2 Thoughts From Yesterday’s NPB

I blogged yesterday on the National Prayer Breakfast, which I had the privilege to attend.

But I had two more thoughts I wanted to mention from the event.

The first was Eric Metaxes’s theme that there is a difference between being phony religious and knowing Jesus.

Metaxes told of his journey and how he rejected Christianity in college. He realized later what he rejected was the hypocrisy and judgmental moralism of phony religious people, not true Christianity.

Metaxes rightly noted that Jesus was the enemy of phony religion. That’s why Jesus was so tough on the Pharisees and so beloved by sinners. This is a great point to remember when sharing the Gospel with non-Christians.

The second thought is a bit more personal. I mentioned yesterday my disappointment in how President Obama politicized an event, which to that point, had  honored Jesus. But while facing my disappointment with President Obama’s remarks I was  convicted of not having prayed more for him.

My wife and I both noticed something about President Obama’s demeanor yesterday and we came to the same word independent of one another: depressed. He also looked like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.

I know there is a good argument to be made that President Obama’s policies have been hostile to the Church and freedom of religion. But as I’ve noted here before, when the Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, the political environment was just a little more hostile to Christianity than it is today, what with Christians being made human torches and martyred in other sadistic ways. Yet Paul told Christians to pray for those rulers. (I Timothy 2:2). I’ve explained here before why I believe such prayer is a long-term strategic imperative for the kingdom of God.

I plan to pray more for President Obama because while I recognize Christians can differ on whether his policies are correct, they should not differ on the Kingdom principle that God works through delegated authority. GS