After publishing my February e-teaching, entitled Government Theft, I was cautioned by some readers to avoid wading into political issues. Yet quite a few others encouraged me with their feedback, reminding me that most of the pressing political issues of our day are fundamental moral issues. To avoid speaking about such issues purely because they are political is to avoid speaking about moral issues that matter greatly to God. And if moral issues matter to God they should also matter to those who pray every day, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Moreover, if those moral issues do truly matter to those who profess to be God’s people, they will act like it. If they have any power to do something that might help God’s will to be done on earth, they will do it.

I did my best in my February e-teaching to establish the fundamental evil of theft as it is clearly revealed in Scripture. No thieves will inherit eternal life, so genuine Christians do not steal, nor do they collaborate with thieves. For that reason, we cannot vote for political candidates (regardless of their political party) who are in favor of accumulating a national debt so immense that it will inevitably be passed on to our children and grandchildren, which amounts to stealing the future earnings of our own offspring. This is a fundamental moral issue. Politicians who ignore it are simply not worthy to hold office, and it is the responsibility of the electorate to vote such politicians out of office lest we share culpability for their sin. Let me say it more boldly: If we vote to put thieves in office or vote to keep them in office—thieves who would steal the future earnings of our children and grandchildren—we cast a vote for theft, endorsing and promoting what God hates and thus, by our actions, deny that we know Him.

When a new year begins, it seems like a natural time to make evaluations about the past year and plan changes for the new one, which many people do. Followers of Christ, of course, are evaluating their lives much more frequently than once every twelve months. Still, there is something special about the start of a new year. So as 2010 begins, I would like to suggest that we reflect on getting “back to the basics.” I’m speaking, in fact, of the most basic of the basics. If we focus on that one thing, our spiritual lives become much less complicated, and everything else falls into place. That most basic thing is, of course, loving God.

Below are seven short thoughts to prayerfully ponder about loving God. I recommend taking them slowly, one at a time, with some pause for reflection. Or better, focus on just one each day for the next seven days during your daily prayer time.

It’s Friday after prayers in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and worshippers are streaming from Al-Jafali Mosque to surround an area in the adjacent square that has been cordoned off by police. In the center of that square kneels a man with hands tied behind his back, flanked by an imam, a prison warden, and an executioner grasping a four-foot sword. The condemned man faces the victim’s family some yards away, from whom he begs forgiveness. Behind him, on the other side of the square, the prisoner’s family is weeping, also begging the victim’s family to forgive.

A government official reads the charges and then the verdict, while the kneeling man closes his eyes and begins to recite verses from the Qur’an. The executioner lifts his gleaming sword. The faint look away.