In his new book, “The Lamb’s Agenda,” Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, challenges believers to put the call of Jesus Christ, the Lamb, ahead of the political trappings of the elephant or the donkey. Reconciling the messages of Billy Graham and Martin Luther King Jr., the author shows that the kingdom of God entails righteousness before God and justice for all people.
As a man who carries a permanent residency card with me at all times, I find the political landscape of the U.S. to sometimes be a mystery. As Carl Trueman expressed in Republocrat: Confessions of a Liberal Conservative, I find myself to be a political nomad. I don’t fit in with the elephant or the donkey, though I more closely associate with one. But where I fail to harmonize with one party’s broader agenda, I feel the rub, and it is a constant reminder that I don’t belong, ultimately, to any political agenda.
That is one of the reasons why Samuel Rodriguez’ new book, The Lamb’s Agenda: Why Jesus Is Calling You to a Life of Righteousness and Justice, found such a prophetic resonance in me.
The premise is simple: Our allegiance is not to the elephant or the donkey, but to the Lamb. And it is only by committing to Christ before Republicans, and the Son of David ahead of Democrats, that we will see a resurgence in our nation of a vital faith for the good of all people.
The book repeatedly speaks of reconciling two of the past century’s most nation-shaking messages: The “vertical” message of Billy Graham, and the “horizontal” message of Martin Luther King Jr.
When Graham charged onward with evangelism, people came by the thousands into a restored relationship with the Father through the Son, Jesus Christ. When King wrote from jail, and spoke in protest of the mistreatment of American citizens, he was applying the ethic of the kingdom of God to seek justice for all. The nexus of the cross (righteousness and justice, vertical and horizontal) is the place from which the church must operate to reach and change a nation.
Whether politics is your favored sphere or not, this book is an important opportunity to get a view into the possible future of our nation, one where freedom in Jesus and love for all our brothers and sisters brings lasting change.
The call is to regain our prophetic voice, and not lose sight of the power, purpose and implications of the gospel we proclaim. The Lamb’s Agenda will be steel in your spine to obey Christ, heed the Spirit, and pursue righteousness and justice for the glory of the Lamb.
