The Election Before the Election

[HKHaugan]

Secularism is the hometown of sin. Secularity denies spirituality thus morality is left alone to individuality and emotionality becomes our functionality. Denial is the daily enterprise of fear and pride, the handmaidens of sin. Without a reasoned spiritual base for moral decision making, anarchy and its chaos are the final result. It’s not enough to say that people are good at heart. Heart is where the problem of sin lies. The human mind and heart have denied sin as the perpetrator of our grandiose assumption that God is no longer personally important in our decision making. He has His space and we have ours, that is, if He is there at all.

Morality is a personal election, --- a mind election, a heart election and a spiritual election. It’s the first election before any other. It’s the pre-election election. Morality is not a group, ethnic, national, social or institutional election. Neither is it a contract or compromised agreement. It is an individual, personal, mind, heart and spirit election. Without spirituality morality inevitably becomes immorality and mortality its finality.

The mind has to have a logical belief system. The heart has to be touched by the substance of that belief to be able to trust it. The spirit has to have faith to act out that belief and trust. When those three are in balance then morality is a natural response. Immorality is neutralized.
Jesus is the living proof. Jesus fit this truth to a ‘T,’ that’s why He came to live among us.

It is Jesus’ example of individual commitment we are given to follow. Behind and underneath every political election another deeper election has already taken place, moral election. There are moral issues that define a culture on a daily basis. These shape every periodic election. An electorate’s morality and its leadership are always a reflection of the individuals within it. Political choices picture the already existent morality voters have pre-elected. We have to be realistic here. It is everyone’s fallen nature that makes choices each day and the periodic choices we make are affected by that imperfect nature. The question for each of us is this: Have we really placed our choices under the microscope of Holy Scripture? This is why I said in a previous posting that the issue is not pro-choice but rather PRE-choice, the choices made that cause pro-choice people to pick up the pieces of their pre-choice morality.

We live in a culture where instant gratification is our real motivation. What’s in it for me right now, my daily survival, my health care, my daily acceptance in my social environment, my daily economic security, my family’s best interest--- right now? This is the nature of sin at work. This is what makes morality a spiritual issue. Are we influenced by the wins and losses happening all around us? Am I getting my piece of the pie? Sounds like what people expect of coaches, ‘What did you win for me today?’ We transfer the dynamic of that question to our leaders in every field---education, politics, economics, athletics, business and even churches, ‘Will the one we ‘elect’ to lead us help us to grow quickly, to feel more secure and really inspire the desire to light a fire and invite people to a ‘successful’ church?’ See what I mean about sin?

Now, watch how sin influences subtle changes in our language. Acceptance, inclusiveness, tolerance and love are culturally redefined to substitute for truth in our modern setting where Truth is no longer absolute. What motivates their redefinition is fear, fear of being offensive, fear of being blamed, aloneness-induced fear. The spirit of fear is replacing the Spirit of Truth. Truth has become whatever persons choose to believe to be true for them. In fact the word ‘whatever’ is a term used in conversation when you want to conclude a point that might demand more explanation that might introduce conflict. It is into this mass inner election where Jesus comes as a perfect person to correct and lead us out of our modern Egypt to see Him as the person we elect to bring us into His Kingdom. He is the way, the truth and the life.

Will we continue to sell our God given birthright for a bowl of stew (see last posting)? The spirit of the anti-Christ hovers over the land thriving on the deceit of its flickering false flame.

There are a number of major issues that the political process cannot fix and yet they remain in the forefront of the real warfare that takes place in the substrata of our cultural reality---abortion, homosexuality, the redefinition of marriage and family, consumerism, Israel, personal identity, personal purpose and accomplishment, all of which are ultimately moral, thus spiritual, in nature. Let’s be very clear about this. The reason the political process can’t fix them is that they are moral not political issues and moral issues are spiritual issues. They depend on the individual not the government. You can neither dictate nor legalize morality and spirituality. There is nothing in man’s political or judicial arsenal that can solve the issues they raise. Inevitably man will fight any attempt to control his personal morality. The majority of the electorate has chosen to leave God and His Word out of the election process---the election before the election.

The answer next……….