2. Appropriate political involvement
The early Baptists weren’t shy about participating in the political life of their towns, provinces and (after American independence) nations. In fact, we owe the First Amendment in part to Virginia Baptist John Leland, who wrote regularly to Thomas Jefferson, and maybe also to James Madison. John Clarke spent much of his life petitioning England’s king for a charter for Rhode Island that included a stipulation about religious freedom. Isaac Backus worked diligently in the political arena for religious freedom in Massachusetts before and after the American Revolution.
And after the establishment of the United States of America as a sovereign nation, Baptists continued their involvement in civic and political life, serving in all sorts of public capacities. William Carey worked in India to end the practice of sati. In other words, Baptists have seen the realm of the state as yet another one of life’s spheres in which they are called to participate as faithful Christians.
Baptists today carry on this tradition of appropriate political involvement. We do not read “separation of church and state” as a reason to remove religious life and thought from government, but as a protection of individual consciences, churches and other religions from intervention by the government. For Baptists, political participation is justified and encouraged by Scripture, which presents God’s calling to new life in Christ as one that encompasses all of life, including life in relation to the state. This doesn’t mean that the Bible gives particular policy positions on a whole host of issues, like health care or traffic laws, but it does mean that God’s wisdom and a Christian’s calling to it includes all of life, even political life.
To put it a bit differently, the church is still the church when it is scattered and not gathered for worship on the Lord’s Day, and it is called to live as such in the midst of the world. Baptists historically have seen this as especially important in relation to caring for “the least of these,” working diligently in civic and political arenas in order to help the poor, orphaned, widowed, and hungry. We could point to Baptist hospitals through the country, or to the SBC’s, and particularly the ERLC’s, consistent work in D.C. throughout the tenures of both Richard Land and Russell Moore to end abortion in the U.S.
3. The church as the sign of Christ’s kingdom
I used the adjective “appropriate” in the previous point because Baptists have historically emphasized that Christ’s kingdom is seen primarily through the local church, not any temporal government. This means that our efforts ultimately should be focused on the local church, the only institution (according to Baptist polity) to which Christ entrusts the keys to his kingdom.
It is in the local church that the things of heaven are bound and loosed on earth. It is in the local church that Christ’s Word reigns supreme visibly, through preaching and through the ordinances. It is in the local church that the lost are called to repentance, that disciples are made, and that the Holy Spirit is present. Baptist political theology thus recognizes that Christians are first and foremost citizens of Christ’s kingdom, and that Christ’s kingdom is visible primarily in the local church. (This, by the way, is another reason that Baptists have long argued for the separation of church and state—the state isn’t the primary sign of Christ’s kingdom on earth.)
But Baptists also acknowledge that we are citizens of earthly nations, in our case the U.S. While the U.S. and all other nations will one day fade away (and face judgment) at the second coming of King Jesus and his eternal kingdom, we are called to be faithful citizens of it in the meantime. Which brings us back to point two: Baptists affirm that we can and should participate in civic life.
