Shifting Culture
Shifting Culture invites you into transformative conversations at the intersection of faith, culture, justice, and the way of Jesus. Host Joshua Johnson engages thoughtful guests in conversations about spiritual growth, justice, creativity, and healing - drawing from the teachings of Jesus to break cycles of division, violence, and pain.
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Shifting Culture
Ep. 364 Justin Giboney - Conviction and Compassion that Lead Us Out of the Culture War
In this conversation, I talk with Justin Giboney, cofounder of the AND Campaign and author of Don’t Let Nobody Turn You Around, about how we can follow Jesus faithfully in the midst of the culture war. Justin shares how the civil rights generation embodied both conviction and compassion, and what it looks like to recover that kind of moral imagination today. We talk about seeing the sin in ourselves and the image of God in our opponents, moving from blind certainty to humble conviction, and bearing the cross in the public square. This episode calls us to reimagine public faith beyond partisanship and to embody the way of Jesus with courage, truth, and love.
Justin Giboney is an attorney, political strategist, and civic leader based in Atlanta, GA. As the co-founder and president of the AND Campaign, a Christian civic organization, Justin focuses on the intersection between faith and politics. In 2012 and 2016 Georgia’s 5th congressional district elected him as a delegate for the Democratic National Convention. He’s the co-author of Compassion (&) Conviction – The AND Campaign’s Guide to Faithful Civic Engagement and the forthcoming book – “Don’t Let Nobody Turn you Around: How the Black Church's Public Witness Leads Us out of the Culture War.” His work has been featured in publications such as including the New York Times and Christianity Today.
Justin's Book:
Don't Let Nobody Turn You Around
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In the culture war, we see good versus evil, and it's never that simple. With humanity, there's never this irredeemable arch enemy that's responsible for all the wrongs that have been done for you to you. And you're never purely innocent, and you can be corrupted just like they have been if you're not already you Josh.
Joshua Johnson:Hello and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create and the impact we can make. We long to see the body of Christ. Look like Jesus. I'm your host. Joshua Johnson, you know, the culture wars have divided us, turning neighbors into enemies and reducing public life to a zero sum game. But Justin giboney believes there's a better way forward when rooted in moral imagination, truth and grace. As co founder of the and campaign and author of Don't let nobody turn you around. Justin calls Christians to carry the cross into culture and politics with conviction and compassion, refusing to let partisanship define their discipleship. In our conversation, we explore how the civil rights generation model courage without hatred, what it means to see both the sin in ourselves and the image of God in our opponents, and how to move from Blind certainty to humble conviction. This episode is an invitation to recover a faithful public witness to trade outrage for understanding powerful persuasion and the culture war for the way of Jesus. So join us. Here is my conversation with Justin giboney. Justin, welcome to shifting culture. Excited to have you on. Thanks for joining me. Thanks, Joshua, glad to be here. Don't let nobody turn you around this book. Where did that phrase come from? For you? What are you trying to say in this book?
Justin Giboney:It comes from an old spiritual, an old spiritual. And basically I'm saying we as Christians are given direction. We're given standards, we're given convictions. And oftentimes, as we engage in the public square, we allow other things to get us off track, to turn us around from where our destination should be, especially the culture war. I think, in so many ways, with the coat, with the church as a whole, we've allowed the culture war to turn us around, to take us away from what Christians should be doing and how we should be doing it.
Joshua Johnson:So is politics the problem, or is it something else? What do you think is the problem for our lack of engagement and letting things, the culture wars, turn us around?
Justin Giboney:Well, I think the problem is us to some extent, right, the culture politics, they become, they can become distractions, but really it's upon us to make sure that we're staying in the word and doing things in a way that is constructive and that speaks well of who we serve and what we believe.
Joshua Johnson:If something is constructive, let's give an example. You start your book with the story of Richard H Kane during reconstruction as an example for us, what does it look like in the public square to have some some courage in the midst of what is happening. Can you just give us that story for us as an example to get us started?
Justin Giboney:Yeah, Robert H Kane was a representative during Reconstruction. And so this is right after slavery had ended, and you had a lot of African American, especially pastors, who actually became representatives and could run for office and could vote. And so he really stepped up. Because even after slavery, you still had a lot of racialized violence. You know, I talked about the Hamburg Massacre, and so somebody had to step in and kind of represent a group of people who had never been represented before, because there were still a lot of problems that needed to be addressed. And he did so with compassion and conviction. I think he did so without really caring about partisanship, but trying to get at what was right at a time where his life could be on the line for doing so, I
Joshua Johnson:think that's important. It's compassion, it's conviction, a lot of times. So we personally, if I'm there, I I'm kind of worried about what people are going to think about me if I have a tribal camp, and if I'm going to actually speak my mind or the truth that I think is what Jesus is calling me to. And how do we embody the ways of Jesus? What do we do with some of the fear of man when it comes to engaging in the public square? How do we start to shed some of that and speak truth?
