Are you a Christ-follower and having doubts as to whether or not you should vote today? Well ... let the following words by Chuck Colson, a man who was a committed follower of Christ and a passionate advocate for government involvement, help you:
So, have you voted yet? If so, well done. If not, right now - or as soon as you’re off work - I want you to go and fulfill your Christian duty to be a good citizen and go vote.
And while you’re at it, call a few of your Christian friends. Find out if they’ve voted yet. If not, tell them that you’re going and you’ll be glad to stop by and pick them up. And let me say this: the next time you hear someone tell you that Christians ought to take a vacation from politics, tell them to go fly a kite!
Listen, it’s our duty, as citizens of the Kingdom of God to be the best citizens of the society we live in. If your pastor no longer has energy or courage to motivate his flock to speak out on public issues, maybe you can lovingly “buck him up.” Remind him or her that God’s people are to love their neighbors, to desire the best for them, to pursue the common good. And we can’t do that on the political sidelines.
When a rabid secularist tells you to stop forcing your religion down his throat - simply correct him. You might say, "Excuse me, but who is suing the government to remove crosses from cemeteries? Who has filed lawsuits to remove ‘under God’ from the Pledge of Allegiance? Who’s trying to tell doctors and nurses and pharmacists that they have to participate in medical procedures that violate their religious conscience? Who’s banning Bibles from schools?
In other words, who is forcing their point of view on whom?
We Christians are simply trying to PRESERVE and PROTECT the rights and liberties that we Americans have enjoyed from the founding of our Republic. We are the ones who take seriously our nation’s founding creed: that “all men are created equal and endowed by their CREATOR with certain inalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, meaning virtue.”
Our founders recognized that true rights come not from government, but from God Himself. Government must not take those rights away. And to protect those rights, we must vote.
Yes, the elections are upon us. Don’t be intimidated. Do not retreat to the sidelines. Go out and vote for the candidate of your choice. Vote as your conscience informs you. And yes, allow your faith to inform your conscience.
So GO ... get out there and vote!! Your vote really does matter. For your sake, for our country's sake ... and for God's sake.
NOTE: The words of Chuck Colson are from an 11/16/18 Breakpoint Daily blog post by John Stonestreet and David Carlson
