This week, a new Republican party platform was proposed. After 40 years of nominally standing for pro-life values and marriage between a man and woman alone, the Republican National Convention (RNC) has officially begun its descent on the slippery slope of fear of man into the valley of destruction if passed.
Christianity is a worldview based upon faith in the person of Jesus, the Messiah. In this worldview, no stone is left unturned; God ought to be glorified preeminently in every sphere of life. This leads to an ordering of loves and providences from God, knowing that God must reign above them all. In the recent past, Christians have had to examine government and its influence in an ever-increasing hostile culture. Romans 13 declares God established government and its agents to restrain evil and promote good. Christians submit to governmental rulers and even corrupt governments such as Nero and those the early church faced. However, we, “must obey God rather than man” (Acts 5:29). When the government demands Christians disobey what God commands or prohibits what the Bible commands, we respectfully cannot comply. Just as the early church would not declare lordship and allegiance to Caesar at the cost of their own lives, we must weigh each law against God’s Word.
In the last few years, Christians have been forced to reexamine the spheres of government, family, and church to rightly sort out how best to honor God. In the government sphere, all laws legislate someone’s morality and appeal to a worldview’s highest good. Since we are dealing with binary ideals of good and evil, someone will be unhappy when their ideal does not get codified. As the inward reality of depravity has become more outwardly expressed, Christians have had many voices encouraging them how best to use the gift of citizenship and voting to honor God. However, many voices in Christian circles have tried to please the masses who appeal to a different moral “god,” the self. In doing so, Big Evangelicalism has argued for a third way, while casting aside the teachings of The Way, The Truth, and The Life (e.g. Imago Dei – He created them male and female). Or, they just remain silent.
Even with the competing voices for the evangelical mind, most could still see that, in a two-party system, the party that better promoted good and reduced evil according to God’s definitions and standards was the Republican Party. The good promoted – the protection of life from conception and the definition of marriage as being one biological man and one biological woman, provide the foundation for society. Christians know this world is not our home; we are sojourners. We eagerly await eternity in the new Heavens and new Earth God is preparing. While God’s justice does not perfectly align with any man-made system, the RNC’s platform better promoted laws that appealed to God as the Creator. It attempted to reduce evil in comparison to the Democratic Party.
Our hope is not in some party to change society. The ill of society is sin – the inherited corruption that cannot be cured without the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, a supernatural work. As we are sovereignly appointed to this time and culture, we make every effort to honor God and promote His good with the gifts He’s given us to steward. Up until this week, what a blessing it has been to steward the privilege of voting in a way that, out of the two options, one’s platform was clearly more aligned with God’s righteousness.
Cue this week’s news. The RNC’s new party platform values, “Life and Family.” When does life become valuable? The RNC’s official stance: your state decides, but rest assured, “we will oppose late term abortions.” Do you value the youngest most vulnerable life? Answer: No. “We support policies that advance access to Birth Control and IVF.” Without writing a separate article addressing this, virtually all IVF procedures knowingly kill babies, in multiple rounds, and have a host of other ethical issues. (For readers who are new to this: if you can get past the “playing God argument,” to avoid any other Biblical issues, you’d have to only extract and fertilize two eggs, no genetic screening or reduction of any kind, implant them both immediately, no freezing in any variety, and no surrogacy. Check out Them Before Us for additional information). As far as birth control, every pill-based birth control has three mechanisms to stop pregnancy; the third is abortive, thinning the lining of the uterus so a fertilized egg cannot implant and grow. How often is the third mechanism used? The jury is out. But for IUDs, hormone patches, shots, and rings, they are known abortifacients as their primary mechanisms.
We then go on to read how the RNC’s platform is supposedly pro-family, removing their stance of marriage as being between one biological man and one biological woman. This leaves the door open for same sex unions being considered legitimate marriages by the Republican Party. With IVF a priority, that could redefine families to include two “dads, “moms,” or perhaps polyamory, depriving a child of the right to both his or her biological father and mother.
There are other stances that some Christians could take issue with. The new platform includes Universal School Choice, which could be code for government money for homeschool, government stipulations and crackdown on homeschool in the future. The “Right to Own and Bear Arms,” with no context, explanation, or even a paragraph on what that means or the regulations regarding that topic.
