“Bumper stickers that drive you mad.” -Sam Phillips
Context is everything. I’ve always wanted to put a “Goat Ropers Need Love Too” sticker on the back of my car in Los Angeles, because few people in Southern California would know the requisite backstory to make sense of it. “Like the Car, Not the CEO” doesn’t provide the protection a Tesla needs unless you know the bumper sticker's context. And “Silence is Violence” is a non-sequitur unless you know something about recent politics in the United States.
Artist Charlotte Church recently claimed that “Politics is life.” She is Welsh. The comment was made during a concert in Wales. But the story begins more than 2,000 miles away. Setting aside the possibility that she meant “Life is politics,” her comment has everything to do with that distant, yet narrow, context.
She isn’t speaking about the story of the genocide taking place in South Sudan, more than 4,000 miles away. This conflict is all but hidden to Western eyes. She isn’t talking about the twelve-year war of aggression by Russia toward Ukraine, even though it is much closer to her homeland. No, Church is concerned about a specific conflict that has become a virtue test for Westerners.
But it is narrower still. “Politics is life” isn’t about the plight of the Palestinians in general. It focuses on the conflict between celebrities over how they should use their platform. Church’s comments are an angry retort to Ed Sheeran’s response to an angry comment by Macklemore (aka Benjamin Haggerty) about the Israel/Palestine conflict. Here is what Sheeran said:
“I have tried in my career not to be a political commentator of any kind, because I want my music and shows to be about unity, not division”, he continued. “But this is a humanitarian issue, and I cannot hide how I feel about it anymore.” -Ed Sheeran
He took a side. He took their side. He spoke against the Israeli’s and for the Palestinians. But his first sentence really ticked people off, including Charlotte Church. They swept aside the goal of music bringing people together and argued that celebrities cannot be apolitical. Their art must be political because “Life is politics.”
This seems like a niche celebrity argument. But Church’s statement made a larger splash in the social conversation because of the wider context. The United States is moving rapidly toward its midterm elections. Both the political left and the political right have co-opted her concert comments in Wales about a conflict thousands of miles away as a tool in the arsenal of Democrats and Republicans who want power over the American people for the next two years. What a crazy game! Yet “we the people” talk about this as if it is significant to our lives in Portland, Peoria, or Poughkeepsie.
Jesus followers get sucked into this game. We breathe this air and feel like we have to choose side-Church or side-Sheeran. Don’t do it! Don’t get trapped in this scheme. We serve a much greater story!
When I first heard Charlotte Church’s claim, a particular interaction between Jesus and the politics of his day came to mind. The best-known “slogan” from this story is:
So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” -Jesus
We make sense of this Scripture quote, as with Church’s quote, by knowing the story behind it.
Jesus teachings and actions brought him into conflict with corrupt religious and governmental leaders. They have tried to “deplatform” him before, but their latest strategy to rid themselves of unwanted competition was to offer him a sugar-coated catch-22.
Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words. They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians. “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are. Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay the imperial tax to Caesar or not?” -Matthew 22:15-17
If politics really is life, this was Jesus’ moment. His people lived under the oppressive structures of the Roman Empire. They were taxed about 20% of their income to keep the rulers wealthy. The wealthy Jewish tax collectors who made their money by extracting those funds from their own people were hated and despised. This was Jesus’ opportunity to use his platform to denounce the unjust politics of the day and call the people to rise against this horrendous policy.
The Pharisees were counting on it. But their trap was clever. If Jesus did not speak against his people’s oppression, his silence, as Greta Thunberg recently said about Ed Sheeran, would show a lack of spine and prove his complicity with power structures. Either way, it was a win-win for them. So, how did Jesus respond to this very public question, which posed a lose-lose situation for his platform?
Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?” “Caesar’s,” they replied. Then he said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”
The taxation only got worse after his death. After destroying the Jerusalem Temple in 70AD, the Romans imposed an even heavier tax on the Jewish people. Yet Jesus didn’t miss his opportunity because Jesus’ goal was about something much greater than the political agenda of Greta Thunberg, Charlotte Church, or the Pharisees. He understood life differently, and it saved him.
Jesus lived according to a different story than the social conversation of his day. This context defined his goal. His role in that story was not to increase his political power. It was quite the opposite. He would achieve his mission by dying on the cross.
When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. -John 19:30
It was his death, not political influence, that revealed his higher purpose, not only to the oppressed but to the oppressor Roman soldiers.
And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” -Mark 15:39
Jesus’ goal in Matthew 22 was to outfox his enemies. He needed to escape their trap and keep moving toward Golgotha. His slogan did the trick:
“So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away.
-Matthew 22:19-22
His enemies left, but they weren’t finished. The next opportunity presented itself quickly, and they took it. In the very next story, Jesus ticks off the Sadducees, yet another group of corrupt power players. They then join the Pharisees to create a new opportunity to knock Jesus off purpose. Jesus prevails again and continues to the cross. He was clear on his context. He knew his calling. The slogans representing others' agendas would not distract him.
All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full… - John 10:7-10
As those of us who follow Jesus have learned, he is the way, the truth, and the life.
John puts it this way:
In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. -John 1:4-5
Unless people know Jerry Jeff Walker and his song “Up Against the Wall,” they don’t get the goat ropers joke. Unless you know that running an innovative electric car company and playing a key role in DOGE stirred up a spate of TESLA keying, you can’t understand why “bumper sticker protection” became a thing. Unless people understand the recent political polarization, beginning with Black Lives Matter, it is impossible to understand why people would put such a vacuous phrase as “Silence is Violence” in their front lawn. And unless people know the context behind our commitment to Christ, “Jesus is love,” sounds like another attempt to assert power over others.
When Jesus-followers get caught up in the idea that life is politics, it only confuses our message. Our commitment to Jesus has changed the context of our lives forever. We live according to Jesus' backstory. If our friends and neighbors are going to understand what we are experiencing, we have to be as clever as Jesus. We have to outfox the traps that slogans set for us in the attempt to co-opt our lives.
Take a moment to consider whether you are trapped by the gospel story of politics or the gospel story of Jesus. Only when we are clear-minded about our mission and our context can we be salt and light this election season.
“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. -Matthew 5:13