Today is primary election day in Wisconsin. I often don’t vote. Some people don’t understand why; and frankly, I seldom try to change anyone’s mind or even share my perspective on the subject. I usually just quietly keep to myself. The last time I voted I simply voted for one person on the ballot and honestly felt “dirty” walking out of the voting stands. Does this mean I am un-American? Well, sort of. Let me attempt to explain. I realize not everyone will agree with my stance and that’s also ok with me. My goal is that perhaps writing this will open some eyes to kingdom dynamics that lead to better Jesus principles amongst the body of believers. Each person is called uniquely for the kingdom of God and likely will think differently according to their own journey (expedition) with the Lord.
This is going to be about a 15 minute read, I encourage you to clear your schedule and make the prayerful investment. I am not asking for much of your time to invest as a Christian in a better perspective for the kingdom you claim allegiance to.
My goal in sharing this, is that you might consider what I think is a better biblical view. Let’s first start out with who we are in the Lord. From the very beginning of creation our vocation in the kingdom of God has been to be bearers of light. We were made to represent the image of God to those in the dark. When God created the world, he created it Good. This is the Hebrew word Tov. It represents the idea of God entering into a partnership with us to bring goodness. We are his instruments to bring good to a broken world; and eventually reclaim what was lost or fallen and bring back the holiness that God designed “it” and us for. God is asking us to represent him to those in the dark and represent those in the dark to God. (This is the definition of a royal priesthood of believers). We are somewhere in the middle right now. If we are new creations in Christ, we are on a transformation journey to leave this world and be fully transformed (kainos-made new) to the kingdom of the Lord. In doing so, one of our missions is to bring others with us into this partnership and journey. This is the life we were designed for, both now and to eternity. If you are clearly the Lords, consider these things.
WALK IN DEVOTION TO THE PRECEPTS OF THE LORD.
1. Can you be a “Christian” American? Can you hold dual citizenship?
When we pledge our obedience (allegiance) to Christ in a profession of faith we are claiming to place complete authority over to Him. Philippians 3:20 (and many other passages) seem to argue for us to consider sole citizenship in Christ. This is the root of what it means to have new life in Christ or be reborn in Him. We are now aliens or foreigners to a nation that we are charged to be simply an ambassador in. Although ambassadors seek to make the foreign countries they are in better places, their allegiance isn’t to that country, and they don’t vote there. (Hebrews 11:13; 1 Peter 1:17, 2:11 & 2 Corinthians 5:20).
2. Are you validating a system that is anti-God by voting?
In the Bible we are told that human authority usurp Gods authority. Essentially God is the only one that can rightfully rule over people. The world was intended at creation to be ruled by God alone. All authority is the Lord’s and was passed on to Christ. I Samuel 8 tells us that choosing a human ruler is the path to sin, it describes lording over others as slavery. Wanting a human ruler was a rejection of Him.
You cannot serve two masters. You will hate one and love the other, or you will be loyal to one and not care about the other.
Matthew 6:24
3. God’s kingdom is rival to other kingdoms and systems of the world.
Voting is an attempt to “appoint a king to lead us,” which makes God say, “they have rejected me as their king” (1 Samuel 8:5-7). God has never viewed other nations favorably. Every other kingdom outside of God’s kingdom is referred to as “pagan.” God still desires a Theocracy with His people and to regain everyone to Him that is lost in the darkness.
4. God should be your only basis for authority?
Do you desire to empower some people to forcibly control other people? Do you want to give them that power over? What about where the Bible says to submit to authority of the world? God doesn’t approve of the authorities of the world, but he asks us to live at peace with them, that we might win them over.
The idea of giving a human authority the ability to legitimize “lording over” others opens up the door for evil to take the place in the sacred space that should only be given to the Lord. Let’s look at an example. If I come to you and demand that you give me money or I will punish you, most of us would never agree to that deal. Yet somehow, we are ok with voting on how to allow others to do that to us. When someone refuses to comply, they are a criminal now because of the authority we have empowered. We are essentially not only allowing a biblical sin (called theft) but are voting for it. We are impowering men to do what is immoral and against the Lord. We have double standards (and become double minded.) We want to allow government to steal, but if a citizen does the same, we want to put them in jail. This deceptive “voting to power” of human authority empowers morality and sin to be inverted or counter to what God says. This is contrary to Jesus’ kingdom. We simply can’t vote to make an evil act a good act. The kingdom of God doesn’t work that way. You don’t have the right to rule over someone else and therefore do not have the authority to vote that right to anyone else. That thinking is backwards to the authority of Jesus over your life. The right to rule belongs solely to Jesus. There is only one authority of the church and the world and that is Jesus.
5. You’re voting for slavery not freedom.
Will a “public servant” represent the people? What if he/she is a Christian representative? The problem comes down to when the representative isn’t representing you or Jesus. Are you going to be ok with them forcibly victimizing what they think is best on you and those around you? Are you ok with imposing your Christian beliefs on others (Jesus let people choose to accept Him.)
By agreeing to “the vote” we have agreed to enter into master slave relationships and instill this on others. The one given the right to rule is the master; the one with the obligation to obey is the slave. We are essentially voting to choose a new master because we don’t believe that God can or will rule. We are being deceived to give humanity what is only God’s. What happens when we choose “satan” as the result of our vote? The lesser of two evils is usually voting for evil. This kind of democracy creates war not peace.
