I'm One Fed Up Wise Guy
5 Jan 2008
You remember the Magi, those star-gazers from the East who followed the star to the crib-side of Israel’s newborn King. Like most folks in our modern-day world, the Magi mistakenly believed that Christ would be found in a celebrated place—Jerusalem—rather than a common place—Bethlehem.
When news of these foreign priests’ arrival in Jerusalem began to spread, King Herod, the power-hungry potentate of ancient Palestine, became quite apprehensive. He viewed this newborn King as a threat to his throne; therefore, he invited these visiting Magi into the throne room of his palace in hopes of snookering them into playing a role in a masterful plot of political intrigue.
Assuring the Magi of his “sincere” and “shared” desire to worship the promised Messiah, Herod instructed them to immediately inform him upon their discovery of the Child’s whereabouts. Although he claimed his reason for desiring to know the Lord’s location was to pay Him homage, it was really homicide that was on King Herod’s mind. He didn’t want to worship the Baby Jesus, but to kill the Child, once and for all eliminating his most feared political rival.
Ever since the days of the ancient Magi, power-hungry politicians have attempted to use priests—religious leaders—for their own political ends. They have manipulated many a minister into aiding and abetting them in the elimination of their political rivals and the furtherance of their political careers. Of course, as today’s Republican Party has repeatedly demonstrated, the minute their candidate is elected, church leaders are discarded like last week’s magazine and promises made to pulpits and pews are forgotten faster than church-courting candidates can say oaths of office.
In light of all of this, I couldn’t help but snicker recently when the Associated Press reported that Hillary Rodham Clinton didn’t stay for the sermon in a Des Moines church where she had been invited to speak in the Sunday morning service. Equally surprising, at least to the Associated Press, was Barack Obama’s skipping out of church immediately after delivering his stump speech to Sunday morning pew-sitters. Why anyone, especially a news service, would be either surprised by this or consider it newsworthy is beyond me. I’ve known for a long time that the only interest politicians have in churches is to utilize their microphones and manipulate their members; certainly not to listen to anything their ministers have to say.
The same politicians that want to speak in our churches during political campaigns want all of our churches bound and gagged during every campaign season. If you doubt this, just consider Congress’ resounding defeat of the Houses of Worship Political Speech Protection Act in 2002. This legislation, which was proposed by Rep. Walter Jones and designed to undo our government’s infringement on our churches’ freedom of speech, was soundly defeated by a vote of 178-239.
Most Americans are unaware of the fact that the law forbidding churches from endorsing political candidates is fairly new. It only dates back to 1954, when Lyndon Johnson, a vengeful politician miffed over some nonprofit organizations’ opposition to his reelection to the United States Senate, retaliated by sponsoring and pushing through legislation to gag all nonprofits in future elections by threatening to revoke their tax exemption status. Ever since, nonprofit organizations, including churches, have been silenced and scrutinized by the IRS due to the chip “Landslide Lyndon” once had on his shoulder.
Politicians don’t care to hear what preachers have to say; in fact, they’ve proposed and passed legislation to gag us and prevent us from saying anything. The fact that they don’t care to stick around long enough to hear the Sunday sermon shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. While politicians love to feign being one of us so as to get before us and deliver their stump speeches to us in hopes of winning support from us, they really don’t care about the concerns and convictions of churches and their clergymen.
Although I can’t speak for all of today’s “Magi,” I can speak for myself, and I’m one “wise guy” who’s tired of being used as a pawn by present-day politicians. That’s why my pulpit is off-limits to politicians. Instead, it is reserved exclusively for those who possess Christ, not merely profess Him, and who use it to draw people to the cross, not to the polls. I, for one, am highly offended by modern-day Herods who incessantly mistake me for some credulous Magi.
Don Walton
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