The Shortcut to Lagash: Sunday Reflection

In 2016, the night before the presidential election, I posted a few paragraphs on how I was feeling. I was in an environment where I was surrounded by left-leaning coworkers, and I felt immense pressure not to voice what I really thought. So instead, I posted that I was exhausted by the divisive rhetoric on both sides and that, while I believed Hillary Clinton would win, it didn’t matter as much as we made it seem because we would move on. While most of us can agree that abortion is wrong, it’s easy to be swayed into believing that 'loving our neighbor' means allowing those living in worse countries into ours for a 'better life.' I got a barrage of comments from both sides saying, “Wow, this is exactly how I feel!” I felt validated. I felt like I had pleased everyone. The problem was that I didn’t actually say anything. In an effort to be winsome and relatable to everyone, I ignored the glaring siren in front of me: It DID matter who won this election, and Christians had no business voting for Hillary Clinton despite Donald Trump’s many flaws. It was true then, and it’s even more true now. In 2016, we didn’t have a clue how Donald Trump would actually lead or what policies he’d truly care about. Now we do. We also have three years — and an entire abysmal career before that — of record on our other candidate, current Vice President Kamala Harris. False empathy Yet I don’t blame the Christian for being confused. We’re bombarded with media lies claiming that Kamala Harris is the empathetic choice. She’s the choice that will be “compassionate” to the illegal immigrant (but not to the victim of rampant immigrant crime) and to the woman with an unwanted pregnancy (but not, needless to say, to the baby being murdered). A few weeks ago, Pastor Ray Ortlund, president of Renewal Ministries and founding pastor of Immanuel Church in Nashville, posted on Instagram Threads: “Never Trump. This time Harris. Always Jesus.” Last week, Glennon Doyle, lesbian self-love guru, who still has a large Christian, female following, posted a series of slides on Instagram claiming that if Donald Trump is elected, “we lose birth control, IVF, abortion, insurance coverage, and LGBTQ+ rights.” Note that quite literally none of that is even remotely true. In the past few weeks, I’ve seen other pastors contribute to the irresponsible lie that “both sides are just as bad” or, even worse, that “both sides are valid options.” From a Christian standpoint, not only is that untrue, it’s unbiblical and dangerous. If you find yourself convinced by the progressive left that it would be “unloving” to vote for Donald Trump, or that it doesn’t matter as long as you “vote your conscience,” I urge you to look a little deeper at what your vote actually means. A higher authority As Christians, we obey a higher authority than our feelings. If we examine each candidate's proposals in the light of biblical truth, deciding how to cast your vote isn’t so confusing after all. Clips from Pastor Jonny Ardavanis of Stonebridge Bible Church and Pastor Josh Howerton of Lakepointe Church were making the rounds on X last week after both pastors preached excellent sermons on how Christians should view this year's election. You can view a clip from Pastor Jonny’s sermon here and Pastor Josh’s sermon here. The clips went viral because the church as a whole is starved for good Christian teaching that speaks to how the Christian should apply the Bible to the ballot box. These are two of the pastors who actually cared to answer. As much as Christians like to pretend like politics and culture are outside the church, they’re not, and it’s vital that the Christian understands where Kamala Harris stands and what she represents in this election. Abortion Proverbs 6:16-17: “The Lord hates … hands that shed innocent blood.” Kamala Harris is the most radically pro-abortion presidential candidate in history. It’s true that we do not have a consistently pro-life candidate in this election, with Donald Trump refusing to support a federal abortion ban and openly and consistently supporting abortion exceptions and term limits, but the Democrats are undeniably, radically worse. While Republicans now think abortion should be rare, as Democrats used to, Democrats celebrate it and flaunt it. It’s not just about exceptions or limits. Harris will not name a single abortion restriction that she supports. Eight states and Washington, D.C., impose no term restrictions on abortion, and more will follow under Harris. In 2019, she voted to block the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which would have required medical care for babies born alive in botched abortions. Her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, signed the Protect Reproductive Options Act in January 2023, which repealed the state's Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, codifying a “fundamental right to reproductive freedom” and essentially prohibiting any restrictions on abortion, including gestational age limits. The bill also removed the requirement for abortion providers to report cases in which infants survive abortion attempts, a measure that had been in place since 2015. While Trump is not standing strong against abortion as he should, he would inevitably surround himself with many who do. He will be supported by people who have the potential to change his mind. Harris will not. Immigration Acts 17:26: And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place. Perhaps no issue today divides Christians more than illegal immigration. While most of us can agree that abortion is wrong, it’s easy to be swayed into believing that “loving our neighbor” means allowing those living in worse countries into ours for a “better life.” But is it really loving to open our borders and put our own citizens at risk? How were we loving our neighbor Laken Riley, a Georgia nursing student, when our border failed to protect her from the unvetted illegal immigrant who brutally murdered her? Were we loving Mollie Tibbetts, Kate Steinle, and Lizbeth Medina when they, too, died at the hands of illegal immigrants? Are we loving our neighbors in Colorado as we allow apartment complexes to be taken over by Venezuelan gangs? Harris and Walz have repeatedly blamed Trump for rejecting a border bill that they claim would have properly vetted illegal aliens. In reality, the “border security bill” would have allowed 5,000 illegal border crossings per day before closing the border, kept catch-and-release in place, sent hundreds of millions of dollars to NGOs to facilitate illegal immigration, and required that any illegal immigrant who claims asylum be released into the country and granted work authorization almost immediately. The fact is that Harris has no plan to secure our border. We know because she’s been asked repeatedly and has never been able to