There are many means to crash a car. One sure way is driving in the opposite direction of a one-way street.
Political battles tend to be polarized. And they often create much dust and heat that can sometimes catch citizens in a seemingly endless whirlwind of confusion, rage, and tirade of misplaced words.
To rally supporters to their side, politicians occasionally get creative. And this is good if such inspiration carefully treads within the secure borders of the sacred, the traditional, and the ethical.
Because, for every meaningful progress, every society must learn early on if any boundaries need shifting, and when they should be.
The newest and even creative trick on Bobi Wine’s sleeve is a song. For the moment he represents the hope of many Ugandans, and especially the youth. He has an unquestionable fanbase, and he knows how to fan their flames frequently. Do not doubt his talent.
And if he can galvanize his firebase into a formidable voting force, the future might open for him.
But the excitement, popularity, and highspeed motion on a dusty road tend to raise a sandstorm that may blur the vision of politicians and their followers. And this is so especially when we seek political change as a crown at all costs.
Here is where as Christians we must be very discerning. Here is why we must think beyond the politics beneath our nose and avoid being caught up in the same sand-storms that wreak havoc on the souls of many.
We must sieve through the porous promises of politics and point sincere seekers to surer salvation since we, of all people, know that there is no utopia to be expected from any political maneuver.
Jerusalem must come from above, for the one below is subject to Babylon as history proves.
The temptation to confuse heavenly hope with human aspirations and strategies is not new, however. Jesus’ first disciples thought that His redemption would be an immediate earthly restoration of Israel as a dominant political kingdom. Even after His resurrection they still hoped in a physical, political establishment (Acts 1:6).
His idea of redemption was so countercultural that even His own have misunderstood Him through the ages. It is why Israel rejected Him.
At home, think of Eusebius, that venerable Bishop of Caesarea who saw in Constantine the promised consummation of all things. To him, God’s kingdom had finally come with Constantine’s victory in Battle of the Milvian Bridge.
This thought lingered until the sacking of Rome in A.D 410, upon which St. Augustine penned the City of God as a much necessary reminder for humanity to look beyond itself for its salvation.
My Concerns with Tuliyambala Engule Remix
I do not want to be misunderstood. I believe that Christians must faithfully participate in the mundane and earth’s daily affairs in as far as they are able, including politics. It is one way we love our neighbors. Our ‘boundaries of dwelling’ determine the context within which we reveal Christ to the world (Acts 17:26-27).
With that said, there are three points to note:
The first is that all political promises are porous. They often miss the heart of the matter, which is the matter of the heart.
The current rendition of Tuliyambala Engule assumes that evil is out there. The enemy is in the State House. But it seems oblivious of the fact that corruption runs right through your heart and mine and the ballot box leaves it wholly intact.
This point would have been apparent had the song remained unaltered.
But it was changed, with the result that confusion crept in as to where the problem is. Thus the remix promises a crown without the cross. It gives an illusion that this Uganda will be better if ‘we occupy’ the seats that ‘they are in.’
The Christian message points to personal repentance rather than political power. The cross is a call to die to self, not to parade personal ambition.
Now, the call for change in the political arena is warranted. The status quo is not how things ought to be. But the song oversimplifies the human problem, which leaves its promises flattering more than promising.
Surely we shall not ultimately wear the crown because of a regime change. The ‘new Uganda’ will still have its problems until Christ returns. As long as our hearts are desperately wicked, our castles will crumble together with our crowns.
Wisdom dictates that we do not replace the eternal with the temporal, nor blur the distinctions by substituting one for the other.
The remixed song promises what only Christ delivers, which is why a political battle-cry replaced perseverance in faith.
The second point I would like to make concerns proper appropriation of imagery. To be sure, we can use redemption images politically if it is with great care and without abusing the original intent of produced pieces.
But Kingdom imagery is by intent one-way. Temporal things point beyond themselves to the eternal. For example, the body is used as an image of the Church. And yet to use the Church as the image of the body is not just inappropriate, it is wrong.
Shadows exist to communicate ultimate reality. But the substance to which shadows point must not be itself now used to indicate the shadows themselves. Images are servants, not masters.
And I think this is the confusion at the heart of Bobi Wine’s remix of Tuliyambala Engule.
Tuliyambala Engule by its original intent is a one-way lane. With clarity, it summons faithful believers in Christ to persevere in their faith until the day when Christ finally makes all things new. It is premised on 2 Tim. 4:7-8.
But, as Pastor Martin Ssempa points out, the song technically replaces Jesus with Bobi Wine as the unfaltering hope of Ugandans, and the capture of power by People Power as the eschatological reality to which Ugandans must look.
In short, the remix replaces the reality with the shadow.
Thus, the song, as it stands is idolatrous. Idolatry is defined merely as the inclination and act of replacing God with anything non-God. Because adoration is a one-way lane that leads to God and not back, the song fails to discern the boundaries that exist in both sacred and tradition, thus hastily shifting them.
The third point is that we ought to be clear about where the hope of humanity lies. It is not in who becomes president. Regardless of which side of the political divide we are on if we are Christians, we must know that our hope does not consist of any partisan establishment.
There is only one Savior for Ugandans, Christ Jesus. Our hope is in His death and resurrection. It is in Christ’s return ‘to judge the living and the dead.’
When He returns, He will crown only those whose hearts were washed by His blood.
And then He will reign, as His power subjugates all pain and evil. He will realize His cosmic shalom apart from any political establishments.
It is then that nations shall beat their swords into plowshares. Redemption shall not be when an individual human figure ascends the political throne, but when the God-Man descends in the clouds to judge all men, kings and subjects alike.
One last thing: although there are many means to crash a car, there is one sure way to lose one’s soul fast, and that is by attempting to replace God with one’s self in human consciousness, promising to provide what only Christ can (Acts 12:21-24).
But as believers, we fight the good fight of faith, never lowering our eyes to the valley, from whence despair and bitterness come. And when the battle is over, we shall be crowned. Not with good healthcare, but with resurrected bodies.
Be you may do well to ask yourself: what crown do you seek?