As I travel the country doing voter training, I’ve never heard more citizens describing this election as simply “a battle between good and evil.”

It expresses a sense, that even secular political commentators are mentioning more and more, that something spiritual is going on. We already know as Biblical believers that we do not fight against mere flesh and blood, but principalities and powers.

Yet today it seems like those evil spiritual forces don’t even want to disguise themselves anymore.

This should motivate more religious believers to vote.

Time will tell whether that will happen. Whether the tens of millions of believers who are not registered will register before the voter registration deadlines kick in, or the tens of millions of registered believers who don’t vote will come out and vote this time, remains to be seen.

Because of the unique dynamics in this election, I do believe we will see historic, record-breaking levels of turnout.

One thing, however, that keeps some believers from voting is that because they are so spiritually sensitive, so keenly aware of the difference between virtue and vice, they feel that neither candidate is acceptable.

They want to stay pure, and above the fray. They feel that voting for a candidate with whom they disagree morally makes them complicit in immorality.

But Scripture gives us a different take.

Yes, it is true that we may never choose evil. When I hear people talk about “choosing the lesser of two evils,” I make the distinction that it is not choosing evil, but rather choosing to limit evil, and that choice is a good.

Choosing a candidate doesn’t mean we agree with him or her on everything. It is not a declaration of moral purity. It’s a strategic choice of how to advance good and reduce harm.

It’s similar to the parable of the weeds and the wheat in Matthew 13. Jesus urges the disciples to have a certain level of tolerance that, in this world, the weeds and wheat grow together. Only in the final judgment will good and evil be totally separated.

This is not permission to choose evil. After all, it was not the disciples that sowed the weeds; an “enemy’s hand” did so, and we can have no part of that.

But Jesus said there’s a danger in being too eager to clean everything up while we’re still in this world.

And that’s true with voting. If we’re too focused on the flaws of a candidate (and what candidate doesn’t have them?), we risk throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Aren’t all our choices in life between the more and the less imperfect, whether it’s candidates, jobs, restaurants or vacation destinations? How many choices are between the bad and the perfect?

The bottom line is that sitting out an election does not remove our responsibility for the outcome. We are responsible for the consequences of our choices. The choice to do nothing is still a choice, and if we fail to vote for the better candidate, we have helped the worse one.

Jesus teaches, as we see in the parable of the talents in Matthew 25, that we will not only be judged on our activity, but on our inactivity.

Let’s make sure we have a plan to vote, and then choose wisely, courageously and biblically!

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