Justin Giboney:Well, we have to refocus on what's important. Every Christian is asked to bear their cross. Jesus says, Whoever will try to save their life will lose it. And so if our main thing in the public square is self preservation or moving our interest forward, then we're going to miss the mark. We're not going to be in the public square who God has called us to be. And so we know that when we're in a public square. What does it look like to be faithful? It looks like caring about orphans and widows. It looks like, you know, not being corrupted by many of the things that are going on in the world, whether it be immorality or injustice. And so once we stay in the Word, and thankfully, we have great examples. This book is full of great examples of Christians actually did do it right, and I know for me, that's what helps keep me on course. I wish I could say I do it perfectly. I don't, but certainly that civil rights generation, that generation before them, even when in reconstruction, as I read their testimonies, as I read how they engaged in times that were worse than today, I know we think today is bad, and it is, but they were in times that were worse, and found a way to be faithful that, to me, is inspiring and something that every Christian should know and be thinking about in this moment,
Joshua Johnson:as you go around and speaking with the and campaign, and you're in public discourse, and you're trying to actually hold some different positions and say, what does it look like to bear the cross in The middle of of this, and get rid of some of this polarization that we have. What, what's going on, like, what are you seeing out there is this discourse something? Have you seen people being more inflamed lately, and the you know, this year, than in previous years? Or what's going on?
Justin Giboney:Yeah, I would say within the last few years, things have gotten even more more polarized, especially when it comes to race and issues like that. Part of the reason has to do with social media and our algorithms and what they feed us. I mean, people need to take time and really look at what their algorithm is giving to them and find ways to break out of their algorithm, because your algorithm is not going to give you the best of every argument. It's going to give you what you've been asking for and what you've been clicking on, which isn't always what you need to be fed. So we really have to take a serious look at that. And then general, just the kind of conflict entrepreneurs who have made an industry based on this division and polarization, and I see too many Christians going to these people for their information, not understanding that their whole job is to keep you enraged. Their whole job is to feed you the worst representations on the other side and to make sure that if there's anything that seems redemptive about the other side, they immediately negate it. Take a step back and look at who those people are in your algorithm that you follow, and you may need to think twice about what your intake should be, because that's what's forming your opinions.
Joshua Johnson:What would you say to people that want to engage in the public square but they're afraid right now, I've interviewed people when we're talking about justice and being out in the streets and saying, Hey, maybe some of us need to be at home doing some some of the behind the scenes work, because, you know, we can't be out in public at the moment, it's a scary time. What does it look like for a community to stand up, and not just individuals, to actually bear the cross in public school?
Justin Giboney:The first thing is we have to be informed. And so what we can't do is just hear something on the street or listen to a few things on social media and run with it. I have said, and I said this on my podcast earlier this week, we have to have a more rigorous standard for the information that we depend on and form our opinions based on. And so I need to sit maybe in a group, you know, maybe we do this collectively, and really dig through what's going on. I need to know what my neighbors are saying, but I need to try to get to the truth. Instead of just taking the information that automatically aligns with my narrative. There's a lot of that going on once you are actually informed, right? Once you have deliberately done that, due diligence then, I mean, you never act, is never in a constitutional republic, acting alone just isn't effective. I think at that point you have to try to organize or get with a group that's like minded and has not only the right objective, but the right spirit to what they're doing, and I talked about that in my work, and then find ways to inform other people, and if necessary, to push back on the power sources that are kind of carrying out this injustice. And that takes time, and I know we don't always have a whole lot of time, but we do have to be very deliberate and thoughtful about how we do it, because what ends up happening if we go out there and the spirit of our cause isn't right, or we don't have our information right, we end up doing a disservice to the issue that we care about. If we go out there and have a public temper tantrum or say things that aren't true, then we end up hurting the people that we're saying that we want to help, and I see so much of that right now. Again, if we go back to conflict entrepreneurs, they are purposefully putting out false information, and by the time it gets corrected, we've already acted on it. We don't even hear the correction, because we're so quick to jump and get involved. There's a process to this. And my book. Talks a lot about the process that many civil rights leaders went through before they engaged. So for instance, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference had a four step process before they engaged. One of those things they had to do was self purification to make sure I'm ready to engage in a constructive way, and that is so important at this time. So you have to be prepared. We live in a society where it seems like immediately jumping into something is necessary and shows that you're authentic and passionate, when, as I said before, it actually can be counterproductive.
