Why I can’t vote for Obama. (I am not speaking for any organization. This is my own personal opinion.)

Subtitle: the innocents, gay marriage, kleptocracy, naiveté.

I have dual citizenship, earthly and heavenly and the latter trumps the former in my loyalties.

I can’t turn my back on “the innocents.” Many Christians have tried to rationalize support of Obama by saying that they don’t want to be a “one issue voter.” When the one issue is this important it can’t be ignored. Psalm 94:21 talks about how the wicked condemn “the innocent to death” and how God will repay them. A couple of years ago I heard a young woman speak who was a survivor of abortion. Yes, her mother went to an abortion clinic but they botched the abortion and this girl lived. This happens more often than you would think. Obama voted against giving little babies in that situation any kind of help. He thinks they should die. He also voted in favor of partial birth abortion, a procedure which delivers the baby except for its head and then the doctor reaches in with a tool and crushes the baby’s head. In the campaign he said that he wouldn’t want his daughters to be “punished” with an unwanted child. I don’t ever see, under any circumstance, a child as punishment. The girl who survived the abortion was glad to be alive. I can’t turn my back on the “innocents.” I will not vote for Obama.

Obama favors gay marriage. If someone wants to live the gay lifestyle that’s their business but again my dual citizenship prevents me from supporting someone who wants to legitimize what the God of the Bible says is wrong. A New Jersey gay couple was denied a wedding in a United Methodist building. They cried discrimination and that church has now lost tax exempt status on that building. If Obama gets in he will support the legalization of gay marriage and we will see that kind of thing more and more. If a gay couple wants to be married in a church building where I serve I could not allow that without violating my conscience and convictions. There is no way I can vote for Obama.

Obama wants to “spread the wealth around.” If someone works really hard and takes some risks and prospers because of it, Obama wants to take their money and give it to people who don’t pay taxes and in many cases don’t work at all and don’t intend to. I realize that some people need help and they should be helped but Obama’s plan is a kleptocracy. As civilizations develop in different ways, some governments begin to unfairly take money away from the citizenry and use it for their own purposes or how they see fit. For a good analysis of what a kleptocracy is and how it develops see the book Guns, Germs and Steel. Obama’s plan would be harmful to our economy in many different ways and because of this I can’t vote for him.
I can’t vote for Obama because he seems to be naïve. He is a good speaker. He is likeable. In my opinion, he is no match for Putin of Russia, or the leaders of Palestinian terrorists, or Iran, or even those who are supposed to be our allies but who secretly undermine our policies and aid our enemies. If I was China I would invade Taiwan the day Obama took office. If I was Russia I would take more territory. The Russians have already shown the world that they are ruthless enough to do it and nobody is going to stop them. If I was Iran I would blow Israel off the face of the earth. If I was any evil person in the world who has been slightly restrained in the past by America’s military might I would choose Obama’s presidency to do whatever I wanted. In my opinion he underestimates the reality of evil in our world. He also said that if he knew that Osama bin Laden was in Pakistan he would go in and get him even without Pakistan’s permission. That would be ill-advised since Pakistan is a country with nuclear bombs.
Obama’s naiveté also extends to his associations. He says he sat in church for 20 years and never heard Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s hatred of America. He says he sat on boards and worked with William Ayers, and didn’t know what he was. Obama’s wife worked at the same law firm as Ayers wife and never knew who she was and that she had been on the FBI’s ten most wanted list. If he’s that naïve how can we trust him to look out for America’s interests when he is in talks with other countries?

Recently I read an article by a Christian author, in which he stated why he was going to vote for Obama. In his article he was guilty of age discrimination but more significantly the author dismissed McCain because of his belief that McCain has a warrior narrative. He also spoke dismissively about Bush because of his go it alone, cowboy mentality.

This author and many other people in this country and around the world seem to have forgotten all the United Nations sanctions against Iraq, 17 or so if my memory is accurate. The last two United States Presidents and their administrations were in agreement along with most of the rest of the world concerning the threat of Iraq. Before the war, President Bush was criticized for not taking action sooner. The United Nations and Congress gave their approval. Cowboy? Go it alone? People are either forgetful, biased or just plain liars.

I personally have been very disappointed in some things that have happened in the last eight years but that doesn’t determine who I’ll vote for. I vote for the person, not the party.

Who will I vote for? I don’t know, except I know for sure I’m not voting for Obama and I hope you don’t either.

rants about the church

Occasionally on my regular trip around my favorite blog spots I will discover that no one has written anything new. In disappointment I sometimes click on someone else's links and venture out in the realm of unknown bloggers.

It's in this realm of the unknown that I often (too often) see a disgrunteled Christian's rant about the Church. Will people ever get tired of writing those rants? I don't think so. As long as there are miserable people in the world, those miserable people will find misery in their church, school, restaurants, neighborhoods, etc., etc., etc.

That's not to say that the Church and these places aren't deserving of some criticism. No matter what we do we could always do it better, at least in someone's mind.

However, I've been following Jesus for nearly 50 years now and I've never found anyplace better than the Church, even with all its human imperfections. And as long as there are humans involved in it, there will be some degree of failure. From Vacation Bible School as a youngster, to Youth Group as a teen, to a parent with children in Children's church and on up to Bible College for me and my kids, there is no place where I have found more people who would accept me, encourage me, invest in me and my family than in the church. People have loved me, given to me, sacrificed for me, challenged me, corrected me, and prepared me. I could go on.

Rants against the church seem to only increase anger because the person writing the rant starts out angry, then they get angrier as they spill their bile, then other people agree with them or argue with them and it all gets messier and messier.

Maybe people who want to write rants and condemn the church or evangelicalism or some other broad segment of the believing population should follow the example of the Apostle John who in Revelation wrote his letters to specific churches. It would seem that he had an actual relationship with those churches, had firsthand knowledge of them and tried to correct specific problems. It would be interesting to see what would happen if the internet ranters would be more specific instead of speaking in broad generalizations. What churches have they attended? Who specifically is a money grubber? Who is egotistical? Name some names. List some churches. What evidence do you have for your statements?

The impressions I have of the Church come from the following churches I have attended regularly at some point in my life: Galena, KS; Arapahoe, NE; Council Bluffs, IA; Lincoln, IL; Rutland, IL; Streator, IL; Brownsburg, IN. Maybe I've just been lucky to hit good churches in five different states. Maybe there are thousands of other messed up terrible churches out there that aren't worth the paint on their walls that I haven't stumbled upon yet. If so, name some names, how many churches, or television ministries or Bible Colleges, or ministers are you basing your comments on? Be specific.

I doubt if ranters will ever do that. In the meantime I will spend time worshipping with my fellow Christians, I'll attend Christian classes and learn from the teacher, I'll share in a Home Group, I'll serve as best I can and I know I will be blessed by this wonderful, imperfect group of people. I hope the ranters will eventually come around.