Christian Idolatry?

I don't do it much, so give me a moment to make a political comment this Friday.

I gotta throw out a "yikes" concerning the current woes the Bush White House is facing. Tough stuff. From the withdrawal of Harriet Meirs' Supreme Court nomination to the possible indictments of administration officials, Dubya has seen better days. These could be a couple of rough weeks for the President, that might tarnish his image and legacy.

Never before have I seen conservative Christians embrace a President in such a way. I don't think Reagan was as highly revered during his admission as Bush is currently. All you have to do is walk through a Berean Christian bookstore and observe the books [plural] describing the current President's Christian faith. It's almost as if we Christians were marketed his faith, told that he was "one of us." And I think we bought it. I've been in multiple churches in the past five years that, at the top of their church's prayer list, was the plea to pray for President Bush. Interesting that I don't remember seeing "pray for President Clinton" on any prayer lists in the 1990's.

Politics is a dirty business and it's virtually impossible to involve yourself in it without getting some slop on you [as the old joke goes, "politics" is derived from two Latin words: "poly" meaning "many," and "tics" meaning "blood sucking insects"]. Now, as miscalculations and improprieties start to come forth, how do Christians who allied themselves with the President synthesize his mistakes with their faith?

Don't get me wrong here: I'm not questioning the President's faith. But I am, once again, questioning how involved people of faith should get in our current political system. It's just not worth the mess. And, even more than that, we need to constantly be careful how closely we align our faith with people instead of Jesus. People are flawed, Jesus isn't. The higher we lift up people, the farther they have to fall.

And, if you have sound theology, you'd agree that Jesus is alive. It's not as if we need anyone else. So we do we set-up ourselves for disappointment by worshipping people?