Grace-Filled Grit with Lana Stenner
Episode 179: Jesus the Party Crasher - Talking Politics with Josh Butler
Have you noticed a deeper level of political division in your community or church? If so, you’re not alone. Today we chat with Joshua Butler about faith and politics. We take a look at how Jesus disrupts politics as usual and redeems our partisan divide. We discuss being bold in our convictions, and involved in politics while staying Christ-centered. This episode is packed with practical tips to help us through the upcoming political season.
Website: joshuaryanbutler.com
Instagram: @joshuabutlerpdx
Facebook: Joshua Ryan Butler
Book: https://joshuaryanbutler.com/books/
We would love to connect with you!!!
https://www.instagram.com/lanastenner/
https://www.tiktok.com/@lanastennerandgoatgang
https://lanastenner.com/newsletter/
Email us at info@lanastenner.com
Have you noticed a deeper level of political division in your community or church? If so, you’re not alone. Today we chat with Joshua Butler about faith and politics. We take a look at how Jesus disrupts politics as usual and redeems our partisan divide. We discuss being bold in our convictions, and involved in politics while staying Christ-centered. This episode is packed with practical tips to help us through the upcoming political season.
Website: joshuaryanbutler.com
Instagram: @joshuabutlerpdx
Facebook: Joshua Ryan Butler
Book: https://joshuaryanbutler.com/books/
We would love to connect with you!!!
https://www.instagram.com/lanastenner/
https://www.tiktok.com/@lanastennerandgoatgang
https://lanastenner.com/newsletter/
Email us at info@lanastenner.com
Welcome to Gracefield Grit. I'm your host, lana Stinner, and we are chatting all about growing your faith, family and the backyard farm. Here at the Gracefield Homestead, we are having honest, hard and authentic conversations with some amazing guests about getting back to the basics and what's important in life. We are not for everyone and we don't clean up our conversations, so you will get the unedited chat Each episode. You can expect practical tips and encouragement. I am so honored to have you join us today, so grab a cup of coffee and let's do this thing. Hey friend, welcome back to the Gracefield Grit podcast.
Speaker 1:Today we are going there with the topics that most want to stay away from politics in faith, with Joshua Ryan Butler. Joshua loves shifting paradigms to help people who wrestle with tough topics of the Christian faith by confronting all the popular thought patterns and replacing them with the beauty and power of the real thing. He is a husband, dad of three and a man chasing after God's truth. What would Jesus do? We are going to ask that question and other tough ones today. So welcome, josh. I'm so glad you're here with us today.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you so? Much. I'm so glad to be here and so excited looking forward to this conversation.
Speaker 1:Yes, and we met probably close to a year ago, sometime last year, on a Zoom call with some of our other friends at our agency, and I'm just really excited about your book, and so by the time this podcast episode airs, your book will already be out. Today is launch day for you as we're talking, and so what a timely, timely message. So my first question for you, because we're going to go there with all the tough topics today your family, man, strong in your faith. What on earth made you want to write a book and focus on the political climate and partisan norms of our culture this year?
Speaker 2:Oh man, great question. Well, you know so I've been a pastor for a little over 20 years now and I've noticed the last two election seasons man, it's just gotten wild, it's gotten crazy. And I've seen the political divide is wider than ever and I've seen it fracturing like families and friendships and even churches. You know so I share one story in the intro of a church that in our network where, you know so, we had 10 churches on a network and one of them, the political divide just fractured their church. You know like, split in and have 1500 out of 3000 people left and left angry. And the backdrop was, from my perspective, was really simple. You know that one of the pastors had put out of a pretty simple Instagram post, kind of a real assurance of his thoughts on something, and it's a pretty tame to me, you know. It's like, oh, it's a perspective.
Speaker 2:But there was a crew of about seven or eight people on the church who got really angry. They kind of received it through kind of a partisan group, which things he wasn't even saying that were being read into it, and they started a campaign to take down the church. They left angry, they got coffee shop conversations with people getting them riled up. They started, they got this group started scouring every pastor in all 10 of the churches in the network, scouring every pastor's sermons, looking for ammo, looking at the pastors and their spouses, social media feeds, trying to find anything they could to take down the church. They got a neighboring church to launch that they went to to start a sermon series against this church and again so much of it was slander, like they were saying, hey, the church is about this stuff that they had never even said. That you know like, and just seeing it fracture this church that we love.
