Wednesday, December 19, 2007

The government we deserve? (updated)

Matthew Mason's post here hits the spot in my opinion. If we have complaints about the government we might need to first ask questions about the Church.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Howdi Pete, Duncan Bell here from Fulwood - stumbled upon your blog somehow a while back.
Anyway, whilst I agree with a lot of his conclusions, his source data is a load of tosh: see http://tinyurl.com/euetj (links to the Guardian) for more details.

I certainly think we need to be thinking about Godly public sector leadership, and I agree with a lot of the statements, but it's often worth checking out the facts. I think sometimes I almost somehow want politicians to fail, and can often be looking for the worst rather than seeking to support or actively encourage.

In Him,

D

Pete said...

Thanks Duncan, nice to hear from you. R u still in Sheffield? What r u working as now?

I presume you're referring to the quotes in Matthew's about the members of parliament? That's interesting to know if they're less than accurate, thank you.

However, I think his overall point still stands. Whilst our government is by no means as bad as it could be, there is something wrong at a fundamental, ideological, moral level with political leadership in this country. But that is to be expected, since that's what happens when the gospel is abandoned in any culture.

Also, if you read on in Matthew's post, you'll see he deals with the question of simply being negative about the government. His main point is to call Christians to repent for letting things get this way - we must take our share of the blame for the condition of our country rather than simply joining in with the whining anti-government sentiments of everyone else.

This is a far cry from simply wanting our politicians to fail, and is no way incompatible with seeking to support and encourage better government as you rightly advocate.

I guess one of the major problems is that Christians have no clue whatsoever what good government is, beyond a few biblically-sounding moral principles.

Perhaps you have more thoughts on a Christian view of political order yourself?

Ros said...

Just to point out that the statistics Matthew cites have been retracted by Neil Jeffers as coming from an unreliable source. Before we all start using them in sermons.

Anonymous said...

I apologise for my carelessness. I have no interest in unearthing political scandals, and have no desire to see politicians fail - that's in no-one's interests, as far as I can see. I've updated my blog post accordingly.