The Tea Party Comes to Church

 

In February of last year (2/11/09) when Christian financial advisor Dave Ramsey appeared on Fox and friends with a handful of teabags saying “It’s time for a tea party” he probably didn’t imagine what was about to happen. The country was about to bail out a bunch of badly operated banks and automakers and the train was getting up a head of steam to deliver national health care of some kind. People who had had enough government grabbed their teabags and joined in. Quickly a new political power emerged shunning both traditional big-spending parties and the Tea party movement was born. 

 

It’s hard to get a clear fix on the values of a populist (largely leaderless) movement like the tea party. It blends one part fiscal conservatism with one part libertarianism and attracts people with both leanings. However three values are common: they want smaller government, fewer regulations and lower taxes. A large number of evangelical Christians quickly linked up with this new political movement which is why I am writing about its effect in the church, because increasingly tea party thinking is making headway in the church. Indeed I think the movement was under way in the church even before it became a political movement.

 

1. Smaller government

In the church tea partiers dismiss denominational programs as wasteful spending. Tea partiers don’t understand why a denomination needs a District Superintendent or three (or four or six) General Superintendents. “What do all those bureaucrats do anyway?” they ask. Tea partiers have little use for denominational offices and programs believing that free market parachurch ministries and companies can supply all the needs of local churches. They fear any new scheme to expand district or denominational “ministries” that are supposed to “help” churches adapting to the church Ronald Reagan’s famous most feared 11 words, “Hi, I'm from the government, and I'm here to help you.” Tea partiers in the church think districts and denominations are part of the problem, not the solution. They think districts and denominational offices should be de-staffed and we should all become more like the Southern Baptists—focused wholly on the local church with little “bureaucracy” above the local level.

 

2. Less regulation

Political tea partiers see little need for piles of government regulations messing with the lives of citizens. In the church they see little need for denominations to make rules for members. They want to get church government off the backs of the people and to quit telling them what they can and cannot do. In some denominations this movement has spawned fighting over denominational regulations requiring members to not drink alcohol or attend movies or gamble. In other denominations tea party thinking has spread widespread defiance of all centralized national rules as they toss them overboard like bales of tea into the Boston harbor. “What can they do—they can’t come and arrest us can they?” Tea partiers in the church believe individuals have the right to make these decisions on their own and no national (or much less International) denomination has the right to regulate a member’s private life.

 

3. Lower taxes

But at its core, the tea party movement is mostly about money—they want lower taxes. If you starve the beast the first two problems are automatically solved—government gets smaller and has less power to regulate. Tea partiers in the church push for lowering denominational assessments—the church’s equivalent of taxes. “Where does all this money go anyway?” they wonder. They ask, “Why pour 5% (or 10% or even 15%) into supporting district bureaucrats, denominational headquarters, missions agencies and wealthy educational institutions?”  Tea partiers think church money should stay local and not be “confiscated” to support programs and people filling denominational positions and missionary offices. They think colleges, universities should be self-supporting and not supported by “taxes.” They think programs like church planting, missions and discipleship ought to run on a “free enterprise basis”—competing in the free market for money like everyone else, not through general taxes.  One said to me, “If they can’t get people to give money for a camp meeting then we don’t need a camp meeting—why are they taxing us to support a program we wouldn’t support if they didn’t tax us?” They feel similarly about universities, district offices, and even youth ministries, church planting and spiritual formation programs—let them all raise their own money and those that survive will be the most worthwhile ones. Tea partiers in the church want to keep their money close where they can keep their eyes on it—in the local church.  Reducing denominational taxes is #1 on their agenda—they believe “starving the beast” will accomplish their other two goals. Have you seen this kind of thinking yet?

 

I’d like to hear your comments…

 

1. Have you seen any evidence of “tea party thinking” in your church?

2. How does libertarian thinking on moral issues (homosexuality, drugs, abortion etc.) square with Christian values?

3. When it comes to local tithing is anyone yet arguing their money should stay even closer to home—in their own pockets?

4. Is this a good movement for the church or not? Why?

 

So what do you think?

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Keith Drury   March 23, 2010

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