogger said that the point was that God’s love is unchanging. I left it there because I don’t know this blogger personally, and didn’t want to wage the war in an environment like the social media comments section, where negativity reigns.
Like it or not, our ability to participate in government at virtually every level is tantamount to religion in America. Much like the new life a Christian receives in salvation, we call it freedom, but ultimately, it is not — it is a duty, a responsibility, and a service to our neighbors that we recognize what’s working and eradicate what’s not. We are tend towards things that destroy us, and we must practice otherwise to succeed in the ways that so many have before us.
God’s grace is big and beautiful, but it does not allow a person to make decisions that are incongruent with the Spirit. In moments of discernment, God’s grace is not enough. We have the responsibility to act in the face of inustice. As I let the conversation stew for a few days, one verse came back to me over and over:
What then shall we say? Shall we continue in sin, so that grace may abound? Surely not!
It seems counterintuitive for the average American to think that voting for one person or the other could be considered a sin — after all, we’ve been told it’s all politics, and that “the other” is the one who has it wrong. But let’s think about it in that youth-group, midrashic tradition where we go back to the text. Historically, “sin” is an archer’s term for missing the mark. An archer who aims for the bullseye and misses has “sinned.” With this understanding, our intentions are not the only thing to consider. If we aim for justice, but land on self-proclaimed law & order, we have sinned. If we aim for peace, but land on whatever the fuck we’re in now, we, most certainly, have sinned.
There are a few things from the Bible that can feel antiquated, but it takes just a moment’s thought to re-contextualize them and see how very true the stories are. Lepers are not a common problem in this first-world, 21st century lifestyle. We don’t encounter widows as often as Paul would have in his travels. Kings are a far cry from our minds. But when we realize that a leper of old is today’s underinsured man with an autoimmune disorder, or that a widow is in the same situation as a single mom working entry-level jobs to keep food on the table for her kids, then suddenly, the teachings of these first-century heroes become much more tangible. These are the people we have to act for, because we have the capacity and compassion to do so.
Most of the people who read this will be middle class, probably white, with the disposable income that allows for things like vacation and new cars every few years. When we vote, we’re more concerned with things like stocks, because we think that’s what “the economy” is, and what our retirement packages will look like if this President does this or this Supreme Court decision does that. But as a middle-class Christian, those luxury items are essentially unchanging. What’s at stake for us does not compare to what is at stake for the “least of these.” We have more urgent fires to put out.
So when this blogger says that “Who you vote for does not change how much you are loved by God,” it is technically true, but practically useless. We should not give ourselves the room to make such an egregious error, when it means the widow will be separated from her child and the leper will go without care. There are not two solutions to this problem.
