Why more blue on the map makes me more hopeful.

I have to admit, seeing more blue on the political map makes me happy. But probably not for the reasons some people might assume.

I don’t believe Jesus is a Democrat. I don’t believe he’s a Republican, either. And I certainly don’t believe that voting for one party makes someone a more faithful Christian than voting for another.

What gives me hope is the possibility that more people are beginning to recognize the difference between following Jesus and following a political party. Because somewhere along the way, I think we’ve gotten those two things terribly confused. We’ve allowed political affiliation to become a measure of Christian faithfulness. We’ve become so concerned with whether someone votes the right way that we sometimes forget to ask whether the way we’re living reflects the person we claim to follow.

And that’s a problem.

I’ve spent a significant part of my life studying theology, working in ministry, and wrestling with what it means to follow Jesus. If there’s one thing that experience has taught me, it’s that faithfulness requires a willingness to question ourselves. Sometimes that means questioning theology we’ve inherited. Sometimes it means reconsidering beliefs we’ve held for decades. And sometimes it means acknowledging that the political party we’ve supported may not reflect our convictions as faithfully as we once believed.

I don’t think that’s a failure of faith. I think that can be an expression of it. Because Christianity was never supposed to be about protecting a political identity. It was supposed to be about following Jesus. And Jesus has an inconvenient habit of refusing to fit neatly into the categories we create for him. He tells us to love our enemies. He challenges our assumptions about who deserves compassion. He reminds us of our responsibility to the poor, the sick, the stranger, and the imprisoned. He asks us to look beyond ourselves. And sometimes, if we’re paying attention, he asks us to reconsider things we were absolutely certain we had right.

I think that’s what concerns me most about the relationship between Christianity and politics today. Not that Christians have political convictions. Of course we do, and we should take those convictions seriously. But that we’ve sometimes become so committed to defending a party, a candidate, or a particular political movement that we’re no longer willing to question whether doing so is consistent with the Gospel. We can become remarkably skilled at explaining away behavior we would otherwise condemn. We can convince ourselves that winning is the same thing as faithfulness.

And we can forget that our responsibility to love our neighbors doesn’t change depending on which political party they support.

I don’t want that for Christianity. And I don’t want that for our country. I want us to be willing to say that our faith matters more than our political allegiances. That when our convictions and our party’s positions come into conflict, we’re willing to wrestle with that tension rather than automatically defending the party. That we can change our minds without believing we’ve betrayed our faith. And that following Jesus might sometimes require us to stand apart from the very people we’ve always agreed with. That’s why seeing more blue gives me hope.

Not because I know what motivated every voter. I don’t. And not because I think Democrats have somehow become the party of Jesus. But because I hope it reflects a willingness to reconsider old loyalties and ask better questions. Questions about how we treat people. About what we expect from our leaders. About whether our political commitments are helping us live out the faith we profess. I hope we’re remembering that Christianity is not something a political party gets to claim as its own.

And that faithfulness isn’t measured by how consistently we vote for a particular party, but by how seriously we take the life and teachings of Jesus. There will always be Christians who arrive at different political conclusions. I think there is room for those disagreements, and I think we should approach them with humility.

But I also think we should be willing to admit that following Jesus may challenge our political convictions instead of simply confirming them.

So yes, I’m happy to see more blue on the map.

Not because I need everyone to become a Democrat. But because I hope more of us are remembering that being Christian has never required us to belong to a particular political party.

It requires us to follow Jesus.

And sometimes following Jesus means being willing to question everything else.