A Victory For Morality
One of the most surprising things (at least to the media pundits) to come out of this past Tuesday's election was that whopping twenty-five percent of the voters said that morals was the number one issue that drove them to the polls. Prior to the election, there were not many saying that this would be a contributing factor. Most, if not all, of the media were saying that the election was a referendum on Iraq. Many said that it was the economy. However, when the voters came out to vote, the truth was that more voters were concerned about morality than the other issues. This is a good thing.
The Bible says, "Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people" ( Proverbs 14:34). History has also proven this to be true as well. The great empire, Rome, fell, not because of it's lack of power, but because of it's abandonment of moral values. Corruption and abuses within the Catholic Church lead to the protestant reformation. Russian communism ultimately failed because it taught that there was no such thing as that which is morally right or wrong. Our nation need not think that it somehow has the "secret" to being immoral, yet not failing as a country. Such hubris flies in the face of history.
I've heard a couple of things from the "spin doctors" this week as to why the vote went the way it did. One thing that I heard was that the "benefits of a secular state" simply were not pursued with enough vigor. The truth is that there is really no such thing as a secular state; God controls it all ( Psalm 83:18). Those who believe that the state can be wholly secular have forgotten the lessons of communism. Indeed, a state needs to have at it's foundation some kind of fundamental morals. There is that which is right and that which is wrong; society ought to base its laws upon that which is morally right.
Some have suggested that if it doesn't "hurt" anybody else then we ought not to prohibit whatever action it is that doesn't "hurt" someone else. The problem with this thinking is that when we do something morally wrong, it always hurts someone else. The disease of AIDS exists today as testament to the FACT that behavior that allegedly "doesn't hurt anyone else" truly does hurt, and kill others. How many children must live with such a horrible disease because of the actions of some mother or father that "didn't hurt anyone else?" Our actions (whether seemingly innocent or not) always have consequences; God said long ago, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting" ( Galatians 6:7, 8).
Another thing that I have heard this past week is that the losing party simply did not get out the message that they have morals too. This is partly incorrect. The losing party made an great effort to convince some that they did have morals. One of the more popular slogans that was touted was that they wanted to hear "less about family values and more about valuing families." If I had a dime for each time that was said…well, you get the picture. It was simply not the case that an effort was not made. It was just that those who truly do have family values and also value families, recognized there was no substance to that message. When you do nothing to stop the murder of unborn children; when you ride the fence when it comes to the issue of gay marriage; when you fail to recognize the selfishness in physician/state assisted suicide; when you suggest that we ought to experiment with human life through embryonic stem-cell research; and when your party fights to eliminate any and all religious influence in our nations schools, one has to ask, "What, exactly, do you value? What, specifically, are your morals?"
This election was truly a victory for morality; however, there is work yet to do in this arena. With every new generation that is raised comes the responsibility to pass along to them the right morals. Deuteronomy 11:18-21 exemplifies this point so well:
Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates: That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.
I am deeply thankful for each one who voted for that which is right. You, the voter, made a difference in our country on the issue of morality. And while our victory for today is won, the cause of tomorrow remains. It is not time to lay down arms, but to press the fight forward! "And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not" ( Galatians 6:9).
Posted in: Bible Lessons, Morality