Christians In the Civil Arena – Is It Actually Biblical And Our Responsibility – What is our Christian responsibility in the civil arena? Is Christian involvement in civil government biblical? Tune in to find the answers and more today!

Air Date: 12/03/2021

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Faith  The Culture

Rick:

You’ve found your way to the intersection of faith and politics.  This is WallBuilders Live! with David Barton and Rick Green, also found online at WallBuilderslive.com and WallBuilders.com. We’re also on Facebook; you can follow us there as well and comment on the shows as you get a chance to listen to them. In fact, you might have a show you’d like us to cover, a topic or an interview. You can email that to us at [email protected] Â We also encourage you to let your local station know if you’d like to hear the show, and we’re not on station there close to you. If you’re not familiar with which station we’re on close to you, then go check it out at WallBuilderslive.com. Here we go to building on the American Heritage series with David Barton.

Christian Involvement in Civil Government

Rick:

Christian involvement in government and in civil government, is that appropriate? Should we as Christians be involved in government? Should we take our Christian values into government?

David:

The answer of Is it appropriate– a better question is Is it Biblical?  The answer is yes. It is Biblical. You look at all of those in the Bible who were involved in the civil arena. What you have in Hebrews 11 is the faith Hall of Fame, all the heroes of our faith.  Everybody listed verses 22 of the 34 was involved in civil government. Now, why would God put them in as heroes and hold him up to us and say, “œHey, you can be like these guys,”€ If He thought we shouldn’t be involved in the civil arena.

Rick:

Wait.  Politicians in the Hall of Fame here?

David:

It gets worse than that in the Bible. If I go to Romans 13, twice in verse four and once in verse six God says that those who are in civil government are “œministers of God.” That’s the same term “œminister” that you have for a church minister.

Rick:

So that means government” a mission field just like anywhere else.

 

God Does Not Make an Artificial Distinction Between Secular and Spiritual

David:

God doesn’t make the distinction between secular and spiritual that we do.

Can you imagine being at the Great White Throne Judgment and everybody coming before, and the  the books are open. You’ve got the Lamb” Book of Life and the works, and everybody’s getting judged.  Here comes the guy, and God says, “œSo, let this guy off. He’s a politician. My word didn’t apply.” No, everybody’s going to be judged by His standards. The Bible applies to every aspect of life. God does not make an artificial distinction of : this is secular; this is spiritual. He wants everything to be under the principles that He’s given us; because, it’s for our best good. He tells us, “œEverything I tell you is to make you successful, prosperous,” Deuteronomy 6:24, Joshua 1 8. All those things are for our benefit.

Take what happened and Luke 19 were Jesus tells a story of how He gets the servants together. He gives to each one of them mina, that trust. One guy took the mina and didn’t do anything with it. One guy took themina and turned it into fiv. One guy took mina and turned it in ten. As we know, it says, “œWell done, good and faithful servant.” I don’t know why; but, we stop it right there.

But that’s not what he said. He said to the first guy, “œHey you took the one and turned it into five. Well done, good and faithful servant. I going to make you ruler over five cities.” To the other guy, He says, “œHey, you took one turn into ten? I going to make you ruler over ten cities.” “œWhoa, wait. I thought you were rewarding me. You”€™re putting me in government? I’m going to be a ruler over cities?” That’s only God views it. How come we don’t see that as a reward? He sees that as a reward. He’s dead serious about this. “œYou’ve done so well. I’m going to put you in the civil arena. I’m not going to make a ruler over five cities or ten. I’m going to make you governor or a state rep or whatever it is.” That’s Biblical, and we knew that.

Rick:

I mean it seems like a perception today though, from the Christian community, is if you’re in politics, you can’t be a Christian.  You can’t be good and holy if you’re in that arena or even business and some other areas, but specifically politics.

