There Are No Sides.
The Question That Reveals Everything
Someone asked me recently: “What side are you on?”
I didn’t blink.
“I don’t have a side. There are no sides in the Kingdom.”
Here’s why that answer matters: The moment you anchor your hope in any human system,political, cultural, or tribal, you’ve already lost. Salvation doesn’t come through parties, personalities, or platforms. A broken machine doesn’t produce righteousness just because you pull the lever harder. Corruption doesn’t transform into holiness by changing uniforms; it just memorizes new talking points.
Scripture confronted this seductive mindset long before cable news, social media, or campaign rallies existed.
The Commander Who Takes No Side
Joshua stood outside Jericho with his pulse racing. The battle was coming. The pressure is mounting. And there, before him, stood an angelic warrior with a drawn sword.
Joshua asked the question every generation eventually asks:
“Are you for us or for our adversaries?” (Joshua 5:13)
The reply should shatter us:
“No; rather, I indeed come now as commander of the army of the LORD.” (Joshua 5:14)
Translation: I’m not joining your fight. You’re joining Mine.
Joshua didn’t argue. He didn’t strategize. He didn’t defend his position or justify his cause.
He fell on his face.
“What does my Lord say to His servant?”
That’s the shift. From sides to allegiance. From argument to alignment. From tribal confidence to holy surrender.
God doesn’t take sides. He is on the side. And every other allegiance, no matter how righteous it appears, must bow before His throne or become an idol in His place.
The Seats Nobody Actually Wants
The mother of James and John approached Jesus with a request dripping with ambition: power, influence, and proximity to the throne.
“Command that in Your kingdom these two sons of mine may sit, one on Your right and one on Your left.” (Matthew 20:21)
Jesus didn’t flatter her hunger for position. He exposed the cost:
“You do not know what you are asking… Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?” (Matthew 20:22)
Then he said something most people breeze past without catching its weight:
“To sit on My right and on My left… is for those for whom it has been prepared by My Father.” (Matthew 20:23)
Heaven doesn’t reward grasping. It prepares hearts.
And here’s the detail that should demolish every power-hungry narrative: The only people who literally sat at Jesus’ right and left were criminals dying on crosses beside Him.
“At that time two robbers were crucified with Him, one on the right and one on the left.” (Matthew 27:38)
So, when people obsess over securing “the right side” or “the left side,” the cross quietly asks: Do you understand what you’re reaching for?
The seats of honor in Christ’s Kingdom aren’t carved from political victory or cultural dominance. They’re forged in suffering, surrender, and sacrifice.
Politics Controls Behavior. It cannot heal the human heart.
Let’s be honest:
Yes, politics can restrain certain evils for a season. It can protect freedoms. It can influence policy. Those things matter on a practical level, and we shouldn’t pretend otherwise.
But let’s stop the delusion that politics can do what only God can do.
A fallen world will always produce fallen systems. Fallen leaders. Fallen solutions. That doesn’t mean we disengage from the process; it means we stop worshiping the mechanism as if it’s the messiah.
Paul confronted this same sickness when believers formed camps around personalities:
“Each one of you is saying, ‘I am of Paul,’ and ‘I of Apollos,’ and ‘I of Cephas’…” (1 Corinthians 1:12)
Then he asked the question that obliterates every tribal identity:
“Has Christ been divided?” (1 Corinthians 1:13)
No. He hasn’t.
And if Christ cannot be divided, then His people have no business dividing themselves.
The Kingdom isn’t built on sides. It’s built on surrender.
It’s not powered by outrage. It’s powered by holiness.
It’s not advanced by corruption dressed as virtue. It advances through truth, repentance, and obedient faith.
A Kingdom Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand
Here’s what choosing “sides” eventually produces when left unchecked:
Suspicion becomes normal. Conversation becomes combat. People stop listening to understand and start listening to accuse. Nuance dies. Complexity is flattened into caricature.
Division doesn’t just organize opinions; it manufactures enemies. It turns neighbors into threats and brothers into opponents. What begins as “strong convictions” quietly matures into contempt. Then hatred. Then violence.
Jesus didn’t offer a political opinion when He spoke these words. He delivered a spiritual diagnosis:
“Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself will not stand.” (Matthew 12:25)
This isn’t a metaphor. It’s mathematics. Division is self-destruction with better marketing.
Scripture doesn’t sugarcoat where that road leads:
“If you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another.” (Galatians 5:15)
That’s the endgame of sides: mutual consumption. Not because we lack information, but because we lack love. Not because we need better arguments, but because we’ve abandoned the one thing that holds humanity together.
When you divide the body of Christ along political, cultural, or ideological lines, you don’t strengthen the church; you cripple it. You don’t advance the Kingdom; you betray it.
A house divided against itself will fall. Every time. Without exception.
My Allegiance? Heaven’s Government First.
I want God’s rule in my motives. My mouth. My integrity. My leadership. My politics. My prejudices. My pain.
Because when the savior governs the inner world, you stop being emotionally manipulated by the outer one.
And you begin to see with devastating clarity:
There is only one eternal choice: the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.
Everything else is temporary. Every banner. Every tribe. Every party. Every movement. They will all fade. Kingdoms rise and fall. Empires crumble. Ideologies collapse under the weight of their own contradictions.
But the Kingdom of God endures.
So, if you’re looking for my side, you’ll be disappointed.
But if you’re looking for my allegiance, you’ll get a clear answer:
Jesus is Lord.
And everything else, every banner, every tribe, every argument, every cause, must bow before that reality or be exposed as rebellion.
The Remedy Isn’t a Better Side. It’s Christlike love.
The Kingdom operates in a different atmosphere. It doesn’t heal division by winning arguments; it heals division by restoring love.
Not sentimental love. Not performative love. Not selective love that only extends to those who agree with us.
Covenant love.
Love that refuses to dehumanize the opponent. Love that speaks truth without hatred. Love that stays anchored when everyone else is intoxicated by outrage. Love that weeps over the lost instead of celebrating their destruction.
The Word makes the remedy devastatingly plain:
“Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.” (1 Peter 4:8)
“Love is patient, love is kind… it does not seek its own… it does not take into account a wrong suffered… it rejoices with the truth.” (1 Corinthians 13:4-6)
“By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:35)
Not by your political affiliation. Not by your cultural tribe. Not by your ability to win debates or destroy enemies.
By your love.
When love dies, trust dies. When trust dies, societies fracture. When societies fracture, kingdoms fall.
But when love is restored, genuine, sacrificial, Christlike love, the Kingdom becomes visible again. Tangible. Undeniable.
“The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.” (1 John 4:8)
The Final Word
I will not trade love for a side.
I will not surrender obedience to Christ for the intoxication of being “right.”
I will not join your holy war against the “other side” when Jesus died to destroy the dividing wall between us.
Because a kingdom divided against itself will fall. It always has. It always will.
But the Kingdom of God, built on love, powered by the Spirit, and anchored in truth, will stand forever.
That is the only remedy strong enough for a divided world:
No better side. Christlike love.
Not louder arguments. Humble obedience.
Not a political victory. Kingdom allegiance.
So, choose this day whom you will serve. But understand you cannot serve two masters. You cannot pledge allegiance to an earthly kingdom and the Kingdom of Heaven simultaneously.
One will always demand what the other forbids.
Choose wisely.
Because eternity doesn’t care which side you were on.
It only cares who you are.
~Selah.
(C) 2025 www.soundthetrumpet.org
