Politics, Conscience, and the Church: The Why, What, and How of Political Disagreement

To paraphrase Aristotle, politics is the science and art of governing men. We normally use the word politics to refer to governing people at the level of the government or the governing authorities or the state.^[1]

1. This essay updates Jonathan Leeman and Andrew David Naselli, “Politics, Conscience, and the Church: Why Christians Passionately Disagree with One Another over Politics, Why They Must Agree to Disagree over Jagged-Line Political Issues, and How,” Themelios 45 (2020): 13–31.

Today many evangelical churches in America feel tension about how to approach politics. All Christians care about justice, but we don’t always agree about how to identify injustice and how to right those wrongs.

I plan to address politics, conscience, and the church by recommending a way forward. I’ll do that by answering three questions:

1. Why do Christians sometimes disagree with one another over politics?
2. Why should Christians distinguish between straight-line and jagged-line political issues? For a clear biblical command, there is a straight line from a biblical or theological principle to a political position (e.g., the Bible forbids murder, so we oppose abortion). For an issue that requires wisdom, there is a multistep process (or a jagged line) from a biblical or theological principle to a political position (e.g., immigration policy).
3. How should Christians disagree over jagged-line political issues?

I have opinions about politics, and I think my political judgments about issues such as immigration, tax policy, healthcare, welfare, global warming, and gun control are right. (And you think your opinions about politics are right, too.) But as much as I would enjoy arguing for my personal convictions, my goal in this article is to help you understand why, when, and how you should agree to disagree in political matters.

1. Why Do Christians Sometimes Disagree with One Another over Politics?

Christians disagree with one another over politics for at least two reasons.

Reason 1. Because Christians Care about Justice and Believe That Their Political Convictions Promote Justice

Let’s break this first reason down into four components:

1. Justice according to the Bible is (1) getting what you deserve and (2) giving others what they deserve.^[2]

2. Andy Naselli, “Justice: Divine, Imputed, Imparted, Public, and Ultimate,” andynaselli.com, September 12, 2022.

Justice is doing what is right according to the standard of God’s will and character as he has revealed it in his word.

It’s important to carefully define our terms because some people have recently redefined justice and fairness and equity to refer to equal outcomes. They think that God is unfair if unequal outcomes exist. An example of an unequal outcome is that some people have more wealth than others.

But we must distinguish between (1) equal outcomes and (2) justice or fairness or equity or impartiality. God is just and fair and equitable and impartial, but that does not mean everyone experiences equal outcomes because God has the freedom to show undeserved kindness to whomever he wants.

Case in point is Jesus’s parable of the laborers in the vineyard in Matthew 20:1–16. The master gives each laborer what he deserves, and he gives some laborers more than they deserve. To get justice is to get what you deserve. It is not unfair to give extra to some, even when they are less deserving than others. As long as God gives each person what he deserves, God is not unfair when he sovereignly chooses to be undeservedly kind to some and not others. And not one of us deserves God’s kindness. God is always fair: “all his ways are justice” (Deut. 32:4).

2. Christians care about justice.

Why? Because justice characterizes God: “he has established his throne for justice” (Ps. 9:7), and he “is exalted in justice” (Isa. 5:16). And the just God has justified Christians. Justification is to justice what faith is to good works. Faith results in good works; doing good deeds gives evidence of faith (Matt. 7:15–20; James 2:14–26). Similarly, being justified results in a desire to do justice; doing justice gives evidence of being justified.

3. Governments exist for the purpose of justice.

Remember, justice according to the Bible is (1) getting what you deserve and (2) giving others what they deserve. God instituted governments to do justice for everyone created in his image (Gen. 9:5–6; Rom. 13:1–7; cf. 2 Sam. 8:15; 1 Kgs. 10:9; Prov. 29:4). So when Christians talk about abortion, immigration, poverty, or so-called same-sex marriage, they are fundamentally talking about doing justice and opposing injustice.

