President’s Reelection Encourages Me

Posted by Kevin Purcell on Nov 8, 2012 in Editorial, Featured | 0 comments

The President won reelection pretty easily from the perspective of the uninformed and those who only listen to the easily accessed media outlets. In truth, his campaign worked really hard for five years to bring about this win. He built a ground game starting in 2007 before the first election. Unlike most candidates who take a break after their first election as president, I’m told he kept his operation in place and kept organizing communities. Big surprise for a man whose primary job before his first election was one of community organizer for political groups in Chicago. He’s obviously very good at his job and he turned out his constituency while conservatives, especially evangelical Christians, stayed home in huge numbers.

I disagree with a lot of what the President promotes.

• He sees government as the primary tool for helping those with great need financially and otherwise while I believe private groups utilizing their good will do a better job of this with government safety nets for those in extreme need
• He sees homosexuals as an oppressed minority group, whereas I see them differently since stats show they usually are better educated and have higher income than the average public
• He sees American military might as a necessary evil at best and one of our greatest weakness at worst while I see it as our greatest strength and a tool for immense good since we brought peace to the world during the Cold War keeping people free from communism and serve as the only defense against Muslim extremists who want Sharia law to rule the world subjugating women and anyone who’s not an extremist Muslim
• He sees taxes as a good tool to bring fairness to the world since people with too much money don’t deserve what they have since they needed help while I see taxes as a necessary evil that should only support the bare minimum of a strong defense, protecting interstate commerce and providing for those in point number one above.

I could go on.

He won reelection by out hustling the Republicans and stirring his base to go vote while appealing to moderates by promising not to raise income taxes for a year after his election. That’s right! A year, since he said he wouldn’t raise them on those below $250,000 next year. He didn’t say he would never do it.

So, how can someone who so fundamentally disagrees with the President be encouraged?

The policies of the administration will prove to fail and when its obvious, people will seek help from somewhere. If conservatives can learn from the President’s reelection campaign, then we can start working to both get our base out and vote during  the 2014 election and start educating America that big government liberalism failed. Sadly, this will require some pain before it gets there. I don’t like that. I hate to see anyone suffer, but if that’s the only way for people to seek help, then so be it.

The President provided a model for getting elected even when your views don’t match the majority of the country. Most people want smaller government despite what the liberals and even the moderate media keeps saying. The President didn’t win because of the welfare state. He won because he outworked Republicans in getting out his vote. So, if we can learn how he did it and match it, we win. On an even playing field conservatism always trumps liberalism in America. If Mitt Romney was really a conservative and got out those 3 Million conservative Christians, he wins. He failed because he didn’t work as hard and wasn’t espousing his sincere beliefs – moderate to liberal social views and moderate to conservative fiscal policy. People didn’t trust him because he didn’t really believe what he was saying.

Third, I’m encouraged because some really conservative people are waiting in the wings to take on the liberal establishment in both parties next time around. The 2014 election will also bring more of them into office because the out-year election always provides gains for the out party. I predict the Senate will turn Republican and the Congress will see a larger control by Republicans and most of those will come from true believer conservatives.

For the next few weeks, don’t let the liberal media convince you that moderation is the key to winning for Republicans. Why would anyone elect a Republican liberal when they can get a real liberal from the Democrats? We need candidates that are true believers and they will win. Why do I say that? Because it was the only way Republicans have succeeded in the past 32 years.

• Ronald Reagan – true believer and won by landslides in both elections due to his strength of character and skill as a communicator telling America why happy conservatism really works.
• George H. W. Bush – he wasn’t a true believer, but he enjoyed the pixy dust from the Reagan years. On his own, after raising taxes, he failed to win reelection.
• Bob Dole was a moderate and lost
• George W. Bush wasn’t as conservative as Ronald Reagan but was closer than any other candidate since Reagan and he won barely in 2000 and handily in 2004.
• John McCain sounded like a conservative but was more moderate than he sounded and only seemed conservative compared to the President
• Mitt Romney governed as a moderate in Massachusetts and we were all told that’s only because of the Democrats in his state, but he still did it and failed to convince the real conservatives in his party that the real Romney was the guy running this year not the one who governed. That’s because we’re smart and look at your actions which drown out your words when they contradict.

Last, God is still on the throne even if Satan himself takes over the USA. And no, President Obama is not Satan!

Manhattan Declaration & the SBC GCR

Posted by Kevin Purcell on Dec 4, 2009 in Editorial, Prayer | 0 comments

The Manhattan Declaration is a document that calls for Christians to stand with one another over conscience issues like abortion, same sex marriage and government involvement in these things.

I had not made a decision about whether I would sign it when one of my respected church leaders/members asked me to consider it and said he had signed it.  I wanted to wait till I read the full text of the document. Due to schedule it took me a while to do so, but this week I finally got around to doing so. Then I read the list of those who signed. The men and woman were people that I have respected, learned from, and prayed for often.  But something bothered me. So I began to look for opposing views. Of course there were the people who are not believers including those on the left politically and the news media outlets that think the three tenets in the document are foolishness. But I found one person that I also respect, have learned from, and pray for who said he was not signing it. John MacArthur. I read his reasons and they were a significant set of concerns.

So I thought and prayed and asked what God would have me do. Today, I chose to sign it. You can read about my concerns at my church’s web site where I posted about it at the request of my church member.  You can also see at the bottom, the update which outlines why I chose to sign it.

But there is another document that I did not hesitate to sign and I want to focus on that.

I am a Southern Baptist. I have been sad to see that after our internal holy war was finished,  our denomination began to decline. For the first time our numbers are smaller than larger than they were the year before. Sadly, this has been masked by growth in ethnic congregations. The heart of the Southern Baptist Convention used to be our Anglo churches. They have been in decline for a long time. I am sad to say that my own church has been one of those.

So when some of our denominations leaders have chosen to stand up for what is called the Great Commission Resurgence, I was interested. I learned about it and studied it and got on board. I chose to sign the list of people who are praying for the “Great Commission Resurgence” or GCR. There has been some debate about this issue, but the motion to appoint a study committee passed overwhelmingly and many of us were excited.

But then I read a blog post this week that criticized it. The heart of the GCR at this point seems to be a call to reorganize the way we are doing missions. And this blog post said that will have little effect because he said that the organizational structure of the denomination has little to do with our decline. He said that our decline was because Christians don’t care that much about the Gospel or witnessing. He said, announce to your church this Sunday that after service you are going to the local stores and passing out Gospel tracts. See how may show up to go. [Update: the blog has a new post about how the GCR could win]

I think he is right about part of what he states. But, does that mean we should not reorganize our denomination thought? No! I have long felt we needed a new way of doing things. The GCR is not this generation’s holy war. It is a sincere hunger to see our denomination growing again. It is needed and I still support it.

The absolute truth is this: until the American Christian church gets excited about changing people’s hearts by living and sharing the Gospel we will continue to decline as a church and anti-Christian beliefs and policies will continue to win out in the public square. We need a multifaceted attack. We need people to be the salt and light to preserve and guide our culture in Washington, state houses, local school boards, and court rooms. We also need them in Hollywood, universities, and civic groups. We need people to influence the culture for Christ by pushing our ideals.

At the same time, all of us need to be about the business of doing the work of the Evangelist. We need all hands on deck! It is not a time to sit back and coast or let others take the lead. It is time to lead and be involved in telling people about Jesus first!