At last night’s GOP Convention, Ben Carson made the following claim:
“The secular progressive agenda is antithetical to the principles of the founding of this nation,” Carson continued. “And if we continue to allow them to take God out of our lives, God will remove himself from us. We will not be blessed, and our nation will go down the tubes. And we will be responsible for that. We don’t want that to happen.”
I must admit that before the election, I had respect for Ben Carson because he seemed like a person of sound moral character and deep religious faith. Perhaps he is. Either way, I don’t agree with much of what he appears to believe. What he said last night is a common belief among some conservatives. But theologically, Ben Carson is dead wrong.
It is entirely unclear to me how we can allow someone to take God out of our lives. Since when is the God of Christianity, who is all-knowing, all-powerful, and perfectly good, at the mercy of a particular group of human beings? Is it really the case that if someone is attempting to take God out of American public life, then God will withdraw himself from our nation?
Usually these kinds of claims are made with select quotes from the Old Testament, such as 2 Chronicles 7:14, “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. (NIV)” Of course, the problem is that this is addressed to the people of Israel, God’s chosen people who are to show and tell people about His redemptive love and mercy. The United States of America is not the nation this verse is addressing. We are not God’s chosen people. The city on a hill is not the United States, it is the church of Jesus Christ.
But are passages like this one relevant at all to Christians? I think in at least one way, they are. Christians should seek to be humble, they should pray and turn away from evil. We are forgiven in Christ. The healing that comes when we do this will inevitably spread to those around us as we embody and advance the kingdom of God.
The mechanism of positive social change is not ultimately the Republican party; it is not the Democratic party; it is not any political party. For followers of Christ, the mechanism is the church. When so many who profess to believe in and follow Christ are casting their lots with Donald J. Trump, and placing their hope in him and what they believe he will do for our nation, it is high time we realized that this is foolishness and folly. If we want social change, and if the target of that change is a just nation, then many of us are simply choosing the wrong path.
Ben Carson is wrong. God won’t remove himself from us because of some secular progressive agenda. But when we move away from God and replace him with nationalistic fervor, fear, isolationism, prejudice, and even hate, we shouldn’t be surprised to find that He seems absent.