OPINION:
The United States has a trust problem.
Pew Research data suggests, “just 20% [of Americans] say they trust the government in Washington to do the right thing just about always or most of the time.” While the lack of trust in government is often (and rightly) viewed as a problem, Christians should not be overly surprised to see our nation fraying at around the edges. Nations have pre-determined lifespans and boundaries (Acts 17:26).
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Christians must take care to avoid nostalgic notions that direct our vision to “better times.” Those times were broken in their own unique ways. While there is great benefit in understanding the past, there is seldom value in glamorizing it. Learning from history is different than pining after it.
Yet, if we become fixated on preserving our nation rather than building God’s kingdom, we run the risk of looking back to find our utopia rather than looking forward with hope for the new heavens and new earth.
If we focus on our eternal hope and salvation, we will recognize that distrust in the government is not just a problem but an opportunity. It is, on some level, a recognition that the political systems on which we depend are more fragile than we normally like to admit. As people begin to recognize they have built a house on sand, they need to be able to look around them to see women and men who are standing firm having built a house on a rock.
To do so, we need to remember that the causes of distrust are often driven by corruption and discord, but they are also the fruit of the political realm’s fundamental limitations. No government is capable of completely restraining human evil or offering security sufficient to stave off poverty or prevent the devastation of things like natural disasters. No policy effort, judicial ruling, or enforcement measures can address the problem of the human heart.
In a recent Washington Post article, “American Democracy is Cracking,” Dan Balz and Clara Ence Morse acknowledge certain limitations of the government.
“What’s broken is the will of those in power to see past the divisions enough to reach compromise,” they wrote. “In more routine ways, the political system feeds frustration and discontent with its incapacity to respond to the public’s needs.”
Balz and Morse claim these to be the culprits for America’s ills: polarization, the perceived gap between public policy and public opinion, the difficulty of amending the U.S. Constitution, and the disproportionate influence of a minority of Americans exercised through the electoral college process, equal representation of each state in the Senate, and majority votes necessary to confirm supreme court justices.
All of these factors (and more) may well be specific causes contributing to distrust in America; however, they aren’t the ultimate cause of that distrust.
Gallup poll data suggest that the distrust extends well beyond the government. Forty percent or more individuals reported having “very little” or no trust in banks (73 percent), newspapers (45 percent), the criminal justice system (45 percent), television news (50 percent), and big business (43 percent). The percentage of those who said they have “very little” or no trust in the church or organized religion (33 percent), military (40 percent), and public schools (38 percent) hit all-time lows.
As institutions fail to meet the expectations of citizens, how can that trust be regained?
It is tempting to agree with Robert Putnam, author of “Bowling Alone,” who is quoted in a 2023 Politico article as saying, “the data and history have convinced us that the leading indicator [for societal change] is a sense of morality…We need a moral reawakening of America. That’s upstream from political choices.”
A broadly shared sense of morality may well provide some sense of order and direction. However, even if a shared morality could be established, leaning too heavily on it, as we have with government, big business, media organizations, or even the church and organized religion, will prove it incapable of bearing our weight for long.
As Christians, we need to remember that the world’s institutions are fragile. Their basic nature and assumptions are flawed because even when they acknowledge an abstract notion of God, they employ logics that are underinformed by and unaccountable to God’s word.
To put it differently, the institutions on which we depend overreach their capabilities to order chaos. However well-intentioned, the political realm often over-promises and under-delivers because the political realm, like the business realm or, too often, the religious realm, makes sense of the world by denying God.
The growing distrust of government and other institutions in America should not prompt Christians to add their voices to the grumbling and complaining but to show the world what it looks like to know a God who can do more than we can ask or think and to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to those who need to hear it.
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James Spencer earned his Ph.D. in Theological Studies from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He believes discipleship will open up opportunities beyond anything God’s people could accomplish through their own wit and wisdom. As such, his writing aims at helping believers look with eyes that see and listen with ears that hear as they consider, question, and revise the social, cultural, and political assumptions hindering Christians from conforming more closely to the image of Christ. James has published multiple works, including “Christian Resistance: Learning to Defy the World and Follow Christ,” “Useful to God: Eight Lessons from the Life of D. L. Moody,” “Thinking Christian: Essays on Testimony,” “Accountability, and the Christian Mind,’ and “Trajectories: A Gospel-Centered Introduction to Old Testament Theology.” In addition to serving as the president of the D. L. Moody Center, James is the host of “Useful to God” a weekly radio broadcast and podcast, a member of the faculty at Right On Mission, and an adjunct instructor with the Wheaton College Graduate School.
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