Historical View: God”€™s Principles Apply to All Arenas

David:

You hit it. That’s the perception today. That’s not the Biblical perception. As a matter of fact, here’s a bunch of historical sermons. Here’s a sermon from 1799. One of the leading theologians of the day, Jedediah Morris, has a sermon on citizens, “œThe Duties of Citizens in America.”€ Here’s one from 1825: “œThe Duties of an American Citizen”€ as delivered on the day of public fasting. That’s even worse. Government declared a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer? Yes. See, we didn’t think there was a secular and a spiritual arena, but God’s principles applied to all. Here is a sermon from 1864, on the relation of the citizen to the government.

Every generation before this one thought it was fine to be involved. But, what’s happened is we’ve let the secular world say, “œHey, spiritual people shouldn’t get involved in ours; this is ours. Who said it was theirs? When did it become? When did they get to take it over? When did we get told we couldn’t be involved? We got the same rights of a citizen that anybody else does. We don’t lose our rights for being a Christian. But somehow, we’ve let the secular people tell us what we can and can’t do, and what we have to think, and what we can’t think.

Rick:

What’s the right response to that now? You seem to see more and more pastors speaking out on this issue and even encouraging young people, “œIf God”€™s called you into that arena, go to college.”

David:

That’s right.  We’ve got to get involved in every–I mean, the Bible says, “œThe Earth is Lord’s and the fullness thereof,” everything except politics.  No, it doesn’t say that. It is His; everything is His. What we do by pulling ourselves out of the civil arena–I mean, one thing is for sure. Jesus said, “œHey you”™re salt; you’re the thing that preserves this.”

Don’t Pull the Preservatives Out

Guess what. If we pull ourselves out of the civil arena, we pull the preservative out. It’s going to get rotten really quick. I wonder why business is corrupt now. We’ve got all these guys on Wall Street, and Bernie Madoff’s going to jail. It’s because we got all the Christian guys out of business, and they took their values with them. Now unchristian guys–it is just simple. We’ve got to be involved in every single aspect of life and living.

Rick:

David, how about some questions on Christian involvement in politics?

David:

Let”™s do it.

ChristianVoterGuide.com

Woman:

I want to be an informed citizen; but, I also want to know that my information is reliable. Where can I go for information that I can trust?
Rick:

Sounds like somebody who wants to go vote, wants to maybe even volunteer and help candidates or contribute to candidates. But, how does she find out who the good folks are and get good information?

David:

There are several ways of doing that.  One is, one of the things that we’ve done over the years has created a website that is known as ChristianVoterGuide.com or JudeoChristianVoterGuide.com. What we do is collect what would be called a pro-family voter”€™s guides of where candidates stand on Biblical issues: federal candidates, a lot of state candidates, governors, representatives, and senators, and presidents. So, they go to that voting guide, and they can get that.

Rick:

That’s the one that’s got the map on it; so, I can click on my state, and it’ll pull up all the ones from my particular–

David:

That’s right. What you’ll find is that a lot of states will have some type of voter guide that monitors where people are. For example, National Right to Life, that’s a national group; but, there state right-to-life groups, and they will monitor where an individual is on the life issue. By the way, let me just do a little commercial here for a minute on the issue of life. You go back to the Founding Fathers. When they told us in the Declaration that among other rights were three: life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. Those are inalienable rights, which means they are God-given rights. The “œpursuit of happiness,” they defined as œthe ability to pursue and to acquire and own and enjoy your own property.” What they were saying is that the God given rights that you have: the right to life, the right to liberty, the right to property–and they said that there are others–but, these are the three that were listed in the Declaration. They came back 11 years later and listed a bunch of others. But it’s interesting that Sam Adams and others looked at that and said, “œNow, that’s a priority. Life is first, then liberty, then property. But life is at the beginning.” He said, “œFirst is a right to life.” In this culture today, we think Wouldn’t have been cool if they had been talking about the abortion issue back then. And I don’t know why we would think that they weren’t.

Rick:

Yes.

