Damned if you do and damned if we dont..
We are told the following by the world and our leaders
- Church should not be in politics, because there must be a separation between church and state
- Christians should be in politics so that you can be amongst those who make laws
Which should you believe? And can we do?
You can easily see the root of the confusion for Christians. If we get involved, we get vilified by the world for mixing ”church” and ”state” if we do not get involved, we get harangued by fellow Christians of being lazy, unfruitful and impotent in society. Why is this ? What should we do?
Remove the Mask…First!
The argument to separate Church and State, proposes the church as an organization and institution that is not welcome in influencing the political process.
This has successfully ostracised the influence of Christian thought through its institutions. We fell for this trap, we were given the face-mask of ”church” as our main identity, we have not focused on our real identity.
Christians are not a faith, neither are we a religion, WHAT ARE CHRISTIANS?
“Yes we have organisations and institutions, but we are not organisations and institutions”
Eugene Ajayi
Yes we have organisations and institutions, but we are not organisations and institutions. Wearing the identity of a religion is like wearing a red hat in The market square, easy to identify, like a “heat signature” our buildings, events, activities are so obvious, our organisations are mostly registered to the state and regulated by the state.
There is nothing wrong with our organisations complying with our state and national laws however we must understand the limitations and risks of being identified by the world solely as religious institutions and organisations. This makes it easy for Satan our adversary to locate and stump our operations at will. We can see these on Facebook, social media and regular Media, the ridicule and the mockery that the body of Christ faces everyday on account of the activities of the “churches”, ”pastors” and ”Christians”
Contrast this with the days of Jesus, they couldn’t locate Jesus in a building, neither his disciples were easy to spot, stop or eradicate. This is because as the Lord Jesus said to Nicodemus “ the wind blows where it wants, no man where it’s going to or where it is coming from, so is a man born of the spirit” if this is what its supposed to be, why then have we become so predictable, discernible and stoppable by the world?
It is because we have taken on an identity as the “other religion” amongst many others, therefore all it takes to shut us down is to restrict this identity, what if we have another identity that is more powerful and unrestricted?
Christians -Patriots of Christs Nation
We are a spiritual race and culture, the only other race asides from the sons of Adam.
Eugene Ajayi
Christians are a spiritual race and culture, the only other race asides from the sons of Adam. It must be really concerning to the cloud of witnesses who bled and died for us to receive citizenship in Christ to see how we relate to this great heritage, how we have made it a cheap religion rather than a regal occupation of a spiritual bloodline of Christ exercising dominion over the gates of hell in order to actively help other sons of Adam to successfully emigrate and integrate with the kingdom of God.
Christians want to change the world,
Christians are probably the only people group in the whole world who care enough about the world to pray everyday for the world, its people and leadership. Billions of hours of volunteer time is being given everyday across the nations to do good works and speak good words to the citizens of our nations.
The world doesn’t play fair…
The hypocritical government of this world however still allow other organisations and institutions to sponsor and influence decisions under different guises for political, economic, military and ideological interests, whilst they have convinced themselves and ourselves that we dont need to be involved. Even when Christians join politics because they want to change the world, the counter logic of worldly governance and politics incapacitates them.
The outcomes the Christian what to produce relies of the logic of truth, transparency, restoration, self sacrifice, love and care whilst that of the world is based on rhetoric, manipulation, self seeking, extractive ideologies …this means it is hard for a true Christian to survive in such systems except if the nation or system they exist in are built upon principles congruent with the Christs principles.
So what do we do?
Christ calls us as his nation Ekklesia to disciple the nations we exist in or are sent to “Disciple all nations” as a “holy nation and royal priesthood”
How can we as Christians (2 billion + ) then transform the world if we are not allowed to participate in politics?
Kind for kind…
It takes a nation to transform another nation, since they will have similar systems, it becomes easy to transform aspect because they are the same type of entity
Every nation has
- Citizens who express it
- An Authority that defines it
- Laws that regulates it
- Government that facilitates it
- Culture that shapes it
Citizenship & Culture
In order for us to transform the world around us, we need to influence the Citizens of nations (tribes) of Adam, as Citizens of Christs kingdom. Our tool of transformation is the Culture of our Christ who is our Authority
Authority
Our Authority, Christ, has already contended with their Authority (Satan and the gates of hell) and won the rights for us as his ambassadors to “occupy” the spiritual spaces and “recivilise” (I.e disciple) the citizens of the nations to become his own citizens or learn to operate in his own ways on the earth.
This is the basis of our mandate to disciple the nations, (i.e his complete work of redemption that recovered the title deeds to the rest of creation from Satan. So this area is well covered.
Government & Laws
This is the point we struggle, We are trying to change and affect the governmental systems of this world using our “temples” rather than our Ekklesias.
Our places and acts of worship are not able to transform a world that has chosen not to engage in worship, except in worship of its own self. The ekklesia is our own way of legislation, judiciary and excecution in our kingdom…In order for us to transform the context of living and life in the nations we must engage the nations like for like.
Should Christians be in Politics?
Yes! a Christian is a subject of heaven that resides in a real estate owned by his father and king. He exists as an ambassador of Love with his brothers and sisters to persuade men and women to give their allegiance to Christ and adopt his ways. Because he lives in the world he participates in every aspect of life, but his real power is not his vote, nor his ability to stand in a political office, even he should if he could, the Christians power lies in his
- Right to manage outcomes through prayers
- Ability to influence a change of heart that leads to a change of choices
- Capacity to change culture from ground up
Our most effective tool is therefore not socio political, it is spirito-cultural (influencing culture through the spiritual authority conferred to us by our king.) This is with the expression of apostolic Christianity in a location or region that we express in pervasive socio-cultural and socio-economic operations to rebuild stable societies according to Christs principles.
Summary
We are ambassadors in every area of society, including politics, but we should engage with the main aim to touch the hearts, challenge the thinking and help people to change their ways and culture to Christs
We should operate more incarnation-ally within society much more than institutionally, we must exist as a people within the people, a tribe within a tribe, a nation within a nation rather than as a motley of organisations. The world responds to like for like
We need to sort out our governance models for our local and regional colonies in such ways that it facilitates and enhances the kingdom way of life for Christian people. Of course this takes a lot of maturity, but it is achievable
We have good numbers in the world, if we could pay attention to the script we have been handed by our predecessors and do what Christ commanded, we could change the whole world in a few short years …
Someone is asking, can you change the world? Didn’t God say all these bad stuff will happen?
Yes he did, he did say bad stuff will happen, but our job is to still shine and occupy in the midst of the darkness until Christ comes to take us home, and then darkness can have its full sway…. we are authorised to disrupt darkness as much as we want particularly if it helps to draw the people of the nations to come under the spiritual nation and government of Christ.
would love to hear your thoughts
Eugene Bayo Ajayi
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