answer. Gender and sexuality Gen 1:27: So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. If you follow Libs of TikTok on X, you already know what the Democrats advocate in this department: books that read like porn being available to young children in schools, gender indoctrination baked into curriculum, and the normalization of drag shows, preferred pronouns, and “gender-affirming care” — dangerous hormone “treatments” and experimental genital mutilation surgeries. I could write a lengthy book on the amount of corruption within the “transgender care” industry, but suffice to say that proponents in this industry are creating lifelong slaves to the medical industrial complex by selling experimental surgeries and hormone “treatments” that they know have an absurdly high complication rate. It’s a neglect of responsibility for us to reject God’s design for sexuality and gender to begin with, and it’s a dereliction of duty to ignore the physical and mental harm being inflicted upon not only adults but children as well. On “Transgender Day of Visibility” in 2022, Harris and Admiral Rachel Levine welcomed six “transgender” and “nonbinary” youth and their families to the White House. Levine said it was “deeply impactful to speak to some amazing trans kids at the White House. Gender-affirming care is the medical standard and allows these kids to be themselves and live a normal life.” The same year, the White House posted a message from president Joe Biden and Harris that read, “Efforts to criminalize supportive medical care for transgender kids, to ban transgender children from playing sports, and to outlaw discussing LGBTQI+ people in schools undermine their humanity and corrode our Nation’s values.” In a 2019 interview with the National Center for Transgender Equality, Harris crowed that as attorney general of California, she ensured that the state changed its policy "so that every transgender inmate in the prison system would have access to the medical care that they desired and need." When running for president in 2019, she pledged on an ACLU questionnaire that if she became president, she would use "executive authority to ensure that transgender and nonbinary people who rely on the state for medical care — including those in prison and immigration detention — will have access to comprehensive treatment associated with gender transition, including all necessary surgical care." Due to Harris’ policy, a man who is sitting on death row for gruesomely killing three people, known as the “Yacht Killer,” has received taxpayer-funded “sex-change” surgeries and is expected to transfer to a female prison soon. Compare this to Trump’s pledge to keep men out of women’s sports and to stop child genital mutilation surgeries. Which candidate aligns more with our God-given duty to protect the vulnerable (Proverbs 31:8-9)? Religious liberty David Daleiden, project lead at the Center for Medical Progress, was investigated for criminal activity in 2015 by then-California Attorney General Harris after he released undercover footage showing Planned Parenthood executives discussing the sale of baby body parts from late-term abortions. In 2016, Harris sent 11 armed agents along with K-9 dog units to Daleiden’s one-bedroom apartment, a raid in which the California DOJ seized dozens of hours of his unreleased undercover tapes. Harris, upon request from her donors at Planned Parenthood, opened a criminal investigation into Daleiden and the CMP. Eight years later, he still faces charges under California’s never-before-used eavesdropping/recording law. A few months ago, half a dozen pro-life activists were found guilty of violating a federal law that forbids protesters to block the entrances to abortion clinics. Jonathan Darnel, who remained outside the clinic, received a nearly three-year sentence. Others in the case received two-year sentences, and another — the only one who pleaded guilty — received a 10-month sentence. Harris has voiced support for efforts to strengthen protections for “reproductive health care providers,” particularly in the context of increasing “threats” to clinics and their staff. In other words, this will only happen more under her watch. In California, under Assembly Bill 957, a child's gender identity must be considered in custody decisions during divorce or custody disputes. This includes custody disputes involving whether the state should have custody of the child. In Oregon, the state can refuse Christian couples the opportunity to foster and adopt if they don’t comply with their potential future child’s “gender identity” and pledge to seek “gender-affirming care” accordingly. This is religious “liberty” under Democrat rule. Boiling it down Trump or Harris? It’s really not that complicated, after all. And the same logic applies to local elections. When considering your vote, take a cue from Howerton's sermon, in which he suggests asking the following questions. Which candidate: Promotes policies most likely to slow societal decay? Will best protect our national security? Is more likely to protect religious liberty? Will oppose the erasure of gender? Is more likely to stop the corrosion of the definitions of the family? Will best limit the taking of unborn lives? It may feel uncomfortable to admit when it’s tempting to reject party lines, but I’m more than confident that the answer to whom the Christian should vote for will simply never be “blue.” It’s not because the Republican Party is right all the time or because Republicans don’t have their own glaring issues that need to be addressed. It’s that the Democratic Party is a cancer to society that promotes baby murder, child genital mutilation, the destruction of the family and parents’ rights, and the unfettered influx of (sometimes violent) illegal aliens, who are draining taxpayer resources while citizens suffer. Been to North Carolina lately? There is only one alternative. Christians, we must choose it. The reality is that it is your duty to vote, because in a constitutional republic, you lead by electing representatives. As a Christian, you’re the leader appointing people to represent you as close to the biblical view on these issues as you can get. To neglect to do so is a dereliction of duty. And the answer on whom to vote for isn’t complicated. As Howerton says, “Personalities are temporary; policies last a long time.” Yes, Donald Trump is uncouth at times and posts silly little name-calling rants on X, but he also appointed Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. Imagine the numerous lives that were spared and will be spared because of that decision. That is what you’re voting for. Around 30 million Bible-believing Christians didn't vote in the last presidential election. That election is argued to have been decided by 42,000 votes. That is why your vote matters.

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