Joshua Johnson:Then help us slow down and get the truth, especially in this day and age where you have, you know information, you're bombarded with information. What does it look like to actually find what is really going on when there are seemingly opposing places, giving me opposing information, telling me two different things, three different things, four different things, we don't actually know. How do we sift through it, and how do we start to discern what the truth is? Right now?
Justin Giboney:No, it's tough. I mean, it's very tough, and it starts with, as you said, not just having one source. If you're in a city and you've been there for a while, I'm hoping you developed a source that's maybe leaning more, a little bit more left, a source that may lean more right, that you trust, and it's a problem if you have no sources that you necessarily disagree with but trust to be honest, because whether you're on the right or the left, there are people on the other side, not everybody. There are people on the other side that you may disagree with, but that are working with intellectual honesty. It's up to us to find those sources, and if we don't find those sources, I think that's more of a commentary on us than it is on the other side, they're there. And if you, if you've allowed people to make you believe that all conservatives are dishonest or all progressives are dishonest, you're wrong, and I think you've fallen into this culture war dynamic, you have to find multiple sources, and that stuff you want to do before something crazy happens, find these sources so you can get the full story and then move from there.
Joshua Johnson:One of the things that you talk about in your book, you're right about in your book, is we're not just looking for like a moderate centrism, where it's mushy, you don't actually take a stand, but you're bearing your cross. In the middle is just talk a little bit about what you have seen, both on the problems of conservative thinking and progressive thinking at the moment, and what what you're actually looking at when it comes to a different way than these two camps.
Justin Giboney:Yeah. So one of the things I do, basically what this book is saying, is, how would the civil rights generation react to this moment in the culture war? How would they react to it? And so in doing that, I give a critique of both conservatism and progressivism. But within that critique, I also say that there's nothing inherently virtuous about middle ground either, right? Like, I'm not saying just find the middle ground and you're right. There's nothing virtuous about that, because sometimes that just means you're taking the path of the least resistance, or you're trying to avoid the smoke. And that's not there's nothing necessarily good about that. However, when you have two sides that are this radically different in this extreme, oftentimes, the answer might be somewhere in between those extremes, right? But, but that's not that's not just what you're looking for. So in my critique of conservatism, I talk a lot about how you know, conservatives have to face the fact that they got that their ideology got slavery and the Civil Rights Movement wrong. Now, there may be some very good things about conservatism, but has conservatism fixed whatever glitch it has that caused it to miss those major moments that should cause humility to somebody who's conservative. Say, man, I do love conservative. I believe in it. Something was was missing, that we missed these moments. It's, I think it's incumbent upon every conservative to find out what that was, in my opinion, part of that, what that was, was just a lack of compassion, was a refusal to put themselves in other people's shoes and to consider others before themselves. There was a lovelessness in this. And you can look at, you know, in one part person I talk about, you know, how these public lynchings and how you had people watching other people get lynched and making it a family affair, right? There's something wrong with an ideology that would allow that. Now, does that mean it's all bad? No, but conservatism was made with human hands, and therefore it's not all good. Then I get to progressivism, and I have a very serious critique of progressivism too, because I believe progressivism is biggest issue. Shoe is an inability to deal with individual sin, an inability to deal with some facts of life that don't go along with what they want to believe or how they feel inside. And therefore what you have is a situation when I say, Hey, I don't really like that truth. I don't really like that fact of life, therefore I don't change myself. I try to push away the fact of life or push away the truth. I say this within progressivism is a lack of moral knowledge. There are a lot of progressives who are very highly educated, who are in high positions, but I would say that sometimes our grandmother, who didn't have a whole lot of education, had more moral knowledge than they do. And part of the problem is we go to some of these universities, and we get exposed to certain things that are supposed to be sophisticated within our society, and we throw away our moral knowledge for something that's less valuable. Now ideally we would want both. We want empirical knowledge, we want moral knowledge and all those things. But I really do believe that, because progressivism feels like truth comes from individuals, which, if we dig into that, that's not truth at all, like if every individual has their own truth, there is really no truth that that binds us together because of that, it ends up in very tough places where people just can't deal with reality, and that ends up hurting people right, whether we're talking about abortion, eugenics, you know that came from progressivism. Just because things are inconvenient, just because things don't fit your self perception, doesn't mean they're wrong, and we've got to be willing to be transformed, rather than trying to ignore truths that are inconvenient.
