I hesitate to write this article for a variety of reasons:

  1. The likelihood of offending brothers and sisters in Christ is great (though I do not wish to do so)
  2. My views are contrary to the norm and may be used as fodder by enemies of the Cross to prove points I do not support
  3. I am not naive enough to assume that I have thought of everything and, if you know me you know that this fact alone bothers me greatly

Outside of Christ, sin is the norm. To expect a nation of non-Christians to uphold a moral code that we, as believers filled with the Spirit, struggle with daily is both ludicrous and counter-productive. Do we somehow believe that forcing people to ascribe to our view of morality will “bring them around?” Of course not.

I am pro-life. I believe the death of the unborn is a travesty. I do not loathe the women who have had abortions nor do I think they are somehow less human. I do not loathe the people who enable abortion nor do I loathe the practitioners. What I lament is the fact that we have come to a place where an unborn child is an inconvenience and not a blessing and that the quenching of our own carnal desires has become more important than giving life. Intercourse has become intertwined with the word “living” and it defines our culture in many ways. Abortion is an inevitability in that environment. But I still love the woman who is having an abortion right now as I’m writing this and as you’re reading it. Do you? Can you?

We yell and pontificate about the moral decline of our nation from being a Christian nation founded on Christian values into a pagan one. News flash… we were never a Christian nation. We were a nation founded on religious freedoms. We were and still are a nation that was founded giving every citizen the fundamental right to worship and believe as they choose to. Yes, our Declaration of Independence and Constitution were both obviously influenced by men who loved and served the Lord Jesus Christ, but that is where it ends.

So, here we stand, more interested in adding an anti-homosexual marriage amendment to the constitution than we are about the Gospel. More interested in overturning Roe v. Wade than we are about caring for the homeless, the hungry, the naked, and the lost. Most of us, it seems, more interested in fighting abortion than we are helping those who have had abortions or more interested in fighting the homosexuals than we are in actually caring for them and loving them as Christ. We focus our rhetoric on lambasting people for not doing something about moral decline and urge our brothers and sisters into activism to prevent further moral decline by impressing upon our government the need for new laws. Changing laws is not going to make a lasting difference without changing hearts. Rhetoric will not solve the moral decay - politics most certainly won’t.

What will? Christ alone working through His Church in this nation. I’m not talking about your once a year volunteering efforts at Thanksgiving or those gifts you gave to Angel Tree or the next nationwide tent crusade. Do you want to make a real impact? Get to know your neighbors. Find out what motivates them. Don’t get to know them with the agenda of giving them the four spiritual laws. Get to know them with the agenda of simply loving them and living the Gospel to them and speaking truth in love (preaching is not what we like to make it) without judgment. They’re worth it, but more importantly, God is worthy of them. Don’t freak out because they’re sinners… if they don’t know Christ… of course they’re sinners just as you were. Don’t forget that on this side of Glory… you still sin like crazy. You just know it now.

I suck at this. I really do. But I know this is what I must do. If each of us would focus our extra efforts into our neighbors and not on Christian activism - we would begin to see real change. I’m convinced of that. Rome saw real change - not because the Christians changed politics, but because they changed the people - they cared for the sick when no one else would - they took in children that had been abandoned - they taught people how to read, how to love, how to be a thriving part of a community and that was a Pagan nation. What do we do? Gnash our teeth and wring our hands at the state of the country and declare woe.

I know, I know - I’m crazy. But where in Scripture do you see that we should be more interested in the moral decline of our nation than we should be about preaching and living the Gospel. When did it become more important that our nation’s laws mirror the ten commandments than it is to hold the people we live near as dearly as Paul and the apostles did - loving them, being interested in the passions of their lives, and by doing so helping them to see that their lives will only find fulfillment in Christ alone. If you read the epistles, you will see that the strongest language is reserved for those who were affiliated with the church or with the established religious orders that are supposed to know better… not sinners.

We are a faithless Church. We rant and rave and wring our hands about the potential turnout of this election because it looks as if a pro-choice liberal (who isn’t a Muslim, by the way) might take our nation straight onto the path toward Hell itself. I’m sorry… I have more faith in my God than that and I actually believe nobody can be made a leader if God doesn’t want him/her to be one. Period. (Read Romans.)

So vote. Vote your conscience. Advocate for the candidate you believe is the man or woman God has chosen to hold the offices up for election on Nov. 4th. Don’t fear-monger. And don’t justify fear-mongering by saying you’re just making people aware of the truth. Have faith in the Sovereign God of the universe. He actually knows what He’s doing. Faith does not mean inaction. Faith does not mean ignorance. Act. Vote. Know why. But, for the sake of the witness of Christ and the glory of God… trust Him that regardless of the outcome of this election, He’s still on the throne and cannot be removed by anyone. The sky is not falling… not yet, at least.