What are some examples of public injustice that Christians should be concerned about today? In a WORLD Opinions article in March 2022, Thaddeus Williams wisely presents four issues that our pursuit of justice should include even if it’s unpopular in our culture (I’ll quote and paraphrase him):

1. Abortion: Our pursuit of justice should include “these tiny humans exterminated because larger humans consider them inconvenient, genetically inferior, or too female.”
2. Pornography and its connection to child porn, human trafficking, rape, domestic violence, impaired brain function, broken relationships, and depression: Our pursuit of justice should include “the victims of the exploitative pornography industry.”
3. The persecution of believers around the world: Christians are “being targeted, imprisoned, beaten, raped, hanged, crucified, and bombed for claiming Jesus as Lord.” Our pursuit of justice should include “the millions of Christians imprisoned or executed around the globe.”
4. Socialism: “The quest to achieve economic equality between the rich and poor through communist and socialist policies has resulted in more than 100 million casualties in the 20th century alone.” Our pursuit of justice should include “the desperately oppressed victims of far-left economic systems.”^[3]

3. Thaddeus J. Williams, “We Just May Be on ‘the Wrong Side of History’ If …: The Demand for Justice in Our Society Leaves Out Many of the Oppressed,” WORLD Opinions, 4 March 2022.

Each of those four issues is a matter of systemic injustice. Those are just four examples of public justice issues.

4. The world has redefined justice by attaching certain adjectives before it.

Here are five examples:

1. LGBT justice: Everyone must affirm and celebrate the ideology of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people—and any sexual orientations or gender identities that do not correspond to heterosexual norms. That’s LGBT justice. (I think that justice would look more like Genesis 19:24: “The LORD rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the LORD out of heaven.”)
2. Reproductive justice: Pregnant people (not women but pregnant people since now “men” can get pregnant, too) have a human right to have personal bodily autonomy—to choose to keep or to kill the unborn baby in one’s womb. That’s reproductive justice. (I think that justice would look more like what God commanded the Israelites in Leviticus 20:2: “Any one  . . . who gives any of his children to Molech shall surely be put to death.”)
3. Distributive justice: Society must distribute (or allocate) power and resources so that there are equal outcomes. That’s distributive justice. (I think that justice is that God-ordained authorities impartially punish lawbreaking and right wrongs.)
4. Racial justice: Society must remove systemic racial disparities in areas such as wealth, income, education, and employment. Justice is equal outcomes, and a failure to have equal outcomes is racism. That’s racial justice. (I think that justice is that society treats all ethnicities impartially.)
5. Social justice: In order to understand what social justice typically means in our culture today, you have to understand what Critical Theory is. In a nutshell Critical Theory affirms four beliefs:^[4]
   
   
   • (1) Society is divided into two groups: oppressors and oppressed. The oppressors have power, and they are evil bullies; the oppressed do not have power, and they are innocent victims.(2) Oppressors (the dominant group) maintain their power by imposing their ideology on everyone.(3) Lived experience gives oppressed people special access to truths about their oppression.(4) Society needs social justice—that is, society needs to pursue equal outcomes by deconstructing and eliminating all forms of social oppression. Social oppression includes not just disparities regarding race and ethnicity but also gender, sexual orientation, religion, physical ability, mental ability, and economic class. The term wokeness refers to the state of being consciously aware of and “awake” to this social injustice. The term woke is “a shorthand to describe someone who, whether consciously or unconsciously, has adopted grievances and activism rooted in Cultural Marxism and Critical Theory, especially related to the intersectional oppression matrix of race, gender, and sexuality.”^[5] That’s social justice. (Is that justice? I think that justice is that God-ordained authorities oppose partiality in civic life by impartially punishing unjust perpetrators and righting wrongs.)^[6]

So the first reason Christians sometimes disagree over politics is that Christians care about justice and believe that their political convictions promote what they perceive as justice. The second reason is like the first.

Reason 2. Because Christians Have Different Degrees of Wisdom for Making Political Judgments and Tend to Believe That They Have More Wisdom Than Those Who Differ

Most political judgments depend on wisdom, and only God is all-wise. Some political judgments are difficult because we lack wisdom. Even if we agree on biblical principles, we may disagree over methods and tactics and timing and more.

The goal of politics is justice; the means is wisdom. Two examples may help illustrate that most controversial political issues depend on wisdom: abortion and immigration.

Example 1: Abortion

The Bible forbids abortion since deliberately killing an unborn person is a form of murder. Therefore, churches should take a stand against abortion—both in their preaching and in their membership decisions. We should not affirm that a person is a Christian—a church member in good standing—if he or she is unrepentantly promoting abortion, whether by personally encouraging women to seek abortions or by politically advocating for abortion.

But Christians do not agree on all the political tactics for opposing the injustice of abortion. For example, should a church promote a pro-life march? Maybe. Maybe not. A particular march may or may not be wise, and a pastor should use his pastoral authority wisely.