Joshua Johnson:So what does it look like then to go if it's not a, you know, middle centric type thing, just because we want to be middle, what does it look like to bear our cross in the middle of
Justin Giboney:it? Yeah, I think what it looks like is not being so focused on being on the right side. Like some people will say, just choose a side and you got to go along with that side. Well, okay. Well, what if my side gets six out of 10 things right? Those other four things, I'm just gonna go along with them. I'm just gonna say, cool. You know, that's okay. That's crit for Christians. That's not an option. And so what, what I've been trying to do, and what I think people would learn from the civil rights generation, and that that gospel ethic is that it's not about taking a side, it's about taking the right position, which may take more time, which you can't automatically assume who's right or wrong. You've got to look at the compassion of Christ. You got to look at the convictions. You got to look at justice and truth and say, Where should I be in this moment? And it might be different than both sides. I mean, I give some examples on how both sides have been wrong on a number of things throughout history. And so for a Christian who's just choosing a side, you're going to be wrong either way, right? I can ask you a question, as they did with Jesus, with two wrong answers. Do I have to accept one of those two wrong answers? Because those are only the only two sides presented. Of course not. And Christians need to make sure that they see this differently and do what Jesus did, which is reframe the
Joshua Johnson:question, what do you think that then made the civil rights generation their the black church tradition. What did you think made their fusion of faith and justice so distinctive for us today?
Justin Giboney:I think the biggest thing, and I give four different things that kind of were unique about this ethic, perhaps the biggest one is the way that they saw themselves and the way that they saw their neighbors. So in the culture war, we're basically taught that the other side is purely evil and irredeemable, that everything they do is to deceive harm or somehow, you know, trick us. Nothing they do really has a good objective. They didn't look at things that way. Number one, they always saw their opponents even as as wicked as they they might be. They always saw their opponents as redeemable, and they always tried to speak them, to them in a way that would bring about that redemption, not in hatred, not in vitriol, but to say, I expect more of you. There's a better standard for you to hit. That's the that's one thing. But here's the other key. They never saw themselves as purely good either. They knew that if they reacted to the in the wrong way, to the oppression that they were experiencing, then they too could be exactly what their opponents were being. And that's so big because we in the culture war, we see good versus evil, and it's never that simple. With humanity. There's never this irredeemable arch enemy that's responsible for all the wrongs that have been done for you to you. And you're never purely innocent and you. Be corrupted, just like they have been if you're not already. And so they had this, these disciplines of self examination and understanding. Hey, even in the songs they sang, Lord, I need you to keep me from being the hatred that I'm seeing, right? And that's, I think that's the main thing that distinguished them from other movements and a lot of movements today, especially secular activism, they saw the sin in themselves and the redeemability in their opponents.
Joshua Johnson:Give me a couple of steps that they did for self examination, because I think if we're going about it the wrong way and we're we're actually just throwing a temper tantrum in the middle and not finding the truth. What is self examination? What are some practices for us so that we can do that work?
Justin Giboney:Well, let's start, start with the theology. Right In Luke we read about the praying Pharisee. And the praying Pharisee looks at the tax collector, the Publican, and says, Thank God I'm not like him. And who's exalted, the tax collector probably wasn't a good person in society, but realized it and repented and knew he needed a Savior, whereas the other one thought he got everything right. I don't want to be that tax collector. I don't want to be Jonah and not wanting to go to Nineveh. So that's the first we have to understand. We all need a savior. We are just as liable to be corrupted as anybody else. And we can look in our life and see the things that other people have done to us, but we should also be able to see that the injury, the injuries that we cause to ourselves. If we're being honest and looking with clear eyes, we're gonna see that. And so some of the things that I tell people to do is a practice that I think has been helpful, is to name 10 things that your side has gotten wrong, either recently or historically. If you can't do that, you're indoctrinated. And you need to, you need to pray and fast and kind of ask, ask God for a clean heart and clear eyes. Because we've all, regardless of a side we're on, we've all had things that have gone wrong, terribly wrong. Number two, understand the virtues on the other side. Now this doesn't mean you agree with them, but there are probably some principles that they have that are helpful. So for instance, if I'm a progressive, I should be able to look at conservatives and say, I may not agree with all their policies on abortion, but the fact that they fight for the sanctity of life is good for society. I should be able to admit that if I'm a conservative, I should be able to look at progressives and say, You know what? Inclusion, even if I don't agree with dei or stuff like that. Inclusion as a principle is important, because some of the worst moments in the church when we was when we didn't include that's the kind of exercise that gets us. Number one, humbles us, but also helps us to realize maybe it's not all bad. Maybe they're doing some terrible things right now, and I don't have to act like that's not happening, or act like I don't have to fight back against that. That's not what I'm saying. But I do have to realize that when it comes to the human condition, no one is irredeemable, that there is common grace, and maybe I have more grace for them when I understand what they're thinking, even if I disagree at some point. So I found those disciplines to be helpful in seeing ourselves differently and also seeing our opponents differently.
