Why Our Upcoming Political Battles Are Spiritual at Heart

Last week I wrote about our 2021 North Carolina endeavors, where 2,700 North Carolina pastors and spiritual leaders attended 13 North Carolina pastors’ luncheons featuring North Carolina Lt. Governor Mark Robinson. As many as 132 of them showed an interest in running for local office in 2022—on city council, county commission, school board and so on—so as to return biblical values and God’s Word to the public square, in obedience to Jesus’ ekklesia kingdom assignment from Matthew 16:18.

As of now, some 30 North Carolina pastors and spiritual leaders will be running for local office in 2022.

Michael Whatley, North Carolina Republican Party chairman, brought a greeting at each of the 2021 North Carolina events: “I am proud to be the chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party, but that’s not why I am here today. I am here because I am a Christian. I am a conservative. I am a husband and I am a father.

“I am here because we need more men and women of faith in the public square,” Whatley said. “We need men and women of faith to step up and run for office—to fill critical offices on city council, county commission and school boards.”

It should be added here that there is nothing intrinsically good or bad about either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. Both are holding vessels for like-minded people or party members.

It is nevertheless unusual to look for evangelical and pro-life Catholic Christians in a party that sanctions and pursues the normalization of killing unborn babies the day before birth. Nor are they as a rule welcomed and accepted in a party that revels in activities that in Leviticus 18:22 and 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 are decried as godless and sinful, such as self-indulgence, transgenderism, homosexual intercourse, same-sex marriage and adultery.

Contrary to what may come across as a battle between Republicans and Democrats in the public square, what really goes on lies on a spiritual level, with two distinct religions—eternal and immutable Christianity and transient and mutable secularism—vying for ideological control and supremacy in the public arena.

Michael Whatley went on to say: “Did you know that almost 50% of our state budget is allocated to county commissions and school boards for K-12 public education? We need to examine how that money is being spent. … We need the direction of our cities, counties and schools in North Carolina to be established by men and women of good character. … How do we do that? By recruiting, training and supporting people with good character to run for local office. You know, I have never seen someone get elected to any office and then become a good person.”

The latter indeed is rather inconceivable since natural man is wholly incapable of entering divine things. The one who loves his life in this world must necessarily lose it, for it is “estranged” from God (A.W. Pink, Exposition of the Gospel of John).

“Any successful election requires a combination of a good candidate and a good campaign,” Whatley says. “We are really good at running campaigns. We can help with messaging and fundraising, grassroots organizing and any other part of running a race. But good candidates are required, which is why we are here to talk to you.”

Over the last 100 years, however, contemporary Christendom has been in the ill-fated, lamentable habit of shying away from confrontation, contention and conflict, thereby letting go to waste the biblically based nation established by America’s Christian forefathers. A democratic republic can never be neutral regarding religion and morality, for someone’s values will reign supreme in the public square. Voter enthusiasm and turnout are key elements to affect a favorable outcome.

As a result of the Christian relinquishment of the public square, the state has exalted itself to a godlike position of worship, with the nation simultaneously and willfully turning away from Jehovah God to fully embrace the Baal of secularism. Of great importance as a seminal Mephistophelian moment in American history in this context was the ominous Warren Court’s (1953-1969) ruling to remove the Bible from public education in 1963.

As to let continuous secular control over church house, schoolhouse, statehouse, courthouse, movie house and art house go unchallenged, God’s Word must be eliminated from the public square and only allowed to be heard behind the walls of the church.

Contemporary Christianity has completely lost the ability to wage spiritual battle with weapons that are not the weapons of the world (2 Cor. 10:4) as well as accepting spiritual warfare and hostilities as part of the call. To quote the French mathematician, physicist, religious philosopher and master of prose, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662): “The most cruel war that God can make with men in this life is to leave them without that war he came to bring. ‘I came to send war,’ He says, ‘and to teach them of this war.”

In his excellent book, My God Is Yahweh: Elijah and Ahab in an Age of Apostasy, M.B. Van’t Veer comments on Ahab’s sin and the negative stamp it set on Canaan and the darkness that fell over the entire people of God in 1 Kings 11:7:

When the aged Solomon stumbled into the temples of Chemosh and Molech, he was sinning as the king and leader of the people, which is why he was punished so severely. Yet he did not demand that the entire people follow him in this sin. Solomon tried to deal with the issue as though it was a purely private matter.

Ahab, however, took a different view of things. At the instigation of his wife Jezebel — which does not absolve him of responsibility — he chose to act as ruler, as the one who takes the lead. He demanded that his subjects follow him down the sinful path … which meant that the service of Baal now became the official state religion. This is what made Ahab’s sin so much more serious than Solomon’s. (M.B. Van’t Veer, My God Is Yahweh: Elijah and Ahab in an Age of Apostasy, 1981.)

This leads us again to the culture forged by the Bible’s removal from public education in 1963 by the U.S. Supreme Court. A decision of such catastrophic consequence propelled the nation by necessity into the sin of Ahab, the pathway to unfettered, secular social change and rebellion against God.

The beneficial countermeasure to “supreme” secular detrimental leadership is found in this: “Some 30 North Carolina pastors and spiritual leaders will be running for local office in 2022.”

Onward to the battleground states of 2022 and 2024: Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.

Gideons and Rahabs are beginning to stand. {eoa}

David Lane is the founder of the American Renewal Project.

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