Example 2: Immigration

Consider the controversy surrounding migrants crossing the southern United States border. One group of Christians believes the present laws that limit immigration are just fine. If anything, they believe we need to tighten the restrictions in order to protect our nation and our children. Another group of Christians argues that humanitarian considerations mean allowing as many migrants in as the present law allows, or even changing the laws to accommodate more.

So how many migrants should a nation permit a year? How many asylum seekers? How will that affect the lives and livelihoods of its citizens? How should we combat lawlessness and terrorism? What is the best way to prevent and combat drug and human trafficking? Is a nation obligated to undertake all the costs of processing the hundreds of thousands of migrants who might show up at the borders?

Answering those questions requires wisdom. Political judgments require a person to rightly understand biblical principles and then to apply those principles based on social dynamics, legal precedent, political feasibility, historical factors, economic projections, criminal justice considerations, and more.

So those are two reasons that Christians sometimes disagree over politics. Now let’s consider Question 2:

2. Why Should Christians Distinguish between Straight-Line and Jagged-Line Political Issues?

Before I answer that question, I need to define what I mean by straight-line and jagged-line political issues.^[7]

7. The below figure is from Jonathan Leeman and Andrew David Naselli, How Can I Love Church Members with Different Politics?, 9Marks: Church Questions (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2020), 41.

• For a straight-line issue, there is a straight line from a biblical or theological principle to a political position. For instance, the Bible teaches that murder is sinful; abortion is a form of murder; therefore, we should oppose abortion. That’s a straight line. That is why a church should initiate the church-discipline process with a member who is advocating for abortion—such as encouraging a single pregnant woman to get an abortion or supporting Planned Parenthood.
• But for a jagged-line issue, there is a multistep process from a biblical or theological principle to a political position. Fellow church members should agree on straight-line political issues, and they should recognize Christian freedom on jagged-line political issues.

Many political issues are not straight-line issues. Probably most are jagged-line issues—issues like immigration caps and tax rates and trade policy and healthcare and carbon dioxide emission caps. For such issues, I’m not sure we can say there is “the” Christian position—though some positions are better than others.

It’s right for churches to take a stand on straight-line issues through preaching and membership decisions. But church leaders need to be careful about whether to take institutional stands on jagged-line issues. Straight-line issues are about what we might call “the Christian position,” and jagged-line issues belong to the domain of Christian freedom (which doesn’t mean the issues are unimportant or that some views are not incorrect).

Now that we’ve explained jagged-line vs. straight-line political issues, we are ready to answer the question Why should Christians agree to disagree over jagged-line political issues? For at least two reasons:

Reason 1. Because Christians Should Respect Fellow Christians Who Have Differently Calibrated Consciences on Jagged-Line Issues^[8]

8. This section condenses Andrew David Naselli and J. D. Crowley, Conscience: What It Is, How to Train It, and Loving Those Who Differ (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016).

Jagged-line issues correspond to what Paul in Romans 14:1 calls “disputable matters” (NIV) or “opinions” (ESV) or matters of conscience. Your conscience is your consciousness of what you believe is right and wrong. That implies that your conscience is not necessarily correct on every issue. What you believe is right and wrong is not necessarily the same thing as what God believes is right and wrong. You might believe with deep conviction in your conscience that a ten-year-old boy has the right to choose to become a female. If so, your conscience is not functioning correctly for that issue because it is based on immoral standards. You should calibrate your conscience.

The idea of calibrating your conscience pictures your conscience as an instrument. Instruments can be incorrect: your bathroom scale may say you weigh 142 pounds when you actually weigh 139. When an instrument is incorrect, it needs to be calibrated. To calibrate an instrument is to align it with a standard to ensure that it’s functioning accurately.

The standard for what’s right and wrong is God, who has revealed himself to us particularly through the Bible. So when your conscience is not functioning accurately, you should endeavor to align it with God’s words. The classic example of this in the Bible is the Apostle Peter. He was convinced in his conscience that it was sinful to eat certain foods—like pork. God told Peter three times to “kill and eat” animals that Peter considered to be unclean. Peter had the gall to reply to God, “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” But because the Lord was commanding Peter to eat those foods, Peter had to calibrate his conscience so that he would have the confidence to accept food and people that he previously could not accept (see Acts 10:9–16).

