The New President

We are living in historical times. For the first time a black man has been elected to the most powerful office in the nation, maybe even the world. Whatever you believe about Barack Obama and his ability to lead the country well and effectively you have to nevertheless agree that it is a testament to God's grace on this nation that we have risen above our history in a short period of time. We are a baby nation...yet here we are, some two hundred years later, electing to office one who would have been scorned even just fifty years ago.

I don't agree with his politics. In fact, I think they are mostly ridiculous. But I do know we should rejoice in the triumph of what yesterday meant for our country. What should concern us most is not who is in office, but now the House and Senate and judges, all of which will be or are already liberal. This concerns me greatly, and while we should be in prayer for our new president, more so should we be in prayer for the direction we will be taking in the next four years, maybe more.

Yeson2 and the Palin Rally

I went to help Jenn Lightfoot hand out Yeson2 marriage amendment flyers and signs at the Sarah Palin rally in Lakeland Saturday morning (now you know who I'm voting for though I've never said it outright:-D). Though things didn't go quiet as expected, we still had a blast.

For long term effects in the state of Florida, this amendment could be considered more important than the election. The amendment would put in the Florida constitution that marriage is between one man and one woman. Period. So if you are living in Florida VOTE YES ON 2! John Stemberger, a man in our church and president of the Florida Family Policy Council has been working tirelessly for years to get this on the ballot. I pray that on Tuesday his tireless efforts will be rewarded.

The pictures above were taken by Jenn. Also, read these articles by my brother, Jesse, called "Where Art Thou, Perfect Candidate?" "State and Statism: Seeing Government Through a Biblical Lens" "Women in Government" and "Big Government and Small God." These don't have to be read in a particular order, but are must reads.

Christians and Politics: Mrs. President? Women in Government

My brother Jesse wrote this and I'm posting it here.

In this article we will continue our discussion by considering an issue that has been on the forefront of evangelical discussion in this election: women in government and how Christians should view such a prospect.

The discussion of women in politics is not a new one. Both major parties have had women in high positions of office for some time. Condoleezza Rice serves as Secretary of State and Nancy Pelosi is the congressional majority leader and House Speaker.

What has brought this issue to the forefront of public discussion, however, is the central role that several high profile women have played in the primaries and general election. Democrats nearly selected Hillary Clinton as the first female Presidential nominee and Republicans nominated Sarah Palin, who would be the first female Vice President. The prospects of having a woman in such high office has led to some very legitimate questions needing answers. As always, we will look to Scripture for divine perspective for our questions.

“As a married woman called by God to submit to her husband, how can she lead the United States of America?”

Perhaps you’ve been sitting around the dinner table recently and the subject of women in government came up. Specifically, the issue of Sarah Palin as Vice President was raised. “You know,” someone says, “If the President were killed, she would be President. Do we really want a woman as President? Is that biblical?”

“How can she be a helpmate to her husband” another adds, “if she’s off leading wars in the Middle East?” “Would her husband be the ‘First Gentleman’?” Someone chuckles. “Would people say Mr. President or Mrs. President when they address her? How about Madame President?”

What most women would not aspire to is becoming an almost certainty in our country. For better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, it would seem almost inevitable that we will have a women elected President, a Commanderette in Chief.

The questions that were raised above—both serious and lighthearted—are legitimate. If that conversation took place around your dinner table, how would you handle it? Perhaps it already has. How did you handle it? Before we examine what I believe is an appropriate biblical response, I want to look at unbiblical responses. On the one hand, we must be careful not to hastily condemn what scripture does not condemn. On the other hand, we must be careful not to condone what scripture forbids or warns against.

Please understand that the arguments presented are in no way meant to be an endorsement of any candidate or party. Sarah Palin is simply being used in this case as a relevant example to examine the Bible’s teaching. The conclusions arrived at would be the same for any political party.

Wrong Answer 1: She’s only Vice President, not President, so she’ll still be following McCain, not leading America.

