Voting
Photo courtesy of Hacking Christianity.
Nov. 4, 2024
The finish line is in sight. Tomorrow you vote, or maybe you voted early, or maybe you just can’t vote at all. Regardless, it’s a day for prayer. {We’re hosting a service of prayer and communion at noon, btw.}
Years ago, mid-sermon on the Sunday before election day, a thought popped into my head and then came out of my mouth. Prayer is like voting. You go into the little booth, there is some privacy, you scratch your head, and you cast your vote for what you believe, what you support, what you hope will usher in a better world. Isn’t that what we do when we pray?
I always vote – even though if I were to count up winners and losers, my voting record, as in my percentage of picking the winners, would be lousy. But I don’t stay home just because I predict I won’t be picking the winner. I stubbornly vote, no matter the outcome. In prayer, we speak with God, we express our longings, our desires, even our demands. It may or may not turn out the way we wish. But we still talk to God. We know that with God our vote counts, and is precious. As Madeleine L’Engle put it, “Prayer is love, and love is never wasted.”
And I absolutely love Senator (and Baptist pastor) Raphael Warnock’s deep insight: “I often say that a vote is a kind of prayer for the world we desire for ourselves and for our children. And our prayers are stronger when we pray together.”
So it’s a good day to pray together: let us pray. Ask God for guidance, for peace, for wisdom. Pray for a deep awareness of God’s presence – recalling that at the end of the day tomorrow, God will still be God. We might think there will be winners, and losers. But in God’s kingdom there are no losers – or if anything, God has a special heart, as we for those the world thinks have lost. And so does/should God’s church, and God’s people.
Tomorrow is a day for being attentive to your soul. My sermon yesterday riffed on Psalm 24’s ask that we have “pure hearts.” Be vigilant, if you’re about to vote, of what feeds your darkness, your fears, your biases, and ask God to purge that and then be open to what might bring hope, joy – and what might be helpful, not to me/mine, but to the vulnerable, those in greatest need. We’re Christians voting, after all.
The vote-casting itself can be a prayerful moment. Sometimes I’m in the booth, with all my hopes, dreams, fears, preparation, and determination – and still I feel a shiver, and frankly I inevitably get confused over this or that race. In that moment, I try to make my confession before God: Lord, this world is so broken, and so am I. Despite my energetic efforts, I’m a bit lost, unsure, and anxious. Heal me, forgive me. Heal us, and do your work of reconciliation we so desperately need. Use me, not just now in voting, but after I walk out of here and into the rest of my day, and into the rest of my life.
If you’ve voted (or don’t vote) and are watching the results, be similarly attentive to your heart. “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46). Tomorrow is a day to be holy, to be peaceful in your soul, and to strain to glimpse beyond the horizon of all the chaos the beauty and wonder of God, and the certainty of God bringing all of us and all of creation ultimately to God’s good end.