A WRITER in the Sabbath Recorder says:—
“There can be no question as to the duty of a Christian to take part in politics.
“There can be no question about the necessity for the Christian to take part in making the laws, and selecting the officers to enforce them.”
Is this so? Is there any question but that Jesus Christ took no part in politics, neither worked for the enactment or enforcement of any laws? And is there any question but that Christians are bound to be guided by his example?
Again, this writer says:—
“We cannot shirk these responsibilities and leave the country entirely in the hands of professional politicians and chronic office seekers.”
But does not this writer know that true Christians in this country, as in other lands, are not in the majority, but constitute only a small minority? As a part of the government, they would constitute the tail and not the body, and the tail does not wag the body, but vice versa. The candidates will be selected by the great majority who are not Christians, but are “professional politicians, and chronic office seekers,” and followers of these characters, and then the true Christians can vote for them if they choose, under the impression that they are casting a Christian vote; while the politicians laugh at their simplicity.
Anybody who reads a daily paper ought to know that politics in this country are managed by professional politicians, and always will be. These men have studied the subject until they have made a science of the business of getting and holding a majority of the popular vote; and the unskilled man can no more succeed in a political contest than can the novice succeed against the man of scientific skill in any other business. And the churches and religious organizations which aim to control politics will succeed in their purpose only when they are led by professional politicians; that is, when their religious leaders learn and copy the methods by which professional politicians attain success. But when this is done, where will be their standing as representatives of Christ?
True Christians are the “salt of the earth”—that which preserves it. Matthew 5:13. But will anyone claim that Christians preserve the earth by their votes? Yet Christians will argue in a Christian journal that Christians must be careful to cast their ballots into the great sea of political worldliness, in order to keep things from going to ruin!
Politics represents selfishness—the instinct of self-preservation, self-advancement, self-exaltation—which is common to all people. Any person, except perchance the true Christian, will resent an invasion of his rights, and will make trouble if he can for the person or party seeking to invade them. Hence there is a necessity felt to a greater or less degree by all persons in power, of respecting the rights of the people; and it is this necessity caused by the common instinct to “look out for number one,” and not the “Christian vote,” that maintains the rights and liberties which civil governments are instituted to preserve.
There are a vast number of people in this country who, while lacking the true Christian spirit, are tenacious of their religion, and ready to roll the ear of Judggernaut over the adherents of a rival religion where they constitute but a despised few. And it is just such pleas for Christian politicians as this the Recorder prints, that will take these over-zealous and under-wise “Christians” into politics for religion’s sake. And when this comes to pass, as ere long it will, the Recorder will have plenty of reason to regret the results that will follow.