The immediate response may be to shrug the issue off because the position in discussion is only the Vice President. While it’s true that different Presidents vary in the amount of authority they give their running mates, this answer is insufficient alone to satisfactorily answer the questions previously raised. The Vice President is part of the executive branch of government. This is one of our nation’s highest offices, presiding over the Senate and acting as an agent able to exercise the powers of the President, if so commissioned by him. Having a higher power to report to does not mean the Vice President is not a high leadership position.

This answer also fails to answer the question of succession to the presidency. If the President were to die or resign, she would become president. If it is unbiblical for women to be in government leadership, could we knowingly elect a woman to a position of direct succession to the nation’s highest office? Part of the Vice President’s responsibility is to act as President if needed. If scriptural principals forbid electing a woman as President, it would also be wrong to give her such responsibility to act as President when necessary.

Also, this objection does not address the many women like Mrs. Palin who have enjoyed successful political careers as state executives. Sarah Palin is Governor of Alaska, requiring the exercise of significant authority and leadership. Is this wrong? If so, why?

Wrong Answer 2: At least she’s not as bad as another choice.

Like it or not, the reality is that many political votes seem nothing more than a choice between the lesser of two evils. Even if it was determined that the Bible prohibited or discouraged women in government, a woman might seem to be a superior alternative than a man. Though understandable, the temptation to check our convictions at the door is inconsistent and unnecessary.

The reason this argument fails on its own is that its premise is faulty. If a woman is biblically prohibited from holding governmental office, she would not be better than the alternative. From a biblical perspective, she would be every bit as bad as any other male choice, for she would have no biblical basis to rule. Therefore, her very position would be resisted and condemned by the Lord. This argument seems to be based on pragmatism and an arbitrary standard of what is good and evil, not on solid biblical criterion.

So, if submission to the President and the lack of a good alternative choice are not sufficient reasons for voting a woman to power, are there any good reasons? Rather than looking for pragmatic justifications for choices this election, we must look to see what the Bible says about the matter.

Right Answer: The Bible does not forbid women from ruling governments.

Whereas there were two wrong reasons given above, we will limit ourselves to one right answer. Although there may be legitimate concerns about how a marriage would maintain its strength if the wife was a state official, the teaching of Scripture does not forbid women from ruling governments. The context of the instruction about feminine submission is marriage and the church, not civil service.

John Piper summarizes the New Testament teaching thusly: “Ephesians 5:22, Titus 2:5, 1 Peter 3:1,5 exhort wives to be subject to ‘your own’ (idiouis) husbands. This term ‘your own’ shows that the relationship of leadership and submission between a woman and her husband should be different from the relationship of leadership and submission which she may have with men in general. Husbands and wives have responsibilities for each other in marriage that they do not have to other men and women.”

In addition to the command for a wife to submit to her husband, the Bible also reserves responsibility for church leadership for men (1 Tim. 3:1-7, Titus 1:6, 1 Cor. 14:34-35). The truth on which the Bible is clear is that within the church and marriage men are responsible to lead and women are responsible to follow. Yet, as Dr. Al Mohler points out, many church denominations that respect male headship in the home do not forbid secular female leadership. According to Mohler, this is not inconsistent thinking. Rather, it provides an accurate understanding of verses on this issue in their proper context. Wayne Grudem points out that, “The positive examples of women involved in civil leadership over nations other than Israel (such as Esther and the Queen of Sheba) should prevent us from arguing that it is wrong for women to hold a governing office”.

Searching scripture reveals various commands for men to lead churches and homes. Women are called to follow the men in leadership. What you will not find, however, are commands for women to submit and to not have leadership over men in civil government. The argument that if a woman must submit to her husband she cannot lead the nation is, therefore, a logical argument, not an exegetical one.

Is it a good logical argument? Can we indeed make such inferences from the Bible? Are the Drs. Mohler, Piper and Grudem being inconsistent in their thinking? The primary objection raised against this understanding of scriptural permission of women to rule in government is based on the objection that if God doesn’t want you to lead a family or church, what hope do you have of leading a nation? I would argue, though, that this very question and characterization of Christian faith by non-Christians betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of government on the one hand, and the church and home on the other.

