TIME TO VOTE – SO EXERCISE YOUR GOD-GIVEN RESPONSIBILTY
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What do these things have in common and why does it matter for us this election? The “Sinicization movement” in China towards religion, the Bishop Johanna Pohjola trial in Finland, and the so-called “Respect for Marriage Act” law in America? All these are examples of a growing, secular statism growing abroad and now—here. When people ask me, “For whom or for what should I vote this election?” Amidst all the rhetoric and rancor, my main advice is that you vote for the platform that limits government’s coercive power, and the platform that more clearly defines a more limited role of government in the lives of ALL Americans.
Thankfully, Scripture provides wisdom here. For millennia, people have recognized three vital, public institutions for our surviving and thriving: church, family, and government. For Christians, these are not just sociological facts; these are gifts from God. Ironically, the least important of the three is government. Yes, government. Two of the three are present amidst Eden’s perfection (God saw that it was good!). Yes, family and church (faith relationship with God) are part of God’s creative plan from the beginning. And we, as people created by God , are still called to be part of God’s preserving blessing in this world, still seeking to “be fruitful and multiplying, replenishing the earth.”
However, Genesis 3 demanded a third, emergency institution, the coercive power of the state. Yes, humanity’s propensity to sin not love, demanded a “this far and no farther,” emergency institution to forcefully, justly, limit humanity’s sinful, outward actions. That’s the main role of government. It exists to protect “innocent life” from those who would maliciously take it, to defend law-abiding citizens from those who are lawless, and, in America, to safeguard life, liberty, and property for the people.
The proper “differentiation of Church and State,” is the call for the state to “stay in its lane,” to do its limited job well, so that free people can be the benevolent forces of freedom and faith in community for others.
Now, I realize that Christians can be Christian in any polity, in any culture. While true, it should not tempt us to be remiss in our self-governing citizenship in America, to exercise our temporal liberties, for the sake of both the culture and the mission of the Church. What a blessing to do both! What a privilege. I cringe when I hear people say, “In the end times we will suffer, be martyred for our faith” so “why does this matter?” True enough. But God gave this country the gift of the First Amendment so it’s “not yet” here. Why would we abdicate our responsibility to vote? Why would we not defend the notion of limited government, equal protection before the law, the right to own property (the point of “thou shalt not steal), the right/responsibility to protect our families and communities. It’s freedom in service to freedom, and it’s a blessing that only America has in the community of governments and nations.
China is now bending the Christian Church to the will of the secular state through a policy known as “Sinicization,” which legally demands that Chinese Christians publicly renounce the confession that Jesus is Lord. Why? The Chinese secular state demands profession that “fearless leader Xi” is supreme. In Finland, Bishop Johanna Pohjola faces ongoing persecution for upholding the biblical teachings concerning marriage, sex, and family. That’s his crime? Yes, that’s his crime. Unfortunately, similar ideas and laws are making their way to America. In fact, they are already here. The “Respect for Marriage Act” legal, redefinitions of marriage and the Title IX confusion of sex to mean “sexual orientation;” such laws have only one demand. Those who don’t believe this must be marginalized for now and “criminalized” later. Yes, the “secular blasphemy” laws of America are being written as we speak. One platform pushes back against that, seeking to maintain a respect for your sovereignty, your conscience rights/protections, and looks for you to make the best of the life that God has given you. The other party claims that it joyfully can govern ALL your life coercively, if you’ll just let them.
So, the “Give to Caesar—Romans 13” wisdom of the Bible means that we should, as free citizens, look not to the coercive power of government to answer questions like, “What is a woman? What is marriage? What is sex? How shall I care for my family, friends, and neighbors?” Why? Well, first, the Bible answers those, NOT THE STATE. Their main role is protecting innocent, law-abiding human lives. We don’t ask them to “turn the other cheek;” we ask them to be just and fair. We certainly don’t want them to confiscate peoples’ monies to “benevolence” others; that’s the work of free people in community with others. And, even more importantly, we don’t look for joy from government. Tell me: How shall we “count it all joy” as the Bible says, when “there is growing, state-sponsored violence against innocent children in the wombs of their mothers?” What happens when we give the state power to “declare certain innocent, viable, heart beating, thumb sucking” lives as NOT WORTH LIVING, free to be snuffed out for any reason? Joy? Hardly. With a renegade state like that, who’s innocent lives are redefined next? This election, for the first time in my life, will not be about a liberal v. conservative view of the “republican, limited government” nature of America, but a vote for a secular, statist usurpation of that form of government or its defense. Do your research, cast your vote.
The Rev. Dr. Gregory Seltz is the executive director of the Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty.
The Founding Fathers of America got this truth right concerning our rights and responsibilities in a free society. We are free because we are created/creatures of God and we are free to be faithful to others in community as His preserving, temporal blessing agents in community with others—of course, ultimately for the sake of the mission of sharing His Gospel, Good News amidst that temporal freedom. The secularization of our culture undermines both truths, ultimately to our detriment.
Some call this the “cultural mandate of God’s people.” It doesn’t save us, certainly, but it calls us to be part of God’s preserving work in our vocations, so that all might freely hear of God’s saving work in Christ. The wisdom of the Scripture and the impulse of the American form of government would suggest that many of society’s questions and issues should be solved by Family, Church, and Free people in community…. with the coercive power of Government, the last resort, if at all.
See Genesis 9:4-5, and Romans 13:3-5
See Jesus differentiation of God’s preserving work through Caesar and His saving work through Christ proclaimed through His body of believers, the Church, Matthew 22. Actually, that’s work for the family, the Church, and free people to do for others. Free people are harder to be coercively governed. It doesn’t surprise us in our work on the Hill that secular, statist policies purposely seek to undermine the family, to diminish the role of fathers in the home, demote the authority of the parents with their children, and remove the responsibility of citizens to be “moral agents” in their own lives. Government policies and institutions can do all that, or so they say.
Joy and inward peace have always been spiritual gifts, spiritual outcomes, not policy gifts of a coercive government.