Anti-Abortion Laws in the 1770s

David:

Yeah, because, back in the 1770s, Thomas Jefferson was passing anti-abortion laws. As long as there have been people who are pregnant, there were people who didn’t want to be pregnant. Abortion was an issue back then. It’s actually written about; but, James Wilson, one of the Founding Fathers who signed the Declaration and the Constitution, who started the first law school in America, who’s an original Supreme Court justice; he wrote about that abortion issue. In talking about that, he said, “œIn the contemplation of law, life from its commencement to its close is protected by the common law.” He said, “œIn the contemplations law, as soon as it’s known that there is life in the womb, it’s protected by common law.”

Rick:

If they believe that, then when they said, “œThe purpose of government was to protect life, liberty,” they had to be thinking even in the cases of abortion, wanting to protect life.

“œIn America, We Recognize God Creates Life.”

David:

You bet. John Witherspoon made a great point. He said, “€œThe difference between America and Europe on the abortion issue is over there in Europe, they think that parents create lives; so, they allow parents to take life because they created it. Here in America, we know the parents didn’t create that life. God created that life. We don’t allow parents to take a life.”€ He said, “€œOnly over in that secular thing do you think that, “€˜Well, it’s my child; I created it, and I don’t want it to be born, so I’ll take it out.”™ “He said, “œYou can’t do that in America. In America, we recognize that God creates life. Parents were involved; but, God created that life, and therefore, you cannot take that life.”

Rick:

So, not even the parents can take that life.
David;

Not even the parents.

Rick:

That’s John Witherspoon?

David:

John Witherspoon, signer of the Declaration, President of Princeton University. He said, “œThis is the big difference between America and Europe is,” and that’s the abortion issue.  So, when you look at the abortion issue, what you’ll find–and the reason the Founding Fathers put that at the top of the list is, if a candidate will not protect the first of your inalienable rights, the most important, he”™s not going to protect the second, third, the fourth, the fifth.  That’s why you’ll find, if you can find where a candidate stands on the life issue–in all the years I’ve been involved in politics, deal politics, deal with with thousands of candidates, elected officials, and congressmen, governors, and presidents. If I can find out where someone is on the life issue, the abortion issue, with 90 percent certainty, I can tell you where they are on every other. I can tell you where they will be on taxing and spending. I can tell you where they’ll be on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. I can tell you where they’ll be on the START Treaty. I can tell you where they’re going to be on bailouts; and, I can tell you where they’re going to be on any other issue.

Rick:

So, even though you haven’t looked at their voting record yet on that stuff or if they’re pro-life or not, it will indicate it.

The Significance of Protecting the First Right

David:

What I know from their voting record is if they do not protect life, which is the first of the inalienable rights, they won’t protect the First Amendment right to worship God according to dictates of conscience. If they’re going to be against life, they’re also going say, “œOh, we don’t need kids mentioning God in a graduation. We need a separation of church and state. We don’t want anybody talking about God publicly.” They”™ll be wrong on the First Amendment right for free exercise of religion.

Rick:

Because, if they’re not willing to defend that most important right, then why would they defend the other ones?

David:

If they’re wrong on the life issue, they”™ll be wrong on the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms, the Founding Fathers called that, “€œthe Biblical right of self-defence.” Strange thing people that are pro-abortion are anti- defend yourself. If they’re wrong on the life issue, they’ll be wrong with the Third Amendment, which is the sanctity of the home. They’ll get marriage wrong. It”€™s a strange thing that those that are pro-abortion are also, “œWe want a new version, a new arrangement of marriage.” If they’re wrong on the life issue, they will be wrong and the Fifth Amendment issue of protecting private property, of eminent domain, and other things. If they’re wrong and the life issue, you’ll find that they will vote wrong every other inalienable right.

