Election Year Fear
By Hal Lindsey
Election years are always pivotal, some more than others. This year especially, the consequences of wrong choices are dire. Both sides tell us so… repeatedly.
In the last presidential election year, 2020, campaigns for federal offices spent over $14 billion (before inflation) trying to get their side elected. That’s not counting state and local elections which also add up to big dollars. Most of that money goes to advertising, but I don’t need to tell you that. Political ads are already flooding some markets, and it’s about to get a whole lot worse.
Some campaign ads tout the qualities of their candidate or the candidate’s platform. But even more of the advertising dollars are spent to make us afraid of the other side. And it isn’t just advertising that plays to our fears. The media want you to click on their election year stories and watch their stations. And one of the best ways to get you to do that is to make you afraid.
The concerns, of course, are real. Politicians decide the laws that we must all obey. They set up the bureaucracies that create the millions of pages of regulations that we must also obey. They decide things that have an enormous influence on how we live our lives. They tax us, and they send our children to war.
As their name implies, politicians set policies. Those policies have a powerful influence on things like inflation. Government policies can destroy jobs and even whole industries. Those policies can be the difference between full grocery store shelves and empty ones. They also have a vast influence on the abundance or scarcity in your own cupboard.
Is the medical system slow and unresponsive — even to people with urgent needs? Both sides blame government policy enacted by people put in office during elections. We vote on the people who decide the curricula of our children’s schools. Politicians and their policies can be the difference between safety in the streets, or chaos.
We’ve seen what bad policies have done here, and worse, what they have done in other nations. Bad political decisions make disaster possible, and sometimes make it inevitable. That makes us feel vulnerable. We are concerned about the “wrong” politicians getting into office. We fret over the thought of bad people taking charge of our cities, states, nation, and world.
These things are enormously important. We should vote and be involved.
But as consequential as elections are, God tells us, “Fear not!” He says it over and over again. Why? Because He sees the big picture. He knows He’s in control. He knows His love for you and the joy He has ahead of you.
Someone might ask, “But what if a bad person gains power?” Well, what if they do? Will God duck into a foxhole out of fear? Then neither should you. Will He stop being your Provider? Of course not! Are His promises to you dependent on who sits in the Oval Office or on your local school board? Never! Does the “deep state” have more power than the Lord God omnipotent? Nonsense!
Don’t let fear rule your thoughts even a little bit. Don’t fret, even when bad people seem to be winning. Psalm 37:1 (NASB) says, “Do not fret because of evildoers.” If you consider certain politicians “evildoers,” vote against them, but don’t fret over them. Leave them to heaven. Live right now in the peace that Jesus happily provides to all who ask.
