Reviewing Jesus for President (part 1 of 4)

I’m going to offer four quick and dirty reviews of Jesus for President by Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw, (and beautifully designed by SharpSeven… they should get a separate review on their own merit) partly because I gawked a little bit at the idea of a subversive anti-empire tome utilizing viral media strategies like a blog tour, and partly because after reading the book I realize that I would have done the exact same thing if it meant infecting more people with such an imaginative and beautiful piece. I’ll write brief comments about a selection of quotes I underlined or highlighted in each section, maybe ask some questions, and give a Jerry Springer-style closing thought. So here goes Section 1: Before There Were Kings and Presidents.

SECTION 1: BEFORE THERE WERE KINGS AND PRESIDENTS

The authors open with a section that discusses their basic premise: that civilization’s opening act was its’ defining act, and ever since Cain and Abel our world has been immersed in a great struggle for power.

This is a foundational idea to the rest of the text. It points to civilization as humanity’s reckless attempt to do life without God and what happens when such an immense vacuum exists in our collective governments. There is no way in hell that civilization can save itself. We need Jesus for President (although it’s a little early in the book for the authors to proclaim this.

They go on to a treatment of the great flood of Noah and the Tower of Babel, each revealing in their own way God’s redemptive intervention in keeping us from becoming our worst possible self in the form of empire. It’s after he disables the central nervous system of the Tower committee that God reveals his plan to deliver humanity from its’ worst impulses: through a set-apart people, first in Abraham and Sarah and then through the leadership of the prophets. “One thing that is consistent throughout the Hebrew Scriptures is that God was deconstructing, redefining, and reclaiming kingship.” (p37).

There’s only one point in this section where I wrote a big question mark, and that’s when the authors seem to draw the conclusion from the story of David and Goliath that God’s intention is to topple evil exclusively with non-violent resistance. Sorry, but the logic doesn’t play out in this scenario. The David and Goliath story isn’t analogous to arming kids with super soakers to go after Osama Bin Laden. Super soakers wouldn’t kill him. David did kill Goliath, ruthlessly and with R-rated bloodletting. It’s not that I disagree with Claiborne and Haw on their general premise of peaceful resistance, but they shouldn’t have to skew biblical narratives to make their point.

I deeply appreciate the authors’ use of biblical literature to set the framework for God’s ethos regarding the deliverance and redemption of humanity. Somehow empire has co-opted the biblical narrative with themes that suggest God is on the side of the US. Pacifists are reading the same bible, but through a different (and I would suggest, more accurate) lens.

Jesus for President Blog Tour

Shane Claiborne is campaigning for Jesus in his new book and tour, “Jesus for President.”

While I haven’t yet read the book, my first observation about the book tour alone is that Shane Claiborne and his subversive message of radical adherence to the Way of Jesus seem like strange bedfellows when matched with Zondervan, a Christian publishing juggernaut. Even more so when, at first blush, it seems like the publisher is going for a mega media blitz by way of viral advertising, baiting bloggers like me to post links to their merchandise in exchange for the potential for wider readership and comments from Claiborne himself.