Monitoring Economic Issues

Now, there is a movement in America that says, “œWe don’t care about those. Those are all social issues. All we care about are economic issues.” So, there are movements out there that say, “œWe don’t care about abortion or marriage, we just want them to stop spending. We want to get out of debt. We don’t want a mortgage in our children’s future.” OKay, if that’s your issue, then for the federal level, there are groups that do nothing but monitor economic votes. Groups like the National Taxpayers, all they do is monitor. You can look up your congressman.

Rick:

“œMonitor” meaning they’re watching those votes.

David:

They are watching.

Rick:

They’re listing how each member votes on all the own economical issues.

David:

And, there’s hundreds of votes; so, what they do is they rank every. There are 435 members of the House. There’s 100 members in the Senate. They will rank every one of those represented senators on the best economic people. So, the number one economic guy in the House who protects money the most, who spends it the least, all the way down through those who will take every bit of money they can, spend it, and go in debt. They rank them all. It’s a strange thing, if I will take their voting record on the life issue and bump it up against their economic vote, it’s almost exactly the same.

If They Won’t Protect Your Life, They Will Not Protect Your Money.

Rick:

If they were good on the money issues, it turns out they were good on the life?

David:

If they were good on the life issues, they were good on the money issues.

Rick:

Yes, that one should come first, right?

David:

Yes.

Rick:

That’s the philosophy.

David:

Yes. If they get the first thing right, it’s interesting. If you’re 100 percent right-to-life, you’re nearly always 100 percent on economic issues. If you’re 76 percent right-to-life, you’ re about 76 percent on economic issues.

Rick:

Wow.

David:

If you”€™re a zero on right-to-life, you’re about zero–

Rick:

You rarely if ever find somebody that is 100 percent pro-life and terrible on economic issues, or somebody that’s great on economic issues but terrible on the life.

David:

Yes, and it makes a lot of sense; because, if they won’t protect you life, they sure will not protect your money. Your money is a lot lower than your life is. If they won’t protect life they will protect Money. It turns out that from my standpoint, even though there’s voting records out there on all these different issues, I go to the life issue first. Because, if I care about my money, I want somebody who understands that you protect the first inhalable rights.

Rick:

That was always the reason I would ask a commissioner candidate or something like that, was I thought Well this is the farm team. They may be in the legislature right. But you’ve give me a whole added reason. It also will affect how they’re spending my county dollars, how they’e spending my school-board dollars. 

Resources to Learn Where Candidates Stand

David:

Exactly right. That is an issue. Now, you go to voters guides like ChristianVoterGuide.com, and it’s linked to hundreds and hundreds of these pro-family, Biblical-issue voting guides from across the country. That’s a good way to know where candidates stand. But, the other thing is, every single candidate in federal office or state office has voting records. You can go to state archives. You can go to, in the case of federal, the Library of Congress monitors every vote. You can go to Thomas.LLC.gov. Â You can pull up their votes on any issue; you can pull their votes on environment or anything else you want. They’re all there. So, because of what we have with accessibility through internet-type stuff today, it’s really easy to know where everybody is

Rick:

Okay, back to the audience, let’s get another question on Christians involvement in civic government.

How Christian Participation Affects Election Outcomes

Man #2:

I want to believe that Christians like me can make a difference at the polls. But, there are times when my vote feels it’s insignificant. Is there any correlation between the amount of Christian participation and the outcome of an election?

Rick:

This one hits a little close to home for me, David. In my first election, I lost by 20 votes out of 30000.

David:

Yeah.

Rick:

Then I won by 36.  So, clearly I’ve experienced that every vote really does matter.

But I think people sometimes feel like I’m just one vote. How can I make a difference in this big picture?

David:

That is part of the problem we have with having a nation of more than 300 million folks. We say, “œGolly, I’m just one person.” You know what happens is, the feeling that you have of being just one person, tens of millions feel the same thing. So there just saying, “œI’m just one. What can I do?” There’s only one raindrop among millions in a cloud; but, all those millions put together make a flood. So, what happens is we get ourselves talked out individually. We say, “œI’m just one; I don’t feel significant.” You may not feel significant; but, there’s a ton of other Americans that feel the same way you do.  If all of them will go vote, it makes a huge, massive difference.

