The Politics of Jesus

Being "political" is so much more than casting a vote.

Years ago I was having lunch with a pastor friend. In between bites of enchiladas, he was busy dispensing advice on how to be a pastor, how to lead a church, and how to effectively preach sermons. I really respected this guy, so I had my phone out and was furiously typing notes when he abruptly stopped talking.

I looked up, half expecting to see his eyes averted to some emergency happening in the restaurant, but he was looking right at me. He said, “Zach, this is the most important advice I can give you so I really want you to pay attention.” I set my phone down on the table. After a very long pause, he said, “Don’t EVER mix Jesus and politics. Never. Ever. Jesus avoided politics and pastors should, too.”

I have decided to completely ignore that advice.

Because despite what you may have heard and what my friend said that day at lunch, Jesus was shockingly political and I believe Christians should be politically engaged, too.

When people feel I’m being “too political” or, more to the point, when they feel I am teaching something that contradicts their preferred party or politician, I’ll get texts or emails with the ever-popular exhortation, “Just preach the Gospel, Zach!” To those folks I simply ask: 

What part of life should the Gospel not affect?

Shouldn’t the Good News of Jesus Christ change everything?

Shouldn’t the Scriptures inform how we live every part of our lives?

Now, to be fair, when people say “just preach the Gospel” or “don’t get political,” I think some of them are really trying to say, “don’t be partisan.” And I would agree with that completely. Jesus never aligned himself fully with any political party, but both Jesus–and the Kingdom he proclaimed–were incredibly political.

We get our word “politics” from the Greek word πολιτικά, meaning “the affairs of the city / the affairs of the people.” Politics are the process of making decisions that affect the everyday lives of people in our cities, our country, and around the world. Politics are all around us. Statements like “just preach the gospel” and “don’t get political” are not only unbiblical, they are unrealistic.

In her book, “The Liturgy of Politics,” Kaitlyn Schiess paints a picture of just how political our lives really are:

Our common life together will always involve the government in some way. When we wake up in the morning, our eyes open in neighborhoods that are determined by politics. The racial and ethnic makeup of our communities aren’t an accident; they are greatly influenced by government decisions about zoning laws and a long history of legal segregation. 

The schools we attend are also implicated—local and national policies affect the opportunities our neighbors have access to. The stores we shop at are governed by policies that protect or neglect workers and businesses. The food we buy is influenced by policies that subsidize or regulate food industries. The cars we drive require gas, an industry with significant political implications for foreign policy and environmental law. 

If we’re truly concerned about our neighbors, then we’ll inevitably come into contact with even more political questions. When we work at a local food pantry, we’re working amidst a number of regulations that determine how nonprofits function. We’re interacting with a problem (poverty) that has varied political causes and solutions. 

When we help local refugee children learn English, we’re sitting across the table from children whose lives have been greatly dictated by politics—the conflicts that harmed them, the way the United States processes refugees, the number we accept, the benefits they can access. When our churches support a prison ministry, they are operating in the web of decades of criminal justice politics. 

Whether or not we even serve in any of these capacities is often determined not just by our own preferences but by the politics determining the proximity we have to any of these marginalized populations. Our lived theology has political consequences.

Not a day goes by where we aren’t affected by politics–we couldn’t completely disengage from them if we wanted to. Not only are politics inescapable for us as human beings, politics are a vital part of what it means to be a Christian. Why? Because Jesus was politically engaged and if we want to faithfully follow him, we should be politically engaged, too. If we try to strip the political implications away from the Good News of Jesus, we create a “gospel” that is unrecognizable from the one Jesus lived and taught.

In the book of Mark, which is widely considered to be the first Gospel account recorded, the first words of Jesus are, “The time has come. The kingdom of God is at hand.”

The word “kingdom” was incredibly political in the first century Roman world. Jesus’s claim that he has come to usher in the “Kingdom of God” was a declaration that the Roman Empire was not of God— and that it was on its way out.

We don’t call political units “kingdoms” anymore so it’s difficult for us to understand just how politically significant the phrase “Kingdom of God” really was. If we update it to modern vernacular we could easily hear Jesus saying, “The time has come. The Government of God or the United States of Jesus Christ is at hand.”

Jesus was making a radical, political statement, and in doing so he launched a very politically-engaged ministry. Obviously his ministry wasn’t only political—it was spiritual and social, too—but my point reminds the same: Saying that Jesus and the Kingdom of God aren’t political is biblically indefensible. 

New Testament scholar Marcus Borg puts it like this: 

In his world, “kingdom” language was political… If Jesus had wanted to avoid the political meaning of kingdom language he could have spoken of the “family” of God, or the “community” of God, or the “people” of God. But he didn’t. He spoke of the Kingdom of God.”

