Jesus Was a Liberal (And Other Irreverent Thoughts About Discipleship)

Emphasis on the past tense verb…Jesus was a liberal.  But that doesn’t mean he’s now a conservative either.  This is a post that’s been building for a few weeks.  Several weeks ago I had an interview at a church for a youth pastor position.  One of the questions I was asked is “Are you liberal or conservative?”  I responded buy saying that I don’t like those terms because their too subjective and divisive.  ”I just try to be as faithful and consistent with Scripture as I can?”  The committee apparently didn’t like that answer because they followed it up with “Would you consider yourself open-minded or closed-minded?”  Honestly, I really didn’t know how to respond to such a question.

In a recent tweet, I stated “becoming more & more confused about what it means to be conservative or liberal & why it matters…”

And then in the article I re-posted entitled “God Hates You,” the author makes this statement:

I have always found it supremely odd that most Christians, when pressed, will admit that they don’t care very much how Jesus lived his life, or the theology he lived out or spoke of, but they claim “salvation through his ’substitutionary’” death.

All this added together and I find myself really confused about the situation in most of evangelical America.  How did the American church get to the point of considering it more important to be liberal or conservative than to simply be a follower of Jesus?  The really disturbing part of the whole thing: those who genuinely strive to understand Jesus’ message, teachings, and life are often the victims of ostracization from both sides.  A while back I was talking to another church planter who was relaying his struggles with people in his fledgling congregation who were perpetually pushing his to come down on one side of the fence or the other.  He was emphasizing walking in Jesus’ footsteps and committing to the life of a disciple, and certain members of the church couldn’t get over the fact that they didn’t know if he was a liberal or conservative.  Why?!?!  What does it matter?!?!

If we’re not striving to live as a disciple of Jesus, then we’ve completely missed what it means to be a Christian.  Discipleship goes well beyond the actions we perform – that’s legalism.  It also has far more meat than simply affirming that Jesus was a wise Jewish teacher.  The reality that most of us miss (myself included) is that to be a disciple of Jesus is to be held to a completely different set of standards in which the terms “liberal” and “conservative” gravely miss the mark.  Jesus came to perfectly uphold and fulfill the Law (Mt. 5:17-18), yet he also saved an adulteress from the prescribed punishment (Jn 8:10-11).  To take a cue from “God Hates You,” how is it that so many good, conservative Christians can be opposed to virtually every governmental policy aimed at providing for the less fortunate among us when Jesus plainly declared, “whatever you did not do for the least of these, you did not do for me” (Mt. 25:45) – a statement that seems to clearly expect all who hear to go out and do whatever they can to care for everyone else.  Jesus’ biggest opponents were the Pharisees and Sadducees, the religious and social conservatives of the day…

Jesus was a liberal – he is still a radical who actively seeks to overturn every opinion, conviction, belief, political persuasion, and relationship not rooted in the will of God.  Jesus was a liberal in the sense that actively worked to change things, to challenge the status quo, to force people to do things way outside the box of norm for his day.  And during his life, he created far more tension for us than he resolved.  And I think ultimately it’s our uncomfortability with that tension that pushes many of us to pick a side of the fence.  It’s too hard to balance on a rail, so we opt for falling off one way or the other.  And as a result as prohibit ourselves from having a beer or dancing because those can lead to other more dangerous and immoral acts, or we march for gay marriage and abortion because “love covers over a multitude of sins.”  It’s either one way or the other…and it’s easier than having just one drink or trying to explain why we love our co-worker unconditionally but can’t support the civil ceremony she and her partner are having over the weekend in Massachusetts.

The thing is Jesus defies logic – he always has.  And the really freaky part is that he commissioned his followers to be like him and make more people like that (“make disciples of all nations” [Mt. 28:19]).  For the person who’s #1 concern is to be a disciple of Jesus – to take up their cross – doesn’t live according to the categories of the world; they live according to the cross…

Filed under: Christian Living, Christianity, Culture, Discipleship