President Me
The most important vote you cast is not a vote you cast around Election Day; it is the vote you cast every day as you go about your life as a citizen.
The two questions that should mean the most to each one of us are:
How am I presiding for my own life?
How am I presiding for my family, friends, and neighbors?
How am I doing as a president?
Am I worthy of a vote of affirmation and confidence from the people and places in my own life?
I think presidential politics often becomes a distraction and an excuse.
We can let presidential politics distract us from the work we need to be doing for ourselves and for the people and places in our lives. It is so easy to be put off doing what we need to do while we put on a show about how a person in Washington, D.C., is not doing what he should be doing.
Frankly, politics may be one area where Christians feel like they can ignore their Christ’s teaching about looking at “the speck” in someone else’s eye (Gospel of Matthew 7:3). I may be failing to make good choices or to serve my community to the best of my ability, but I can excuse all of that while I’m making a fuss about someone far off in the capital.
Over the months leading to this national election, I have devoted most of my thoughts to matters close to home. For every minute that I invest in critical thought about the candidates and the issues, I’m devoting five or ten minutes to critical thought about me and my own circle of influence and service. For every question about electing someone better, I’m asking myself five questions about how I can do better for the people and places in my life.
What does my God expect of me?
What do I expect of myself?
What should my family, friends, and neighbors be able to expect of me?
What should people who entrust me with leadership expect of me?
Asking questions like these is leading me to some real changes.
What would happen if you asked yourself the same questions? What would happen if you had to “campaign” to preside in your own life? Would you be a better candidate? Would you be a better president of you? Of the circles where you serve?
This may seem like a way to “punt” on national and state elections; it’s not.
It’s a different way of seeing those elections and thinking about them.
First, no matter who wins the “big” elections, I know that it doesn’t change who I need to be and what I need to do. I have a far greater impact and influence on the people and places around me than the man we elect to be President. I can’t waste energy and time on the President when I need to devote that energy and time to the people around me.
Second, it changes my relationship with the candidates. I’m aware of who I am, what I am about, and my responsibilities toward the people and places in my life. I can hold candidates to the same expectations and standards to which I hold myself. I’m hiring people to do a job–a job I am doing myself on a smaller scale. I can use the expectations and standards I set for myself to decide who is fit to do the job of representing me. I need someone in Lansing or Washington who is going to be a public servant the way I am a public servant here in Clawson, Michigan, and Detroit.
Third, I can keep the right perspective. National politics are divisive, but I don’t think they reflect the reality of life among the people themselves. When you zoom out the lens on our nation, we look divided; but when you zoom in the reality “on the ground” is different. On my street in Clawson, Michigan, I have neighbors with Biden signs on their lawns and neighbors with Trump signs on their lawns. Yet, we are friendly, helpful, and neighborly with each other. We have so much in common and we take care of each other. The people on my street show me what is real and true about America. Whatever national media or partisans want me to believe about “the other side” just doesn’t add up with what I know to be true.
These three ways of seeing and thinking about elections help me decide who to hire for government jobs like President. I will hire people who see and understand these three things.
Sometimes, I may feel like both choices for an office are not up to my standards. But even when that happens, the most important thing is to ask if I’m up to those standards.
Because, no matter how things turn out on November 3, the most important President will still be President Me.