There's nothing wrong with Christians entering politics, but Timothy Keller, senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, said believers should never let their work get in the way of their faith.
On Thursday night, Keller spoke before the Movement Day Global Cities Conference at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City, according to The Christian Post. There, he issued this message: "You're Christian first."
"All across the world there is a lot of political fragmentation... there is more and more political fragmentation in so many countries, and unfortunately Christians might be tempted to be fragmented right along. We might start getting divided politically instead of remembering that you're Christian first and you're white, black, Asian, Hispanic, second. You're a Christian first and you're American, or you're British and you're African second," Keller said.
Keller then urged people to form a city Gospel movement. This movement should comprise of a group of Christians and churches coming together despite their different races. He said through this movement people should be able to "see the urban body of Christ grow in quality and quantity faster than the population."
"The salt and light of Christian love and truth will actually influence the life of that city, renew it, improving it socially, influencing it culturally and lifting up Jesus' name so it's increasingly respected and honored in that city," Keller said.
Now that people are living in a post-Christian culture, Keller said Christians are definitely going to face tons of problems because non-Christian culture is based on the rejection of Christianity.
"The very idea that you think you have the truth, that's what's in a post-Christian culture. We need to be redeemed from [it] because we are not all free to live life the way we want to live. And that's what post-Christian culture says is the meaning of life. The meaning of life is to get rid of the idea that there is any kind of overarching moral norm or absolutes and to be free to live life any way you want," Keller explained.
The problem is, according to Keller, is that many churches don't really know how to navigate this post-Christian culture. Churches don't understand this "digital, wired, trans-local culture."
Nevertheless, Keller believes that through its "supernatural resilience," the church will be able to surmount these new challenges.
"Every time the Church has come up against something that we've never faced before, we've broken through. There is a supernatural resilience in the Church... there was this place where Jesus said, 'upon this rock I build my Church and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it,'" he said.