6. Are you legitimizing evil?
When you vote you are essentially expressing your will for someone else to be in power over others. Some say you are forcing others to pay for what you want. Voting is too often an act of aggression, to impose others to live the way someone else wants them to live. This is the opposite of what the Bible teaches. We are creating mass peoples to draw lines and make those on the other side the enemy. Jesus says the opposite, treat your enemy with love grace and mercy so that you might win them over to the kingdom. Is your vote causing violence? Will your vote bring violence by enforcing views to millions of people that don’t agree? Jesus didn’t force anyone into the kingdom. By voting or legitimizing this system of the world you are likely validating oppression and violence. You are agreeing that whoever wins the vote gets to legally impress their views on everyone else. What happens if their views are evil or anti-God? Guess what, you just went along with it and/or empowered the evil. Every vote is an attempt to dominate others by coercion and oppression.
7. be a peacemaker.
Romans 12 is clear that Christians are to be agents of peace. You have probably heard said, “If you don’t vote, you have no right to complain.” I would strongly disagree. If you vote, you agree to the system. Essentially if you vote you are agreeing to allowing the outcome. In other words, whoever is picked as ruler has the moral right to dominate an entire nation’s population and possibly impose what is morally and Biblically against God. By Biblical definition this is conforming to the world.
BIBLICAL IDEOLOGY
Is this asking for Anarchy? Do you want the wild west back? These are valid concerns and questions. Essentially Christians are allegiant to only Christ’s kingdom but charged to be agents to reflect Jesus to the world they came from. What would happen in America if the only authority was God’s? In our humanity this is difficult. Who would bring justice to the rape offenders? The murders? Those oppressing others?
The Bible teaches that justice is only the Lord’s and not mine. In fact, it teaches that I should turn the other cheek. What about rape? What if someone rapes your daughter? Do you turn the other cheek? Does God then allow me to represent Him and bring justice to that person? Do I get to do that? I would argue the Bible never teaches that. So then will God just start smiting all the sex traffickers? Will the earth open up and swallow every murderer? Likely not. That was what Jonah was mad at God for.
It is interesting to me that most Christians call those that advocate abortion “murderers.” (To be clear, I am HUGELY pro-life). We view those performing abortions as murders similar to the same camp we put rapists and child molesters in. Before 1973 a Christian would treat them as the enemy. But what we learned over the last nearly 40 years is that we can still treat “murderers” with Christs love. Somehow, we learned to have a cup of coffee with murders and perhaps even come to the place of turning the other cheek, but we can’t do that for rapists or sex traffickers. Jesus could, can, and does, and asks us to do the same. That is difficult in my humanity. Do you trust that Jesus can rule you and this world?
Can God use you as a representative in the government? I am open to this, but personally I don’t like it. That we should vote for Christians to bring light to a dark world. But what happens when it doesn’t go our way? You often hear something like, “now we are in the fight” talking about the politics of Christianity and the ways of our world. Isn’t this a bit anti-biblical? I get a bit uncomfortable when anyone decides they think God is telling them to fight. Does God want you to fight or tell us that He will fight our battles? This is an age-old theological debate. I own a gun range, believe me, if God asked for that fight, I would be all in, but I don’t think He has or will ask me, it isn’t in the Biblical history of His character in my opinion.
Jesus brings light to the interpretation of the Old Testament, and He sure didn’t seem to be advocating the fight, and most (if not all) of the fighting of Israel in the Old Testament seemed contrary to the Lord’s bidding for them. When God first asks Israel to completely follow Him; He opened the red sea and himself defeated the Egyptian army. That is perhaps one of the few pictures we see of God’s ideal, a theocracratic battle.
Should we “take a chance” and vote for the Christians and hope that they don’t turn on us as most politicians are known to do? If you could snap your fingers and make every political officer a Christian would you do it? Wouldn’t that just make Christians seem to be lording over others now? Can we change the system?
Some are also going to present the church problem. Isn’t the church supposed to be the body of believers that “JUST” lives under God’s rule and authority? How are they doing with that. Yea, you see the problem here. Abuse and power are attributes of humankind. God is the only one that is truly righteous. Some of the most hurt people have been at the hands of well-intended Christians. There unfortunately aren’t a lot of churches that seem to represent the Jesus I know or be the kind of people I would desire to rule over me or anyone else. We all need to pray for the humility of Christ.
I just want Jesus.
What is a better view? Biblically both in the old and new testaments it was theocracy. A rule by simply God in your family that would eventually spread to all the world. There isn’t a place for hierarchy in the body of believers. If you biblically “lead” in a gifting area as a shepherd, you lead as a servant in humility taking on the mindset of Christ. You trust Jesus completely. You give yourself, and pray for your family to live in obedient trust and allegiance to the only King and Kingdom, that of Jesus. You act as a light bearing agent in the image of God to reclaim what has been lost for that kingdom. You live according to the word, and the word is Christ. Start with yourself and your intimate family of those proclaiming the only king and kingdom. Start with simply voting for Jesus in your life, and pray that you may be an ambassador, a representative of the body of Christ who wins over the world to the kingdom of Jesus.
What about Romans 13? Glad you asked!!! Click here:
EXPEDITION 44 