[FIRST. I had told myself I would avoid politics here on my blog as best I could, but some things need to be said. I wrote this for my personal journal—not intending to share it. Then I read it to a friend who said, “That’s not about politics. That’s about friendship.” He’s right. It is about friendship; my friendship with James and everyone who is a friend whether we agree or not.]

FROM TIME TO TIME, someone will bring up politics in a conversation with me by saying, “Your friend James Lankford…”

Then they try to move the conversation one of several directions: either they think I’m cool to have a friend in high places deadset on protecting us all from the liberals, or they want me to know that they know I have a friend whose fingerprints are all over the Kool-Aid pitcher in the Whitehouse kitchen.

Either way, it’s guilt by association. Why do we do that? I don’t think that I would assume that just because you might have been on a bowling team with Ted Cruz that you are a political nutjob or that his daddy and your daddy had anything at all to do with the Kennedy assassination. (He didn’t did he?)

James and I are friends. We don’t play tennis together or exchange recipes or vacation together. The only time we talk these days is if we happen to see each other at a restaurant, which hasn’t happened since last March, unless we happened to park next to each other at curbside pickup.

I got to know James way before his life in politics. In our early conversations, politics never came up. Here’s how we met. In the 80s, I worked as the youth ministry consultant for Oklahoma Baptist churches. During that time a movement began, known as the “conservative takeover” of the Southern Baptist Convention. The movement, in my view, was set to destroy doctrines that I believed to be not only right, but essential to a church that claimed to follow Jesus.

Not all people and not all churches were signing up for this takeover, but still, for me, in the role I was in; I couldn’t see myself continuing there. During this time I made friends with a guy who understood what was going on and could empathize with the dilemma. He was also a friend that could offer me a lifeline—a way to support my family and still have a ministry to youth. I took it!

After I left the Baptist convention position there was a time of transition, and ultimately they hired a guy for a similar version of that role. That guy was James Lankford. On a couple of occasions I would meet with him to talk about what work had been done, what the priorities were then and what they could be going forward. And that’s how we became friends—over a shared passion for teenagers.

Today we’ve both moved on. We’re too old and disengaged from youth culture to matter or make a difference. So, do we have anything left in common?

Here’s one thing: I would love to have James’ voice. I don’t mean I want to be a senator and be on Fox News. Just being an informed and conscientious voter consumes all the energy I want to give to political involvement these days. When I say I would love to have James’ voice, I don’t mean his words. Don’t get me wrong: James is smart, he is perceptive, and I believe he wants to represent Oklahoma well. But his words of late are not my words.

Please, let me try to navigate these next few paragraphs, knowing that my words will fail, but I’m trying to speak without alienating. I do understand the concern about the drift of our culture, the impact of “elites” and “fundamentalists”. I get the concern about globalization and cosmopolitanism. The desire of the evangelicals to explain declining numbers? I get that too. I hear the argument that people like Donald Trump seem to be necessary in order to reverse the perceived morphing of America. Here’s my question: At what cost? I’ve asked Senator Lankford this question many times.

I am not writing this to defend James or defame him. He is my friend. I do not agree with him on the best ways to solve America’s political and social woes. He and I talked early in his time as a U.S. Representative, before becoming a senator. I asked him how it was being a member of the House. He said it’s pretty much constant negotiating: I’ll support your deal if you support mine. A lot of listening to lobbyists and reading bills. Those are not his exact words, but close. I am fearful that at some point James could become a Politician—a Washington insider, a fortune seeker. I am fearful that is one of the worst things that can happen to our elected representatives.

When I say I would love to have his voice I mean I would love to have that deep, resonate bass voice, but I would not use it in unison with Ted Cruz to read “Green Eggs and Ham” or to join the chorus of his eleven who are conniving to overturn constitutional processes with their collective, elected voices. It sounds sort of like sedition—this challenge of state’s electoral votes on January 6. Please James, as one friend to another…

This is nothing new, I understand that. Many years ago, Will Rogers said:

“About all I can say for the United States Senate
is that it opens with a prayer and closes with an investigation.”

Thankfully, friendship can survive politics. If it can’t; politics isn’t worth it, or the friendship wasn’t genuine to begin with.

Please don’t feel like you need to respond or explain to me how things really are. I’m old. I’m set in ways. I will remain unswayed. I am hard-headed, but not hard-hearted. Disagreement doesn’t diminish friendships for me. I will always call James my friend.

Now to quote Penny Wharvey McGill (O Brother Where Art Thou):

“I’ve spoken my piece and counted to three.”

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