I’m a Christian evangelical. To my way of thinking, “Christian” and “evangelical” are synonymous, since a Christian should live a life that bears witness with their attitudes, words, and actions to the good news of Jesus.
Somewhere along the way, though, people came to regard “evangelical” as synonymous with “conservative” and even with “fundamentalist.” Some folks think it’s not possible to be a “liberal evangelical.” Actually, one could make an excellent case that many liberal evangelicals reflect more of the way of Jesus in their ways of thinking, talking, and acting than do many conservative evangelicals.
It’s been interesting to observe how many of my more conservative evangelical sisters and brothers have approached the question of whom to support in recent elections.
When Barack Obama was running for president, lots of folks insisted that he was a Muslim and refused to believe his assertion that he was a Christian. I’m not sure it mattered to them whether he was Christian or Muslim. They weren’t sure which was worse: being a Muslim or being a liberal Christian. They figured that if Obama was a Christian, he wasn’t Christian enough, because he wasn’t their kind of Christian.
I understand that mindset, since I also sometimes judge the reality and quality of someone’s Christianity. Mainly, I’m troubled when a professing Christian seems to exhibit little awareness of what Jesus did and said. We’re supposed to be following him, after all, so I’m suspicious of… [Read more…] about I’m an Evangelical Voter. No, Really …