Sacred Cow Saturday - Episode 10 - Religion and Politics

Gianna Jessen is a true hero and revealer of truth concerning the horrendous things that happen to babies that "survive" abortion procedures. Barack Obama can try and play technicalities all he wants - the fact is that he is the pro murder candidate.

I often hear Ronald Reagan's name maligned by intellectuals but unlike Obama he showed that the issue of life was not “above his pay grade”. When asked when does life begin Reagan (like Obama) said he did not know, but in contrast to Obama he said that that uncertainty was reason enough never to allow abortion. It would seem that, if elected, Obama should get minimum wage.

Again I want to stress that I am not overly interested in the political realm but I take keen interest in engaging a Christian worldview where our morality is biblically aligned and our political allegience lies with truth. And in light of this it is important to shed light on candidates who attempt to lure the Christian vote with a deceptive agenda and Obama continually attempts to position himself to the voting public as a Christian voice even though he denies so much of basic Christian truth including the exclusivity of Jesus. My concern lies not with people voting for Barack Obama, my concern lies with the undiscerning church goer who votes for the pro murder candidate because he thinks he's voting for a Christian.

Don't think for one minute that this is an endorsement of John McCain. Christian brothers and sisters, we should not kid ourselves about what can be achieved through politics. Civil law only serves the purpose of restraining a wicked and perverse generation enough for the Gospel to be preached. As I often say the heart of he human problem is the problem of the human heart and preaching is the God ordained means of bringing this about. For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe (I Corinthians 1:21).

The emergents, liberals, and "red letter" crowd have railed long and hard against the "religious right" for being too political and campaigning for the wrong issues. In fact guys like Tony Campolo (standing on the Democratic party platform), Jim Wallis (who chastened the religious right for their failure to be civil whilst saying "George W. Bush was, and is, clueless about how to be the president of the United States") and Brian McLaren (who is doing and funding TV commercials or Barack Obama) continually claim to be above partisan politics.

The truth is that the "religious right" gets it wrong. But their failure has not been the issues they have fought or political opportunism. They have fought the right issues but have shifted the emphasis in evangelicalism from mission to activism. It is good to fight moral issues but fantasy to think that morality can be legislated. I often say that the heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart and God's ordained method for changing the human heart has been faithful preaching; "For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe" (I Corinthians 1:21). No amount of legislation can do what can only be done by God's Holy Spirit - regenerating the human heart.

The left on the other hand takes getting it wrong to a whole new level. They have been the actual political opportunists who have politicised moral issues, abandoned the authority of Scripture, and redefined the Gospel.

Christians need to remember that civil laws, ultimately, only serve to restrain a wicked and perverse generation enough for the Gospel to be preached. We are strangers in a strange land that is temporal and perishing. We serve a King who is eternal and has left this strange land to go and prepare a place for us. In the meantime Christ has called us to preach His Gospel in only two situations - in season and out of season. Remember that when you vote.



A lot of negative things are being said (often by emergents, liberals and "red letters") concerning being a single issue voter. True - saving lives of the unborn is not the only issue. But we need to remember that a single issue can disqualify someone from being president and some issues are so BIG that they can outweigh all the others in one single swoop. If you are a preacher or a church and you don't get the Gospel right then everything else is a waste of time.

By Joe Belz from World Magazine

It's become an increasingly frequent reminder to us evangelical Christians not to let our cultural identity be framed by "single issues."

It was a reminder implicitly included in the "Evangelical Manifesto," a document whose basic content we at WORLD have applauded but whose political direction I questioned in our last issue. Why are the Manifesto's backers so ready to join the cultural left in suggesting a guilt trip for those evangelicals who have been preoccupied with the evils of abortion and same-sex marriage?

And if some argue that the rising generation of younger evangelicals is a bit embarrassed by what they think is an out-of-balance focus by their elders, and thinks it's time to get equally exercised over issues like racism, economic justice, and the environment—well, if that's the case with our twentysomethings and our teenagers, then maybe we need to go to work and do a better job of explaining to them why we've put the emphasis where we have for the last generation and why we believe that it's time not to lower our voices.

Evangelicals shouldn't be embarrassed to say boldly and clearly: Abortion and same-sex marriage are uniquely heinous sins. They rattle the foundations of a civilized society. They take a culture in a dreadful direction. We haven't been wrong to say so. We aren't fanatics.

And I'm not referring here so much to the young women caught in the anguish of an unexpected pregnancy or folks bewildered by their sexual identity. I'm talking mostly about a society that goes all out to tell such people that what they're doing is just fine. There's forgiveness for individual sinners. There's judgment for societies that lead them astray.

It's true that we evangelicals sometimes haven't been as zealous as we ought in fighting racism, abuse of the environment, and poverty. But on all those fronts and more, we're at least facing the right direction. We're sometimes slow.

But here's the difference: What evangelical do you know who says insensitivity to the poor should be promoted? What evangelical leader is calling for more racism? Who advocates the uncontrolled plundering of the environment?

That is exactly the kind of cheerleading that is going on for abortion and same-sex marriage. Whole movements and organizations devote themselves to telling us how good abortion and same-sex marriage are for society. It now is expected that Barack Obama feature on his speaking schedule, as he did on June 26, a New York fundraising dinner for the Democratic Gay and Lesbian Leadership Council—where the news account reports casually that Obama helped the homosexual lobby raise $1 million in just one evening.

But here's the core of the matter. To be robustly and consistently anti-abortion is at the very same time to cast your vote for environmental sensitivity, against racism, and for economic justice. These are not independent, isolated packages.

It's hard to see how anyone can claim to be a protector of the environment and not put a high priority on the preservation of human babies. To defend a focus on the future of polar bears and whales, while asking evangelicals to get less noisy about infant humans, is an embarrassing contradiction.

Similarly, keep in mind that abortion is one of the most racist of all social causes in history. Minorities don't just happen incidentally to be targeted by the practice of abortion. The history of Planned Parenthood and similar organizations is racist to the core—as is their current practice.

And no economist can look at the loss of 50 million American babies over the last 45 years and not wince at the impact of such a drain on the economic vitality of our society. Today's poor Americans are poorer than they would have been if we'd taken care to preserve enough consumers—and workers—to fill a state one-and-a-half times as big as California. Tomorrow's elderly will worry about Social Security more than they would have with 50 million more contributors to the system.

So stop apologizing for having focused on a single issue. Don't let the "Evangelical Manifesto" or anyone else shame you into an overly narrow self-image. It's the folks promoting causes like abortion and same-sex marriage who are the real "single issue" fanatics, falsely teaching that you can mess with just one or two aspects of life without upsetting the balance God so wondrously installed in His creation order. We need to expose that lie for the tragic falsehood that it is—and to teach the next generation what a very bad bargain they have been asked to accept.

http://www.worldmag.com/articles/14153