THE ELECTION THAT KILLED

In May of 1902, the election season was heating up on the Caribbean island of Martinique. So was the island volcano Mount Pelée. As the volcano belched smoke and fire, the citizens of Saint-Pierre, at the foot of the volcano, regarded it with mounting concern. The governor of Martinique however, was more worried about the upcoming election than he was about the volcano.

Governor Louis Mouttet feared that a panic would hurt the candidates of the ruling Progressive Party. So he directed the editor of the local paper to downplay the danger of an eruption. He set up roadblocks to prevent people from leaving the city. He suppressed telegrams warning of the danger. And in a grand gesture, he paid a visit to Saint-Pierre three days before the election to assure everyone that things were just fine.

The following morning. at 8 A.M. Pelée erupted. The blast of superheat ash killed the governor and thirty thousand others in less than two minutes. There were only two survivors (Source: Rick Evans The Greatest Stories Never Told).

It seemed destruction didn’t care what party was ruling.

Politics is always a “hot” issue. Let me give you a warning. It doesn’t matter what side of the aisle you fall, what party you back or what policy you support, ultimately our citizenship is in heaven (Philippian 3:20). Our friends and neighbors are in a greater danger than just electing the wrong guy; they are in danger of hell. We need to make sure we don’t get so caught up in playing politics that we don’t forget to sound the warning call.

Lots of folks don’t mind posting on Facebook or knocking doors in town to get their candidate elected yet would hesitate to say anything about the fate of someone's soul. What does it profit a man if gets a majority in the legislature or controls the Supreme Court, yet loses his soul?

Destruction is coming. It will rain down fire on everyman regardless of party affiliation. Are we prepared? Have we given warning to other? Are we making roadblocks to people in coming to know Christ? Do we tell everyone it will all be fine if we vote this way and ignore that something greater than the election is at stake, our souls?

Comments

I Know All Those Words, But That Sentence Makes No Sense To Me

Let’s say you travel back in time six hundred years or so. Luckily, you happen across a fellow that speaks English. Upon hearing your tale, he describes you as nice, smart, and handsome. Wouldn’t you feel good? You shouldn’t. As Sol Steinmetz in his book, Semantics Antics , explains; Nice originally meant someone who was foolish, ignorant, senseless, or absurd (middle English 1300). Smart for the first 300 years of its use meant causing pain, sharp, cutting, or severe, a sense that survives in the idiom "smart as a whip.” Handsome wasn’t complimentary. When coined around 1425, it just meant easily handled; it didn’t have its current positive connotation until 1590. You might think he said you were a kind, intelligent, good looking bloke, when in reality he said you were a foolish pain easily dealt with. Words have an annoying habit of changing meaning over time in the same language and it becomes even more compli...

Master Your Self

In a contest for the toughest president of the United States, it would be hard to go against Theodore Roosevelt. He was known for his “manly” pursuits hunting big game, climbing the Matterhorn, participating in boxing match while president. (These weren’t play fights, he lost the vision on one eye because of them!) Once before he was about to give a speech an assassin shot him in the chest. Roosevelt refused to go to a hospital and insisted on giving his speech, still wearing his blood-soaked shirt! Teddy might have become tough but he wasn’t born that way. He was a sickly child that suffered from severe asthma that almost proved fatal. As was a young boy, doctors discovered that he had a weak heart, and advised him to get a desk job and not strain himself. He was homeschooled because of his many illnesses and spent most of his time indoors. But then as a teen his father, whom Teddy Roosevelt revered, told his son, “ ...

Until Midnight

In Acts 20, there is the tragicomic event surrounding a young man by the name of Eutychus. He did what a lot of folks before and after him did, he fell asleep during a sermon. Unfortunately, he was setting in in the third story window at the time. So instead of nodding off and hitting the pew in front of him, he fell to his death. The good news was the apostle Paul was delivering the sermon and had the ability to bring him back. I don’t know, however, if we can judge Eutychus too harshly. The sermon had gone on till midnight. Paul wouldn’t finish it up till daybreak. That’s a long lesson. I know some folks that might want to jump out of a window if I had a lesson that long, yet these Christians wanted to be there to hear Paul. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pushing for all night sermons but I think we might need to adopt these folks' dedication. They knew that Paul was only in town for a limited time only and they were determined to ...

Ecclesiastes 12:10

Search This Blog