Speaker 2:And I wish that was just a one off story. But I get your story after story of friends who are pastors and churches around the country and of families I know and friendships I know where they're, just like. We don't go into Thanksgiving now feels like entering World War three, we don't know how to navigate the political division, and so a lot of the heart behind this book was not so much like, oh, I want to go and jump into the political frame, but I do have this heart as someone who loves Jesus to just try and go. How do we come back to scripture? Oh man, jesus, what would you have for us, as your people, to really navigate with maturity and faithfulness, just going into the election season this year and the moment that we're in. How can we do this? Well, as the people have got.
Speaker 1:And that's so good, and I don't know. I mean I'm in my fifties now. I have never seen the political climate this intense and this divided as ever before. So you know, we definitely this is a topic that we need to dive into. I mean, it seems like everyone's you know, up in arms and has sides and all of that, but man, it's, it's showing Jesus's love through it, all that's that's the trick right so for those of us that have these strong convictions about our political beliefs, how do we get along with the others in our lives that don't agree?
Speaker 1:I mean, and you know I'll be honest and most of my audience here they kind of know where I fall on the. You know we we talk a lot about the farm and goat joy and gardens and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:But, occasionally, if something's you know strong on my heart and I can't sleep about it, you know I'll do a podcast episode here and there. You know like I'm very pro-life, I'm very conservative, I'm very much from a. I mean, I'm Bible bell, I'm in Missouri, here in the most conservative state there is, and so sometimes you feel like you're in the sound bubble of most of the people around you are failing, you know, or have the same views, and all of that.
Speaker 1:And you know, I'll be honest, I'm so excited to talk to you because for me I do struggle having family members and you know friends are in the past co-workers where you, you have these strong views and you don't want to lose respect if they have the opposite view and you want to be Christ-like. So give us some tips so that you know we don't alienate and we show Christ. What, what do you speak to that for a minute? Because you're speaking to me because I need some help.
Speaker 2:Yes, totally, totally no.
Speaker 2:well, you know one big tip, you know, is my goal and hope is not to get people to leave politics behind, where it's actually that we would not be apolitical or centrist or whatever it's really to bring our convictions to the table, but with a Christ-like humility and posture, you know, and so part of the backdrop for this, the last five years pastoring in Tempe, arizona, which is a college town, and so we had about 40% plus of the church, were college students and professors, people at the university, which they tended to lean left politically, you know, and then. But where we were at, we bordered the university on one side, and then Chandler and Gilbert on the other side, which were very, you know, lean, very strongly, right, you know. And all the folks were in the church together, you know. And so you had, yeah, like you had, people coming from a very ideologically diverse place and this was going okay.
Speaker 2:How do we stay at the table together even when we might disagree? And one big thing this may seem simple, but even in not reading into things that the other folks that we know are not necessarily saying, you know being a good question, asker. So I mean a few humorous illustrations to turn the book. We had a visitor at our church who leaned very strongly left, you know, and on the left side of the spectrum, and they showed up and they're asking why do you guys have these all lives matter posters all over?
Speaker 1:your church.
Speaker 2:And I was like we don't have all of these matter posters.
Speaker 1:Oh, the church's like no, you got them plastered everywhere, you know, and we were like what are you saying, Like why I'm not sure what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:Did we hear graffiti? I'm thinking you know. Like, did someone spray paint our building?
Speaker 1:What are you talking about?
Speaker 2:Can you show us? And so they go and show us. And it's true. We have these posters around the church with our vision statement and our vision we've had for over 10 years, which was all of life is all for Jesus. So all of life is all for. Jesus, and they were coming, though and with their particular ideological grade, they were hearing that and reading like oh, they're saying all these matters Like that's not what we're saying.
Speaker 2:We're saying all life is all for Jesus, you know. And then we had someone else on the who leaned right, you know, on the right side of the spectrum, and there was a sermon that was done where the pastor was talking about progressive sanctification and so kind of the historic idea that we don't become sanctified overnight, we don't grow in holiness overnight. It's a gradual, progressive process. And he explained all that. But at the end of the sermon a woman came between who was irate and was just angry going why are you saying that if I'm becoming sanctified, I'm going to become more progressive?
