Recently a friend told me they found the new “Prayer” for our President, then showed me Psalm 109:8 : ” Let his days be few; and let another take his office.” We chuckled, he mentioned that we should definitely not include verse 9 and then the conversation ended. Neither of us have the desire for any sitting president to undergo calamity, nor do we put much stock in reading current political situations into imprecatory psalms. Such an approach to Scripture takes away from the focus on God and onto minuscule political issues.
So, chalking this experience up to just another political joke circulating I went on my merry way not knowing that I should have been outraged…or so says Mr. Brian McLaren.
According to his blog McLaren is “disgusted by the latest absurdity from the religious right…” He’s also “depressed by the lack of courage among Evangelical leaders to speak out strongly against it.” He follows by challenging evangelical leaders to speak out!
I’ll address his challenge first. The reason he won’t have many accepting this challenge is because most evangelical leaders (MacArthur, Piper, Mohler, Sproul, Greening, the divinesatisfaction blog…ok…a bit of a stretch there) are spending their time focusing on rightly dividing the Word of Truth, equipping the saints and evangelizing the world to be overly concerned with trivial political humor no matter if it is done in good or bad taste. I’m pretty sure that this isn’t the first, nor the last time Scripture will be used for political humor. Perhaps…and this is what I hope though it may not be true yet…the so-called “religious-right” has learned that the way to spread the gospel is not through politics, a lesson McLaren and the “religious left” obviously haven’t learned.
But now let me turn to McLaren’s pious “disgust” with the perpetrators of the afore-mentioned political Bible-humor. I have sent McLaren an email asking him to share with me if and when he published his disgust over the condemnatory religious rhetoric spewn forth from the church of Rev. Jeremiah Wright. This to me seems even more serious than the Psalm 109:9 scandal for while most of those who perpetuate that “joke” really wish no harm to the president, Rev. Wright’s hate-filled messages are meant to be extremely serious! Some might say that this isn’t comparing apples to apples. True, but if you’re not outraged by the Wright “apple”, you have no Christian reason to be disgusted by the Psalm 109:8 orange.
But let’s try to find something a bit similar. I also asked McLaren to share with me any comments he may have made about the film about the assassination of President Bush. This is, after all, the crux of the issue. For possibly the first time many non-Christians and liberal Christians are looking at the context of the verse and crying that what the joke is really about is the desire for the death of the President. If he wasn’t “disgusted” by the “absurdity” from the liberal left (McLaren’s political bent) he has no Christian reason to be disgusted by the Psalm 109′ers. After all, the Psalm 109′ers have plausible deniability since they don’t include verse 9.
Another thing strikes me as ironic. McLaren over the past few years has reinvented just about everything within Scripture, from Hell, Paul, the atonement, Christ, God, innerency, etc. It’s obvious that literal interpretation is not something he takes much stock in…so why start with Psalm 109?
If Mr. McLaren has in the past shown outrage over the likes of Rev. Wright and the assassination fetish that the left had both in film and comedy over the past 8 years, then I will gladly grant him his “disgust” over the Psalm 109′ers. But, I still have to ask…why? Aren’t there bigger things than politics? The Bible is going to be misused and abused for every reason under the sun (like supporting candidates who favor the murder of the unborn). Those who find their satisfaction in the God of the Bible must know what these misuses and abuses are, be able to correct them, and then move on!
And, those who find their satisfaction in the God of the Bible must know how to laugh at themselves…and sometimes even their own political ideology.
*edit* McLaren ends his post with “Lord, save us from your followers.” I might amend that to say, Lord, teach us to follow you instead of our favorite political ideology/candidate.”
Me thinks thou dost protest too much.
You have too seriously be looking for ways to criticize my boy, Brian, to protest his protest of what has to be one of the dumbest ways I’ve seen Scripture used. This is bigger than politics. I have nonChristian friends who hate evangelicals and believe they could never be one because of asinine moves like Psalm 109. This kind of stuff hurts my own ministry.
I’m not convinced it’s not about politics since Brian appears to be the lefts version of James Dobson. But if/when Brian responds to my email I’m willing to be corrected…and even post it here.
So…Ps 109 reflects poorly on Christians but Rev. Wright doesn’t? Christians have had to deal with bad press for years…while the Ps. 109′ers may not be helping they can’t make it any worse than it’s been for the past 2000 years.
What I found interesting was Franky Schaeffer’s response to this whole thing (he is the son of Francis Shaeffer, and has publicly repudiated basically everything his father ever stood for). His comment was that because of the Psalm 109 thing, if something happens to Obama, “it will be on their heads”–referring to the religious right.
So…while we are unwilling to ascribe real terrorism to the Muslims who perpetrate it, we are quite willing to ascribe an imaginary assassination attempt to the “religious right”. Sweet.
Having said that, I think it is wrong-headed of believers to use such scripture–even in jest–about a sitting (or, in Obama’s case, globetrotting) US president. I think our prayers for him should be sincere, beginning with the prayer for a true work of Grace in his life–something more than the “Bless and keep the Tsar…far away from us.”