Trump’s New Faith Initiative and the Hidden Danger for Churches

Jim Denison

President Trump is forming a task force led by Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate the “targeting” of Christians. The task force will be directed to “immediately halt all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government.” He has also signed an executive order establishing a White House Faith Office “to assist faith-based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship in their efforts to strengthen American families, promote work and self-sufficiency, and protect religious liberty.”

President George W. Bush similarly established the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partners in 2001. President Barack Obama continued but renamed the office in 2009.

A White House initiative to encourage faith-based efforts as they seek to strengthen our nation is both a good idea and a bad idea. The implications of both extend far beyond Washington and touch every soul in America today.

Why Democracy Is “a Rare and High Achievement”

Carson Holloway is a political science professor at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. In a fascinating, in-depth article for the Heritage Foundation, he describes the crucial role of religion in creating and sustaining America’s democracy. He frames his argument through the insights of French political philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville’s monumental study, Democracy in America.

According to Tocqueville, political freedom requires a moral foundation that only Christianity could supply with its claim that humans are equal before God. Such equality rejects rule by kings or autocrats, calling instead for self-rule that requires democracy. He noted that the Puritans, with their self-governing churches (as opposed to European churches governed by the state or the crown), further reinforced America’s impetus toward self-government.

And Tocqueville recognized that democracy’s inherent tendency to foster individualism, materialism, and democratic despotism requires the restraining moral impulses of Christian morality.

According to Holloway, Tocqueville noted:

Popular self-rule, government by the people, is not the ordinary tendency of things but instead a rare and high achievement. Most societies in history have not attained it. The Americans were able to achieve and sustain it because of their virtuous habits of public-spirited attention to the affairs of the community, and their religion was necessary to sustain those virtues and therefore necessary to America’s claim to political greatness.

You can see why a governmental effort to “assist faith-based entities” as they strengthen our nation logically serves the cause of democracy.

When the Choir Outnumbered the Congregation

Here’s the first problem to beware: It is the witness of history that when the church relies on the state, the church becomes weaker and more controlled by the state.

To make my point, you need only visit the great cathedrals of Europe, most built by churches with funds provided by their state sponsors, most now virtually empty on Sunday. I have attended worship services in the UK where the choir outnumbered the congregation.

When churches do not need to grow institutionally by reaching people with transformative messages and relevant ministries, many will not do the hard work of crafting and sharing such messages and ministries. They will inevitably measure success by the opinions of their current members rather than by their impact on the lost and the larger society, keeping their “salt” in the saltshaker and their “light” under the basket (Matthew 5:13–16).

This is not to say that governmental efforts to protect religious followers from discrimination are unwelcome or that church and state can never partner effectively. But it is to say that the church must never become dependent on the state or lose its focus on the lost.

Jesus founded the church for the purpose of attacking the gates of hell (Matthew 16:18). When we are not doing so, we are not the church. We can be a religion, an institution, or an organization, but we are only the church when we are taking Christ into the world.

William Temple was right: “The church is the only organization that exists primarily for the benefit of those who are not its members.”

“Man Is Born to Trouble as the Sparks Fly Upward”

The first challenge leads to the second: Christianity can best serve democracy not as a religion but as a relationship.

Tocqueville is right in principle: The theological assertion that people are equal before God, along with self-governing churches and the guidance of biblical morality, have been vital to the development of American democracy.

But Christianity as a religion is not enough. Its ultimate purpose is to lead people into a transforming personal relationship with Christ. Theological assertions, church attendance, and biblical teachings are means, not ends.

“Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward” (Job 5:7). If we are honest, we must all say with David, “My iniquities have gone over my head; like a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me” (Psalm 38:4).

Paul confessed, “I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing” (Romans 7:18–19). I’m glad he wrote these words, since they assure me that I’m not alone when I struggle spiritually. At the same time, I’m sorry he wrote them: If even the great apostle faced such struggles, what hope do I have?

Just this: “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Corinthians 3:17). Freedom from self and freedom from sin. When we turn to the Spirit, asking him to control and empower us (Ephesians 5:18) and worshiping the living Lord Jesus as the Spirit leads us, then “we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

When We Are Like Jesus

Think of it: You and I can be “transformed” into the image and character of Christ himself (cf. Romans 8:29). Not by a religion about Jesus but by an intimate relationship with him.

And when we are like Jesus, we cannot help impacting our nation for God’s glory and the greater good. We cannot help loving our Lord and our neighbor in ways that lead our neighbor to love our Lord (Matthew 22:37–39).

So, for the sake of our nation and your soul, may I ask you: Are you more like Christ today than you were yesterday?

If not, why not?

Quote for the Day:

“There is no country in the world in which everything can be provided for by laws, or in which political institutions can provide a substitute for common sense and public morality.” —Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

Jim Denison, PhD, is a cultural theologian and the founder and CEO of Denison Ministries. Denison Ministries includes DenisonForum.org, First15.org, ChristianParenting.org, and FoundationsWithJanet.org. Jim speaks biblically into significant cultural issues at Denison Forum. He is the chief author of The Daily Article and has written more than 30 books, including The Coming Tsunami, the Biblical Insight to Tough Questions series, and The Fifth Great Awakening.