Joshua Johnson:What a great practice to engage in. Hopefully we get to engage in it multiple times, and we go back to it over and over. I think one of the things that people are seeing here, and you've talked about my side, is always right, meaning we have blind certainty, like we we don't see anything else, so it's blind certainty. But you also talk about conviction, like we have to have both compassion and conviction in the same thing. What's the difference then between that certainty, that blind certainty, and then conviction in the public square.
Justin Giboney:So blind certainty, I think, is certainty in all of our opinions to say that we're always right. Conviction is looking at the Bible and saying, I have a I have a confidence in what God said is right and wrong. But I know my application of that might not be perfect, right? Because what the Bible does is it gives us a framework. It gives us a framework by which to engage others, to engage our neighbor, to engage society. We should have confidence within that framework, in as far as we have been diligent in reading the Bible and that we're in the Spirit, we should be less confident on our ability to apply it every day, which means that we have to examine ourselves and how we're applying it. We can never say, Okay, I understand the Bible. I understand this framework. I got it good. Let me go out and apply it and not ever look at how it's being. Apply now we should have a little bit of concern that we may get off course, that we may be turned around, which again, causes us to examine ourselves, causes us to continue to read the Bible, causes us to talk to our neighbors and the people that we may not like, to see how our public witness actually looks to others and the impacts that it's having. So that's the difference. We want to have confidence God. We should be fully persuaded in the things God says. I don't believe in the gospel of uncertainty. We can't be certain about anything, by the way, the people that say that are pretty certain about justice and the things they want to be certain about. But we should be certain about what God says we should be humble about our about our ability to apply it in a way that does justice to who we serve and our neighbors. So
Joshua Johnson:then, what does moral imagination look like? You talk different stories of moral imagination. So we have these convictions. We know what is, you know, this framework. We say, okay, God's spoken. This is actually the justice that we need today. What does it look like for moral imagination to take place?
Justin Giboney:So just so people know, moral imagination is the ability not just to see what has been, what's going on right now or what's likely to be. Moral imagination in a very tough moment is the ability to see what ought to be based on God's promises and based on Christian faith. Moral imagination is what allows us not to be arrested by the moment. Moral imagination is what allows me to look at somebody who hates me and still see human dignity. It's seeing beyond the moment based on my faith and what God has promised me and what should be in humanity, moral imagination is also my ability to say, hey, this command that God gave me not to do this with my body or not to do that to my neighbor, it hurts right now, and I can't really understand why it's helpful, but it is because God said that it is right, and so in a moment like we're in today, you know, with assassinations, political viral violence, all the divisions to me, moral imagination is the ability to say, I'm not just going to do what's in my immediate self interest. I'm not going to do I'm not just going to believe what aligns with my narrative. I'm actually going to look out for people who might not look out for me. I'm going to advocate if somebody says, you know, I voted for the Democrat, but I'm actually going to advocate for the Trump loving areas in rural America that hardly have any hospitals. Maybe they wouldn't do it for me. And if I don't have any moral imagination, I'm like, why would I help somebody that wouldn't help me? If I have more more imagination, I say they're humans. They deserve to be treated a certain way. And whether they would do it for me or not, I have to do it, because that's how things ought to be, and they'll never, they'll never be that way, if, if all of us are always looking to our interest in what's immediately best for us, and that's kind of where moral imagination plays a role.
Joshua Johnson:It was so great for some people to have some moral imagination in this moment today, because everybody seems to be I'm here. I am more, you know, for what I'm against than what I am for what I'm standing for. Everybody is evil. On one side, no matter what side you're on the other side is evil. We have to have this moral imagination. I think one of the things that you talk about is that you say that we're in an acts 19 type moment today in the church, instead of an Acts two moment. And I think that's that's a big difference of like, standing up for what you're against, then standing up for what you're for. Speak about those two dichotomy of nine, Acts 19, Acts two. Yeah.