The belief that if you cannot lead a family or church means you cannot lead a nation assumes that it is harder to lead a nation than a family or church. The Bible, however, teaches us the opposite. You may be able to lead a nation quite well while utterly failing in your own home. King David led the nation of Israel effectively but neglected his own sons, one of whom revolted against him. David might have an interesting perspective on the relative ease of leading the nation as compared to his family.

People who hear the Christian teaching on female submission in the home and church—and then argue that this effectively denies leadership in government—betray an erroneous belief that the government realm is one of higher spiritual authority than the church or home. We would certainly acknowledge that being unable to lead a church means you can’t lead a nation, assuming the nation is superior to the church. What if the state was not superior to the church? What if a country was not supreme over the institution of the family? Would it not follow that a woman could exercise leadership over government, if is was inferior to the positions of leadership in the church and family?

The only way governmental authority can be denied women on the basis that authority in the church and home is also denied is if governmental authority is superior to the church and home. However, as we have proven in the previous article on statism, the authority of the church and home are actually greater than the spiritual authority of government. Consequentially, although the Bible does not allow a woman certain high positions of authority as leader of a family or church, she may flourish in positions of lesser authority, including all government positions.

God’s Word is clear that the church is the most important institution in the world. All things have been made subject to Christ, who rules in absolute power and dominion over the earth and all the nations and inhabitants therein (Phil. 2:9). It is through the church that Christ exercises his reign over creation. Although Christians are subject to the governing authorities for the sake of their testimony, the church is not subject to government, but to the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.

In a society that idolizes the state and all its earthly power, such an argument is nonsense. In the Kingdom of God the divine perspective is that a faithful pastor of a small church that never makes the evening news, and a faithful father who consistently and lovingly trains his children, both demonstrate more vital leadership and decision-making, more eternally significant guidance and wisdom, wielding more spiritual authority than any world ruler ever would.

Looking Ahead

Elections reveal our values. We have choices to make as Christians. Many politicians believe that government is more important and has more authority than the church and family. This is why they find it incredulous that a Christian could believe a woman could be a submissive wife and devoted mother while holding political office. Granted, it would certainly take impressive godly character to do so.

There are, however, some politicians who respect the spiritual authority of the church and family. They see government as a servant, God’s agent to protect these sacred institutions. We shouldn’t cast our votes based on the gender of the candidates. We should vote for the candidate whose platform best reflects biblical values and whose agenda is going to best protect what God values—marriage, family and the church’s faithful proclamation of the good news of Jesus.

Gotta Love It

Just got this email.

Bar Stool Economics



Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:



The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. 'Since you are all such good customers, he said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.



The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.



And so:



The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).

The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).

The seventh now paid $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).

The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).

The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).

The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).



Each of the six was better off than before And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.



'I only got a dollar out of the $20', declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,' but he got $10!'



'Yeah, that's right', exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!'



'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!'



'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!'



The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.



The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!



And that, boys and girls , journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.



David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.

Professor of Economics,

University of Georgia



For those who understand, no explanation is needed.



For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.

Staying On Topic

Since I've been going off recently about abortion/politics, here's another post for you. Not really a post, actually, but an order for you to watch these youtube videos. Not asking. Ordering.

Bleh!!

I hate abortion. When confronted with the fact that he voted to withhold life saving treatment to babies born after botched abortions this is what Presidential candidate Barack Obama had to say. This whole topic makes me want to throw up in my mouth.

"If it sounds incredible that I would vote to withhold lifesaving treatment from an infant, that's because it's not true. The -- here are the facts.

There was a bill that was put forward before the Illinois Senate that said you have to provide lifesaving treatment and that would have helped to undermine Roe v. Wade. The fact is that there was already a law on the books in Illinois that required providing lifesaving treatment, which is why not only myself but pro-choice Republicans and Democrats voted against it."