Speaker 2:He's like that's not what I'm saying, you know and then he had two emails in his inbox the next morning for people saying the same, you know, same. They were angry about the same thing, and so those are humorous illustrations. But I found that it's actually way more common, even if the examples are that extreme. It's way more common that often we have a grid. We're in our kind of our circles, where the environment that we're on on social media, the environment that we're on, even geographically I live in Portland now, that's where I'm from, and Portland means very strong left and I found, oh my gosh, people I know here have often a grid, that their filters everything they're hearing and they can often skew how we're hearing what other people are saying and can make us even assume the same things that they're not actually saying.
Speaker 2:And so I really want to have us cultivate curiosity and I get a lot more practical in the book we can talk about that, but but I think just recognizing from the get go that, a posture of charity towards those and humility with those that we're encountering with I'm going. Ok, I don't, I don't want to read everything through my filter.
Speaker 2:I want to ask good questions try to seek to learn and understand more where they might be coming from what experiences maybe of sheep or perspective in their opinion?
Speaker 1:That's good. That's good. So what would you say to those that say it's not politics? This is biblical truth, you know uncertain. You know, it seems like there used to just be easy politics. You know we all kind of agreed on the moral issues, and then it seems like lately it's kind of, you know, taking in, so so speak, to that a little bit, because I think that's where people struggle with a little bit.
Speaker 2:Great, excellent. So one of the things I do in chapter one of the book is what I call the poor political religions, just trying to map the lay of the land right now of where we're at. And so when we talk about what is a biblical perspective, so we often think of politics as left and right today. Right, and that's true, left, right side of the spectrum, but I also argue that there's also a top down axis of modernity to postmodernity that has split the traditional political parties right.
Speaker 2:So some of the deepest political fighting we see today is not not just left versus right, but different camps within left, different camps within the right. And so the way that I try and map this out, to summarize, you know, would be, if we talk about the upper left quadrant or the modern left, I call the religion of progress. And so here the creed is we can change the world. The high priests in this quadrant we can think of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, places like Silicon Valley, technology, the technological boom. There's a high faith and trust in science and reason and institutions and technology to move humanity forward. The worship leader of this quadrant is perhaps Bono right, who is like rallying the masses to uplift humanity around progress in these things. If we move to the upper right quadrant or modern right, which is kind of what I grew up in with the right, you know what would be the creed is. Maybe pull yourself up by your bootstraps, where the religion of responsibility and here the high priest historically was maybe someone like Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich, milton Friedman there is a sense of taking responsibility and ownership for your family, for your job, for those close to you and if you know, if we could all just kind of do that with the world to be a much better place, and then you could see today perhaps that baton has been fast. You see popular cultural figures like Jordan Peterson, where you know if you want to change the world, start by making your bed, Take responsibility for yourself. Or Jaco Willink and David Coggins, who are big figures with like extreme ownership Just own your side of things, right.
Speaker 2:But now if we move to the lower quadrants, which are we got to the postmodern now where that has split things, the lower left we call the religion of identity, whose motto is live your truth, and we see this really strong.
Speaker 2:We think today about the urban core and figures like Tom and he see codes or Elliot page, and there's this strong sense of this pattern still wants change, still wants progress, but no longer trust institution, science, technology, all that out there. Those things have oppressed people, they've made things worse, and so we need to look within and find the deepest view and cultivate and express your inner self, and so this religion is big on, like Instagram and TikTok, a personal self-expression like show yourself to the world. Then if we go to the lower right when I call the religion of security and here at the creed, would be good fences make good neighbors. There's a sense of the world's a dangerous place. There's threats. We need security to live safe. There's still a sense of responsibility, but it's not so much to objective moral truth out there as much as loyalty to insiders, those who are with us or like us and, yeah, and with this one.
Speaker 2:Again there's kind of that postmodern suspicion of science, institutions and reason and authority, and so here we'll hear a lot of things like man, the deep state government is out to get you big pharma, it's pushing its meds, it's vaccines, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's on you, the deep state. You know the fake media is out to deceive you, and we need to stand up against those things. And so what I talk about is that in these four quadrants, each of these has some truth. Like the Bible, god gives us all four of these values God gives us we see in the Garden of Eden, progress and responsibility and identity and security. But when those things become an idol that is kind of uprooted from God's creation and design and something that we value and elevate over our allegiance to Christ, it can take us in these distorted directions. And so I argue that all four of these quadrants have some gifts to bring to the table, but all four have some real distortions that we see in our culture now that can wreak havoc.