Justin Giboney:So, so in Acts two, we know that we had all things in common. And this is the church coming together, the Holy Spirit coming, you know, within us, and it brought us together. We have all things in common. We're working together, common vision, common objective, moving forward, as God would ask us to do, sharing all those things that were being done. Acts 19 is a little bit different. In Acts 19. You see this? This is the riot in Ephesus. So Paul had been going around Ephesus basically, kind of messing up the idol making industry, saying that Gods made by human hands aren't Gods at all. A guy named Demetrius, who's basically a conflict entrepreneur, gathers some of the people in that trade together and says, Hey, man, he's ruining our trade. We need to go get him eventually, like the whole city gets involved. And the interesting thing about acts 19 is the Bible says, I want to say it's like verse 32 that when the riots going on, that there was confusion. Some people were shouting something, one thing, some were shouting another. Most of them did not even. Know why they were there. So you have this chaos where neither side can articulate, where a lot of people, I should say, can't articulate why they're even participating, yet they want to kill Paul. Now let's think about it. There's no way in the world that Paul was responsible for all the pain and suffering, or whatever their issue was that they were mad at but he became the target of their angst, of their fear, of a lifetime of disappointments and all these other things. It was aimed at him, and that's exactly what we do today. I'm going through something. I have a lot of causes to what's going on. Some of those causes are me, but I find that one target on the other side and focus all and kind of purge all of my vitriol on that one target, whether it's a person, politician or whatever, or whether it's an ideological group, that's really what we're doing. There's confusion. We're upset, but we're not really clear on how we should deal with it. There's confusion, and we don't even we're reacting, but not even with a good explanation of why we're acting in this way. I
Joshua Johnson:find that interesting, because in I think that Paul is acting in a place in Acts 19, on what he is for. It says afterwards, after, after, the mob came through. They wanted to kill Paul. The magistrate there basically said that Paul has never spoken out against our goddess Artemis. He basically just lifts Jesus up, so he's actually standing up what he's for. And then when mobs start to happen, it's confusion, and there's confusion everywhere. So even when people are standing up for what they're for and their convictions and, you know, have compassion in the middle of it, when the mob comes, what does it look like to to to shift it back into a place of standing for what you're for? How do we clear the confusion, like clear the confusion out of the moment that we're in now.
Justin Giboney:Well, somebody has to ask the mob the question, because here's the problem with mobs, they don't do any self examination. And so if a number of people would have turned around and say, Wait, what are we rioting about? What is this about? Who's responsible, and how do we know they're responsible, right? We just talked about doing that due diligence to make sure you actually know what's going on. Christians have have to shine a light on the mob mentality, and we have to get to the truth of what's happening. Right? We have to say, well, who? Who's this guy who pulled off this together? Can I have a conversation with him, like, Why? Why are we all doing this? Who exactly is Paul, and what is he saying? And once we find out all that, okay, where do I stand? What do I believe in? Now I can address it in a way that might actually agree with some of what Paul's doing, in a way that might actually have to push back against Demetrius, the leader of all this now that I actually know what's going on. But that takes time, and it takes courage, because when you're in the middle of a riot, for you to be the one to question it and critique it is a dangerous thing, and that's where we find ourselves, our tribes. The last thing they want us to do is to shine a light on them. That's what do they say? That's, you know, self hate, that's disloyalty, that's treason, all these other things, because they can't handle the light, because the premises and conclusions that that they've used to bring us into this aren't necessarily true, and so we have to be, we have to have, as we talked before, talked about before, the courage to turn around in the midst of this kind of acts 19 moment and ask questions and shine a light and critique, even though that's a really tough thing to do, but I think it's part of of crossbearing.
Joshua Johnson:Speaking of crossbearing, you write, Christians must carry the cross in culture and politics. Our public witness is crossbearing, which makes it both an obligation and a privilege. I think a lot of people say, hey, Christians just don't get involved in politics. We're just going to sit here in the church. Why is it an obligation to be cross bearing in politics and in culture?
Justin Giboney:I mean, it's the it's part of the great commandment. There's no way to love your neighbor as yourself and completely stay away from anything that's political. It's not the only way to do it. But if I know that my neighbor is being enslaved down the street, or I know my neighbor is being manipulated and oppressed, and now their children aren't eating, I can feed them, but I also need to change the systems that are causing the problems. And so I never read anything in the Bible that said there's something so dirty and corrupt that God can't make it better. And when people say we shouldn't touch politics, I almost say, Are you questioning the power. Of God. How do we engage if we're afraid to engage with the things that are the most corrupt and problematic? Now, I think what they're saying to be to be charitable, is, yes, we shouldn't be corrupted by it. We shouldn't. We're still not, you know, we're in the world, not of the world. And I would agree with you on that we have to be very careful, because there have been Christians who've gotten into politics and been used and abused and and things of that nature. So we have to be careful. But I don't see anywhere where the Bible says Don't, don't touch that, especially when politics are such a big part of our daily interactions. And the truth is, in your attempt to not be political, you're still actually being political.
Joshua Johnson:So then, as we engage in politics, how do we not give into ideology and stick with the cross and Jesus?
