Political Season

Last updated on: August 2, 2016 at 9:45 am by Eric Smith

Political Season 2016-08-02T09:45:08-06:00 Eric Smith

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Yard signs in Apex, NC. Image by Seth Ilys, released into the public domain, and taken from Wikipedia.

By: Anonymous

I hate political seasons. I especially hate the presidential political season. I hate the commercials, the debates which are really just arguing sessions between two grown adults who end up acting like four year olds (if any four years old are reading this I apologize for putting political candidates at the same level as you). I hate the media during this time, slamming candidates, slamming other stations and arguing among each other like five year olds (I apologize to five years olds). I really, really hate the political yard signs. They are everywhere and then when the elections are over the signs are still there. Six months after the signs are still there. Sometimes a year later you can find signs in the oddest spots (I wish candidates could get fined for having their signs left out so long).

Political season is horrible especially when the evangelicals get involved. Now I am an evangelical or mainline or protestant or Christian or whatever else you want to label me (personally I just like Jesus follower but I don’t think when they do polls they have a Jesus follower category). It’s not that I do not like evangelicals, I do and I am glad that evangelicals, Christians or whatever category you chose to use are involved in politics. But sometimes they get crazy. People look like you are crazy if you are a Christian and a democrat because somewhere in the Bible you can’t be both. Then moral majority puts out there flyer for who you should vote for if you are truly a Christian, (again this seems to be a command from God sent to us by him every four years). I also love when the TV preachers tell you that God has revealed to them who will win the election but they won’t share until after the election is over. This year I knew the Broncos were for sure were going to win the Super Bowl but I just didn’t let anyone know until after the game.

In some ways Christians are just like the people of Israel in the book of Samuel. We aren’t crying out for a king but we cry out to God for a president, one who will bring prayer back into school, tear down the altars of secularism and whatever else we want torn down and reestablish our Judeo – Christian values (whatever that means). Then a president gets elected and some Christians are excited because God has answered their prayers while others are upset because God didn’t answer theirs. It’s as bad as when Christians pray for one team to win and others are praying for the other team. So when the team wins is it a sign that God loves them more than the losing side or that God has actually heard their cries? Maybe God is more impressed that they actually talked to him. So the question is does God care who wins? Is God swayed by one group or another? Does God give us the president we pray for? I’m not sure what the answer is (I did pray for the Broncos to win the Super Bowl this year and they did so I guess God loves me and hears my prayers more than Panthers fans).

I hate the political season. It makes it even more confusing when you bring God and theology into the picture. Again, I’m not sure what role God plays and what role prayer plays but there is one thing I do pray for: I pray that people will pick up and throw away their political yard signs when the election is over. That is a prayer I hope God will always answer.

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