Election Over! Now What?

It’s Sunday evening as I compose this.  It seems like something important is supposed to happen in a couple of days.  Oh, now I remember.  We are electing a president. 

I can’t wait for Wednesday!  Certainly the outcome of the elections will be important.  But I think I may be most excited about television with no campaign ads.  Have you seen the viral video with the little girl crying because she is tired of Bronco Bama and Mitt Romney?  I’m with her.  By the time you are reading this in the newspaper or online, the decision will have been made unless we have a repeat of 2000.  Boy, I’ll bet anyone named Chad is really hoping to avoid those hanging jokes.

So how much will our lives change now that we know who will be our president for the next four years?  I suspect life will change much less than we imagine.  While there are vast differences between the candidates, neither brings to the Oval Office a magic wand that will solve unemployment, health care, the national debt, or what’s wrong with the Dallas Cowboys.  Certainly many of us are praying for a renewal of the Judeo-Christian values on which our country was founded, but real change requires more than election cycle promises.  It is easy to change personnel, but unless the system changes, the best personnel can hope for is to have a measure of influence.

So, here’s a deeper question for those of us who are Christ-followers.  If our lives really do matter to God, what do we do now that the presidential election is over? 

 "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'   This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'   All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." (Matthew 22:36-40) 

No election loopholes here. 

Jesus came and told his disciples, "I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age."  (Matthew 28:18-20) 

Not here either. 

Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. (Romans 12:2) 

Seeing a pattern yet? 

Neither a change in personnel nor a change in system changes our mission.  So let’s pray for our president and our nation and get back to the business of living lives that make God proud.  

His office is, after all, permanently and eternally filled.