Can God’s power be hindered by our refusing to vote? Certainly, many statistics reveal that there are a lot of individuals professing to be people of faith, and each election, they refuse to vote with a common reason in their minds that causes them to justify their actions. However, before we go there, we should first ask a foundational theological question. Do we believe that man can hinder God at all? There seem to be two extreme views in the church in America about God and His workings. Can He influence the leadership of a nation by His intervention or some may say His outstretched arm as He sits on His throne in Heaven?
One position, called the sovereignist position perspective, means that God is sovereign and therefore whoever He wills to be a leader will be the leader and He will be sure of it. Thus, in that thinking what difference does it make if we vote or not? If He is going to swing it the way He wants it to be! How logical fellow believers is that with the foundations of government that this country was founded on? Just for a minute with that kind of logic, and not literally but does not God then, become the one who is stuffing the ballot boxes? Please think with me for a minute! All it takes is for some very minor research to be done on our founding forefathers, early writings, in their coming to New England, as the first Pilgrims, and you will see that their very first vision for this new country was for it to be a nation founded on the principles and teachings of God’s Word! Therefore, to take a single passage of scripture out of the Old Testament, or the New, and form a doctrinal foundation for God’s sovereignty over all elections is not in proper theological order. We must be considering other Biblical truths, to add balance for defining Biblical or divine sovereignty over the affairs of men is by itself theological error. Should we consider in Daniels 22:21 reference to God setting up and putting down kings referring to monarchial order during those seasons of government on the earth? Should not the following scripture be in leadership patterns of our first republic or democratic forms of government? The scripture says in 1st Corinthians 3:9 KJV(a) “For we are co-laborers together with God and the whole principal that our forefathers created our government on was that the whole country would be made up of people who knew how to pray and to receive from the Lord the knowledge of His will not only for themselves but for the country that they live in every day. For the concept of voting to even work correctly It would have to be done by people who also longed for a holy God-led and righteous society and understood! According to Psalms 78:40-41″How often they provoked Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert! Yes again and again they tempted God and and limited the Holy One of Israel. Psalms 78:40(NKJV) Yes fellow believers in God through Christ the Psalmist clearly says not only once but (again and again) they limited God, just as you and I can limit God by our unbelief and our lack of seeking out, finding what and doing what He has revealed His will is on any certain matter especially voting for the ones who are supposed to be our leadership positions.
We then take the often-quoted scripture “and He changeth the times and the seasons: In Daniel it states, He removeth kings, and setteth up kings: He giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge (22:21-22 KJV). If God is the one who chooses how does He choose? We see the tossing of dice-like things called lots for smaller elections in the Bible but in our country, the first voting that we have record of was by the Pilgrims in 1620, shortly after they arrived at Plymouth Colony. The Pilgrims established the Mayflower Compact, which was signed on November 11, 1620. This agreement was a foundational document that outlined the principles of governance for their new settlement and included a commitment to work together for the common good.
While many of the initial decisions and selections were made by mutual consent among the adult males, the act of signing the Mayflower Compact itself can be viewed as an early form of democratic voting among the settlers. Additionally, general elections in the colony began to take shape with the establishment of governing bodies in the years that followed.
As for other English settlers, the Virginia Colony, established in 1607, also practiced forms of governance that included voting. The Virginia House of Burgesses, founded in 1619, became the first elected assembly in the New World, allowing settlers to vote for representatives who would make decisions on their behalf. I want you all to think for a minute about “what if ?” the early Pilgrims considered the concept of the modern-day sovereignists in a scaled-down way by saying, “Let everyone stay home who does not feel like voting and which-ever person gets the larger number of votes be the one who is the leader!” If you consider it like that with a smaller number of people you sooner realize that it makes little sense. To this day it is one of the largest reasons in people’s thinking that they stay home and do not vote. They simply believe that whether they vote or not ,God’s will for who will become President will be done! Why not stay home and watch a movie, don’t we believe that God is the one according to Daniel who sets up and puts down kings? Isn’t that sadly the erred foundation of too many peoples thinking?
Let’s look again at what should be the thinking that makes God’s true involvement in an election effective in seeing His will being truly done in who gets elected?
First you have to start with a Nation that truly is “One Nation Under God!” A nation with a majority of truly converted people who are all praying long before election day for the person that God desires to be elected to be revealed to all praying people who have learned how to hear His voice and obey His leading. From right here now its easy to see that if it were possible to shove all-of our churches in reverse and undo or redo all that’s been done to reach people with the Love of Christ over the past 20-30 years so that we can have enough praying people to vote and influence the numbers to be a majority over all of the rest who also vote. What you can also consider is that as in the early days of the Pilgrims, there were a minority onboard the Mayflower. Out of the 102 passengers on board the Mayflower 35 were considered members of the Pilgrim church and the others were individuals attracted by the promise of new opportunities. In the book “The Light and the Glory” by Peter Marshall and David Manuel the Authors spend years researching the original manuscript of that infamous voyage in 1620 and while there were some who were mocked and ridiculed the daily witness of those true followers of Christ were a bright light and a great witness to those who the pilgrims referred to as “strangers.” No doubt it was because of the fact that the rugged sea-worn ships crew were indeed strangers to the Christian ways of these loyal pilgrims. One note from the ship’s log stated something to the effect of “If those church folk had not been taught that it was sinful to complain about anything before God they would have never survived the journey! They took notice of how much and how diligently they prayed and visually observed the strength it took to endure the deaths of some of their own family members having to bury them at sea. The common sea sickness having to observe the visual heaving of the wide types of individuals gaggling, and grabbing ahold of their lives as giant waves and severe storms rocked the well-worn Mayflower that had been on other voyages and at one point had their main wooden mast beam crack down the middle. If it had not been for the praying and quick-thinking William Bradford, the Mayflower’s spiritual elder the Mayflower very possibly would have sunk halfway across the Atlantic. He had taken the trip by the assignment of the church’s senior pastor. Pastor John Robinson had to stay back to minister to the rest of the spiritual flock that had to stay behind in Holland. William Bradford a direct family relative according to Ancestry.com remembered a large printing press packed away for their needs ahead that had a large metal screw jack built into it. Elder Bradford quickly led a group to unpack the printing press then disassembled the jack and used it to screw back together the beam which held for the rest of the journey and saved the Mayflower and its crew! The reason that I am telling these stories is that these unconverted crew members were so moved by the leadership abilities demonstrated at sea that they had no problem voting for them as leaders into the new community of “New England” once on dry ground! My point is that those who vote for those of the Christian Faith do not have to be members or followers of the Christian Faith! If they witness all of us seeking and praying and staying full of the Holy Spirit and acting in Jesus’s love and kindness to all many will be converted to our Jesus without preaching a single sermon to them. But by winning them with His love. Just as in a smaller way in the home women are sometimes called to win their husbands by His love! Just the way an Army General recently testified of the way Former President Donald Trump has demonstrated immeasurable generosity to people in need with no obvious intent to draw any attention to himself while doing it. Something Donald Trump has been reported to have doing countless times through the years even before he ever ran for the office of the President of the United States.
Brothers and Sisters in Christ I will close with this thought. If you for a minute believe that you are excused from voting for any reason that causes you to believe that God will just sovereignly put the president into office that He chooses because of a single passage of scripture you have read or have been taught then please-please reconsider your teaching and ask God’s forgiveness and make it a point to get out and vote this year, for America’s sake, and yours…. In Jesus Name, Amen!
