Day 43

So tomorrow is election day, and I can't WAIT for all the mud slinging and campaign money spending and heated debating to end. At this point, my desire for anyone to win overshadows my desire for one particular candidate to win, just so that the election will be over.
I mean, I don't really mean that. I am decided in who I am voting for, and I hope he wins, but if he doesn't, I don't think America is going to plummet into a pit of despair. I've been thinking a LOT about this election, as I hope many people have, and I have been going back and forth on who I am voting for, but in the end, it's going to be for McCain, and that's not a wishy-washy decision either. I think he will be a strong leader and make very wise decisions for the country, even if I don't agree with him on every single issue (like education, which is a big thing for me to compromise on). As far as I can tell, he's got a lot of integrity and is not afraid to have an opinion, even if it is not popular in his party, which is a lot more than can be said about Obama. So there it is. I mean, that's not the whole reasoning behind it, but it will suffice.
But I had a conversation with Monica this morning that is reflective of what I have been thinking about lately, and that is morality. Tomorrow I'm not only voting for president, but also on the legalization of a small amount of marijuana, banning dog racing, and dropping the state income tax. Those really aren't that huge in the moral scheme of things, but I've been thinking about what I believe is right and wrong, and whether it's ok to vote that onto the whole state, or nation. Some topics are easier than others. Prayer in school, for instance, should absolutely not be made into law. That is ridiculous, and any person who has a relationship with God can pray whenever they want, and does not need extra time allotted from the school day to do so. And I don't think that anything else that asserts Christianity as a faith should be made into law. But then there is this blurry line on moral issues, like abortion. Or marijuana. Or homosexual marriage. And generally, I don't think that faith reasons should be used in arguing these points on a legal scale, either. Like, to say that homosexual marriage shouldn't be allowed because God wouldn't want it is not sufficient, even for me, and even when I agree with that point personally. There have got to be other reasons for it to be a law. But then my heart breaks for this country because we are having these dilemmas in the first place. This is not how God intended for us to live life. So when I think about these things, naturally, my first instinct is to vote to preserve conditions to obey God's biblical laws. But I also know that this doesn't necessarily do any good, because you can't legislate fear of the Lord. God himself said and demonstrated that laws won't turn a person's heart towards him. A changed heart has to cause behavior change, and not the other way around.
It's really a tough question, and when I think about it a lot, I struggle to figure out how faith really fits into the world of politics, and secretly I'm glad the nobody who is a strong Christian (i.e. Mike Huckabee) has made it into the white house, because as far as I can figure, those two things just aren't compatible. So the only solution, then, is to keep on praying for more and more people in the country to come to know and love God, then these questions won't arise.

Ok. I need to go to work now.
Ps- I ran 18 miles yesterday and then went to work after, and I didn't even die. Whabam!