Now, is there a correlation between Christians getting involved, even when we feel insignificant, and what happens in the election? The answer is yes.

This is something we’ve been tracking for a number of years. What I’m going to do is grab my computer and set it up here, and I’m going to go through some stats.

Rick:

These are first voting stats? How often people show up?

What Happens When Christians Show Up…Or Fail to Show Up?

David;

Voting stats on what happens if Christians show up, and if they carry their values with them, and what the results were. These are all federal elections.

Rick:
Okay.

David:

I”€™m going to take you back to 1992 to 1996. In that period of time, there was a 17 percent decrease in the number of Christians who voted in an election. The next four years between 96 and 2000, there was an additional decrease of 23 percent.  

Rick:

So, eight years in a row, we’re going downhill; we”™re losing votes.

David:

Eight years in a row, we have dropped. Four election, cycles eight years, we dropped by 40 percent of Christian-voter turnout. The problem is, Proverbs 29:2, “œWhen the righteous rule, the people rejoice.”

Rick:

Yeah.

David:

Well, if the righteous don’t elect the righteous, they won’t get there. I mean, it’s not going to be the pro-abortion people that elect pro-life people to office. You’ve got to have people with the same values. So, when there’s a 40-percent drop in Christian-voter turnout, it is 40 percent less likely you’re going to get a God-fearing person in office who holds those Biblical values.

So, after having seen that plunge in those four election cycles, nearly 10 percent in an election cycle, a lot of effort went into the 2002 election to get Christian-voter turnout back up. With all this effort that was being put into voting, it did result in an up tick of voting. The reason that is significant is, in that 2000 election, there are what are called “œEvangelical voters,” “œborn-again voters,” “œChristian voters.” An “œevangelical voter” is someone who says, “œI go to church at least once a week; I pray; I read the Bible at least once a week. I have a life-changing experience with Jesus.” That’s an Evangelical, a serious Christian.

Rick:

So, it”™s not all Christians, not everybody in church; it is a specific–

David:

Those are the ones that are considered to be very active in their faith.

 

Join Us In Israel!

Hey guys what are you doing January 28th through February 7th? If you said you don’t know, let me give you an idea. We are going to Israel. Rick Green, my dad, David Barton, Tim Barton, our families are going and we would love for you to go with us. We are going to the Holy Land if you’ve ever been to Israel this is something as a Christian that will make you forever read your bible differently.

To see where Jesus walked, where He lived, where He did miracles, where so much of the Bible took place. If you’ve ever read through the Bible and you’ve given it a mental picture, the mental picture will not do justice of what happens when you’re actually on the ground. If you’ve ever thought about the story of David and Goliath and you”‘ve envisioned what it looks like, we’re going to go to the actual field where it took place.

There are so many things that you will see that literally makes the Bible come to life. In fact, that’s the name of the tour group we’re going with is The Bible Comes to Life. Go to CMJacksboro.com. You can click on the link, it has an Israel itinerary, all kinds of details. Hope to see you on this trip this coming year.

Christians Are to Be Salt and Light

David:

Well, there’s 60 million in America in the 2000 election; but, only 15 million voted.

Rick:

One out of four.

David:

One out of four, only 25 percent of Bible-believing, active Christians voted.

Rick:

That means that if I”€™m sitting in church on Sunday morning, and I voted, there’s at least three sitting beside me that did not vote.

David:

They could have. See, of the 60 million, 24 million we’re not even registered to vote. So, even though Jesus says, “œGo be salt; go be light.” Forty percent of evangelicals said, “œNot me, man. I refuse to be salt and light.”

Rick:

Totally checked out of the process.

