Love of Money, Love of Power
Originally published May 23, 2015
Scripture says that “the love of money is the root of all evil.”
I think we can amend that today to “the love of power is the root of all evil.”
Christians today (I speak as a Christian here mostly to Christians) have a terrible temptation in America to use the power of the government to compel some actions and forbid others.
We gained great political power by aligning with the Republican Party. We’ve managed to re-criminalize abortion after 1973’s Roe v. Wade decision. We’ve managed to destroy the social safety net at the state and federal level. We’ve managed to remove the ability to vote from “those” people (Black Americans, mainly, but also the poor and elderly) who inconveniently vote for Democrats (A.K.A. “The Party of Satan”). We have been snookered into supporting war, supporting abuse, supporting injustice, supporting violence, supporting greed, supporting oppression, because gosh darn it, we make it a crime to smoke weed or to take recreational drugs, to watch pornography, to marry whom you love despite a religious difference. We’ve managed to get what we think are “Christian” values enforced through the power of the state merely by selling our own souls to the devil.
I can’t imagine Jesus would be smiling as his followers vote to take away food from the poor. I can’t imagine Jesus smiling as his followers push the homeless and the hungry away. I can’t imagine Jesus smiling because his followers use the sword of Caesar to ensure that only the peculiar feelings of some Christians become the doctrines and rules all must follow at the pain of prosecution.
Well, it never works, marrying the kingdom of God to the kingdom of Caesar. In every age it’s tried, and in every age, it fails, and in every age it brings disrepute to the Church, to faith, and to God Himself.
The most recent example is how the right wing and the Christian church were married in order to deny marriage to same-sex couples. We have had many leaders of faith stand up to say “Same-sex marriage is an evil that will cause God to destroy America!” And we’ve had much hue and cry over this issue.
And now the blowback is coming. The latest is the revelation that the Duggar family, held up as the “perfect Christian family,” has a child molester in their family. Josh Duggar, the eldest, has confessed to his actions of molestation to several of his own sisters as well as to at least one non-family member.
Luckily for the Duggars (but not so much for justice and truth), the crime wasn’t investigated until after the statute of limitations have passed, there were no charges filed, and the records were destroyed just yesterday.
So Josh Duggar escapes.
But he has been at the forefront, as have the Duggars themselves, of those “Christians” saying that granting civil rights to our gay, lesbian, bi, trans, and queer brothers and sisters would lead to gross immorality.
Pot, meet kettle.
We Christians went for the power to stop others from living out lives that do not concern us. The Duggar family was in the front of a campaign to take away civil rights from Arkansan citizens because of imagined immorality.
That is hubris, and it caught up with them, and it is catching up to all of us who try to say, “The Christian church must demand the government follow the rules of a sectarian faith.”
There are those who might need the comfort and healing of the gospel, but these actions, and their blowback, will push them away from a true encounter with the living God. Those people can see how those of us who “know” God act, and their reaction is now to say “no, thanks.”
Thanks, Duggars. Thanks, Christians who have allowed this to happen. Thanks, Christians, who are marching lockstep with the Duggars now, excusing their actions as a family in covering this up and denying it happened.
You’ve again defamed the gospel and maligned the grace of God, turning it into an excuse to hide what you did.
You did it because you wanted power over others. And it failed, and now we all must clean up the mess you created.