Um...ok. What's his point? That in four sentences he can say two different things? Unbelievable. For how eloquent he is this made NO sense. There was already a law in place that required life-saving treatment be given. Why would he vote against it if only for the fact that it would undermine Roe v. Wade? Am I missing something? The point is it is absolutely incredible that ANYONE would withhold treatment from a dying child, born ALIVE, and say that it's not true that they voted to do that very thing. Give me a break.

Then, to turn around and say that he would support a partial-birth abortion ban is so hypocritical. What are we supposed to think? If I'm pro-abortion I wouldn't like that answer. It is double-speak even for his own supporters. I'm PRO-LIFE and I don't like that answer. If you're gonna vote one way at least remain consistent; either say that life begins at conception so therefore abortion is murder, or say that a baby isn't a baby until its born, or it starts breathing, or its heart is fully formed, or its brain is fully formed or SOMETHING. According to this guys track record, a baby isn't a baby until the mother wants it, whether it's 2 months old in the womb or it's a living, breathing 2 year old. If a mother doesn't want her two year old so she wants to withhold life saving treatment from him when he gets hit by a car, should we? It's ridiculous.

Ok, I get fired up about this stuff.

Rant about My Generation and Politics

I love politics. I always have. Ever since the Gore/Bush debates when I was in my early teens, I was the only one among my friends who cared even remotely about who got the presidency that election. What thirteen year old wants to talk politics with their friends, anyways? I registered to vote when I was seventeen so that I would be mailed my card when I turned eighteen.

It still baffles me talking to other college students, especially Christians, who say that they hate politics and don't care. Hate politics? I can understand that...a little. But don't care? We can't afford not to care. When Christian's stop caring about who is leading the country, especially those in my generation, we know that we are headed for trouble. We already are. People my age, twenty-somethings, have stopped caring, stopped thinking for themselves, go with the flow and and have a carefree attitude about the state of our political system.

This is due in part to what politics looks like nowadays...finger-pointing, back-stabbing and lying. The last presidential debate was nasty...I left the room I was sick of hearing "my opponent this, my opponent that." Blah blah blah. Both sides were doing it, too. My candidate was just as bad as the other side. Answer the question and let us know what you actually THINK.

So I am calling my generation of Christians to educate themselves. God appoints presidents, kings and dictators. But He has placed us in a unique position to vote for who should lead our country, have a voice in a sea of lying, back-stabbing politicians. If we don't know the issues, don't know why they are important, and are too lazy to study them for ourselves, we might as well be thirteen again...only concerned with appearances and passing Algebra. Where are country is going has everything to do with the future of innumerable truths that we hold dear. Will our children be allowed to even preach the Gospel on the streets? Will they be allowed to tell their friends that Jesus is the ONLY way without being arrested for hate speech? Will they be allowed to speak up in the classroom about their beliefs against evolution?

Will we teach them that abortion is wrong? What about gay marriage? What about cloning human beings? What about stem cell research? What about the thousands of frozen embyros languishing away in fertility clinics? If we don't have these issues squared away as our own convictions, how will we teach our kids? If we don't care about these issues, and don't care what the candidates think, by all means vote with the flow. Just know that you aren't being radical as Christ was. He never went with the flow, or thought something just because Peter and John thought that way.

As a side note, my brother Jesse is writing a series of articles being handed out in my church to help folks through the current policital/economic craze going on in our country right now. You can read the first of them here.

Contemplations on Fair Competition

In basketball, like any other sport, players compete to win the game. This is accomplished by scoring the most points, playing the best defense, and being more physically tough than the opponent. In basketball there is always a declared winner. The four regulation quarters played might end in a tie, but extra time is added until at the end of the allotted time there is a champion: The team who played the best, scored the best, passed the best and dribbled the best. This accumulation leads to the most points scored and therefore a winner.

What would the game look like if there is no competition? It would be ridiculous for one team to hand the ball to the other team and let them score, just to be fair. The very foundation of the game would be shattered. Yet this very concept is the idea behind socialism, which is defined as “a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole”. It is the antithesis to capitalism, which is defined as “an economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or corporations, esp. as contrasted to cooperatively or state-owned means of wealth”.