If you aren’t convinced by Jesus’ first words, consider Jesus’ first sermon. At the very beginning of his public ministry, he goes back to his hometown of Nazareth to teach in the synagogue. Here’s what he says in Luke 4:18-21:

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” 

Jesus says he has come to bring freedom and aid to the poor, the prisoners, the sick, and the oppressed. He then says he is going to “proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” This phrase harkens back to a Jewish practice called The Year of Jubilee which occurred every fifty years. During this time, all indentured servants would be freed, all land would be returned to its original owners, and all debts would be canceled.

The Year of Jubilee was a return back to God’s original intent for his world. A place where everyone is completely equal, everyone rests in God’s love, and there is abundant goodness in all things and between all things. Jesus is declaring that he has come to bring the Year of the Lord’s Favor to fruition not just once every fifty years, but every single day, from that moment forward. 

I’m not sure a more political sermon has ever been preached. And this isn’t out of the ordinary for Jesus. In fact, this sermon is the declaration of his mission statement and ministry vision, like a politician returning to her hometown to announce her candidacy and campaign plan. Jesus lays out his mission and then says, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

When Jesus says “good news” at the beginning of the sermon, it’s the word “Gospel.” The word Gospel doesn’t originate with Jesus or even Christianity more broadly; it first became popular because of Caesar Augustus and his Roman Empire. “Gospel” is a political word. 

“Gospel Proclamations” were common in the Roman World. They were sent out to announce a birth in the royal family or the expansion of the Empire. The Roman Empire was huge and ever-expanding, meaning new nations were constantly being conquered and brought under Roman rule.

Most of the time, Caesar’s “Gospel” proclamations meant that yet another nation had been defeated by Rome and another group of people had been enslaved to the Empire. Or it meant that a royal heir had been born who would one day grow up to be yet another cruel dictator. 

The Gospel of Caesar Augustus was "good news” for a really small group of people– the rulers of the Empire. This is where Jesus and God’s Kingdom come in. God decides to co-opt the word “Gospel” for his own purposes. The first two times we see “Gospel” used in Scripture, it’s spoken by angels announcing the birth of Jesus—the most famous being found in Luke 2:9-11:

An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news (gospel) that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.

What is this Gospel Proclamation from the angel? Jesus, God in the flesh, has been born on earth and he has come to offer grace, forgiveness, healing, wholeness, and fullness of life to everyone.

This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And it couldn’t be more different than the Gospel of Caesar Augustus. The Gospel of Caesar was only “good news” for a few people, but the Gospel of Jesus is good news for all people. Under the Gospel of Rome, only the Empire flourished, but the Gospel of God’s Kingdom allows everyone to flourish.

Jesus wasn’t just political, he was directly challenging the political establishments of his time—including the Roman Empire, which was the most powerful political entity the world had ever known. Contrary to popular belief, Jesus was not a centrist. He didn’t “both sides” everything or sit in the uncontroversial middle trying not to upset anyone; he simply refused to conform his life, work, and politics to any earthly or partisan categories. 

Jesus spent his life challenging political powers and pushing back against those who used religion and politics to hurt people. In the end, they killed him for it. The cross was the Roman government’s means to execute political dissidents; they used it because it was so painful and so public that they hoped to deter anyone who witnessed it from the same political rebellion of the one hanging on it.

Let’s recap: Jesus announced his Kingdom calling with a political proclamation, laid out his Kingdom mission with a political agenda, and they eventually tried to end his Kingdom ministry with a political execution. But they couldn’t. Jesus overcame death with life and rose from the grave. Instead of, “Just preach the Gospel and stop being so political,” it seems more appropriate to say, “Don’t preach the Gospel, it’s so political it might get you killed.”

Now that we’ve established the fact that Jesus was politically engaged, what exactly were his politics?

Jesus was famously cryptic, answering questions with questions and telling elaborate stories to make his point. In fact, in the parts of Jesus’ life recorded by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, he was asked 183 different questions. Do you know how many he answered directly? Three.

Just a few days before the end of his life, Jesus is questioned by some religious and political leaders who are trying to trip him up. Matthew 22:35-36 reports: 

One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 

The legal expert is referring to the 613 commandments found in the Jewish Law which we now have in the Old Testaments of our Bibles. He’s asking Jesus to choose which one of these laws is most important in the eyes of God. This feels like a no-win situation for Jesus. Matthew, the narrator, tells us that the legal expert was trying to trap Jesus.

Of the 183 questions he is asked, this seems like the perfect one to dodge, but Jesus doesn’t. He answers it. And he answers it so directly that his answer has come to define what it means to be a Christian more than any other verse in the Bible. Here’s what he says:

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” 

Matthew 22:37-40

Love God and Love Others. This is what’s most important. Jesus even doubles-down on just how far-reaching this commandment is by saying “all the law and the prophets” hang on it. This is Jesus claiming that everything God has ever commanded comes down to this.