So how does a Christian calibrate his or her conscience? In at least three ways:

1. by educating it with truth. Truth refers primarily to the truth God reveals in the Bible, but it also includes truth outside the Bible. For example, assuming that God allows some forms of contraception, the decisive information that may lead a Christian couple to use or not use a particular form of contraception may be truth outside the Bible—that is, scientific information that explains in detail how a form of contraception works.
2. in the context of your church. Godly church leaders and fellow members are one of God’s gifts to you to help you calibrate your conscience. You don’t have to do it alone.
3. with due process. Some issues may take you years to work through. That’s okay. It’s better not to rush it than to prematurely change and go against your conscience.

How does all this relate to jagged-line political issues? As a general rule, treat straight-line issues as whole-church issues, and treat jagged-line issues as Christian-freedom issues or matters of conscience. Our consciences should function differently for each set of issues.

• For straight-line whole-church issues, pastors should preach, “This is what God says.” It’s right to try to persuade people to be conscience-bound on whole-church issues. Furthermore, straight-line or whole-church issues will impact membership decisions. An abortion doctor or a member of the Ku Klux Klan or Antifa should not be a member of a faithful church. Those are both straight-line issues, which means they are whole-church issues.
• Jagged-line issues are matters of conscience that fellow church members should be able to agree to disagree over. Disputable matters include issues such as how you interpret who “the sons of God” are in Genesis 6:2 or how Christians should view the “Sabbath.” It also includes the majority of political judgments. For example, is the American government presently enforcing the death penalty in a just way? If not, what are the next steps the government should take to solve that problem?
• A moment ago I said, “As a general rule treat straight-line issues as whole-church issues, and treat jagged-line issues as Christian-freedom issues or matters of conscience.” Why as a general rule? Here’s why: We want to faithfully believe and obey all of the Bible. It’s not enough to say that we want to believe and obey only what is absolutely necessary to be a Christian. We want to be faithful Christians—all of Christ for all of life. For example, is it possible for a Christian to think that a parent should not spank his or her young child? Yes, that’s possible—even though the Bible teaches that parents should physically discipline their young children at times.^[9] We don’t want our standard of teaching to be so low that we won’t teach what is true simply because some Christians disagree. We want to believe and obey all of the Bible. And sometimes that may involve taking a position on a political issue—such as the biblical basis for the death penalty and for just war (contra pacifism) or for private property (contra communism).

9. Cf. Andrew David Naselli, “Training Children for Their Good,” The Journal of Discipleship and Family Ministry 3.2 (2013): 48–64.

Jagged-line issues easily become deeply ingrained in your conscience. And that sets the scene for conflict because we inevitably dispute disputable matters. No two sinful humans agree on absolutely everything—not even a godly husband and godly wife. We have different perspectives, backgrounds, personalities, preferences, thought processes, and levels of understanding truth about God, his word, and his world. So it’s not surprising when fellow church members disagree about jagged-line issues. We should expect that and learn to live with those differences. We don’t always need to eliminate such differences, but we must seek to glorify God by loving one another in our differences. That is Paul’s main concern in Romans 14.

Here are two of Paul’s principles in Romans 14:

• 1. Welcome those who disagree with you as Christ has welcomed you (Rom. 14:1–2; 15:7). Those who have a weak conscience on a particular issue are theologically incorrect but not heretical since the issue is not “of first importance” (1 Cor. 15:3). Your main priority should not be for them to change their view. Your main priority is to “welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God” (Rom. 15:7).
• 2. Don’t look down on those who are stricter than you on a particular issue, and don’t be judgmental toward those who have more freedom on a particular issue (Rom. 14:3–4). Love those who differ with you by respecting them, not disdaining them.

So is it okay to talk about jagged-line political issues with fellow Christians? Yes, as long as you do it with the right spirit and with the right proportion.

So Christians should agree to disagree over jagged-line political issues because of how God commands Christians to relate to fellow Christians—respect those with differently calibrated consciences. A second reason for distinguishing between straight-line and jagged-line issues concerns how Christians relate to non-Christians.

Reason 2. Because Insisting That Christians Agree on Jagged-Line Issues May Misrepresent Christ to Non-Christians

If you as a Christian insist that your conviction about a jagged-line political issue is the Christian position, then you may be misrepresenting Christ to non-Christians. We should be careful not to bind the consciences of fellow Christians on disputable matters. What unites a church should be our love for Jesus and our commitment to follow him as our Lord.