Speaker 2:And so I think part of you know what I'm arguing for or advocating for in this book is that as we encounter people who lean in different directions, you know, I know some good friends who lean towards each of those four quadrants I have one eye. We lean towards. You know the call to bring your lean, but submit your bow. You know to bring your leaning to that we would bring our leaning, our political leaning, with the values and perspective and experience that we have, and bring that to the table, but that we would submit our bow, meaning we would submit our ultimate allegiance to Jesus and that can create a context where we can learn from people who lean in different directions. But we can also stand against some of the distortions that come in each of those quadrants that we're seeing wreak havoc today.
Speaker 1:That's so good and I, you know I absolutely loved your book title and I don't even know if I mentioned that earlier. It's Party Crashers. How Jesus Disrupts Politics as usual, and Redeems Are Partisan Divide and I just think, man, I have a lot of work to do in that area and I think you know, whichever quadrant you're in, I think most of us are just so dug in and struggle with how do we? It's gotten so heated, like you said, you know Thanksgiving dinner you get to where you're like, oh, is that one gonna be there? That's gonna hammer me again.
Speaker 1:Or you know that type of thing and you see it dividing families, and so I think you know what a timely message. So another question for you why isn't it important for believers to resist the temptation to choose friendships, small groups and churches based on political affinity? The benefits of spending time with those with different political leanings than ourselves, of course, you know I kind of like the idea of going to a church where my pastor believes. You know, I want my pastor to believe like I do.
Speaker 1:I wanna think you know he has my same views on the Bible and all that. So why is that not the best route to go?
Speaker 2:Great, no, great question. Well, that few observations. One, you know, I think, of social media, for example, today, and some of the impact of what's happening, and part of that is, I think, it's tending to amplify the most extreme voices, you know. So studies would show that the most extreme 10% on the left, 10% on the right, are the loudest and most present. So if you're living on social media world, you tend to think, man, that's everyone, the silent majority there's a good 80% plus of folks who are frustrated with the polarization probably have way more in common, you know, and so I think there's a danger that we can, if we're not around people that are different from us we're just kind of living in the social media bubble world we can become convinced that, you know that the conversation is at a way, more extreme level than it really truly is. And likewise, I think, in that we tend to dehumanize and people online in ways you've never talked to someone that way in person, you know. But when there's that distance online, we talk that way and it can become easy to really get caught up in sort of demonizing, like everyone over there is like this and we're, you know right. But the third one, and this is maybe the most significant to what you were saying, I believe, is that when we're only in relationship or connection with people who see the world of what's in what we do, it tends to push us towards the most extreme positions, whatever side you may be on right.
Speaker 2:So there's an influential book that came out a while ago called the Big Sword, by Bill Bishop, and what he traced and studied in this was how the tagline of you like mixed company, moderates and homogeneous company pushes us towards the extremes. And what he meant was that one of the things we're seeing in American society is that where you live geographically and where you live, you know, social media, wise online is tending to push us into environments where everyone around us sees the world the same way we do. And what tends to happen there is when you lose that kind of mixed company with people who see the world differently, that mixed company tends to provide more nuance. You still may have, like I do, you still have very strong convictions, but you see them with a bit more nuance.
Speaker 2:You see the other side, or people who are different, with a bit more of their humanity and all, but as we get siloed into environments where like again, I'm here in Portland where Tensilene very progressive and I know so many folks is like that's the only world they know, the only people they know, and that can really distort their perspective of the other side. And so I think, whatever environment we're in fighting to sustain or cultivate relationships with people who see the world differently is going to make us, I think, more mature in how we follow Jesus, how we understand that we can see the other side, even when we have restaurant convictions. We see their humanity and I believe, ultimately this is something Jesus did and modeled, that Jesus gathered to himself a politically diverse group of disciples. So look in the book at how, yeah, he brings to himself, like the they were a mess.
Speaker 1:They were all over the board. They were definitely not alike any of them.
Speaker 2:yeah, Totally, and you think I mean. The zealots wanted to overthrow the Roman Empire and the tax bookers with collaborators keeping the Roman Empire in power and then Jesus calls them both into his disciples and you're going. Oh man, those had to be some really interesting campfire conversations. You know where they're doing ministry together throughout the day, and then they're talking about their hopes, of dreams at the end, and he's calling them stuff Blue-collar fisherman and white-collar doctors and there's like just this outrageous mix and I love.