We’ve Only Had ¼ of Our Team on the Field in the Culture War

David:

Totally checked out. That by itself is enough to say, “œIf evangelicals had showed up, there wouldn’t be a culture war in America today.” I mean, we’re in the culture war. It’s kind of tied; we”™re even; but we’ve only had one for the team on the field. That’s what it amounts to.

Rick

Because it’s not just who you’re electing, it’s the policy that results from that.

David:

That”€™s right.

Rick:

That’s what you mean: you’d win all those cultural issues; because you’ve got good people in.

David:

So, in 2002, that’s why there was such an effort. With all the effort that went in 2002, was an uptick of 2 percent Christian-voter turnout.

Rick:

It didn’t sound like a big increase, 2 percent.

David:

But it is big; because, you have been losing 10 percent an election for four straight elections. You’ve regained 10 percent; you’re up two on top of that. That’s a 12-percent trend swing. 

Rick:

So, you turned it around.

Why People Voted

David:

You can measure that. Now, the 12-percent trend swing, we can measure that by looking at what’s called “œexit polling.” Exit polling says, “œYou voted. Tell me why you voted.” What we found was in the 2002 election, 41 percent of people who voted said, “œI voted the way I did because of abortion. Abortion is what drove my vote.” Now significantly, within that group, 23 percent said, “œI vote straight pro life,” and 16 percent said, “œWell, I voted straight pro abortion.” Well, that’s a 7-percent advantage if you’re pro-life. Pro- lifers now outnumber the pro-abortion folks.  So, a 7-percent advantage, that’ll make a difference in a lot of elections where you have a pro-life person running as a pro-abortion person.

Rick:

Let me make sure I understand what you’re saying.  So, 40 percent of them said, “œAbortion was what drove my my vote.” Of those people, far more of them said, “œI’m going to vote for pro-life reasons.”

David:

Yeah, “œI voted for this person because they’re a pro-life person,” versus, “œI voted for this person because they’re  a pro-abortion person.”

Rick:

Which gave an advantage to candidates that were pro-life.

Christian Influence Seen At the Federal Level

David:

That”€™s right. It gave a 7-percentage advantage. Now, the results of that were seen, for example, at the federal level in the Congress of the United States. The freshman class of 2002 contained 54 freshmen; that’s a fairly large freshman class, 54 freshmen. Of the 54, 36 of them were pro-life, which is a 67 percent pro-life class.

Rick:

Wow. So, that advantage in the voting numbers resulted in an advantage in the House.

David:

Having an elevated number of people who voted said, “œI think abortion is important issue,” got people elected to Congress who said, “œWe want to protect life.” Two-thirds of those elected to Congress in the House that  year said, “œWe’re here to protect life.”

In the Senate that year we elected 10 freshman U.S. senators. Eight out of the 10 were pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family.

Rick:

Even better now. What is it now, 80 percent?

David:

The Senate is where we need the most help. Eighty percent–we got an 80-percent class Now, that’s good; that’s 2002. Now we come to 2004. In 2004, we actually had a 93-percent increase in Christian voter turnout. We had been down at 15 million evangelicals, and it came up between 29.8 million; so, almost double. Still less than half, but almost double. The result of that was exit polling.

 

You look at it again, and 42 percent said, “œI voted the way I did because of abortion.” But, instead of having a seven-point advantage in favor of pro-life people, it was actually up to having a 12-point advantage in favor.

Rick:

Huge.

David:

So, now it’s easier to elect a pro-life people; because, more pro-life people went to vote. The result of that was the freshman class of 2004, which in that class had 40 freshman House members. Two-thirds were pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family. In the Senate that year, you had nine U.S. senators, and seven of the nine were pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family. Now, put that together. In two elections, we have elected 94 members of the House of Representatives, and two-thirds of them are pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family. In the Senate, we’ve elected 19 U.S. senators in two elections, and 15 of the 19, or 79 percent, pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family. That’s good stuff.

The Problem

But, you elect them. Y0u put them there because you want policies that look like that.