3. How Should Christians Disagree over Jagged-Line Political Issues?

Christians who disagree with one another over jagged-line political issues should disagree in at least three ways:

Way 1. By Acknowledging When There Is Leeway on Jagged-Line Political Issues

Leeway refers to space for Christians to have different opinions. Christians should distinguish between the Christian position on a political matter (e.g., abortion) and political matters for which there is leeway (e.g., national math standards for eighth graders).

If there is no leeway according to the Bible for Christians to disagree, then pastors should preach about those matters from the Bible as the Christian position. If there is leeway for Christians to disagree, then pastors should not attempt to bind consciences on such issues. If you have a conviction about what our tax rate should be (and I do!), then there’s a big difference between calling your view “the Christian position on tax rates” and “a Christian position on tax rates.”

Ethics professor Andrew Walker proposes a helpful “ethical triage”:

• must = obligatory
• should = advisable
• may = permissible^[10]

10. Andrew T. Walker, “‘Is This a Sin?’: Ethical Triage and Church Discipline,” 9Marks, 2 October 2019,

That’s a helpful grid for thinking through political matters.

So the first way Christians should disagree over jagged-line political issues is to acknowledge when there is leeway to disagree. Here’s a second way:

Way 2. By Uniting to Accomplish the Mission Christ Gave the Church

The distinction between straight-line versus jagged-line issues needs to be set inside the larger conversation about the mission of the church. God gives everyone jobs to do, including the three main institutions he has established: the family, the government, and the church.

So what is the mission of the church as an institution? God has commissioned local churches, acting corporately, to make disciples by teaching everything Jesus commanded. But God has not commissioned local churches to advocate across the whole range of issues that comprise the work of government. It’s not a part of the church’s mission. The church can teach what the Bible says about taxes and private property, but the church probably shouldn’t presume to speak to this or that tax bill.

An individual Christian is not the same thing as the church as a whole. An individual Christian stepping into the public square should make every use of common-grace knowledge, his own study of the Bible, and even partnerships with non-Christians to advocate for just ends on every straight-line or jagged-line issue out there. Individual Christians possess much more freedom to speak to a broad range of issues, so long as we take care not to treat all of our political positions as “the” Christian position.

So Christians should disagree over jagged-line political issues by acknowledging when there is leeway to disagree and by uniting to accomplish the church’s mission. Here’s a third way:

Way 3. By Prioritizing Loving Others Over Convincing Them That Your Convictions about Jagged-Line Political Issues Are Right

That’s Paul’s burden in Romans 14. It’s ideal that you not have a theologically incorrect position (i.e., a weak conscience) on a disputable matter. It’s important to believe what is theologically correct. But more important than eliminating disagreements on disputable matters is that fellow church members love one another in their differences.

I am not suggesting that you never talk about controversial political issues with fellow church members or that you never make a case for why you are convinced that your political judgments promote justice. I am simply exhorting you to prioritize loving fellow Christians. Here are six specific ways to love one another:

1. Welcome those who disagree with you as Christ has welcomed you (Rom. 14:1; 15:7). Treat brothers and sisters who disagree with you over politics as family—not as enemies. View them with an eternal perspective. To cultivate that mindset, meditate on eternity and the final judgment.
2. “Be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger” (James 1:19). Why? “Because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires” (James 1:20 NIV). Sinful anger overreacts and escalates controversy and tension. Wise Christians know when and how to dial down the temperature of political disagreements.
3. Pray with affection for those who disagree with you. When you pray about the outcome of someone else’s faith, God often deepens your affection for them. When fellow church members celebrate Bible teachings that are of first importance, jagged-line issues shouldn’t overthrow those rich truths we love and live for and would die for.
4. Respectfully think about those who disagree with you. Don’t disdain them or look down on them. “Slander no one . . . be peaceable and considerate . . . be gentle toward everyone” (Titus 3:2).
5. Don’t use the label gospel issue for a jagged-line political judgment that you think is an implication of the gospel. Calling something a gospel issue sounds the theological alarm at DEFCON 1. It may communicate something like this: “I hold the Christian position on this political matter. If you don’t agree with me, then you are not a Christian.”
6. Exult with one another that we can trust our sovereign God when politics tempt us to be sinfully anxious.

