I was born in 1977 under the burgeoning Cuomo dynasty in New York State. When Mario took office in 1983, my Grammy owned a hair salon in Colonie Center called “Flahs” and she regularly did hair of his wife, Matilda. It was a heady brush with fame for a 9-year old Alicia whose only significant contact with the outside world was through the hitchhikers we would pick up on the side of the road. My Grammy loved the Cuomos and attended their swanky parties and voted Democrat across the board. She drove a Camaro, had an endless tan and regularly wore hot pants to my Christmas concerts. She was so rock and roll.
Fast forward around 35 years and a bunch of us suffered and died under Andrew Cuomo’s nefarious mismanagement of COVID-19 in New York state and after he slinked away, Kathy Hochul swooped in to kill even more New Yorkers via her confounding hatred of unborn people.
We righteous Christians love to pontificate against the gubernatorial mobsters running our state, but what the heck are we actually doing about it? We didn’t vote Lee Zeldin into office when we had the chance. (Fun fact: Your church’s non-profit status is coming up on Hochul’s hit list.)
Enough Christians aren’t voting, that’s obvious. In terms of headcount, conservatives voters once far outweighed the liberals in New York State- did you know that?! Did you know that “in 2014, less than one-third of the state’s registered voters cast ballots in the governor’s race“?!
TWO-THIRDS didn’t even show up. But downstaters are heading up our way and they vote in larger numbers, they’re richer and willing to fight to win, so they do win and here we are crying about how our governor and his flying monkeys don’t represent us. Well, they do, actually.
Kathy Hochul represents us. She represents our failure to make any substantive changes via the voting process and the failure to send a clear message about what we will and won’t tolerate. You know who didn’t have a vote? Jesus. Jesus and all those Jews held under the thumb of Rome never voted for anyone. They were invaded, sacked and ruled, whether they liked it or not. Taxed. Punished. Lorded over. All at the whim of their Hochul Caesar, a man who thought of himself as a god, was a murderer and enslaved millions of people. Sound like anyone you know?
In Matthew 22, the Pharisees asked this famous question, “Do you think it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” Jesus gave this enigmatic reply, “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
Here is the gist of what was going on:
- You know your income taxes are funding abortion.
- You know your property taxes are the highest in the United States and are funding deviant sexual education for your 5 year old.
- You know you’re paying for sanctuary cities and welfare for scammers and crack heads and that your Constitutional rights are constantly violated.
- You know that your money is paying for things you are morally, ethically and religiously against
So, “Do you think it is lawful to pay taxes to Hochul Caesar or not?”
The answer is this: It doesn’t matter now. We voted for this or didn’t even show up at the polls to vote against it. So yes you need to render unto Hochul Caesar and she just passed a budget that will BLOW YOUR MIND (and your wallet) with greater taxation and spending. If we’re against it, we need to take time off work, get out of bed, drag our kids over, inconvenience ourselves and vote against it.
Educate yourself on what these candidates stand for and vote/don’t vote for them. IT MATTERS. We’ve voted ourselves into a corner by our failure to speak with our vote. Politicians don’t read letters, and aren’t swayed by picket signs. I promise. They speak the language of voting. Don’t complain about what you allow.
In Romans 13:1-7 Paul wrote about Christians and civil authority, but what many interpret as “obey” is more accurately stated as “submit” – submission and obedience are not the same thing. Paul, Peter and and many others consistently disobeyed laws that violated God’s commands, yet they submitted to the hands of the law when facing punishment for their actions. The difference matters.
As Christians, the law of the land doesn’t govern our morality. God does. Remember, the Holocaust was legal. So were slavery and segregation. So is abortion. What if there was a one-child law in America like there is in China? Would you obey and get an abortion? VOTE. If you’re truly tired of it, you have the power to make it go away.
As for Kathy Hochul, the champion of the LEFT, you should pray for her (1 Timothy 2:2). Not a preachy-pray rant to the heavens. Pray for her and his family, as you should for our president, with a genuine heart. God loves them as much as He loves you and they have way more power than you’ll ever have so PRAY – AND THEN FOR THE LOVE OF GOD – V.O.T.E.