Speaker 2:I feel like that new TV series, the Chosen like, does a good job of showing just kind of the humanity and the different conversations and they've got different perspectives of leanings and I think for Jesus that's part of the point, you know is that he's actually he didn't. Jesus didn't have to go to the cross and die so that we could hang out with our buddies. You know, he died to reconcile a diverse group of people who are learning to come together in Christ and work through this stuff together through our unity in him.
Speaker 1:That's so powerful and so true and I love that series. We just finished watching the last one in the movie theaters and, yeah, the picture that they you know there was some artistic liberty there, but man, what a good picture of those disciples and how diverse they were. And you know, when you were talking about how, you know you can learn from others and you know it helps your perspective, I, you know, I think back to a time when I was in the workforce and a very small. I worked for a nonprofit and it was only six of us and I was the only one with this political lean and all the others had a different and they were very vocal and you know I'm usually vocal but I'm like the only one there, you know, and so I remember going home and telling my husband it's so bizarre how we're so different in this one little tiny area of you.
Speaker 1:Know these political things, but our lives, our daily lives, you know like 95, 98% you know, they're good moms, they love their kids, they wanna make sure their kids are, you know, eating healthy and exercising, and they go to church, and we're just totally opposite. But we wanna focus on those differences. But we go home and we all do the same things, with our family and our going to the grocery, and so it is, you know, so important to find those common grounds with still, you know, holding your faith and holding your beliefs. So you talk about six creative options for healthy political involvement that are in line with the faithful Christian witness. Tell us what those are.
Speaker 2:Great, definitely, yeah. So often I think for many of us we feel like there's man, there's only three options. Right, many people feel like you've got the elephant option and the docking option. You know, like the Republican or Democrat, you've got the ostrich option, which is sort of but your head in the sand period, and we hope this all blows over.
Speaker 1:That might be easier, I think.
Speaker 2:Totally, totally. But I actually wanna suggest that there's six other creative options. In each of these we see I believe in the Bible and scripture, and we also see in Christian history tradition. So, you know, the first thing you talk about is the local option, where we have so much emphasis on national politics today and, yes, go out and cast your vote. But I actually think that there's so much that we can do locally and to actually get involved in our communities.
Speaker 2:So one thing that we did at our church last election season was we started what we call prayer and action groups. And we started, you know, prayer and action because sometimes people pit those against each other, like, oh, don't give us your prayers, we just need action. Go. No, we have the God of the universe on our side, we wanna go to him, you know. And then some folks would be like, oh, we'll pray about it, but we don't actually pray and you know, and we don't actually get involved. But we challenge our folks who are the most passionate about the political season to go, okay, well, let's get our hands involved, you know, like here in our city, in our community. And so what people? You know we started two groups one on sanctity of life, a pro-life group and one on criminal justice, knowing that each of those you know one was often associated with the right, the other with the left and calling people who were passionate about those issues to get involved in this group. And so about a dozen, five, 12, 15 people in each and going hey, we want you to commit to gathering together for a year for learning from some of the best you know, reading some of the best books, meeting with people locally who are leading in this area, and to commit to praying together on this issue and, by the end of that year, to commit to something that you can do constructively here in our community that would make a constructive, positive impact. And what the fruit of that was amazing and other groups began to launch in other areas like this.
Speaker 2:But we found that there's actually so much that we can do locally that is powerful, where I think, like Jesus, the kingdom, it often starts like that yeast, that in the dough that starts with this seed that grows into a tree. It starts small but tangible. It can have tremendous impact long-term. So there's the local option. Second option I call the Daniel option, when there are some people who I think are called to political office, like Daniel was as an official in Babylon, and so when I think about that, I've had multiple elected officials in congregations where I've pastored, you know, and trying to walk with them through that, and sometimes they're really going okay. How do I navigate some of the tricky waters of this? And I take a lot of inspiration from Daniel, chapter one, where he's in Babylon and they want him to eat food from the king's table and to take the name of pagan God, and Daniel lets them name him after a pagan God, but he doesn't eat the food from the king's table.
Speaker 1:And I kind of want to be like Daniel what are you doing?
Speaker 2:man, eat the steak. Take the steak, but don't let them call you after a pagan God you know.
Speaker 2:But the Bible commends him for this. This is the right thing and so I think it's going. Man, god is giving him discernment to navigate things. Even scholars today are confused. Why did he do the one, not the other? They're not sure. But it's commended in scripture and I think there's a sense of inspiration here to go. God can provide discernment and wisdom for those in office to, if they really pursue him and seek him, not to compromise convictions or things, but to navigate some of those tricky waters with discernment.