Our God is in the heavens;
he does all that he pleases. (Ps. 115:3)

Why do the nations rage
and the peoples plot in vain?
The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers take counsel together,
against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying,
“Let us burst their bonds apart
and cast away their cords from us.”
He who sits in the heavens laughs;
the Lord holds them in derision. (Ps. 2:1–4)

Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. (Matt. 6:34)

Most reasonable people want justice to mark society, and that’s one of the reasons we engage in politics. But if we’ve wrongly defined the problem with a skewed definition of justice, then our solutions will be likewise skewed. The question of politics is complex, but not as complex as some would like you to believe. There are straight-line issues that are very clear in Scripture, and these straight-line issues include in the very least opposing abortion and LGBTQ coercion. But there are other jagged-line issues that are so complex that Christians can live together in unity even while they disagree on particulars (like the finer points of immigration caps). Some want to make straight-line issues seem like they are jagged-line issues. And some people want to make jagged-line issues straight-line issues. We should avoid both extremes. Now that we’ve talked through the why, what, and how of political disagreement, it’s beneficial to think through a test case on a straight-line issue: abortion.

Test Case: May Christians in America Vote for a Pro-choice Candidate?

“May Christians in America vote for a pro-choice candidate?” My answer to this question has become increasingly precise from 2016 to 2020 to 2024. In 2016, I could not vote for Donald Trump with a clear conscience due to his character and unpredictability (nor did I vote for Hillary Clinton). In 2020, the political landscape had changed: The Democratic Party had adopted shockingly extreme views on abortion by doubling down on third-trimester abortions and sometimes commending a woman’s “choice” to kill an accidentally delivered child. The Democratic Party had also championed so-called gay “marriage,” transgender “rights,” and other LGBTQ+ “rights” in the name of tolerance in a way that punitively threatens the religious liberty of evangelical institutions such as churches, schools, and adoption agencies. Certainly, the Republican Party had its issues, too. But some evils are greater than others, and there was not a moral equivalence between the two main parties.

I can’t vote with a clear conscience for a politician who supports the high-handed sin of abortion—at least if there’s another candidate who is pro-life. In the 2020 presidential election, I did not vote for Joe Biden, and I reluctantly voted for Donald Trump. I say “reluctantly” because I did not vote enthusiastically. I wish I had a better option. But it seemed like the least bad option at the time.

Now in 2024, I’ll unpack five statements that encapsulate my views:

1. After the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in June 2022, I publicly acknowledged that in 2016 I miscalculated regarding three Supreme Court Justice appointments.

On June 26, 2022, I posted on X that I agreed with my friend Andrew Walker that “failing to appreciate President Trump’s hand in Roe’s demise is intellectually dishonest. … He is owed acknowledgement and gratitude ….” I opposed candidate Trump in 2016 because I could not trust what he says because of his character. “I miscalculated re 3 Supreme Court Justice appointments.” This does not mean that I am enthusiastically pro-Trump now. I am simply tipping my hat to pro-life people who voted for Trump in 2016.

2. My conviction against voting for pro-abortion candidates is even stronger.

I agree with what theologian Steve Wellum wrote in an article in 2023 titled “One-Issue Voting: A Red Herring, Not a Real Objection”:

The bottom line is this: the debate over the value of human life is not simply another issue; it’s a foundational one. We as Christians need to be absolutely clear on this point. All moral and political issues are dependent on it and flow from it. With the Dobbs decision, we have a renewed opportunity to make our voice known and to vote for what is most important: the upholding of the value of all human life and its societal protection from conception to death. Although our nation’s human life crisis is at root a spiritual crisis that only God can remedy by new birth, Christians must continue to stand on this one issue since there is no more foundational issue than what we say about the inherent, created value of human life.^[11]

11. Stephen J. Wellum, “One-Issue Voting: A Red Herring, Not a Real Objection,” Christ Over All, 27 January 2023.

3. We now live in negative world.

Aaron Renn coined the terms positive world, neutral world, and negative world.^[12] Here is how he describes those terms:

12. Aaron M. Renn, “The Three Worlds of Evangelicalism,” First Things, February 2022; Aaron M. Renn, Life in the Negative World: Confronting Challenges in an Anti-Christian Culture (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2024).

