2020 has been an unprecedented year for many reasons, and the US Elections was the world stage for the last was no different. Everything about it was unprecedented, and for many was a nail-biting experience with anxieties, hopes, dreams and emotions deeply vested in whichever way it would unfold.
I for the most part have tried to keep a neutral stance, for I have many Republican friends and have an equal number of Democrat friends. Both sets have expressed with impassioned articulation their reasons why their chosen party should prevail. I could see for both understand their trail of thought. And at points I found myself wondering whether I would choose to be a Democrat or Republican – Let’s be clear at this point, I am not a US citizen or resident so I had no right to vote and was therefore at a relatively safe distance to be an observer of the great debate.
As in all things, as Christians our yardstick of truth is the Word of God, and that is what we should endeavour to follow. So in this blog post, I am for the first time publicly going to share my thoughts on how one would do best as a Christian to approach the issue of the election – and not to come down on either side for support, or I hasten to add not for condemnation either. There has been enough emotive, divisive, hateful and disgraceful rhetoric throughout the campaign. I am simply using this global headlining issue as an example of how we as Christians – be you Democrat, Republican, White, Black, Hispanic or any other ‘label’ – how we should approach ‘life issues’ as Christians without losing sight of our faith in the emotion of it all.
Look Back To Look Forward
It is helpful to have a very quick whistle-stop journey of God’s elected divine pattern of governance, if only to appreciate everything in its correct context.
Divine Will For Governance – When God created the earth He set everything up in the order that He divinely willed for it to be managed going forward. He created Adam and Eve, gave them clear direction on the purpose (till the ground, be fruitful and have dominion). As the earth became more populated, God set up systems by His will and Word for governance. That system was a theocracy. A theocracy is is a form of government in which God is the supreme Authority who gives His divine guidance to His nominated authority on earth on how the day-to-day affairs of life and structures should be managed. We see in God’s Word that He chose Prophets, Priests and Judges to be the Authority of government on earth. That was His will. He gave His Word of revelation to the Prophet, the Priests had the responsibility of managing the performance and sanctity of that Word in the service of God in the temple, and the Judges had the responsibility of resolving everyday disputes in alignment with the principles of God’s Word. That was the structure of how God’s governmental structure worked. First there was Moses the Prophet, Aaron his brother was chosen by God to be the Priest and when it became apparent that Moses struggled to manage the exceedingly great daily affairs of the people, God gave wisdom to his Father-In-Law Jethro to suggest to Moses to choose capable men and appoint them as leaders to serve as Judges to manage affairs, with more complex matters to be escalated up for Moses to adjudicate (Exodus 18: 13-26). This was God’s governmental system and it worked.
However, as in all things, mankind’s humanity began to impair the perfection of the divine will. This showed up in the book of Samuel where the Children of Israel grew to complacent in their relationship with God. They took divine access and governance for granted and then began looking at other nations to see what they were doing. They then became envious and complained to Samuel ‘we want a King’. They wanted to be like everyone else, not recognising the divinity of their being different and set apart. (1 Samuel 8:6). Samuel did what every good Christian does in a crisis – he went straight to God with the problem, and God told him to go ahead and give the people what they want. They ended up with Saul as a King, and we all know very well how that ended up. He started off fairly well, but by the end he was so concerned about himself and his own image and spent much time pulling down (and even trying to kill) the very person that God had appointed to serve him, who in God’s providence was the next in line to be King – the great King David. Saul was so all about himself that he lost sight of God’s purposes and couldn’t see past his own reign and wanted to kill David so he could hold on to his position. (This is not me, this is Bible – God’s Word: 1 Samuel 19).
So, at that point God’s divine will for government went from a theocracy to His permissive will for government with chosen King David to reign. It was God’s permissive will for the King to be a person after his own heart, which obviously required that the King was submitted and obedient to God’s Word in their actions, following God’s Word closely in their decisions. This was King David. Yes he made some mistakes that would be scandalous in today’s church, but he had a heart for God which always drew him to repentance before God. Next up was David’s son Solomon. His heart wasn’t quite as sold out for God as David. In fact, Solomon’s weakness was women, and he had plenty of them. He not only had plenty, but also picked them from outside the boundaries of whom God said. In disobedience he married foreign wives and they led his heart away from God. That was the beginning of the split of the Kingdom of Israel. Mankind messed up following God’s divine will for government, and did it again in His permissive will for government. What then happened thereafter was a succession of Kings whose hearts were far from God that caused oppression and deep despair to God’s people the Israelites. And with every King it got successively worse until they repented and turned their hearts back toward God, when they were granted peace and joy. Sadly, like many of us today they got so caught up in that complacency and familiarity of being in a blessed state that the emotions of their humanity caused them to turn again from God, which resulted in a cruel King having dominion over them.
Today’s Society
These days we have in the world many different governmental structure, but as we are focussed on USA, we’ll stick with that. It has been designated by the US Constitution to be a democratic government, where the people are governed by elected officials.
Now, i’m going to really sprint through a very simplistic overview of my understanding of the US political history to understand the fabric of the two main parties – Democrat and Republican. The purpose of this is to get a clear understanding of the essence of each.
