What's Your Focus?

Here is an interesting piece by the Reverend Mark H. Creech attempting to justify Christians focusing on politics. He rightly points out that the primary calling of Christians is religious, but he then attempts to place politics not far behind. Here is one passage that stood out as particularly odd:

Jesus also said in this same sermon, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" (Matthew 5:6). Again, this text's primary application is about a person's yearning for salvation -- one's hunger for forgiveness -- thirsting to have the righteousness of Christ imputed to one's account as a free gift by faith. But as Tom Minnery contends in Why You Can't Stay Silent, "righteousness is more than that .... In the Hebrew culture, people thought far more about the community than they did about the individual. Righteousness was not primarily about one's personal relationship with God; it was the standard for right relationships between people ... this passion for a righteous society was a part of Jesus' meaning when He pronounced His blessing on those who hunger and thirst to see righteousness dominate the affairs of mankind. The Revised English Bible translates Matthew 5:6 this way: 'Blessed are those who hunger and thirst to see right prevail; they shall be satisfied.'"

The text's "primary" application? No, the yearning for God is the only application of this text. Creech then supports Minnery's claim that righteousness is more than gaining the righteousness of Christ. What?! How can we find more righteousness than what we receive from Christ? To suggest that politics can improve the work of Christ seems to be blasphemous.

Why can Christians not just focus on what is really important? Why make tortured arguments and twist Scriptures to justify a political focus? Why not just start doing what Jesus told us to do?