• POSITIVE WORLD (1964–1994). Society at large retains a mostly positive view of Christianity. To be known as a good, churchgoing man or woman remains part of being an upstanding citizen in society. Publicly being a Christian enhances social status. Christian moral norms are still the basic moral norms of society, and violating them can lead to negative consequences.
• NEUTRAL WORLD (1994-2014). Society takes a neutral stance toward Christianity. Christianity no longer has privileged status, but nor is it disfavored. Being publicly known as a Christian has neither a positive nor a negative impact on social status. Christianity is one valid option among many within a pluralistic, multicultural public square. Christian moral norms retain some residual effect.
• NEGATIVE WORLD (2014-PRESENT). In this era, society has an overall negative view of Christianity. Being known as a Christian is a social negative, particularly in the higher status domains of society. Christian morality is expressly repudiated and now seen as a threat to the public good and new public moral order. Holding to Christian moral views, publicly affirming the teachings of the Bible, or violating the new secular moral order can lead to negative consequences.^[13]

13. Renn, Life in the Negative World, 6–7.

This change from positive world to neutral world to negative world is significant regarding how the political parties think about sexual ethics—especially abortion.

4. The Democratic Party now celebrates abortion as a central plank of their platform.

Joe Biden posted this on X on March 6:

President Biden is saying in big block letters, “We want to murder babies in the womb.”

Here’s what Darrell Harrison helpfully posted on X on March 8, 2024:

Here’s what Andrew Walker rightly posted on X:

In an article for WORLD Opinions in March 2024, Albert Mohler writes this truth:

Vice President Kamala Harris went to Minnesota last week in order to make history, the White House claimed. She made history, to be sure. She became the first U.S. president or vice president to visit an operational abortion facility. Harris’s move becomes the latest forward advance of the Culture of Death. Now, a facility that exterminates unborn human babies becomes a background for a campaign event and the foreground for making abortion central to the presidential campaign—and at every political level.

. . . Kamala Harris is a woman we can trust to worship unreservedly at the altar of abortion. While President Joe Biden is described as holding to some reticence about abortion rights, the reality is that Biden has assigned Harris the campaign responsibility of making abortion the winning issue for Democratic candidates in November. The party is even working to get abortion measures on the ballot in some states just to produce an electoral wave. The charade about Biden’s reticence on abortion is all an act. Biden is now the most pro-abortion president in American history. He wants it to be the winning issue for Democrats this cycle and he personally deputized Harris to run lead. . . .

Vice President Harris surely knows that her political future is tied to the re-election of President Biden. She also knows, even better than the rest of us, her chances of becoming president if Biden is re-elected. She intended to send a signal with her attention-getting visit to the abortion facility and her eager advocacy for abortion rights. She did send a signal. She and her party are dead-set on making abortion central to American culture. That’s why Kamala went to the death camp.

5. I don’t think voting for a Democratic candidate is a faithful option for a Christian.

Here is how I’d state my political judgment now:

I think it is extremely unwise and probably even sinful to vote for a pro-choice candidate (especially for president, congress, or governor) when there is another viable candidate who is pro-life.

A more difficult case is choosing between two pro-choice candidates. It’s not wrong to vote for the lesser of two evils in order to avoid greater evil.[14]

14. Cf. Ben R. Crenshaw, “Are Conservatives Getting Played by Trump on Abortion? A Wake Up Call about Trump and the 2024 Election,” American Reformer, 2 September 2024.

At this time, I think this leaves a Christian three main options:

1. Vote for a Republican candidate.
2. Vote for a third-party candidate. (I personally think this is wasting your vote.)
3. Don’t vote. (I personally think this is irresponsible.)

Given the Democratic party’s platform, I don’t think voting for a Democratic candidate is a faithful option for a Christian.

In conclusion, some paint the Republican and Democratic parties as morally equivalent, but they are not. While Christians may not like the alternatives, voting for a party that celebrates murder in the womb, transgenderism, and a host of other sexual deviancies is at best exceedingly unwise and at worst sinful. Christians live as dual citizens of an earthly nation and the heavenly kingdom. As we navigate these waters, we ought do so in humble reliance—and hope—and thus it is fitting to end in prayer:

Father, when we disagree with one another on complex political issues, would you please help us disagree in a way that pleases you? Give us courage to be faithfully countercultural and to represent you truthfully to non-Christians. Please give us wisdom to love and forbear when we disagree about disputable matters. Please unite us to accomplish the mission Christ gave the church. We ask this for the fame of your Name. Amen.

[Editor’s Note: This longform essay updates Jonathan Leeman and Andrew David Naselli, “Politics, Conscience, and the Church: Why Christians Passionately Disagree with One Another over Politics, Why They Must Agree to Disagree over Jagged-Line Political Issues, and How,” Themelios 45 (2020): 13–31.]