You have probably heard the joke or one similar – Is your refrigerator running? Good, because I’ll vote for it. The last few elections in our country have made us feel uncomfortable, and this year’s is no different. In many races, the candidates do not seem qualified for the job, and we might even find them offensive. And when we hear stories of votes not getting counted or somehow lost, we might begin to wonder if it matters if we vote for a refrigerator – or not at all.
There are so many facets to this consideration that they certainly cannot be covered in a blog post, but yesterday I heard some things from Jeff Myers, the president of Summit Ministries, that I found helpful and wanted to share two of them with someone else who might be struggling to find a reason to vote.
Voting With Principles in Mind
The first is that there are principles, policies, and personalities. The founders of our country tried to form the nation based on principles we could all agree on, such as our rights do not come from the government but from God. From those principles, they made policies, and then the people elected the personalities to carry out those policies. But the personalities will always be in conflict, and what we have currently done is to put the personalities above the principles. We don’t like the person, so we won’t approve of anything they say or do. We have forgotten the principles that can unite us and are the unchanging basis of our laws and our very existence.
Good government, chosen on those principles, allows more people to be blessed and be a blessing. So the first takeaway is to vote on the basis of principles rather than the person.
Why Voting Matters Even When the Candidates Aren’t Perfect
The second idea is that the times will always be evil. The apostle Paul called his day evil (Ephesians 5:16), and they are certainly not good now. The evil doesn’t change. What changes is how we live in the time God placed us. With our vote, we aren’t to choose between the lesser of two evils but use our choice to lessen evil. Who will encourage standing up for the defenseless? Encourage policies that set people free, not seek to control? Insist on taking responsibility instead of taking away responsibility?
Mr. Myers related that in ancient Rome baby girls were not valued and would often be abandoned on the street to die. Christians would walk the streets, pick up these baby girls, and take them home to raise as their own because they believed all life was valuable. When the boy babies grew up, where were all the marriageable girls? They were in church. Many men converted to Christianity, some legitimately and some probably not, in order to marry the women. But either way, it enabled Christianity to spread throughout the Roman empire and through it, the gospel. Those Christians were not trying to change the world, but by their simple actions, they did.
Our single vote may not change the course of our nation overnight, but consistently taking a stand for good, for principles and not so much the people, allowing the government to make more room and space for good for more people, can and eventually will make a difference.
For more thought-provoking topics, tune in to Hope 100.7.
God bless you. Stay hopeful! ❤️
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