The October Surprise

October Surprise:

How to Get the Right Man in Office during Election Time

by Erik Magnusson

Member of Belmont Baptist Church of Conyers, Georgia

It seems that nobody cares who wins the elections anymore, until it gets down to the last month or two before the vote. Then, everyone gets nervous, and everyone wants to pray. Unfortunately, by that time, the good candidates have already been weeded out in the primaries, and you are often left with a choice between "the lesser of two evils."

Even so, a mediocre candidate is always better than a bad candidate, so there is no reason why we should not continue to pray. We should pray during the entire Election Season, if not all year long, every year, so that the better candidate of the two, will win, or rather, so that the candidates who will do more harm than good, will somehow be exposed for who they are, and as a result, the public will choose the better of the two.

We should never forget that election time is not only for the office of President, but for Governors, Representatives, Senators, City Councilmen, County Commissioners, Mayors, and hundreds of other officials throughout the country, all of whom will affect different aspects of our lives, sooner or later, or at least, our society. Moreover, most of these will appoint people to serve in positions that will also, in turn, affect our lives in the same way. The next President, for example, will appoint a replacement for every Supreme Court Justice that retires during his term in office, and several of such are due to retire shortly. Your freedom of speech, therefore, is always at stake during Election Time at any level, your right to bear arms, your freedom of religious expression, and--as liberal candidate go out of their way to give an ever-increasing role to the United Nations for the government of our country--perhaps even your own nation's sovereignty is at stake, now more than ever. Keep in mind that you will likely become aware of only half of the decisions that your elected official will make; the other half will be done behind closed doors; some will be written into law now, but only to take effect in ten years, when it is far too late to do anything about them.

Fortunately there is a secret formula for prayer that appears in the Bible, whereby we are guaranteed that God will move the hearts of the people to put the right man into office now, and every time that we follow the conditions laid forth in that promise. It is a highly-misunderstood promise, and as a result, everyone wants to quote it, but nobody knows just how to put it into practice. The good news is that, if you are one of those people, today is the day that you will likely understand that promise for the first time in your life. Consequently, you will be able to put it into practice, and if you do, God Himself, promises that you will see results.

It all has to do with the promise of God that says this:

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." (2 Chr 7.14)

Cognizant of the fact that most of us are already tired and weary of hearing this passage quoted, I promise to show you something entirely new about it, and to leave the rest alone. I would like to call your attention to only one thing in this passage today, and that is the tiny little phrase, "humble themselves."

Everybody knows what "humbling" is, in the usual sense, so the last thing that we need is a reminder for the obvious. Moreover, we think we know what it means, and we think we have put it into practice, and yet, all the while, we do not seem to see any results in our society, so we are left believing that it is just one of those promises that we will never understand.

However, I would like to point out that, in this context, the term "humble themselves" is not used in the usual sense. It is not referring to an attitude, but rather to an action; it is not speaking of how we should feel, but of what we should do; it is not speaking of humility as a character quality, but of the practice of afflicting one's own flesh, to the point that our spirit can pray in a more effective way, so that we can, in turn, see better answers to prayer. In short, the phrase is speaking of good, old-fashioned fasting. The following Biblical passages help prove the point.