Theology Thursday: Will MCC endorse political candidates?

Welcome to Theology Thursday! Theology is the study of God, his relation to the world, and our relation to him. I hope these newsletters help enhance your faith and deepen your love for God and his people, the church.

Today's question:
Will MCC endorse political candidates?

Pastor Brady's thoughts:
The IRS recently determined that political speech at a church or “through its usual channels of communication on matters of faith” does not violate the Johnson Amendment (a provision of the tax code that bars tax-exempt organizations from engaging in political campaigns), and thus churches are no longer legally prohibited from endorsing political candidates. 

In response to and prompted by this change, the MCC elders have adopted the following policy, effective 10/7/25: 

In no official manner - the pulpit, social media, signs on church property, or any other institutional means of communication - will the leaders of Minier Christian Church endorse any political candidate (or party) running for public office, be it federal, state, or local. 

The purpose for this policy is twofold: 

First, while it may be deemed spiritually necessary or beneficial to, at times, address politics publicly (for any number of reasons) - and the message of the Bible certainly has social implications - a policy like this helps ensure that we keep the main thing the main thing: the gospel, and our mission to advance it. This policy draws a helpfully clear line for ministry staff/elders in terms of assessing “how far is too far?” when addressing politically-adjacent issues from the pulpit or otherwise. 

Second, this policy protects ministry staff/elders by enabling them to reference this policy if/when a congregant wants the church to endorse a political candidate or party. This policy removes the onus of case-by-case decision-making from the individual staff member or elder.

For a little background: the IRS’s rule that it has now reversed was established in 1954. Then-senator Lyndon Johnson proposed and successfully passed legislation that prohibited non-profit organizations from explicitly and directly endorsing and directly opposing candidates for elected office.  

In the church context, this meant that in no official manner - sermon messages, formal church announcements, written statements on church letterhead or from church email or social media accounts, promotional material on church property, financial donations, etc. - could a church tell people who it believes they should vote for (or who they shouldn’t).

This does not mean that church leaders couldn’t personally endorse and/or campaign for a candidate or party. In a conversation with a neighbor or a church member in the grocery store, a pastor can share his opinion on whatever he wants, including who to vote for. He can work for political campaigns, he can go door-to-door canvassing for candidates, he can participate in the democratic process just like anyone else. But he could not do any of that in his capacity as a minister representing his church.
 
I could say, “I’m Brady Cremeens, and I think you should vote for So-And-So for Dog Catcher.” I could not say, “I’m Brady Cremeens and, as Lead Minister of Minier Christian Church, I think you should vote for So-And-So for Dog Catcher.”

Now, I can.

But, I won’t.

And neither will anyone else formally representing MCC.

It is our stance - and my stance - that, with discernment and tact, the church should preach and teach on any and all moral issues that may, because we live in a democratic republic, have connections to political policy and the public discourse. Our God is a just God, and part of Christians’ calling and responsibility during this waiting time between Christ’s first and second coming is to work toward biblically-informed justice wherever we can. Yet, seeking and pursuing justice is a fruit of faithfulness, but it is not the fruit of faithfulness.  
 
Fighting to promote a Christian worldview and even public or governmental action on abortion, racism, immigration, marriage, war, violence, the economy, gender identity, or any number of other issues that are not merely matters of personal preference but affect society broadly is within the purview of Christ’s church, but it is secondary to the first item on our job description, which I argue can be found in Jesus’s dual teachings known as the Great Commandment and the Great Commission.

The Great Commandment, from Matthew 22:36-40:

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

The Great Commission, from Matthew 28:18-20:

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Citing these passages does not, of course, simply put an end to the discussion. What it means to “love your neighbor as yourself,” for example, is obvious in some situations and contexts and very much debatable in others. Christians who wholeheartedly agree that following Jesus is imperative for our lives and faith will disagree about how to carry out the expectation to love one another when it comes to specifics, and especially when it comes to the specifics of government policy.
 
Churches in America have always been able to take official positions on any issue they wanted, as long as they did not in the process of doing so endorse a particular candidate or party. That is now no longer the case. And, actually, as a matter of my personal political philosophy, I support this decision by the IRS. I’m a big free speech guy. I would rather everyone - including church leaders - have the freedom to say what they believe, rather than come up with clever ways of saying it without really saying it. Honesty and forthrightness are good, if for no other reason than it helps expose those pastors who are in this line of work for something other than Jesus.

The separation of church and state - an idea with roots in the American colonies more than 100 years before the U.S. Constitution and its 1st Amendment was written codifying just such a separation - is a vital and valuable principle. But the purpose of the 1st Amendment and the freedoms of religious speech and assembly it ensures (along with the “establishment clause” - Google it) was to restrict government overreach into private worship, not restrict private worship’s influence in the public square. In other words, the separation of church and state is about keeping the state out of the church, not the church out of the state.
 
Churches can and should - when appropriately and winsomely measured - speak about matters of moral and ethical importance. The Bible sure does!

But I still won’t be endorsing political candidates, even though it’s now legal. Just because it is permissible does not mean it is wise, to paraphrase Paul in 1st Corinthians 10:23. In terms of anything overtly political in my preaching and teaching, I believe I have steered clear thus far and intend to continue steering clear, for a number of reasons:
 
Jesus, Paul, and the other main characters in the New Testament simply didn’t teach or present for us a model of political activism as the chief means of faithful ministry. Jesus did not come to deliver the people from Rome, but to deliver them from their sin. The world is political, so the church’s engagement in it will necessarily have political functions too. But the church cannot be explicitly political. There are plenty of other institutions for that. The church is called to prayer, worship, gospel testimony, discipleship, and loving fellowship. It is called to holiness, above and somewhat outside of the manipulative mechanisms of worldly systems (...in the world but not of it…).

Jesus and his followers simply did not see it as their objective to change the world through political means, but through bold and courageous representation of God and his goodness. So should we.  

Relatedly, I am interested in removing whatever barriers we can that keep people from hearing and responding to the gospel. We should do everything in our power to knock down unnecessary walls, not build them; to soften the hearts of the unsaved, not harden them. We have to draw some firm lines around biblical doctrine, and I don’t shy away from that, but I have no intention of drawing any lines the Bible itself does not draw.
 
If disagreeing with me on politics wouldn’t keep someone out of heaven, I don’t want it to keep him out of Minier Christian Church, either. 

So, MCC will not be endorsing political candidates. No allegiance but to the gospel; no king but Christ.
 
TO KNOW GOD AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN!
- Pastor Brady

Have a question for Theology Thursday? Send an email to office@minierchristian.org and we'll respond, or we'll include in a future Theology Thursday Buffet.