The United States of America is fundamentally a capitalist nation. This idea is the very foundation of our personal freedom; it is the ability to pursue success as an individual and not primarily for the betterment of anyone else. Though this is more pertinent economically, it also seeps into every other way of thinking. Americans compete for anything and everything, whether it is in economics, sports, or academics. Americans competed to be the first in space, and our national competitiveness continues in our pursuit of Olympic medals. The effect of this way of thinking is that Americans value personal freedom and democracy over socialism, Communism, anarchy, monarchy, or any other governmental system or lack thereof. Because Americans hold these values and live by them, we can now implement these values in common and everyday life. Americans don’t have to work towards the betterment of community because we are forced to but because we want to.

The basketball illustration can be taken a step further. What if the team with the ball hands it over to the other team to score not only to be fairer, but because they are forced at gunpoint? This would not be effective in instilling in the team with a desire to make things fair; instead, being forced to against their will would cause the team to hate both their captors, and their opponents. It does not effectively instill a love for the common good of their neighbors, so to speak. Rather, it instills a distrust of the system, and, therefore, a distrust of those within the system.

This is why Americans value competition and succeeding. It exhibits the idea behind democracy: personal freedom. We can now live for ourselves, own our own homes, manage our own money, acquire our own education, and work toward our own betterment.

However, capitalism does not negate the fact that we should be concerned with the welfare of our community. Freedom is a beautiful thing, but freedom itself is not effective unless it is exercised within constraints. Freedom does not mean I am not obligated to respect the freedom of my fellow man. I cannot place my own freedom as higher as or more costly than the freedom of others. This way of thinking would lead to moral chaos.

There are, therefore, two sides to the coin of competition. There are those who would use and abuse living in America. Several examples lie with mega-corporations that began to arise in the early 20th century, led by men like Rockefeller, JP Morgan and Carnegie. Dr. Dennis Cuddy writes, “Unfortunately, there are today people who seem to believe the statement by John D. Rockefeller that ‘competition is a sin.’ Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie and others are depicted in a 1911 ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH cartoon by Robert Minor as welcoming Karl Marx and his "Socialism" to Wall Street. This is because under Socialism, CEOs of major corporations and banks can limit competition via their control of politicians who pass laws and enact rules and regulations favorable to the CEOs.”

In essence, these corporate giants wanted to welcome socialism in order to control economics and politics. Freedom and competition allowed them to be giants in business in the first place, and yet they were then willing to trade this in to stay at the top and abuse those under them. Some of them believed that under socialist thought, they could control not only economics but politics as well.

Our own government was established on a system of checks and balances so that one person or corporation could not abuse competition and freedom. The essence of the structure of our government contains executive, legislative and judicial branches, formed to execute a well-oiled machine that works for the people and not against them.

One last example of how abusing competition can lead to chaos is a story of a group of people that I was with who were flying on a Bolivian airline. At the time, there was only one airline that flew in and out of an airport located in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. When the group arrived to board the flight and head from the capital of La Paz to Santa Cruz, the airline informed the group that they were not going to get on the flight because they had sold their seats to other passengers. When asked how this happened after the seats were already bought, the airline attendant told the group that they were supposed to call 24 hours in advance to keep their seats, even when they had already been bought and reserved. Because this was the only airline that serviced Santa Cruz, there was no choice but to wait and board a flight leaving later. Not only that, but the very same thing happened on the return flight, this time with a different excuse even after the call was made to reserve the seats (which were already bought) 48 hours in advance instead of just 24 hours in advance. The airline was using and abusing the power it had, simply because it was the only airline that serviced a particular city. It had knocked out all competition, so it did not feel morally obligated to keep an agreement is had previously made to paying customers.

In closing, our society stands as a beacon for freedom because competition and success are used to uphold our country. Small business owners can often struggle against larger businesses, and complain about the level of competition they are up against. Yet this very idea promotes the freedom for us to open our own business in the first place, as an exercise of free enterprise. Without fierce competition, this country would sink into the mundane ideology of socialism, where freedom is not free and mankind is exploited to the whims of a vast community that does not see individual human life.