From: dlhpfm!dlh@ncoast.org (daniel lance herrick)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: "Christian politics"??
Date: 30 Aug 92 07:10:43 GMT
Organization: dlh Performance Marketing

bulloj@rpi.edu ( ) writes:

> My question is, why is it that more "Evangelical 
> Christians" tend to be very right-wing Republicans? 
> 
> Is there any information out there that would help me to understand this
> phenomenon? 

There is a book.  We spend a lot of time talking about it on this
newsgroup.

Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 both contain the injunction, "Thou shalt
not steal".  There doesn't seem to be an exception allowed for stealing
with a ballot box.

The policies of our national government for a long time have been built
on ideas of taking from those that have and giving to those that don't
have.  Half or more of the booty stays in the hands of the implementors
of the policy in the process.  In a place where both of the clubs
advocate systematic theft, some people who think a little bit about
Biblical ideas attach themselves to the club that acts a little ashamed
of it all and try to reform it.

Others of us are so reactionary we vote for people like Ron Paul and
Howard Phillips.

We remember that Paul (nee' Saul) wrote that "rulers are not a terror
to good works, but to the evil. ... For he is a minister of God to thee
for good."

We remember that "righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a
reproach to any people."

Enough snide remarks.  Let me describe a consistently Christian
approach to reconstructing our society in the direction of that
exaltation.

The book of Judges tells of the Children of Israel turning away from
God, and he sells them into slavery (later it is "gives") and they cry
out to God and he sends a redeemer.  And 40 or 80 years later it has to
be done all over again.  (Those numbers are important - one or two
generations.  Sometimes the redeemer does his job well enough that he
teaches a generation to teach its children to serve the Lord.  Other
times only one generation is faithful.)

One of those redeemers was named Gideon.  When I ask people about
Gideon they say something like "Wasn't he the guy that raised an army
and it was too big and they whittled it and it was still too big and he
took 300 men and routed 120000 Midianites."  And I say, "Yes, but that
isn't the important part of the story.

This is all in Judges 6.  Gideon was threshing grain in a winepress
(hiding down so the Midianites won't see the chaff blowing in the wind
and steal or destroy the grain).  The angel of the Lord appeared and
said, "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour."

They talk, Gideon offers food, the angel tells him to put it on a rock
and calls down fire from heaven to consume it.  That night Gideon has a
vision and is told to tear down the altar of Baal, which his father
owns.  He has ten servants help him and does it, in the night because
he is afraid.

At this point we have one man who has turned away from his sin and
committed to serving the Lord.

The next morning the young men of the city come and demand Gideon so
they can deal suitably with him for destroying their god.  Gideon's
father, the owner of that destroyed god, said, "Will ye plead for
Baal?...if he be a god, let him plead for himself, because one hath
cast down his altar."

Now we have one man and his father.  A few others are with them.  At
this point, the war is over.  The ethical issues have been settled. 
The Lord, who brought the Midianites to chastise the Children of Israel
will now deal with them for their presumption.

Apply that to the 1990's.  Elect godly men to dogcatcher (the
traditional symbolic bottom level elective office), alderman, city
council, school board, county supervisor, sheriff, mayor.  When we clean
up the things for which we are directly and personally responsible, the
Lord will take care of the larger cesspools.

Meanwhile, we have the government that the Lord has raised over us. 
Think about that.  Why would a holy God put men like George Bush and
Teddy Kennedy and Howard Metzenbaum where they are today?  There may be
a hint in Amos 3:6.

Let's bring things to a point where the "minister of God to us for
good" is not a rod of chastisement but a leader in the "righteousness
that exalteth a nation."

dan

[If you're going to use the OT as your reference for government -- and
that probably makes sense since it's the primary place where we have
governments under God's control -- I would refer you to the prophets'
continual demands for taking care of widows, orphans, and other
powerless people.  Now there may be some question as to whether the
current welfare system is quite what the prophets had in mind.  But
that's an issue of implementation.  It is not theft for the government
to use taxes (in the OT it would be called tithes, but they were not
voluntary) to make provisions for the needy.  Again, I am not
necessarily defending specific programs as they currently exist.  I am
saying that there is Biblical precedence for using government to aid
people.  --clh]