The most important decision you will make on Election Day
This will likely not be a word for everyone but – regardless of your faith tradition, if you believe in God and in prayer – the most important election decision you make will not be who will get your vote. The most important decision will be to begin your day in prayer.
The old adage is true – "religion and politics make strange bedfellows," but when it comes to being a person of faith – your belief system should guide your politics, not the other way around.
If you listen to the pundits and politicians, you would think that the future of humankind rests in the hands of who will be elected to the highest office in our land, but as Pastor Max Lucado likes to say, "We don’t know what the future holds, but we know Who holds the future."
With that small bit of wisdom, prayer opens the door to the kind of direction and wisdom we all need when stepping into the ballot box.
For what should we pray – before voting? Take a cue from King David in the Hebrew Scriptures – "Show me your ways, Lord, teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior and my hope is in you all day long" (Psalm 25:4-6).
That little prayer says a lot does it not? If we have made up our minds about who gets our vote without consulting the One Who put us on planet Earth, then our vote is based upon the impotent wisdom of the person in the mirror. But if we seek first the direction of the Almighty, it is not hyperbole to suggest we have the opportunity to enter into a kind of divine partnership with the fate of our nation.
And, if "my hope" – to use David’s words – is in God "all day long," then it is rightly placed because for people of faith their hope should not be primarily in a party, a policy or a politician.
So before making a decision about "who," pray – ask God to reveal His ways... His paths... His truth... In the moment, God may very well confirm your thinking, or God may change your mind – but whatever the case, as with every aspect in a believer’s life, you will not be making your decision alone.
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And if you are tempted to believe, as many suggest, that the Almighty is more closely aligned with a particular candidate or political party than another, then a dose of the truth serum called prayer will jolt you out of that mirage and set you back on a more faithful response to this moment in history.
We should not cling to the hope that God is on "my side" and not on "their side." During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln was purportedly asked if God was on his side. "Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side," said the president, "my greatest concern is to be on God’s side, for God is always right."
As a friend of mine likes to say, "We need to stop spending so much time trying to decide whose side God is on and make the decision to be on God’s side," which leads me to what believers need to be praying for after the election.
We are besieged on all sides from the acolytes of division who preach the message of red states and blue states, us and them, enemies and allies, even good and evil. If you have found yourself being tugged to think of America this way, maybe it is time to reboot your internal operating system. A political opponent is not, and should not be deemed, an "enemy." That person is just an opponent, as you are to him or her.
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A friend of mine driving through Pennsylvania during the last election cycle passed a billboard that read "America’s Only Hope: Not The Donkey or the Elephant, but The Lamb." This year, 2024, cries out for an end to our political bickering, but that will require some divine intervention, which comes in response to prayer.
Regardless of who wins, the call of believing people who pray is to pray specifically for all those in authority – all those who are elected – that they will, in fact, help us live more into our American hope. What if our candidate loses? Pray. What if our candidate wins? Pray.
You may have seen the recent film "Reagan," which included a touching moment when the Democratic House Speaker Tip O’Neill, who once called Ronald Reagan the worst president in American history, visited President Reagan in the hospital as he recovered from an assassination attempt. For a moment in the film, they break from their jovial banter and recite a portion of Psalm 23 together. But the real story is quite more potent.
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Outside of family, O’Neill was the very first representative of official Washington to visit the recovering Reagan. There was only one member of the president’s staff in the room when O’Neill entered. Max Friedersdof, who had been posted to keep unwanted guests from coming into the president’s room, would later share what actually happened in that moment with NBC’s Chris Matthews:
"When the speaker came in, he nodded my way and walked over to the bed and grasped both the president’s hands, and said, ‘God bless you, Mr. President.’
"... the speaker got down on his knees and said he would like to offer a prayer for the president, choosing the 23rd Psalm. ‘The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures...’ [The president]... recited part of the prayer with the speaker in almost a whisper."
"Once they’d finished, the speaker let go of the president’s hand, stood up, and bent to kiss him on the forehead. ‘I’d better be going,’ he told the patient, ‘I don’t want to tire you out.’"
My fellow Americans, sit with that for a moment.
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Would our "divided" nation not benefit from more potent, faithful, moral, prayerful leadership like that instead, perhaps, of what we have been witnessing between political factions over the last few years? How might we get there? Pray.
So, before you vote – pray. If you have already voted – pray as well. And after the election – pray all the more.
If you are looking for words that might help you along, why not borrow those of George H.W. Bush, who also made a very important decision the day he was inaugurated: his first act as president would be to pray. He turned to the Almighty and led the nation with this prayer:
"Heavenly Father, we bow our heads and thank You for Your love. Accept our thanks for the peace that yields this day and the shared faith that makes its continuance likely. Make us strong to do Your work, willing to heed and hear Your will, and write on our hearts these words: ‘Use power to help people.’.... Help us to remember it, Lord. Amen."
Can I have another Amen? As the days ahead unfold, let us pray... and then keep on praying. We need it.