Cultural Shift

Elections are stressful. It doesn’t matter which side of the aisle you’re on. Anxiety is at an all time high in society and we try everything to find a solution. However, the word of God has excellent advice for dealing with anxiety. Pray about it. The word of God says don’t be anxious for anything but to make our requests known to God through prayer. Anxiety is not something we can deal with alone. There is something powerful about talking about it with God. He already knows everything we are dealing with because He is all-knowing. However, we tend to hang on to our problems. Talking to God about it helps us to release our problems so that we don’t carry them around anymore. For some of us, that anxiety reflex is natural. So, it can be difficult to hear that we have a conscious choice whenever we encounter something that causes anxiety. We can either hang on to it or let it go and give it to God. The longer we hang on to it, the worse it can make us feel. God wants us to give it to him so that we can have life to the full. Worry less, pray more.

If you were to name two things that don’t mix, you would probably say religion and politics. However much of the Bible has to do with laws and policies. Particularly God’s laws and policies. But it also instructs us what to do when human laws contradict God’s laws. In the Old Testament, God gave the Israelites 613 laws because the Israelites had been slaves for over 400 years and now they had to govern themselves. Those laws govern anything any nation will ever need; education, economics, immigration, you name it, it’s there. So, you could say that God established a complete civil government for the Israelites. Faith and religion absolutely can go hand in hand. In America, the First Amendment was put in place for a reason. However, politics has been pushed out of the Church because of the concept of separation between Church and State. But it has been deceptively twisted. In 1802 when Thomas Jefferson was president, he explained to the Baptist Convention the protective authority of the First Amendment. He explained that government intrusion into religion is limited by the First Amendment. It’s there to protect the church from the government, not the government from the church. In 1954, the Johnson Amendment prohibited any 501c3 from participating in election activity. It intimidated pastors from speaking out for fear of losing their tax exemption status. This was a true violation of the separation of church and state because the state put pressure on pastors not to say anything that could be construed as political. It is often said elections have consequences and that is true. As Christians, we need to vote for the most biblical policies that we can find. While the church isn’t becoming more political, political issues are becoming more spiritual. As good stewards of what God has given us, we have a moral obligation to make our voices heard.

One of the Greek words used in the New Testament for Church is Ekklesia. It has the meaning of an assembly of people whether it is in a building or in the public square. In the ancient world, the public square is where people would discuss and debate ideas or they would gather to hear any official announcements from the king or the emperor. Early Christians would also gather at the public squares to share the gospel. Today, our churches are shying away from engaging in the modern-day version of the public square. The Word of God is being watered down and some pastors are afraid to preach on certain subjects. Jesus taught that we are to be salt and light and that requires our church leaders to be bold and not be afraid. Every political issue we see today is also a spiritual issue. We have the tools to speak to and address those spiritual issues. The Church needs to have a place in today’s public square if we are to be salt and light. Let’s pray that an awakening and revival happens in our churches.

We’re continuing to focus on prayer in a season where everything seems overwhelming. But as Christians we know that prayer helps us to release those issues to God. We can’t bury our heads in the sand, when we are supposed to be interceding for all the issues around us. There is an obvious rise in wickedness everywhere and we are called to pray against that. Everywhere we look we see that things are broken. In government and in personal lives. As Christians we believe that the rise in wickedness is responsible for this. Some will call us conspiracy theorists because of that and that’s ok. We need to be awake and aware of what is going on around us. Our enemy is not the people around us. Our enemy is the Prince of the World also known as the Devil. He wants us distracted fighting with each other. We need to pray against that. God isn’t done working in this world. He isn’t done with performing miracles. God is bigger than we think, God is closer than realize, and God is better than we imagine.

As Christians, we are called to pray for our leaders, our country, for God’s people Israel, and all the other political issues around us. In America, we have the privilege of voting for our leaders, so we ought to vote in accordance with our values as well as pray. In Proverbs it is written, “When the righteousare in authority, thepeople rejoice; But when a wickedmanrules,the people groan. Good, Godly leaders are badly needed in America and around the world. We also need to do what it says in 2 Chronicles and humble ourselves, seek God, and repent of our sins. As it is written, then God will hear from heaven, and heal the land. Being humble before God is crucial and it makes our prayers more effective. This is also how we can be salt and light and be the best witnesses to the people and culture around us. Being humble before God also increases our own faith. When we humbly pray, we bring our requests before God and give them to Him. That means we don’t have to worry about what we have asked God for. When we pray more we can worry less. We can’t make anything happen by worrying about it. Worry only breeds discouragement in our hearts. But, God can make our requests happen by His will if we bring them to him and we will feel encouraged. The conditional promise that is written in 2 Chronicles was originally written for God’s people Israel. Christians have not replaced Israel, even though we have access to the same promises through Jesus Christ. We are called to pray for Israel and to bless Israel.