Good Intentions Highway

I was at the Rock and Worship Roadshow last night in Boise when I was struck by an epiphany: Politicization/Legislation of Christianity in America may well be the biggest blunder to promoting the Gospel since the Inquisition.
I will say up front that my Faith has been all over the map. I can most likely be described currently as Christian-Left, but it's really more eclectic than that. My faith is in Christ and Christ alone and I do rely on His Grace; the rest I question daily. I have been following the news of the day with the Republican Primaries with great interest, as well as many of the laws being proposed on the state level with regards to abortion, contraceptives, and personhood. I am pro-life, but also pro-choice(on many issues, not just abortion), but that's another whole blog. To cut to the quick, I am likely to vote for President Obama this time, although I voted for McCain, last time. All that said, let me elaborate on my "epiphany" of last night.
I believe that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is something that is promoted on the heart level, not the political arena. It is a personal call to the individual, by God, through believers and other situations. If we become so boisterous as to insist that our view become everyone's view through legislation and the legal process, we alienate all those who hold different views. In a sense, we solidify their view that we are JAMES(Judgemental, arrogant, mean-spirited, egotistical, and self-rightious). We can not win over hearts and minds to the gospel of love by insisting that they follow it or we will lock them up.

This also speaks to the fact that there are many interpretations of christian belief within our own camps. Who's interpretation becomes the approved one? It is a very slippery slope created with the best of intentions. God is already enthroned in the hearts of believers, to enforce it in the codes of a society that has people of many beliefs and creeds is to alienate all those with differing beliefs. There is a reason that the Founding Fathers made a point of not requiring/allowing any religious test for our elected officials. Further, they made laws that allowed religious freedom, not just protection for religion, but freedom FROM religion.
The christian-right may well win the vote, but in the process we will likely push those on the fence to the gospel into the opposing camp. People are not fond of being forced into anything. If that were the case, God could have simply taken away our free will and made us into worship-bots. He wants us to choose Him, of our own free will. That no longer becomes an option if we are legislated into being Christians, like-it-or-not!
Lets get back to loving all of God's children and letting God open the doors to hearts by being the people he has called us to be. As the song states: They will know we are christians by our love", not by our political agenda.