Time to Get Real!
November 7, 2006
Today is Election day and time to VOTE! But it is also a referendum on the performance of America's moral and spiritual leaders, our pastors. While the outcome of the election throughout the nation tonight may indicate how successful Christian leaders were in calling Christians to VOTE, early indicators in Oregon suggest many of our pastors continue to fail the leadership test. Leadership and the Lack thereof in our Pulpits
For instance, a well known Bible centered church in
the Portland area virtually hid the Oregon Family
Council Voter Guides in the deacon's closet
rather than hand them out or make them readily
available to the congregation. The reason? The
board, including the pastor apparently, decided it
was more important not to 'offend anyone'
than to supply much needed and wanted
information about issues and candidates on the ballot
in Oregon and Washington County.
That is just one instance. How many more stories like this could be told, not only in the greater Portland area, but around the state and the nation? Every nationally known Christian leader in America that is paying close attention to the culture and particularly the political decisions that affect each and everyone of us, is greatly alarmed at the ongoing 'silence of our pulpits.' How tragic, for all of us! And we wonder why Christians, and particularly pastors, are finding themselves ever lower in the respect category when Americans are surveyed?
Embracing The Secular Belief System
One Christian observer in Portland recently
wrote the following:
"Our Pastors are and have been for many years, involving themselves with entertaining services, pablum messages and playing to the vanity of immature "professing Christians". While occupied in this pathetic pursuit, their congregations have been, and continue to allow their children to be indoctrinated in the religion of Humanism, taught by Pagans in the failed public education system. This system along with higher ed and grad school completes the process of destroying the Christian faith of each generation. The demographic split of roughly 50% God and America haters, and 50% nominal Christians and other secular conservatives, accounts for the debacle which we are witnessing as we approach the mid term elections. America as we once knew it cannot survive if Christians continue to abandon their faith and embrace secularism in the education of their children."
There is Hope... and Leadership
On the positive side, a pastor of a very large
southside evangelical church in the Portland area not
only ensured his congregation was informed,
he encouraged them from the pulpit to both
register and VOTE. He and his staff and volunteers
announced and provided voter
registration cards prior to the voter
registration deadline, and Christian Voter
Guides as soon as they were available. He
showed the Measure 43
Parental Notification DVD on the large screens
at both services and urged his congregation
to Vote.
He also taught his congregation the truth
about what has come to be called 'separation of
church and state' and gave biblical principles
for good government.
This same pastor also introduced prominent candidates for public service, from his pulpit, but stayed within the law by not endorsing any of them. The congregation responded positively to his leadership, leadership that should be evident in every church in Oregon, the Northwest and throughout the nation. Is there some reason other pastors cannot or won't do the same?
We Shall See
Beginning shortly after 8PM PST tonight, we will see
whether the largest voting block in the nation,
evangelical Christians, took their citizenship to
heart.
We will also see if a significant number of the 19 million evangelicals who DID NOT VOTE in 2004, repented of their indifference. That will tell the story whether our pastors followed the example of the Oregon pastor who said nothing, or the one who led his congregation as he should have.
P.S. Hundreds of thousands of Americans
have sacrificed their lives to earn, preserve, and
protect our right to govern ourselves. Please do not
take their sacrifice lightly. VOTE, and
VOTE according to Biblical principles and VALUES!
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America
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of "Restoring The Nation Under God"! "For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Corinthians 10:3-5
Copyright © 2006, Restore America. All Rights Reserved.
email:
dcrowe@restoreamerica.org
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