Give us a king!

In 1 Samuel 8, the children of Israel came to Samuel and asked for a king. They were tired of being different from the nations around them, in that God was their king, and not a man. They wanted to be like everyone else and have a human as their leader.

God, though He was the one being rejected as by the people, instructed Samuel to give the people what they said they wanted and to give them the following warning about how a man would reign over them as king:

Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who were asking him for a king. He said, "This is what the king who will reign over you will do: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. Your menservants and maidservants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, and the LORD will not answer you in that day."
But the people refused to listen to Samuel. "No!" they said. "We want a king over us. Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles." - 1 Samuel 8:10-20

You know how that worked out...over the next generations, the kings of Israel (and Judah) did all the things that God warned the people they would - and more! They became murderers, adulterers, idolaters, liars, thieves and led the people into all sorts of terrible things.

Obviously, they would have been much better off to rely solely on God and his leadership and resources. (Duh!)

Where am I going with this, you ask? Election season in our country always reminds me of this situation from Israel's history. We spend so much time and energy (and prayers?) considering who we want to lead our country. We think about it, we read about it, we watch and listen to what others think, etc., etc. Ugh.

This may sound cynical, but at the end of this campaign, we'll have chosen someone to take our sons and daughters and put them into their service, take a bite out of our paycheck and use it at their discretion.

If I could, I would go back in history and tell those people what a huge mistake they were about to make! How great would it be to live in a country with God as your king? I ask you! But, alas, we live in a time and place where there's a choice to be made regarding who will lead us over the next four years.

So, who to choose? Here's my two cents, and the priorities I use when doing my civic duty and casting my ballot on election day:

1. Life
In my opinion, the most important thing I want to know about my leaders is that they will value and protect life at all cost. I need to have confidence that my leaders will stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves - the unimportant, the insignificant, the weak.

To me, this reflects Jesus more than anything. Throughout the biographies of his life, you find Jesus protecting and interacting with people who were overlooked by everyone else - children, lepers, the handicapped, the ill. These were the unimportant people, but not in his eyes. He spent valuable time talking with them, praying for them, healing them and teaching them.

I refuse to vote for someone to whom this attitude is unimportant or "above my pay-grade" to decide.

That thought alone generally makes my decision for me. If I need to go further;

2. Less is more.
I want the government to affect my life as little as possible. I want to keep as much of the money I earn in my bank account rather than Uncle Sam's and I don't want to be dealing with restrictions and bureaucracy every time I turn around.

I realize that a certain amount of that is necessary to protect us from our enemies and to care for those less fortunate, but we're in a situation where the government can get out of control. I want less.

I guess that's it, really. Nothing too complicated! I suppose there's not much question about where my vote will go at this point...

Thoughts? What are your issues / ideas?

Until next time - RevPhil