Personality or Policy, Election Principles

[HKHaugan]

Policy or Personality, Election Principles

Principle 1  Personality

“There is no one righteous, no not one…(Romans 3:10).”  That disqualifies any and all personal judgments of anyone running for any political office.  Voters have no direct personal knowledge of a candidate.  Unless people have a personal relationship with a candidate, or anyone else for that matter, personality judgment is out.  That disqualifies 99.99% of us from personality judgment.  Jesus was right when He said we need to take the plank out of our own eye before we look at the speck in someone else's eye (Mt.7:5).  External impressions cause judgmental attitudes and emotional conclusions which need to be replaced by Spiritude.  It’s the heart’s sin problem.

 

Principle 2  Policy

“A good tree cannot bear bad fruit and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.  By their fruits you will recognize them (Mt.7:18,20).”  By their policies and accomplishments, politicians are known.  What a voter does have is the written record of the accomplishments and failures in the public files kept in official offices. Nothing else.  These are the only legitimate means by which we can determine qualification. No one gets it all right.  If our judgment is perfect, we need to run. 

 

Principle 3  Trust

Do not trust media manufactured videos and articles to offer anything accurate.  They are staffed by imperfect people like ourselves.  They are paid to manipulate our judgment.  Who really can know anyone but the Creator who made us?  Psalm 139 becomes the medium for self-judgment and a proper road to objective not subjective evaluation of others.

 

Principle 4  Prayer

Prayer.  Pray for objectivity.  Replace  personality with policy, personal judgment with reasoned ideas and feeling with faith (Col.2:4-6). In politics nothing is as it appears.

 

Principle 5  Purpose

Romans 13 gives us the purpose of government which is responsible to maintain peace, justice, defense and punishment of those who do wrong.

 

Principle 6  Sovereignty

God is in control.  Regardless of the outcome of any election He remains God and He is working His purposes out.  We are not the only generation that matters.  Until He returns, our task is faith as we think, trust and act based on God’s sovereignty.  One thing is clear.  Civilizations rise and fall based on their moral condition (our God reigns forever– Ex.15:18, Ps.9:7-12).

 

Principle 7  Share

Share the idea of ‘policy-or-personality’ objective focus or subjective attitude, if a political discussion begins.  Our witness is first spiritual.  Give God the glory, the praise and the thanks that we live in a country where the Bible is the foundation of its ruling documents, The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution (1Tim.6:20-21).  Think of the Cross---the vertical beam is our faith and the horizontal beam is our witness and our testimony.