Yesterday I posted an essay asking Christians who might be tempted to vote for Donald Trump in the November presidential elections one simple question: where is the line? I thought I’d follow that up with some links to related articles.

The two most important ones are these by David French:

Will Somebody Please Hate My Enemies for Me?

Remember, the Christian command to love your enemies came from a savior who was an entirely innocent man about to be executed by his enemies, yet he was also dying for them at the same time. When the Apostle Paul told first-century Christians to be “kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil,” he was speaking to an early church that wasn’t enduring tweetings, it was facing beatings. It was facing death from the leaders of an evil regime. Those were the enemies Christians were to love. 

Love isn’t optional, not even when lives are on the line.

How, Then, Should Christians Vote?

If the world’s wealthiest and and most powerful collection of Christians are supine before their political masters in the United States, marching to the beat of secular drummers (even if allegedly “holding their noses” all the while) then I fear the message that sends is that we do not have faith that God’s providence governs the nations. We cannot and must not “put our trust in princes.” There is no such thing as a “binary choice.” We can choose not to yield to the spirit of the times.

In his Notes on Christianity Today’s Impeachment Editorial Jake Meador, writes in a similar vein to French.

We must be faithful to God’s call not only in the political ends we pursue, but in the means by which we pursue them. That this makes our work far more difficult is, perhaps, precisely the point: It sanctifies us as we pursue lines of work that could, necessarily, involve the acquisition of great power and influence. It also should put to death any number of sins that might tempt us as we approach the work of politics and government. By insisting that the Lord’s Work must be done in the Lord’s Way we open ourselves up to the possibility of martyrdom, but that is simply to say that the cost of discipleship applied to politics is the same as the cost of discipleship applied to everything else: it is a call to die. It is a call to accept a defeat so complete that the only consolation available to us when we experience it is the possibility of aid from outside the world—an aid which, so the Scriptures tell us, is precisely what we have been given.

Among many concerning things are articles with headlines like this: Where Christian evangelicals worship Trump more than Jesus – key voters stay loyal to president and you feel sure they’re not really overplaying it.

In the end Ross Douthat is right but I wonder, what if no one can: The Only Way to Remove Trump

If you disagree on politics then there’s hope: Researchers Have Found a Way to Disagree Productively About Politics And Religion although they’re probably wrong.

And if you’re tired of politics, try prayer.