Speaker 2:I'll go to the other ones more quickly, but I have the prophetic option, which is sort of like Martin Luther King Jr, where you're not so much working from within the system but outside of it and bringing creative imagination of like. Here's a different way that the world could look like Also. The fourth is what I call the scuba option, which is people I know who have gone deep and done long work in a specific area, such as my friend Jenny, who's done long-time work for 20 years in foster care and vulnerable children, and she's not a politician but she's the one the politicians now come to when they're making policy for vulnerable kids going. You know this field help us. I think of people like William Wilper Forest, historically, who went really deep, working for a long time on a specific issue to accomplish change. The fifth option is the monastic option, which is people who say man.
Speaker 2:I don't know that I can get involved in politics, sipping it, without feeling compromised. So I'm gonna invest in my church and my local community to actually be an alternative community in the midst of the world that surrounds us, to actually modeling something better and cultivating a different kind of space here.
Speaker 2:And then the sixth one is the reform option which is going. There are some really helpful ways that we all know the system is broken. So I talk about some ways that we can work for reforming a better type of system. Things like campaign finance reform and ranked twist voting, proportional representation, things that people can explore as possible ways to make the system better. But big picture is going. I hope I can spark our imagination with some different ways beyond just which you know box.
Speaker 1:We check about it, you know for actually involving yeah, and that's that's so smart and that's you can make such a big difference in your own community. And you're right. We we spend so much time just focused on the national level and you know every every little community is is different and and need your help. So I think that's so wise. Why is it important to explore common historical practices of the church to understand you know what is going on now, how, how do you see those tied together?
Speaker 2:Great why, man, I think there's so much we have we can learn from the global and historic church. So historically you might talk about the local option. There's a rich tradition in Christian tradition called Subsidiarity which really emphasizes the local involvement. It kind of emphasizes, like um man, local relationships, local network, local institutions having a way more Powerful impact the gods interested at the level, then necessarily the big, broad, abstract distance at distant ones. When we think of you know mentioned the Daniel option there's a rich tradition of Political thought in terms of for those in office and those in government, those in those positions, how those would work. When I think of the as one of the options I mentioned, you know it is rooted in kind of the reformed caipirian tradition of what we call the spirit or sovereignty of God giving Different spirits of society serve an authority to cultivate his flourishing those areas. So I think there's just so much we can learn there, but globally as well. Harder, where this became so powerful for me is I used to be a global pastor Before I became a lead pastor and I was overseeing working a lot with underground, with churches in Vietnam, in Cambodia, and so in Vietnam you had the persecuted church there who were seeking to live faithfully in the context of explicit persecution.
Speaker 2:Many of the pastors that have been jailed for their faith had been put in Work camps for deck, you know, for a decade.
Speaker 2:And then in Cambodia, where there was so much Corruption in the government just blatant, explicit corruption that they were having to navigate as they're working. And then I found myself in Portland, which was a, you know, pastoring in a city that was hostile to the Christian faith, and yet we're seeking to work with the mayor's office and the Civic leaders to Contribute to our city and kind of go Okay, how do we do this? Well, where are the lines where, you know, we want to maintain our integrity as the church and not compromise? We also want to be constructively involved with our city and I've just found and there's so much that we can learn from the global Church and the historic church when we situate ourselves in the bigness of Jesus's kingdom around the world and in history, it's inspiring to me to go Okay, jesus is winning, the gates of hell will not overcome his kingdom, and it gives him a thing, an inspiration and confidence for us to have that bigger picture, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:That's, that's amazing. I didn't realize you did that that. Wow, what. What a mission, and I'm sure that just totally Gave you a new perspective on the church. That's, that's amazing. So kind of a Side note here that I wasn't planning to ask you about do you see a Difference in the church as a whole since COVID, in the shutdown and Kind of the rise of the online church? You know we could all watch our shows on on, you know, youtube or wherever before, but it became the norm. So speak a little bit to that and what your view is on on the church changes after after the shutdowns.
Speaker 2:Definitely no, I think you're right. You know, I think that the that COVID and the shutdowns in 2020 man, so I was, you know, pastoring through that season and I just saw it seemed like the 2016 the division fracturing was Strong, it was big there, but 2020 feels like it just exponentially went wild. And I think you know a variety of factors there that come to my mind. One was I do think it pushed us as a society even more online and I do think that the social I'm on social media, I enjoy it. You know I'm online, I'm bring for it.
