I wish I had a nickel for everyone that I have heard say "I don't know who I am going to vote for this year," "I'm just not going to vote," or, "I'm not going to vote on principle."

Before you turn me off, I will admit, I said it too. In full disclosure, I financially supported another candidate during the primaries and voted for yet a different candidate in the California primary - my first choice was already out. However, I want to point out the full gravity of this situation. Before you stop reading and move on to the next most interesting post in your news feed, I ask that you read forward with a prayerful perspective and an open heart.

I have heard it said more than a few times, "We don't have to choose between the lesser of two evils." This is true. We don't. However, we must choose the platform and issues that do have the most viability and promise for maintaining an environment conducive to religious liberty for the sake of the Gospel.

Contending for the faith means that we understand how public policy is shaped and how public policy impacts our society.

Today I was reading an article about just how awful is Donald Trump's character. I thought, "Yes, but what's the alternative?" This is not to cower to the lesser of two evils, but to understand that contending for the faith is what is most important. Contending for the faith means that we understand how public policy is shaped and how public policy impacts our society.Policy positions are worth your vote and policy positions are not the lesser of two evils.

So, as believers, what are we to do? Are we to vote for a candidate who has less than perfect morals? What about a candidate that said horribly negative things towards women, who perhaps has done horrible things to women without their consent? What about voting for a candidate who has spent most of her public life scheming to deceive the voters she serves for personal gain? What if she is a chronic liar who lacks the moral integrity to be the commander-in-chief?

Let's take a very brief look at our options. There are five candidates for whom you can vote come November.

Jill Stein (G),

Gary Johnson (L),

Evan McMullen (I),

Hillary Clinton (D),

and Donald Trump (R).

Please understand, there are no other options. There is not a 6th candidate yet to be identified and, contrary to popular opinion, you cannot simply write in just anyone you would like to have a shot at the Oval Office. So my presupposition is that if you are wondering for whom you will vote for in November, you are referring to these choices and only these choices. If not, you should not vote because you are out of touch with what is going on and perhaps a detriment to the outcome of the election anyway.

If you noticed, there are only 2 candidates participating in the debates. This is because the Commission on Presidential Debates has a standard that you must be a viable candidate to participate. In other words, the 3rd party and independent candidates are not going to win and everyone knows it.

Now to the issues and policy positions, of which there are MANY to consider and MANY that should convince you to vote if you sincerely look at the biblical position on those issues. However, out of all of them and including the right-to-life, I implore you, my brother or sister in Christ, to consider even just one along with its implications for all other issues and more.

Several days ago I was perusing my RSS feeds and come across an article that has been nagging at me ever since. I thought many times that I should share this but thought, "Eh. Let people figure it out on their own, after all, what can I do." But after putting it off, I have felt more and more guilty for not sharing this perspective. Especially since now we know that the Clinton campaign has spoken so negatively about faith calling those of faith "backwards thinkers," among other things. The HRC campaign has even discussed an attempt to touch off a revolt within the Catholic church to change the views of the church on issues like the right-to-life. These emails affirms that HRC will be a continuation of the Obama administration in regard to religious liberty.

The article to which I am referring is titled, "Team Obama launches a shocking broadside against religious faith," written by Rabbi Abraham Cooper and published September 23, 2016 by FoxNews.com. This article records a very little known reality of what will become the status quo of religious liberty under another Clinton presidency. She has said that she will be Barack Obama's 3rd term and has made her agenda of progressivism no secret. So it's safe to say that she will appoint a cabinet, department heads, and judges along the lines of Obama, or even more progressive.

The current chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is Martin Castro, an Obama appointee. On September 7th, Castro took it upon himself to decide on behalf of the entire nation that the Constitution is no longer adequate for our modern progressive culture. This is not sensationalism. In a letter he penned to the president, vice president, and speaker of the house, Castro stated that "Religious exemptions to the protections of civil rights based upon the classifications such as race, color, national origin, sex, and gender identity, when they are permissible, significantly infringe upon these civil rights." In other words, Martin Castro, the chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has just answered the question all Christians have been asking lately about the state of religious freedom in the United States. Religious liberty is dangerous and should be limited. Obviously, there is no gray area in scripture regarding the sanctity of ALL life; all sizes, colors, and shapes, born, or unborn are precious in the sight of God. This is not a race or body type issue. However, Martin Castro believes that your faith must be censored in this culture to allow for the progressive agenda.

Religious discrimination is currently practiced in our culture, Sweet Cakes my Melissa officially announced their closure a few weeks ago. Now religious discrimination has been proposed as rule-of-law.

Let's look at the logical end of this position. If you believe the biblical position on so many social issues, issues like same sex marriage, gender identity, and the right-to-life, then under a Clinton administration the government's position on these issues would supersede your right to believe the Word of God. What does this look like in practice? It looks like the government mandating that Christian ministers must perform marriage ceremonies even if it violates their beliefs or face charges. It looks like your tax dollars will continue to be used to fund abortions that end the lives of so many unborn babies regardless of your faith-based conviction. It looks like the government mandating that even private Christian schools fall under the state mandated curriculum that contradicts the teachings of scripture. Ultimately, it looks like the Word of God, removed from our schools since 1962, will now be removed from your hands because others are in need of protection from it. You must obey the government, or pay the price. For Sweet Cakes the price was their livelihood and a measly $135,000.

Christians have not yet seen persecution in the United States. If HRC is elected, we "domesticated Christians" may begin to realize the meaning of the term.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The famous words stated in our great nation's Declaration of Independence.

