A Baptist, Fundamentalist, Election Post-Mortem
All the hype is over, all the counting is done—except for Arizona which will probably still be counting when the next election rolls around. How should we feel about what happened in the 2024 election?
Most importantly we must remember that our hope is not in political candidates or in secular leaders.
It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man.
It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes. (Psalm 118:8-9)Praise the Lord, O my soul!
While I live I will praise the Lord;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.Do not put your trust in princes,
Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no [c]help.
His spirit departs, he returns to his earth;
In that very day his plans perish. (Psalm 146:1-4)
Our hope is in our Lord. That is true when the side we voted for wins AND when it loses. Unless Jesus Himself is on the ballot, we are always voting for the lesser of two evils—we are always protesting against the worst of the two options. So, this occasion for rejoicing should be a bit muted. We are not in the Kingdom yet.
Reserved happiness.
There is occasion for reserved happiness and thanksgiving for the mercies of God. The issues that matter most to conservative Christians were protected to some extent. There was a clear choice for religious freedom and freedom of speech. While neither side holds a biblical position on abortion or LGTBQ issues, one side does oppose boys using girls’ bathrooms and boys participating in girls’ sports. One side is less supportive of abortion than the other. Republicans favor school choice, which is significant for the Christian School and Homeschool movement. We must have affordable ways to opt out of the Satanic brainwashing that has taken over most of our public schools.
Immigration.
Even the immigration issue matters to believers. The immigration policies of the last four years have expanded human suffering—especially for those who have illegally crossed our borders. Those policies create an entire class of people who are being exploited on both sides of the border. Sex and drug trafficking have exploded under the present administration—including child sex trafficking. The vast numbers of victims are women and children—the very people scripture tells us to protect (Exodus 22:22-24, James 1:27). We know that an orderly, legal, immigration process would do a lot to lessen that suffering and protect precious immigrants who want to come here legally.
Abortion.
Regarding abortion, kudos to Florida, Nebraska, and South Dakota, and shame to Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Montana, and Nevada. For nearly 50 years the pro-life movement battled the courts. That battle is now over. It has shifted to the states and with that shift, it has also shifted to the minds and hearts of voters. But even more so, the battle has shifted to the thinking of women who are considering an abortion. From a Christian perspective, the only sure way to change minds is to change hearts. For all of human history, abortion and infanticide has been a normal part of paganism. Our abortion crisis is not the heart of the problem, it is a symptom of it.
The real problem is that true Christianity has lost its influence in the culture. We have become completely selfish as individuals and now consider children as accessories rather than precious human beings. The main problem is with us. We must be real Christians, live like real Christians, and evangelize as real Christians should.
In Arizona, nearly $50 million in advertising was spent in support of an abortion amendment—ten times what was spent in opposition. Millions of abortions occur in this nation because it is a profitable industry and many are making fortunes killing babies and even selling body parts. A reasonable future tactic might be to set sites on the abortion industrial complex. In most states, saving the unborn will be an incremental battle, not an all-at-once victory. We cannot quit because we have had setbacks. We must consider every unborn baby we manage to save as precious before God. And so, we must work, even if it is to save one at a time.
Urgency remains.
Chad Connelly says that the problem with Christians in politics is that when they win they quit and when they lose they quit and that we need to quit quitting. We not only can’t quit, we should not even slow down a bit. We must continue as urgently in prayer now as we were in the weeks before the election. But our focus has to be so much more than politics. We need to be about Great Commission business.
The activity leading up to the election was increasingly frantic because a deadline was looming. Christians do not often evangelize or work with that same sense of urgency because we do not have a specific deadline looming. However, we are facing a deadline. The day is coming. It has already been set, we just do not know exactly when it will be yet. The day of my death is already determined. It will happen should Jesus tarry and I must invest my time for Christ because I know it is limited (James 4:14). Every person I want to reach with the gospel also has a deadline looming. Jesus spoke of this and reminded us to keep focused on eternal things because the end is near (Luke 12:16-21).
Even Jesus Himself ministered with a sense of urgency.
I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work (John 9:4).
When I was in the ministerial class in college we used to sing a chorus together every time we met.
Souls for Jesus is our battle cry,
Souls for Jesus we’ll fight until we die,
We never will give in,
While souls are lost in sin,
Souls for Jesus is our battle cry.
We have lost that spirit. We must regain it.
Listen to the audio version of this post here: A Baptist, Fundamentalist, Election Post-Mortem