In the late fall of 2020, Shelly and I were discussing how one could be a Christian and support the Democrat Party since the party stands for everything that opposes Biblical Christianity, including abortion, marriage rights, the Bill of Rights, family values, personal responsibility, et. al.
We decided to contact her Uncle because he is a devout Christian and a socialist member of the Democrat party. We gave him a call, and his answer to us was, that he is rooting for the left in order to re-strengthen the right.
I really don’t know what he meant by that, and I wasn’t very satisfied with his answer.
He sent me an article a few days later about how Adam Kinzinger was defying both his Republican party and his Church (Kinzinger is a member of a Baptist church).
The article was from The Atlantic and was about how noble Kinzinger was to do the right thing by opposing Trump and how it was causing strife with his membership in the Republican party and in the Church.
My initial reaction was the piece was a bit too dramatic, but I read the entire article and took notes with the intention of responding to Shelly’s Uncle’s gesture of sending me the piece. I assumed he wanted my thoughts on the matter.
One year later, I never wrote the letter back to him, so I’ll write a summary here.
Adam Kinzinger believes the Devil’s ultimate trick for Christianity is to embarrass the church. He is mistaken. The Devil’s ultimate and most powerful tool is distraction. He uses it all the time, both in the Church and in the World. If the Devil can distract you from what you truly need to focus on, you won’t focus on the thing truly needing your attention. According to Kinzinger, Trump is a tool of the Devil to make the church look foolish.
The Devil’s ultimate and most powerful tool is distraction.
However, The foolishness of God is wiser than the wisest man. Obviously, the impetus to focus on Trump the man is not good for the country, and evangelicals insisting on the man rather than the rule of law isn’t good to see either. But to imply that somehow the devil won’t embarrass the Church at every turn is an absolute fantasy. Logic and reason have been tossed out by our current culture. Merely speaking the truth—merely by speaking the Word of God Himself to the public—will be used as a point of shame against the Church in this current culture, and that can’t be ignored. Consider the problems caused by Max Lucado speaking at the National Cathedral recently.
Kinzinger concludes Christians have lost a lot of moral authority because they supported Trump and spoke of conspiracies. Again, I think his insights are misguided. If he were wise, he would expect the world to destroy the reputation of the Church and strip away “moral authority” from the Christians. It isn’t just the Christians that have lost moral authority, though; it is anyone who espouses any truth as it is taught in the Scriptures.
His conclusion that his Faith and his party have been poisoned by conspiracy theories and lies is a misguided, unwise conclusion as well. I don’t believe the election was stolen. In the end, the federal process played out exactly as it is supposed to according to the rule of law according to the Constitution. The election was not stolen at the federal level, and no right-thinking person really believes it was.
What is being challenged is impropriety and monkey-business at the local level. If a little-league game were scored by a biased electronics technician who rigged the scoreboard to display a score in favor of his child’s team, no one would say “the game was stolen!” Neither would anyone allow the impropriety to go uncorrected, either. Once the final score is entered into the record books, though, it’s entered. I’ve always been struck by Isaac not taking back the blessing from Jacob. Jacob didn’t steal the blessing from Esau. Esau despised the blessing by “selling” it to Jacob and then Jacob received it legitimately and sincerely from Isaac. Once Isaac had blessed Jacob, and he was made aware of what had occurred, he didn’t claim that Jacob stole Esau’s blessing, he merely accepted that it had been received by his younger son.
Rand Paul voted to accept the electoral results while at the same time saying some hanky-pankey was going on at the state level. This isn’t saying the election was stolen. Kinzinger may very well have the same viewpoint as Paul on this matter, but the reporting from The Atlantic doesn’t make that distinction. It goes along with the buzzwords. That’s not a centric approach to what happened, and it is that kind of rhetoric that makes a conservative like me raise an eyebrow at The Atlantic. When you use buzzwords, you have an agenda, and that agenda is not a mere reporting of facts.
When you use buzzwords, you have an agenda, and that agenda is not a mere reporting of facts.
Kinzinger and the other Republicans who voted to impeach Trump were treated like some sort of Judas who traded Trump for political 30 pieces of silver. It is true that Trump supporters had set up Trump as an Antichrist. It’s honestly kind of scary. On the other hand, I don’t think the media did a very good job of NOT setting Trump up as an Antichrist. They make him and his supporters more and more powerful with all of the hatred they spew toward him AND his supporters.
The media are the ones who orchestrated Trump’s speech as an insurrection and have held up Kinzinger and his fellow pro-impeachment members as heroes. There was no insurrection; there was no call for violence. Kinzinger, as a Christian and as a Republican, is only being praised by The Atlantic because he doesn’t talk or act like a Christian or a Republican. He acts and talks like a left-leaning, secular moderate.
Kinzinger is bothered by the idea that “… every little political victory that we do that has an impact on an election is actually fighting for God and the truth.” This bothers me as well. The Church would do well to remember that we are united in Christ, and the Church’s business should be about delivering Christ in Word and Sacrament to sinners for the forgiveness of sins. The Church should not be about PACs. This doesn’t mean that members of churches shouldn’t be part of PACs, and their being members of the body of Christ SHOULD influence what decisions they make.
Kinzinger’s decision to encourage Vice President Pence to invoke the Twenty-Fifth Amendment and remove Trump from office makes it appear as if Kinzinger cares more about the Republic than he does the truth. A Christian should care more about the truth.
Kinzinger cares more about the Republic than he does the truth.
In the article, Kinzinger said, “Our time on earth is not going to be that long compared to eternity.” He’s right, and it is my belief that Christians in places of governmental authority should spend that brief time on earth stopping babies from being murdered and children from being trafficked instead of debating the finer points of how murdering a child vs not murdering a child might be politically expedient.
In the entire article on Kinzinger, his Christianity, and his party, what is never explicitly addressed is that politics and government are NOT the answer to our problem at hand. There is a distinction between the two Kingdoms, and within the kingdom of the left hand, there are many factions, but moving from one faction to another doesn’t mean you are suddenly in the kingdom of the right hand.
Adam Kinzinger is first and foremost a politician. He plays a theatrical game. Just like everyone on “the screen,” he is an actor.
He is not to be trusted, believed, or looked up to by anyone living in the real world like you and me.