Speaker 2:But I do think there are things that there are Tenancies that the online world exacerbates. You know it pushes us into more homogeneous echo chambers that algorithms tend to feed and silo us into areas where we're just kind of confirmation biases, confirming whatever biases or things that we already tend to have. I think that that kind of furthers some of the dehumanization and dehumanization of the other side. So I think the online element was one. I think another one is that a lot of the, the, the, the pull, the issues with polarization. They hit home much more. You know, like this wasn't just kind of an abstract. What do I think about this? It's like oh my gosh, these issues are. I'm stuck in my house, like, like, like, but even like, I think that sense of like, oh my gosh, these, these aren't just kind of abstract issues, but this, this, really these are impact, how we respond to this. Whatever side you're on, this is either gonna impact People around me in this way or people are me this way. Either we're all gonna be shut in or this can impact the health of others. You know, like it.
Speaker 2:I think it brought home that that real world impact of these things and the stakes seem to have gotten raised. It's like for for many folks. And, finally, I think that it kind of, you know, is interesting. So it was in Arizona and now in Portland, which are very different environments. I grew up here in Oregon and then be back in in Arizona, but we found Even tons of people moving into Arizona out of California and Portland place like that, or moving into other places like, like, even geographically, people seem to be resorting themselves around, like I'm sick of this place, I want to go over here, I'm sick of this one right here, because of kind of the political or cultural Affinity of those places, and so all I say I think post 2020, it what's the the thinking of? Like Star Wars with the hyperboost lights? Question to extremes some of the trajectories you're already on, whether it's social media, geographically, whatever into more of those silos and ratcheted up the sense of fear and practical impact of the stakes of some of these conversations.
Speaker 1:I totally agree. It just feels different, definitely. And then, and then for some that are, you know, some didn't want to come back, they got so used to, you know, sitting on their couch and their PJs, and then it's like, well, why would you know, do I really need to be in physical Communion and fellowship with those people when I can just watch it on TV? And so it definitely has changed, changed things. So one last question for you, for, for those on either side you know, either political party or wherever they land, if, if they're having someone that is in their life, that they're close to and I know people on, you know, in this- yeah that that they disagree with, or or maybe they agree with, but they're going to that super extreme.
Speaker 1:You know, I can, I can think of, of someone in my life and it's like, okay, your conspiracy theory. You know you may be right, you probably are right. I thought you were running on your right, you know so yes.
Speaker 1:But like, where's the joy you get? You know, turn the news off at some point. You know you have to. Where's your fruit if you're spending all your time researching this? Even if there's some truths in there, you know you could your waste in time that could be on the ground making a real difference. Or you know Where's the joy, where's that? So speak. And there's, you know, on the other side of things, the same way. So speak to those people that have someone in their life that they mainly agree with, but they're going a little extreme. And and how, how do you save those relationships or how do you balance that out If it's too time-consuming and too overwhelming on both sides of those?
Speaker 2:That's great, excellent, yeah, so most of the book is really trying to give practical resources along these lines of what you're asking. So a couple areas, one that I focus on in chapters four and five, is what I call the 10 political commandments, which we used at our church in the last election season. So this, like in a church or a small group, even a family or whatever you know, to be able to go hey, these are 10 things we want to commit to in this upcoming election season in terms of our posture. So we jokingly called these the 10 political commandments because we didn't want them to be confused with the actual 10 commandments. But when these are things God commands in scripture, so we do want to take them seriously, and so these weren't about what opinions to hold, but rather about how to hold them well.
Speaker 2:And so these were, you know, just the first one was worship I commit my allegiance to King Jesus over all idols and ideologies. The second one was love of neighbor I commit to participating in civic life as a means of loving and serving my neighbor rather than just serving my own interests. And then there were other ones, like the image of God. I'm a people of wisdom, fruitful speech, political justice, peacemaking, removing the law, humble learning, loving enemies. But I think one resource and these are available as a free download on my website If you want to go there it's called a Christian political commitment. One resource is to kind of prepare yourself and even a small group or church or friends or others or family going hey, this is, this is how the guidelines God gives us for how we want to prepare to enter into this.
Speaker 1:And even if others violate that.
Speaker 2:We're going to stick to these.