Are we actually all created equal, though? What are the unalienable rights that all men are to receive? Does the unalienable right to life supersede another's right to liberty and happiness? How do these rights relate to one another and which is primary?

These are the questions our nation will answer when they visit the polls in November. They will answer the questions as they vote for candidates who will appoint perhaps hundreds of judges over the next 4 years.

HRC Does Not Believe in Constitutional Protection for the Unborn

Interviewed by Chuck Todd on MSNBC News, Hillary Clinton my not have spoken to the moment that life begins. However, she did profess her belief that unborn humans do not have Constitutional rights. Here is the transcript from MSNBC's website (the bold and underlines are mine and my comments are enumerated below according to the number in brackets). I include this portion of the interview in it's entirety so that you can see the context.

CHUCK TODD:

When or if--

HILLARY CLINTON:

So I've had the same position for many years.

CHUCK TODD:

When, or if, does an unborn child have constitutional rights?

HILLARY CLINTON:

Well, under our laws currently, that is not something that exists. The unborn person doesn't have constitutional rights.[1] Now, that doesn't mean that we don't do everything we possibly can, in the vast majority of instances to, you know, help a mother who is carrying a child and wants to make sure that child will be healthy, to have appropriate medical support.

It doesn't mean that you don't do everything possible to try to fulfill your obligations. But it does not include sacrificing the woman's right to make decisions.[2] And I think that's an important distinction, that under Roe v. Wade we've had enshrined under our Constitution.

CHUCK TODD:

You had said you think there is room for some restrictions. So is it fair to say that women don't always have a full right to choose?

HILLARY CLINTON:

Well, under Roe v. Wade that is the law. And as I said, I support the reasoning and the outcome in Roe v. Wade. [3] So in the third trimester of pregnancy, there is room for looking at the life and the health of the mother. Now, most people, not all Republicans, not all conservatives even agree with the life of the mother. But most do.

Where the distinction comes in is the health of the mother. [4] And when you have candidates running for president who say that there should be no exceptions, not for rape, not for incest, not for health, then I think you've gotten pretty extreme. And my view has always been this is a choice. It is not a mandate.

You know, I have traveled all over the world. I have seen what happens when governments make these decisions, whether it was forced sterilization, forced abortion in China, or force childbearing in communist Romania. So I don't think that we should be allowing the government to make decisions that really properly belong to the individual.

The entire transcript is located here.

[1]HRC defers the answer of this question to "the law". On the face of her comments it appears as though HRC is not actually answering this question from her personal position, but rather stating what "the law" grants to unborn people in regard to Constitutional protection. Who can fault her if this is the position of "the law"? This must not be her position, huh??? Oh, ok. "The law" does not give unborn persons Constitutional protection. Then she states, "The unborn person has no rights." This is the statement she made.

[2] HRC skirts the line in order to play all necessary angles on this question. She mentions that she wants to provide obligatory health care to a mother who chooses to carry her baby to full time and give life, but that this is not a right the unborn possesses that would supersede the the choice of the mother to terminate the life of the child.

[3] Here is where HRC's first comment [1] is truly fleshed out for us. So what "law" is it that removes Constitutional protection from the unborn? It's the case law established by Roe v. Wade. Here HRC unequivocally states that THIS (Roe v. Wade) "is the law" then vows allegiance to this "law" once again as she did in the second presidential debate.

[4] And finally, we discuss "restrictions," a topic all right leaning voters want to hear. And hear it many of them do. The problem is they do not hear what restrictions to which HRC holds. You think this is referring to restrictions on trimester limits, or restrictions on abortion in the case of gender selection, perhaps. Maybe she is referring to restrictions on babies who were born but managed to survive the attempt to end their lives, or restriction to protect an unborn baby when she just might have some sort of abnormality.

NO! She is not referring to any of these restrictions. She is referring to restrictions in regard to the health of the mother. Keep in mind, from a conservative the terminology used in regard to the health of the mother is not "restriction" but "exception." HRC tries to lump right-to-life conservatives in with her on this point by throwing the term "exception" out there. Some may buy into this. However, the debate on the right is whether or not n abortion should have an exception when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

HRC, on the other hand, states "in the third trimester of pregnancy, there is room for looking at the life and health of the mother." This should send red flags and alarm to all who love the Constitution. What she is saying is that there could be room to restrict abortion, or refuse the procedure, to women in the third trimester when the mother's health could be at risk for having the procedure.

So when does life begin?

If Constitutional protections are not afforded to the unborn, then by default, they are not human, with unalienable rights as the Declaration of Independence asserts and the Constitution provides. Therefore there is no conflict between life and liberty for those who wish to sleep at night.

However, the TRUTH of the matter is that LIFE BEGINS BEFORE CONCEPTION.

Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Psalm 139:16 (ESV)

God knit each one of us together with a plan and a calling. He established our days before we ever saw them. His plan includes us before we took our first breath. God is omniscient and knew us before we came to be and loved us before we were conceived. We were, in fact, endowed by our Creator with the right to experience His plan and purpose.

Contending for the Unborn

This fall, when you and I cast our ballots, we will not just be voting for a candidate. We will be voting FOR or AGAINST the Constitutional protection of the least of these.

We will be exercising our influence to either 1) provide for the protection of the unborn for years to come in the court rooms across our nation, or 2) we will waste our voice and vote by choosing to "prove a point", or 3) perhaps we may even complacently provide for the further provision of the invasion on the womb of the unborn.

Unalienable rights? Life must come before liberty.