Rick:
Yes, you want the victories at the policy level; so, we voted. We got good people elected. What happened after that?

David:

Now the problem is that what has happened for a number of years,  we have not passed any pro-life laws. Since Roe v. Wade, Congress has not done a single thing to restrict the jurisdiction of abortion.  Now, they have 19 measures where they restrict the funding of abortion. The Hyde Amendment says you can’t use federal funds for abortions. We’ve got the Weldon–and the Kemp-Kasten, and all these things about you can”™t–

Rick:

We didn’t stop abortion; but, we had some victories where we–

David;

We just  said, “œWe’re not going to spend our money to do it.”€

Rick:

Yeah.

David:

Well, this new class comes in 2002 and 2004. They’re highly pro-life; because, the voters were highly pro-life, and they didn’t pass the first law to restrict the jurisdiction of abortion. They passed the first four laws to restrict the jurisdiction of abortion.

Rick:

So, we’ve gone 30 years with no restrictions.

After 30 Years, Four Major Laws

David:

And now, we get an them. For example: the Infant Born Alive Protection Act, The Unborn Victims of Violence Act, The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban, the Fetal Farming Ban, four major laws. By the way, statistics show that as a result of those laws, abortion went down in America 24 percent.

Rick:

Wow.  

David:

So, guess what. We showed up; we carried our values; we elected people who had our values. They get in office; they legislated with those values. It made a difference in policy.

Rick:

Absolutely.

David:

Now that’s 2004. Then we go to 2006. In 2006, there is a 30-percent drop in Christian- voter turnout.

Rick:

We’d been doing better for two election cycles.

Congress Only Reflects the Values of Those Who Voted in the Last Election

David:

We’d been going up; now we’re down, a 30 percent drop. We went from that 28.9 million,, down to20.5 million evangelical voters in federal elections. At that point, having it drop, we elected that year. The freshman class of the House was 54 members of Congress; only 17 were pro-life. That’s a 31-percent pro-life class. Guess what. Christians didn’t show up; they didn’t carry their values. And now, we have two-thirds of the freshman class is pro-abortion, anti-marriage, anti-religion. We’re going backwards. In the Senate that year, we had 10 freshman senators. Only one of the 10 was pro-life, pro-faith, pro-family.

Rick:

We went from 80 percent freshman class–

David:

To 10 percent; because, we dropped that 30-percent drop in Christian-voter turnout. By the way, having 10 freshman senators and only one thought marriage should be between a man and a woman, the statistics nationally at that point were 72 percent of the nation believed marriage should be between a man and woman. Wait a minute. That means seven out of ten senators should have of marriage. That is what people have to learn. Congress never reflects the values of the people; it only reflects the values of those who voted in the last election.

Rick:

So, even though you’ve got a nation this big, the Congress is not going to reflect the values of all those people. It’s only that part that shows up. And if we’re not a part of that part showing up–

When Christians Don’t Vote Their Values…

David:

We didn’t show up to vote. Now, when you get to 2008, we have an up-turn of Christian- voter turnout again: 66 percent showed up–a 66-percent increase in 2008. At that point, we’ve gone up to 34.1 million, which is a big number. But, the problem was exit polling. That year, all of these Christians showed up, and they did not carry their values with them. Only 6 percent thought that abortion was an issue, either for or against. Only one percent thought that marriage was an issue.

Rick:

Where it was 41 percent in those–

David:

And, now we’re down to 6 percent.

Rick:

Oh my.

David:

Christians showed up; but, they didn’t carry their values. The result was in 2008, we elected 57 freshmen to Congress.

Rick:

I got to ask you. You say that hey didn’t carry their values. What do you mean?

