November
2006
Dear Ministry
Partner,
James
Madison, one of the American founding fathers, once said,
"If men were angels, no government would be necessary.
If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls
on government would be necessary. In framing a government which
is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies
in this: You must first enable the government to control the governed,
and in the next place oblige it to control itself."
Politics. The very word seems to
be a turn-off to most decent people. It brings up images of compromise,
corruption, selfishness, and opportunism. It is as if we hire
(elect) people to go do a certain job, and instead they spend
their work hours "boosting their personal finances".
Yet every two years in America, a major election cycle occurs
when we have the chance to pick who makes the laws which will
control our lives. All of us care about our future, so what’s
a Christian to do about this mess that is called the political
process? Is
Christianity supposed to be involved or separated from politics?
Both Jesus and Paul had comments
on the topic in the New Testament, and politics is actually composed
of several important issues, so the study of politics from a Biblical
point of view is important to a Christian. The word politics
is defined by Webster as "the science and art
of political government." So unless we want to do
away with political parties and have a dictator, we seem to be
required to live with the political process. The election process
is where the science of government ends and the art of persuasion
begins. If a culture was governed by the principles of Christianity,
the politicians would "play by the rules" in both campaigning
for office and later conducting themselves on the job. So Christianity
strongly needs to be involved in the political process if we want
it to be ethical. In light of this, it is actually the absence
of Christianity which makes politics so inefficient, frustrating,
and disgusting. If Christianity is "separated" from
politics, then we invite the worst people to control us —
and encourage the most unethical practices in the election campaigning
process.
If we want politicians to conduct
themselves in an ethical manner, then we have to agree on a definition
of ethical behavior — i.e. the Ten
Commandments and Biblical principles. So it stands to reason
that unethical people will want to get rid of the Ten Commandments
and Biblical principles in government so they are unrestricted
in what they can do to us ordinary citizens. Naturally, these
kinds of unsaved men and women will often stoop to any lie or
unGodly technique to try to persuade the masses for their ultimate
unethical goals and purposes.
We who are decent cannot run away
from this process just because someone yells "separation
of church and state" (a phrase which does not occur in any
legal documents in the American government). Rather, we must speak
up to bring accountability to these professional liars. (Note,
the Apostle
Paul did not refrain from identifying liars, and in fact said
to "rebuke them sharply" in Titus
1:12-13.) To bring the needed correction, we Americans simply
need to vote at elections in order to "hire" the more
honest and Godly candidates for political offices. While at some
elections it may seem like we are choosing between the lesser
of two evils, that is better than allowing the greater of two
evils to get into positions to control our lives and society as
a whole.
The Apostle Paul recognized this
in 1st
Corinthians 6:4-5 where he rebuked the Corinthian Christians
for not choosing the Godliest individuals as their judges.
"If then you have judgments concerning things pertaining
to this life, do you appoint those who are least esteemed by the
church to judge? I say this to your shame."
The clear message from this passage of scripture is when Christians
have the opportunity to elect people, those candidates should
be the ones whose personal morals and agendas most conform to
what is approved and expected in the church.
Jesus recognized the "political
parties" of His day and throughout the four major New Testament
gospels was quick to publicly and privately criticize the compromise
and sin where it existed. The Apostle
Paul even identified which political party he belonged to
when he saw it was beneficial to do so (Acts
23:6). Jesus did not stay "uninvolved" from the
political parties of the Pharisees
and Sadducees,
but rather deliberately spoke out to bring public accountability
for their sellouts, selfishness, and incorrect positions on issues,
even including a "secular" topic like taxation (e.g.
Matthew
16:12, 17:25-27, 22:29). Jesus also publicly addressed the
character of the king of His day (Herod) by calling him a "fox"
(Luke
13:31-32), rather than somehow perceiving it was inappropriate
for a "spiritual person" to express an opinion about
politics or candidates. While Jesus did not run for a traditional
elected office, in reality He was and is openly campaigning for
people to choose to make Him their King. In fact, Christians who
witness (which we are all supposed to do) are actually "campaign
workers" for Jesus. So if we are to be Christ-like in all
we do, then we should not ignore the political parties of our
day and the related character issues and policy issues which always
exist.
Similarly, God used prophets throughout
the Old Testament to point out sin and compromise in political
leaders (usually kings) in both verbal ways (e.g. 2nd
Samuel 12:1-7) and in writing (as demonstrated throughout
books like Judges,
Kings,
and Chronicles).
Modern Americans have a much better
political situation than the Jewish believers of the Old Testament.
Every 2 to 4 years, we can get rid of politicians of bad character
by simply voting them out of office. However, there are forces
trying to keep Christians from running for office — but
even worse, a huge percentage of Christians have not even voted
in major elections. I realize that it takes time to insert the
voting task into our schedules. In addition, many Christians think
that just their one vote will not effect an election. But that
is why we must be people of principle rather than just doing whatever
is most convenient at the moment. In reality, many elections have
been won or lost by a few votes per precinct. And proper Christian
stewardship demands that we do what we can do and should do regardless
of how much difference it seems like it will make. Otherwise,
each Christian could think, "Why should I tithe, or witness,
or pray, because I am only one person. It won’t make much
difference."
One reason our voting is important
is because key moral issues like same-sex marriage, abortion,
human cloning, stem-cell research, immigration laws, and other
life-changing and culture-changing directions will be addressed
by the people we elect. In addition, James Dobson said, "Christians
should vote as a tangible demonstration of our love and concern
for our neighbor. Many of the policies instituted by those in
elected office will affect our loved ones and those around us
in very real ways. Christians are not simply another special-interest
group, pushing only for those issues directly impacting us. Rather,
(our concern should be)... for all."
While many churches and ministries
don’t want their tax-exempt status threatened by announcing
support for a particular candidate, we can still encourage Christians
to get informed on all the candidates and issues. There are non-partisan
web sites which give the voting records of politicians such as
www.CitizenLink.org
(from Focus on
the Family) and www.FRC.org
(the Family Research Council). We all must take the initiative
to do whatever we can for the good of God’s Kingdom, because
as Edmund
Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph
of evil is that good men do nothing."
Doing what we can,
Dale & Judi Leander
P.S. — For amazing insights
into how forces in our nation have been succeeding in influencing
us and the population in general, get our special book offer The
Marketing of Evil.
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