Lastly, there are areas that seem to promote good but are ambiguous. The first is gender. “We will keep men out of women’s sports, ban Taxpayer funding for sex change surgeries, and stop Taxpayer-funded Schools from promoting gender transition, reverse Biden’s radical rewrite of Title IX Education Regulations, and restore protections for women and girls.” However, it does not clearly define gender as male and female. Another area is the creation of the Federal Task Force on Fighting Anti-Christian Bias. Is it Biblical to have a government funded agency to fight against Christian Bias? Who are these task force Christian fighters, and how are they selected? Will the creation of this force take into account only 6% of professing Christians have a Biblical Worldview (Culture Research Center) and all people have a sin nature?
Where does this leave the “road is narrow,” orthodox, Bible-believing Christians? With these nuggets to chew on:
- Can we say the RNC generally promotes God’s good with this new platform? Perhaps to a small degree. Now we are left with the question, “which party lessens evil?”
- “Can we vote for abortion in order to lessen more evils?” Our taxes have been and will continue to fund abortion. Those are compulsory. In the issue of voluntary voting, this is a worthy point to address. In the 2020 election, many people made the right argument that a Christian could not vote for the Democratic Party based upon its platform; that choice was morally opposed to what God has said about justice in His Word. While that still stands true, this acquiescing of the RNC’s platform could usher in not voting as a viable position of conscience for the Christ Follower. Before, the two platform’s definition of family and life were starkly opposed – one derived from the god of self; the other, the Moral Lawgiver who wrote His Law on every human heart. Now, they stem from the same god, one party bold enough to finally declare it and another full on embracing it. Time will tell how, in good faith, Christ followers will or will not vote in this election and thereafter.
- We have three choices with the current party setup to enact change: the non-vote, a Democrat vote, or a Republican vote. If believers in good conscience choose the non-vote, that could allow the Democratic party to come to power. Going by party platform, more evil is endorsed and celebrated in that party compared to the Republican party, even with these platform changes. Shall the believer cast a vote to mitigate the most egregious evil presented? If Christians bow out of voting, how does that align with honoring God, promoting His good, and reducing evil in society? Though the non-vote is a legitimate position and matter of conviction, Christians still have a duty at hand. Cultures that love their neighbor are better than cultures that hate their neighbor (Stonestreet). One facet of love as God defines it is, “not delight[ing] in evil, but rejoice[ing] with the truth.” Though we must seek out organizations and local options to promote the Biblical sanctity of life and marriage, believers can still mitigate evil with their vote in national elections. For example, if Party A advocated for: unrestrained abortion, transgender affirming care, and mandated any educational establishment receiving federal funds make “sexual encounters” occur in K-12 curriculum, that would be abhorrent compared to God’s standard. If Party B advocated for: murdering children up to 5 months in utero, transgender affirming care, but had no “encounter mandate” in education, it would still be abhorrent to God. In this jarring example, Party B, though evil, legislates less evil; the believer would love their neighbor by voting for Party B, working through other means to mitigate the atrocities Party B legislates. Christians can still be a restraining force for evil in this fallen, corrupt world. Though Christians have no political home explicitly promoting Biblical good, we can honor God by loving our neighbor in truth and deed, including voting for the party that legislates evil less.
- No matter how Christians vote in October, now is the time to respectfully express disgust with the new Republican platform. We must continue to champion the cause of life, lest our hearts become numb to sin or consider the sanctity of life a “battle lost.”
- Water runs downhill; with one compromise, then another, and another. As we have seen in the UK, I believe this is the first major slide we will see toward an unrecognizable Republican Party perhaps in only twelve years. We have no eternal stake or allegiance to the Republican Party; God alone is our Judge. While it has been a blessing for Christians to mostly agree with a party in a two-party system, we will enter in a new era if this platform is voted in. We must think Biblically how to glorify God with our gift of citizenship and voting, submit our lives wholly to God, and be led by the Spirit in these matters.
Take heart, Christian. Times like these remind us this world is not our home. By tasting the bitterness of the world, how much sweeter is the incorruptible, resplendent home that awaits with our Glorious King. May we serve Him faithfully where He’s placed us, for as many days as He graciously gives. Soli Deo Gloria.