Republican referred to a term used to identify supporters of Thomas Jefferson who was in favour of a decentralised government with limited powers. One of the Republican party’s striking characteristics in its early days was its commitment to anti-slavery. They opposed the extension of slavery into Nebraska and Kansas. At the first presidential nomination in 1856, the Republicans nominated John Fremont with a mandate to call on Congress to abolish slavery. All very civil and noble. Some time after that in the subsequent election, Abraham Lincoln won as the Republican as there was in-fighting and division amongst the Democrats who were principally split over the slavery issue – should certain people remain as slaves, as they were good for the economy. However, by the time Lincoln was inaugurated there was a split in the states and that heralded the onset of the American Civil War. In 1863 Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation which effectively meant that slaves in rebelling states were free entities, and that was subsequently formalised in the US Constitution in 1865 by virtue of the 13th Amendment. Fast forward slightly and the civil war was prolonged somewhat which undermined Lincoln’s prospects of being re-elected. So he paired up and chose his Vice Presidential Candidate as Andrew Johnson, who was a Pro-Union Democratic Senator. They won in a landslide overwhelming victory, but sadly Lincoln was subsequently assassinated. Although Johnson tried to maintain the virtuous essence of the Republic Party, eventually the Radical Republicans won control over Congress in 1866 and although they failed in their bid to impeach Johnson, they succeeded in their implementation of the Reconstruction Program – A program which in essence was purely economically driven which meant that freedmen were not good for their economy, slavery was beneficial for them. They wanted protective tariffs and fundamentally their primary concern was to protect and enhance financial wealth, matters of humanity were secondary if at all relevant.
In the years that followed the Republican Party had a variety of leaders who in some part tried to uphold the essence of the virtuous principles held by Lincoln. However, as is life various happenstances such as the Great Depression meant that those initiatives proved unpopular. The upshot of that is that the Republican Party in a feat to promote the core value of economic buoyancy began to embrace more intrinsically to the party’s value system policies which promoted anti-communist ideals, a reduction in governmental regulation in the economy, lower taxes for the wealthy and resistance to federal civil rights legislation. Skipping forward to present times, it isn’t hard to see the parallels between the largely unchanged essence of the Republican Party from then to now. Trump represents far-right social positions and speaks with open hostility toward immigrants. It was his ‘Make America Great Again’ slogan that appealed to those Republicans deeply committed to these somewhat controversial ideals which are devoid of any semblance of the virtuous or communist principles that characterised Lincoln.
Against that backdrop, it is clear to see that the Democrats are the polar opposite in terms of the essence of their party’s core values – they promote equality, fair access and promotion of equality of civil rights.
In a society as deeply divided and torn as America is right now, with people having suffered the impacts of many different adversities, it is clear to see that the Democrats would have a clear appeal to the ‘everyday man’ who can identify on some level with the pain of adversity on whatever level in the quest to achieve The American Dream.
Yet, on the other hand it is clear to see that those who had the clear opportunity to accumulate wealth and benefit from the systems of slavery that benefitted the economy have a deep preference to see the core policies of the Republican party brought to the fore without dilution, which Trump offered in great abundance.
The question therefore is where do you see God stand in all of this? When we think of the Ephesians Fruit of the Spirit; Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self-Control, those are the hallmarks of the Spirit of God.
Therefore, as a Christian the yardstick of Truth, God and Life is where you see evidence of His Spirit, and that should guide your choices and decisions.
And it’s all very well to take good regard to the noble efforts of the different parties that have policies to uphold and embrace the biblical principles, but it is absolutely incumbent to ask oneself this question – Does piety replace or supersede fruit of the Spirit? If that’s too vague and abstract a question, in more graphic terms, the question can be posed another way: If a Ruler governs in an oppressive and unempathetic manner, but takes measures to preserve the rule of God’s Word in society, does the latter action absolve the former and thus make the ruler a worthy candidate?
I’ll leave you with this thought – The Philistines captured the Ark of God and took it into into the temple of Dagon. The Philistines were the enemy of God because they didn’t live in accordance with His Word, were opposed to His people and sought to crush and overpower them. But they sought to preserve God’s Word and did so in a way they thought fit. God was not having any of that. Pious acts do not impress God, for His Word says ‘To Obey Is Better Than To Sacrifice – 1 Samuel 15:22.
For every time the Philistines put the Ark on a high place by Dagon, God knocked down the statue of Dagon. The Lord’s hand was heavy on the people of Ashdod and he brought devastation on them and afflicted them with tumors. When the people of Ashdod saw what was happening, they eventually recognised that the Ark had to be returned to Israel. (1 Samuel 5)
Again, God is not impressed by empty acts to preserve His Word, when those in charge are not living His Word – that caused Saul’s downfall, it caused King Solomon’s downfall and so too will it cause the downfall for any person who does not live with the Fruit of the Spirit evident in their life, whether or not they have been entrusted with the power to carry and/or preserve His Word.
In fact, the example above is with reference to the the Ark of the Covenant, but how much more are God’s people whose body is the temple of God that houses the sanctity of God’s Word in our hearts. If God will cause His Ark to be protected, how much more his human masterpieces. He will not allow His people to be crushed, oppressed and downtrodden under any leader who may hold the Ark but not act in accordance with it.
As I said at the outset of this blog, the purpose is to explore the two parties’ essence to help us understand where we see the Fruit of the Spirit of God, for that is what points to truth.
To all my global readers, please stay blessed and in LOVE, in GOD.
If you found this blog thought-provoking, please do share with your community and even let me know by leaving a comment or a like! With thanks and love.
Kingdom Minds 