David:

That they”™re voting on–“œWe don’t care what abortion is. We’ve got to save the economy. We don’t care abortion is; we got to fix foreign affairs. We don’t care.” They didn’t care about the value issues; they cared about all these other issues. In caring about the other issues, they elected people to office who didn’t hold their values. So, out of the 57 freshmen that we sent to Congress in 2008, only 23 were pro-life. That’s 40 percent. It had been that the more Christians show up, the more pro-life people you get. Now we had Christians show up the highest that it had been, and we’re down below 50 percent; we’re 40 percent.

Rick:

So, Christians were we were showing up; but, they were voting just like non-Christians.

David:

That’s right. There were not–there’s no Christian reflection in their vote. In the Senate that year in 2008, we elected 14 freshman senators. Out of the 14 freshman senators, only two were pro-life; that is 14 percent. We didn’t carry our values. We showed up; but, we didn’t carry Biblical values with us when we went to vote. We carried our pocketbook; but, we didn’t carry Biblical values.

When Christians Carry Their Biblical Values to the Polls…

Having said that, let’s go to the 2010 election; because, in the 2010 election, you actually have the highest-recorded Christian-voter turnout in recent years. You also have a huge advantage in carrying their values with them. For example, in 2008, only 6 percent said that abortion is an issue. In 2010, you had 30 percent who said that it was the driving issue, not just an issue, but the driving issue. Of that, you had 22 percent who said, “œWe vote pro-life only;” 8 percent said, “œWell, we vote pro-abortion only.” Now we’ve got a 14-point advantage.

Rick:

The biggest advantage we’ve seen.

David:

That’s going to elect a lot of people to office. It’s the biggest one we’ve seen, the highest Christian-voter turnout. So, the freshman class of 2010 was pretty significant. Instead of having 54 or 56 or 58 freshmen as we have been having in previous years, the freshman class of 2010 is 97 freshmen, almost twice the size. Eighty-one of them are pro-life.

Rick:

That is the highest percentage we’ve seen as well.

David:

Eighty-four percent pro-life Congress, pro-life, pro-marriage, pro-family, the highest we’ve ever had. The highest turnout of Christian voters that carried Biblical values with them. We have. This is the most pro-life–as a result of 2010, that produced the most pro-life Congress since Roe v. Wade.

Rick:

Wow.

David:

You look at the Senate. There were 16 freshman senators elected in 2010; 13 of the 16 were pro-life, pro-faith. We”€™re back to 81 percent again. It makes a huge difference.

You’ve Got to Show Up and Bring Your Values With You

Rick:

it takes both though. You’ve got to show up. You’ve got to bring your values with you. If Christians will show up, and they’ll vote their values, then you get elected officials–

David:

Even if they feel like they’re the only one on the ship. Even if they feel like It’s the Titanic, and I”€™m on standing alone. You’ll find out you’re not alone. There’s millions of people who have that same feeling of isolation that you do. If you just do what”™s right. If you go vote and carry your values with you. Vote for people–again, talked about life as the first issue. If you get that one right, all this other stuff is going to work. You get the life issue right, the economics is going to work. The Scripture says, “œRighteousness exalts a nation,” not, “œEconomics exalts a nation.” If you want to be exalted, you have to have righteous policies. That’s Biblical issues; it’s not economic issues. When we vote our pocketbook above righteousness, we lose every time. We’ll lose economics, and we’ll lose righteousness.

When Christians Vote Their Values, They Make a Positive Impact

It’s a great question: Is there a correlation between Christians voting and the stats? Yes, there absolutely is. If we’ll just go to that and will carry the vote as a Christian, carry our Biblical values with us, and protect life, and protect marriage and all those things, it makes a huge difference. As we saw in 2000 and 2004, you started getting laws passed that look like the values of the country.

Rick:

The system works. We just have to work the system. Do the right, and we’ll get the good results.

David:

That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right.

Rick:

Thanks for listening today folks. Many of you have the DVD set of the American Heritage series. You can get the sequel, which is Building on the American Heritage Series. There is a lot of new material, some fantastic programs. You want to have in your library. You can get it at our website today at WallBuilders.com.