Speaker 2:You know we're going to stick to Jesus even if others don't. That's not being one thing, but another thing that I look at is what I call formational practices for a polarized world, which is learning to see some of the things that we might take for granted as reading scripture, as being in community with other people in our church, like face to face community in our church. You know you mentioned how much we then pulled apart into online. Maybe I'll just stick out, but I show a lot of research on actually being involved in an actual church body. You know fellowship has a dramatic impact on how we actually gauge maturity in these areas. But I look, for example, at reading. Scripture is one example. You know that we might not think of that as something that shapes us politically, but it does. You know that there's actually God's story for the world contrasts with a lot of the competing stories at play. So talking about how man, the religion of progress, is telling a certain story about the world, the religion of responsibility and of identity, of security, those religions at play right now are telling a certain story about the world that can run in some dangerous directions, and yet God's story provides a counter narrative, a counter story that actually shapes and forms us to be attuned to resisting some of the idolatrous stories of our age Community. You know, being in a small group, being in connection and staying connected and committed with people who see the world differently, perhaps like that, actually has a formative impact on our lives. Rather weird.
Speaker 2:Prayer I look at creative practices of prayer. I've got a friend who prays. You know, when you think of your kingdom, come God, you will be done and Earth is heaven. The Lord's prayer. A friend of mine takes news headlines he sees and he creatively reimagines what God's kingdom looked like breaking into this area. So, for example, when he saw the bombings in Syria a while back, he began to pray that Aleppo in Syria would become like the ultimate vacation destination where people could nap during the day in the streets, that people could stay out late dancing, because of just the safety and peace and security, you know. But he can imagine man I'm seeing on Earth right now. It looks like this horrendous, but imagine. Let his imagination be fuel. God, I want to pray towards your kingdom breaking in. I look at ways to actually use your ballot as a catalyst for prayer. How to pray we, you know, not just pray. God, make my candidate win, you know.
Speaker 1:Right right.
Speaker 2:Actually pray creatively. You know, we pray for our daily bread, but do we pray for the farmers who are growing that bread and the truckers who are delivered to the grocery store? The Department of Transportation who's helping to, you know, facilitate all that so that we have the abundance that we have right now.
Speaker 2:Similar areas with medicine or different areas. Yeah, so emboldening and kind of catalyzing our prayer of life, and I think doing things like this gathering regularly I'm sure you know that that forms us under Christ, our ultimate King, you know and doing these practices regularly actually is going to shape and form us so that we step into that conversation with the person who sees the world differently. And maybe they're immature, maybe they're small-minded, maybe they're caricaturing us, maybe they're demonizing us, but I think we're going to have the fortitude and strength then to be able to go into that conversation and not let it rattle us not, let us shake us not, let us turn us into fighting fire with fire, you know not becoming immature in response, but we can be the mature person who kind of raises the bar in the conversation rather than kind of sinking into the lowest common denominator of how people around us might be.
Speaker 1:Wouldn't that be wonderful in this in the next few months. Right, that would be fabulous Goodness Well. I'm so glad you came on today. Tell our friends here online where they can find you. You know social media where they can find this book. Tell us, tell us where to find you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Yes, my website, joshwellrimebutlercom Social media. I'm most active on Instagram and some on Facebook, so it's a Joshua Butler PDX. It's my handle there, Joshua Butler PDX, and yeah, would love to interact with people. Check out the book. It's available wherever Amazon, wherever books are sold. I've got a whole list of retailers on the book page on my website, if you check that out. But yeah, if folks check it out, I would love to hear what you think, so feel free to read it yes and I share your thoughts.
Speaker 1:I love, love, love your title Party Crashers. How Jesus Disrupts Politics as usual, and Redeems Are Partisan Divide. My goodness, could there be a better title? There couldn't be. I mean, I love it because it's just so timely and needed so well. Thank you for coming on and we will add all of those links into our show notes for those of you that are looking to find him online. So thanks for coming today.
Speaker 1:Thank you for joining us today in this episode of Gracefield Grit. I know that your time is valuable and I truly appreciate you being here. I hope it was helpful and that you'll share it with a friend. In order to schedule amazing guests on our show, we could use some good reviews. So if you've enjoyed this episode, I'd be honored if you could head over to the podcast app on your phone, tap the album art for the Gracefield Grit podcast, scroll down to the bottom of the page and write a review. I'm looking forward to our next episode and I hope you'll join us again. Blessings to you today, friend, as you live out your own Gracefield Grit.