Christian voting

I had a conversation the other day about the morality of voting as a Christian. My question was about voting for or against gay marriage rights.

From what I have seen, there seems to be one dominant view in Christian society about voting on gay rights. The idea is that voting to allow gay marriage will result in the destruction of the "family unit" and a consequential degradation of the moral fabric of society at large. Marriage, they argue, is an institution under God, and allowing gays to enter into the covenant of marriage desecrates that covenant to the point of meaninglessness.

On the surface, their logic seems to make sense. Allowing same sex marriages would certainly change the very visible definition of marriage in the United States from man-woman to human-human.

Still, when I consider the incredibly high rates of divorce and marital infidelity, I have to wonder if our current idea of marriage is really what was planned all along. Is divorce itself not a desecration of the covenant of marriage? Last time I checked the rate of Christian divorces was about the same as the rate for non-Christians. What about marriages between non-Christians? People who do not believe in God to get married every day -- is this not a desecration of equal magnitude and importance?

My idea is that marriage by the state and marriage by the church are two completely different things. Marriage by the state is a legal covenant, while marriage in the Church adds another layer -- a spiritual covenant. For some reason, people in the Church seem to believe that allowing gays to have a union defined as "marriage" will take away from what they have. In my mind, it doesn't matter if it's called the same thing -- it's obvious enough to me that the spiritual covenant of marriage in the church is something completely separate from anything the state can establish.

Do I think gays should be married by the Church? Nope. In my view, marriage in the Church should be the pairing up of two Christians (i.e., people who have given over control of their lives to Christ). Although I think sinners are married in legitimate Biblical marriages everyday in the Church (because we all DO sin), I think in this circumstance the Church would be condoning this sin. Perhaps just as importantly, it would also be putting two people in a position where sin is easier, instead of helping to lead these people to find freedom from this sin. Sin is not o.k., not in any form. Although the Church should love and accept you with your sin, it should never wink at it or suggest it doesn't matter.

So, in sum, marriage in the Church is wholly separate from marriage by the state, and gay marriage in the Church should not be allowed. Gay marriage is really no threat to the institution of marriage in the Church.

So if the answer is not a definite “vote no”, does that mean it should be “vote yes”? I will close with a question, which will perhaps be the subject of future postings.

Does voting to confine the rights of others to fit within the Biblical view of morality line up the Christian mission?