Justin Giboney:The first thing I tell people before they get into anything political is you have to know who you are. You have to know who you are and what your values are. Otherwise, when you get into politics, somebody else is going to tell you who you are and what your and what your values are. So you have to have a certain level of confidence in who you are as a Christian before you step into it. And then you have to be honest and know, I have to keep my eyes open. I have to be a critical thinker, because even if I go to the Republican Party or I go to the Democratic Party, everything they represent, since they're made with human hands, just like those idols, everything they represent, is not going to be something that I can go along with. And so I need to have a healthy skepticism of some of the things they're bringing to the table. I have to be willing to push back, even if it means that I might not get that position or get that vote or be moved up to a higher space, that's what I have to be willing to do if I'm going to go into the public square and be faithful
Joshua Johnson:as you're going around and you're speaking and you're doing things with the end campaign. Are you finding any hope in the culture? Are you seeing people taking a stand, showing up with some moral imagination, or are we really at a crossroads where we just, we really need to get some people to stand up to be able to have that moral imagination?
Justin Giboney:Yeah, I mean, there's, there's, there's always examples, if you look, you look hard enough. I think some of the things that Memphis Mayor Paul Young has done has really stood up for what's right in tough situations, and chosen not to be partisan when it meant helping the people, helping his constituents. And so, yeah, if you, if you look forward to you'll see it is there. Enough of it? Do I wish there were more? Of course, we need more people, and we need more everyday Christians speaking up and exemplifying what that looks like. But it's not just gonna happen. Each of us have to be determined to have a public witness that glorifies God. I
Joshua Johnson:don't know. Maybe America isn't unique in their political violence, but we were founded on violence, and we have violence. Is there something that we can do today to turn that violence around, to stop the cycles of violence that are happening in our country since the beginning?
Justin Giboney:I think the first thing we have to do is be very clear that when it does happen, whether it's on our side or the other side, that it's absolutely unacceptable. And that's one thing that I didn't unfortunately see. You know, with the assassination, some people were talking about a lot of other things, instead of in a point blank manner saying, this cannot happen. I don't care what his opinion was. I don't care how he offended me and my community. This can never happen, period. Let some people marinate on that and then get into right other conversations. That's the first thing we have to do. And then we just have to educate people on Look, you're that only makes things worse. It doesn't help anything. You're never going to get rid of all of your political opponents, and if you did, somehow, you'd be a monster. So understand that we're going to have to find a way to live together, and that you're just going to have to step up your game when it comes to persuading people who don't agree with you. That's what democracy is about. That's what civic pluralism is about. They don't have to agree with you. They don't have to think you're smart or beautiful or any of that stuff. You need to persuade them the best you can to do the right thing. And we begin to think that we're so right on certain issues that we shouldn't have to persuade anybody. Everybody should just agree with us. No, but they don't. And so what you see Martin Luther King doing what you see Dorothy Day doing what you see Fannie Lou Hamer doing is persuading people who disagree with them of what is right, not trying to force, not trying to use the government to force them to do basic stuff that you know they want to do. No. Persuade the most people so that we can have justice right, not so we can agree on everything and you can just think I'm a great person and compliment all my cultural idiosyncrasies, but so that we can make sure that government is serving its purpose, that its order is bringing order, and that it's bringing justice. In between all of that, we have to persuade one another, but that's harder than just having temper tantrums. That's harder than just barking at the other side. It means you have to be artful. It means you have to be thoughtful. It means you have to hear other people out so that you know where they're coming from. And that seems to be too big a price to pay for a lot of people out there today. You
Joshua Johnson:know, I was, I had an interview with somebody, we're talking about justice, and said that only in America people ask, what is justice? The church around the world knows justice, and they're they pursue justice. Why do you think Americans in particular have a hang up on the word justice and what it is.
Justin Giboney:Well, I think the thing about justice which is different than charity. So a lot of people that do charity well, don't do justice well. And part of the issue is that with charity, you give as much as you want to give, and then you can stop right? Charity doesn't necessarily have to hurt you. In the same way, justice is either given completely or not given at all, and justice forces a conflict with self interest. And so a lot of people who you hear that have a problem with justice in the social context, social justice is because they don't want to give what justice demands of them, because that would, that would take too much from them. Justice is really, really comes from the imago day. It comes from, you know, the image of God, and understanding that since we all have human dignity, we have to be treated to a certain standard. And that standard may get in the way of somebody's financial interest. That standard may get in the way of somebody's identity, national identity narrative, but it's what people deserve. And to deny that, I think, is really to deny one of the things that the Bible talks about the most. And so it is unfortunate, but there's a lot of narratives and self interest that get in the way of us doing what we're called do?