Like a door hangs on two hinges, the entirety of the Christian life hangs on Loving God and Loving Others.

These commandments are not only crucial, they are inseparable. If you don’t love others, then you don’t love God. If that sounds harsh, listen to what Jesus’ best friend, John, later writes in the 1 John 4:20-21:

Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister. 

It doesn’t matter how much you claim to love God. You can read the Bible all day and night. You can go on mission trips every summer. You can give 80% of your income to the church. You can pastor the largest congregation in America or write a best-selling Christian book. Without love, Jesus says, it doesn’t matter.  

Simply put: If you aren’t loving others, you aren’t actually loving God.

Back to the Bible. You may have noticed there at the end of John’s passage that he says, “And He has given us this command…” You can probably infer that when John says “He” here he’s talking about Jesus, but I want to show you exactly where this command from Jesus comes from. John records it in his account of Jesus’ life during something called The Last Supper. 

Jesus and his closest friends, the disciples, are sharing the Passover meal together. The disciples don’t know it yet, but this will be the last meal they ever have with Jesus before he is betrayed by Judas, falsely convicted, and executed as a political dissident on the cross. But Jesus knows it’s their last time all together like this, so he takes the opportunity to teach them about some really important things. After they finish dinner, he begins:

“My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and just as I told the Jewish leaders, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come. A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By THIS everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” 

John 13:34-35

Jesus tells his closest friends that he’s leaving– he knows that he’s about to die on the cross, rise from the grave, and go back to God’s space in heaven. So Jesus gives his followers what becomes his final command: Love one another.

When Jesus says, “By THIS everyone will know you are my disciples…” he is using a grammatical device to make a crucial point that we often miss. The word “THIS” is what’s called a “singular demonstrative pronoun.” Demonstrative pronouns are used to demonstrate something. We use them all of the time. When we are trying to teach our children colors, we hold up a blue object and say, “THIS is blue,” a red object and say, “THIS is red.”

Jesus is holding up LOVE and saying “THIS is what it means to follow me.” 

Love is the singular identifying characteristic of being a Christian.

Love is not ONE OF the ways people will know we are disciples of Jesus… it’s THE ONE WAY. And Jesus isn’t talking about some amorphous or indolent version of love. He says we are to love other people the way he loves us. How does Jesus love people? 

Unconditionally and sacrificially. 

Unconditional, sacrificial love is what Jesus did and what he now calls us, as his followers, to do too.

To put it another way:

The politics of Jesus are centered on unconditional and sacrificial love.

In his book, The Politics of Jesus: Rediscovering the True Revolutionary Nature of Jesus' Teachings and How They Have Been Corrupted, Obery Hendricks says:

Today’s political landscape is rife with politicians proudly—and loudly—identifying themselves as Christians. Some of these imply—indeed, some even claim—that their political positions are inspired, if not fully guided, by the teachings of Jesus. Yet we have seen that the politics of Jesus are very different from the partisan politics of politicians. 

Partisan politics are characterized by self-serving deals, unethical compromises, and a thinly veiled selfishness in which all seem to seek only after the good of themselves and those they count as their own, while giving little thought to the well-being of others except as it benefits their personal agendas. Rather than “Love your neighbor as yourself,” the mantra of today’s political culture seems to be “Love yourself and those who are like you.” 

Far too many Christians have traded “love your neighbor as yourself” for “love yourself and those who are like you.” The Christian organization LifeWay conducted a survey which asked Christians, “Who do you hope your presidential vote benefits most?” Almost 70% of people chose themselves or people who are like them. Seventy percent.

Let me be very clear: There is nothing remotely Christlike about political engagement that prioritizes “people like us” over and above everyone else. In fact, using religion and politics to hurt people is what made Jesus so angry that he flipped over tables in the Temple. Following Jesus means pursuing sacrificial love for others in every area of our lives, especially politics. I love how Andy Stanley says it: “Love for God is best illustrated, demonstrated, and authenticated by love for others who are nothing like you and who may not even like you.”

Christians will almost certainly disagree on the best ways to love others and the best policies to help folks in need, but we cannot abandon our calling to sacrificially love all people for a politics built upon ignoring or marginalizing people we don’t like. Or people we disagree with. Or people who are different from us. Beth Moore puts it perfectly: "Love God. Love one another. Love your neighbor. Love your enemy. That about covers it. In Christ’s meticulous census, the community exempt from the love of Christians has a population of exactly zero.” 

As you can see, being political is so much more than casting a vote. If we want to have the politics of Jesus, we must be a people centered upon sacrificial love for everyone and committed to working for justice and peace in our communities.