{"id":10010,"date":"2020-11-19T16:22:53","date_gmt":"2020-11-19T16:22:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=10010"},"modified":"2022-03-04T21:46:24","modified_gmt":"2022-03-04T21:46:24","slug":"righteousness-exalts-a-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=10010","title":{"rendered":"Righteousness Exalts A Nation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 0<\/p><p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">[<span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\"><strong>Note:\u00a0 <\/strong>This MS is available in larger font on our <strong>Brief Articles 2<\/strong>\u00a0 page.]<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\"><strong>[Author\u2019s Note: I wrote this article in advance of the 2012 Presidential election.]<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Our nation is in manifold difficulties that threaten to destroy the America the Founders envisioned and of which many of us have long been proud citizens. These troubles include dire economic woes at home and crisis conditions abroad. Even deeper problems relate to the loss of faith in God, in the Bible as the Word of God, and of a moral compass and core. Truth be told, the first-listed troubles above are related to the second list. One especially suspects this relationship when one considers the public (and all-too-imaginable non-public) misconduct of so many of those who control the nation\u2019s political power.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">The upcoming elections will likely determine whether or not our nation sinks more deeply into the morass. If we elect people who will continue the current direction, we will likely never recover our place of moral leadership and defender of freedom; <strong>America will never be the same. <\/strong>However, if honorable men and women are elected, that disaster may be avoided.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Voters will not only elect a president, but also senators and representatives. We must remember that the next president will likely appoint two or three justices to the Supreme Court, whose decisions will affect the course of our nation for decades\u2014for good or for ill. <strong>This election therefore looms as the most important one in our history.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">No <strong>congregation<\/strong> of the Lord\u2019s people can be part of a political party. However, <strong>individual Christians<\/strong> certainly can (and should) be thus involved. We have an obligation when it comes to casting our vote: \u201cAbhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is good\u201d (Rom. 12:9). This dictum\u2014not blind party loyalty\u2014must guide our votes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Political parties have their flaws, and there are no flawless candidates. However, the contrasts between the two major parties (and their respective candidates), and their \u201cplatforms\u201d are vast regarding moral\/spiritual issues and emphases. How can a Christian be faithful to God if he votes for any candidate who represents a party or endorses the leader of a party that is involved in such as the following?<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Ordering a symbol of Jesus\u2019 name covered before he would speak at a religious university, lest he offend Muslims<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Consistently omitting <em>the Creator<\/em> when quoting from the Declaration of Independence<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Openly refusing to enforce the Defense of Marriage Law<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Exchanging <em>E pluribus unum<\/em> for <em>In God We Trust<\/em> as our National Motto<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Forcing health workers to violate their consciences pertaining to abortions and funneling tax dollars to abortion mills<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Endorsing homosexual \u201crights,\u201d including same-sex \u201cmarriages\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Omitting even one mention of God in its platform, and loudly \u201cbooing\u201d when political expediency forced its inclusion<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">Demonstrating that its leadership and much of its membership despise God, the Bible, and the moral principles taught therein<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;\">I need not name either the party or any of its candidates described above; those with even a modicum of awareness (of the past four years, especially) can easily identify both. No leader of a major party has ever evinced so much <strong>open hostility toward God and those who believe in Him and His Word<\/strong> as the leader of the party (and his cohorts) now in power. It will only get worse if they <strong>remain<\/strong> in power. Christians dare not stay at home on Election Day, November 6 (unless they vote early). Scriptural principles will <strong>not allow<\/strong> the Lord\u2019s people to vote for those who subscribe to the foregoing list of anti-Biblical actions.\u00a0 Moreover, those same Scriptural principles <strong>require<\/strong> us to make our voices heard in favor of those who stand opposed to them. <strong>Not\u00a0<\/strong><strong>voting at all<\/strong> will in effect be a <strong>vote for<\/strong> the Godless candidates\/party. As a people who love God and our country, let us all pray that the right people will be elected, and let us do what we can to see that they are.<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\">Righteousness exalteth a nation; But sin is a reproach to any people (Pro. 14:34).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\">When the righteous are increased, the people rejoice; But when a wicked man beareth rule, the people sigh (Pro. 29:2).<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\">[<strong>Note:<\/strong> I wrote this article for and it was published in <em>The Lighthouse, <\/em>weekly bulletin of Northpoint Church of Christ, Denton, TX, September 30, 2012, of which I was editor.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\"><strong>Attribution:<\/strong> From <em>thescripturecache.com<\/em>; Dub McClish, owner and administrator.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 10pt;\"><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 0[Note:\u00a0 This MS is available in larger font on our Brief Articles 2\u00a0 page.] [Author\u2019s Note: I wrote this article in advance of the 2012 Presidential election.] Our nation is in manifold difficulties that threaten to destroy the America the Founders envisioned and of&#8230;<\/p>\n<div class=\"easywp-readmore\"><a class=\"read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=10010\">Continue Reading&#8230;<span class=\"easywp-sr-only\">  Righteousness Exalts A Nation<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[97,108,33,355,212,680,1009],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-homosexualitysodomy","category-marriage","category-moral-issues","category-political-correctness","category-politics","category-politics-and-religion","category-voting","wpcat-97-id","wpcat-108-id","wpcat-33-id","wpcat-355-id","wpcat-212-id","wpcat-680-id","wpcat-1009-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10010"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10010\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19427,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10010\/revisions\/19427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}