Joshua Johnson:Do you have an example of somebody actually seeing the humanity of the other side, the image of God in another person to bring about some justice and change in our culture? Sure.
Justin Giboney:I mean, there's tons of historical examples. I mean, I just mentioned Fannie Lou Hamer. One of the stories that I talk about in the book is how she was kind of going around in the 60s and trying to demystify the political process to people who had never been able to participate in it. And she was pulled over by highway patrolman taken to, you know, in jailed, and he had somebody beat her until she almost died, just because she was trying to help people, you know, learn how to vote and the importance of voting. And years later, she's asked, How do you feel? How do you feel about that officer that did that to you? And she said, I feel sorry for him, because he's sick, and America's sick and it needs a doctor. And basically, Christians are that doctor. What she did right there was, instead of saying he's irredeemable and I hate him, she had compassion for him, which opened up the door for her to actually love him and feel and want him to be redeemed. What we do today is somebody said something I don't like, or insensitive about my community, or an issue I care about. They're irredeemable. I now have the right to hate them and to deny them any, you know, any kind of help and all that stuff that's a way to respond to it. That's not a Christian way to respond to it. And I hope this book brings people really, what this book is about, in a lot of ways, Joshua is, is, it's proof of concept. So I can say all this stuff about love, enemy and all this, and you know, how we should, you know, see the sin in us and see the virtue in others. I can say all that in theory. And it's like, okay, that's Pollyanna ish, like, Yeah, okay. Or I can say, well, guess what? I know it can happen because it has happened, and when it happens, it's more effective than your temper tantrums and your vitriol. Let me show you this example, and that's really what the book is doing, is saying, let me give you a real life example of how this happened and why the way you're going about it is wrong, and there's a better way to do it in practice.
Joshua Johnson:So then, what is your hope for the for your readers? People pick up this book and read it and find these examples in your book,
Justin Giboney:my hope for the reader is that they see they start to view Christian Social Engagement differently, that they. Community are willing to examine themselves about how they see their opponents and how they see themselves. In no way is this book telling us not to tenaciously fight against immorality or injustice, and none of these examples I gave Did someone say, Well, I love you, therefore I'm let you hurt other people. That's not what it is. But I still need to make sure that my heart is pure, that I don't become evil in my fight against evil. And so I'm hoping that people will look at these examples and say, there is a better way to go about this. The culture war is ultimately whether I win it or whether I lose it, gonna damage other people and damage my spirit. So I have to go about it another way, and thank God that he's given us an example not that long ago of how to actually do it.
Joshua Johnson:Justin, I have a couple quick questions here at the end. This has been a fantastic conversation, but one, if you could go back to your 21 year old self, what advice would you give?
Justin Giboney:Ooh, I would have told my 21 year old self that you need to stay in the word, that just because you're in this environment that says that the Word of God is expired, that's not true. And the people that taught you that probably, you know, the people who taught you about the word probably have more moral knowledge than the people who are telling you that it's worthless.
Joshua Johnson:That's good. Scott, anything you've been reading or watching lately you could recommend.
Justin Giboney:Oh, yeah. So Ross douthats book, think it's called belief, or believe is a really good book, especially for people who are in academic spaces or, you know, spaces like that, and trying to evangelize folks that just don't believe in God and have a very post modern view of of the world. So that's a really good one. Yeah,
Joshua Johnson:it's great book. It's good just as this book, Don't let nobody turn you around. Will be available in November anywhere books are sold. I love this book. I think it's really important today in our culture war and the moment that we're in, this is one of the books that you need people to read to get an imagination for what has happened, to find those stories, to be able to stand in a place with conviction, to bear the cross in the middle of culture here, to actually have not just orthodoxy, which you talk about, but orthopraxy, you're actually merging the truth and practice in a way that we can engage in culture. I love this book, and I think it's really important, so I really want people to go and read it. How can people get the book and then Is there anywhere you'd like to point people to? How can they connect with you?
Justin Giboney:Yeah. So as far as getting the book, you can go to Amazon, Don't let nobody turn you around. And you can buy that online now. You can pre order that right now. And for me, you can listen to the church politics podcast, which we do an episode once a week. You can go on an Instagram and follow me at Justin e gibbony, and same thing on x.
Joshua Johnson:Justin, thank you for this conversation. I think it's really helpful for a lot of people. Hopefully people actually take it in their hearts and actually live into a new, new way, a way that looks like Jesus. We can embody Jesus in culture, in the ways of of God, so that we could see a better world and we get rid of these culture wars. It was fantastic. I loved our conversation. So thank you very much. Amen.
Justin Giboney:Thank you. Thanks for having me. You
