Is it a sin to vote for Obama and the democrats?

Click HERE for a great article on this subject!

Note: We (Youths For Christ and America) are not responsible for anything written on the site listed above as we do not have any affiliation with this organization. We do, however, consider this article to be both helpful and relevant. We understand that some of you may support Barack Hussein Obama and his views. If so, please know we are not forcing our opinions on you, but rather stating relevant facts. Thus, we encourage you to read the article with an open mind and use your God-given powers of logic to form your own thoughtful, educated opinions.

We know you have thoughts on this matter, so we encourage you to share & discuss them with us below.

-Chandler Albers

Government welfare vs. Christian Charity

by Jody Sparks

In our country, a growing number of people are on Government welfare. Some got laid off and can’t find another job, although they are doing their best. Others, however,  either never worked, so that they could get on welfare, or quit working and now rely on Government funding so they don’t have to keep on looking for work and provide for themselves.

Welfare is a system that was set up, so that when a person got fired, they could have something to fall back on when they ran out of money between jobs. It was never meant as a permanent life style, but it is being lived like one. I went to school with many kids who never planned on going to college because they knew that as soon as they were old enough, they could just get on welfare. They were raised on this mentality, and will most likely pass this lazy life style down to their children too. This is destructive to the economy.

The Government is taking money from hard earned Americans, and giving that money on to people who refuse to work. There are over 100 million people on welfare today! It is a grossly huge number! When I first saw how many people were relying on the work of others to provide for them, I was shocked, and thought that it was a fluke, or a joke.

But sadly, this terrifying number is true. Over 100 MILLION people are on welfare today! America has tried things like this before, and if we were to look back at our history, we would see that America is on a downward spiral.

In the early 1600’s there was a settlement called Jamestown. They tried this type of government, and it failed miserably. The people of Jamestown pooled their food together in a central place, and each person was to contribute to the pile. Each person was only allowed to take a certain amount of food out, and when everyone was working, it appeared to work just fine. No one was getting more food than anyone else, everyone was equal, and no one went hungry. There was plenty of food in the area, but many people starved and died!

You see, a few people stopped working. A few stopped planting, stopped growing, and stopped harvesting. They just took from the pile of food that everyone else was contributing to. More people saw that the few weren’t working anymore and followed suit. This continued, until even the hard working people, the most honest, and diligent people there, were starving because they had to contribute all of their food to the common pool, and divide it up. Eventually enough people weren’t working to completely ruin the colony. The little food that was being added, was nowhere near enough to provide for everyone there, and the people refused to start working again.

Something similar is happening today. As more and more people stop working, and start relying on others to provide for them, the country is feeling the effects. The economy is in a recession, and those people who had enough money from working, suddenly don’t have enough to feed themselves or their families because they are having to support others as well. Those who were middle class, are more and more becoming lower class when it comes to money. As more and more people take advantage of our failing economy, it falls faster and faster.

Not only is the welfare system a bad idea when it comes to the economy, and government, it is also unscriptural.

In 2 Thessalonians 3:10 it says “For even when we were with you, this we commanded you: that if any would not work, neither should he eat.”

This is very clear. If a man is not willing to provide for himself, then he should not eat. The Bible is clear on it’s support for self reliance.

Mark 10:7 says “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife,”

This verse does have to do with marriage, but notice that it says that a man shall leave his father and mother and be with his wife. Not bring his wife to his parents so that mommy and daddy can take care of them. We need to behave like adults in this country and work for ourselves instead of relying on others to give us our food. There is nothing wrong with being down on your luck and not being able to find a job to support yourself as long as you are still trying to find work to do. But when you stop looking for a job, when you give up looking for ways to be self sustaining, then you are in the wrong. If you are unwilling to work, you should be just as unwilling to eat.

Voting Smart

by Neil

Voting is one of the great privileges of American citizenship. It gives we the people the a large degree of control in our government through the selection of government officials, and sometimes even the implementation of specific policies. This ability is essential to the maintenance of a free society, as it helps to ensure that rogue politicians cannot seize power and wreak havoc at will. However, for the system work in this way, the people must be educated in the concepts and philosophies of freedom and government. And above all, the people must vote!

As Christians, we are required by God to use our talents and abilities to His glory (Matthew 25:14-30; James 4:17). As Americans, we have the ability through the voting process to steer our country toward Godly principles, as well as the responsibility as citizens to maintain a government which follows the Constitution. Thus, the conclusion is obvious: Christians in America are obligated to vote! It’s that simple, if you are able to vote, it is your solemn responsibility to exercise that right!

However, it is just as important to be educated about the issues and the candidates. After all, voting won’t do any good, and might actually cause harm, if the voters don’t know what they are doing. Now I’m not saying that we all have to be political junkies, but we should all know enough to effectively perform our duty. There are many ways to get educated about politics; talk to friends and others you trust, watch and/or listen to the news (with the understanding that most news sources are biased), find good books on the subject, and of course, read our blog! Above all, don’t let anyone tell you how to think. Everyone has their own opinions, and those opinions will influence the information they give you. Just listen to all the viewpoints, and use your God-given logic and reason to form your own opinions.

Also here’s three important things to keep in mind when you’re voting. First, if you don’t know anything about a candidate’s positions, don’t vote for them! That’s how bad people stay in power, people vote for them without thinking or studying them, especially on the local level and in primaries. Do your best to educate yourself about all the candidates, but if for some reason you miss a few, just don’t vote in that particular race.

Secondly, keep in mind that voting for someone doesn’t mean you approve of everything that they do or believe. No candidate is perfect, in fact, many will hold some positions that you may strongly disagree with. However, it is better to have a mostly good official than a mostly bad one. It’s not about who is the perfect candidate, but who is the best candidate. Of course, some issues are more important than others, especially to us as Christians, and we must not violate our consciences; but we should not feel guilty for voting in a candidate just because they have some problems. As stated earlier, we have the responsibility to put people in power who will bring the country closer to God and the Constitution. There is not a single person who will do that perfectly, so we must select that candidate who will do it better.

Thirdly, remember that sometimes the best candidate is not a viable candidate. Third party and independent candidates sometimes have great ideas, but usually don’t have any reasonable chance of winning. Thus, a vote for them is generally a waste of your power, and could very well hurt the better candidate of those who have a shot. So don’t throw away your vote; vote for the best viable candidate, they’re better than the alternative.

We as Americans have so much influence over the direction of our country. As Christians, we have the obligation to use that influence to spread Truth, and perform our responsibility to uphold our nation’s founding principles as citizens of the Republic. We are the hope of this country; we cannot fall asleep at the wheel. So let’s get educated, get involved, and for all of us who are able, get out and vote!

PrayDay!

by Chandler Albers

Today is November 1st. Needless to say, a lot is going on in America. Hurricane Sandy has been doing incredible damage to the East coast. We’re still trying to figure out just what happened in Libya. Oh, and we have less than a week until election day! So now it’s time for us to do something incredible. And we need YOUR help! We’ve been planning this for a while, and we’re very excited about the 1st ever Y4CA PrayDay!

Today, we will use the biggest difference-maker we have available. It doesn’t matter how much we write here, how much we talk about with our friends, or how much we do to make a difference—unless we give God the wheel.

We are humans. We have limits. But God has no limits! He can do anything!

But Jesus looked at them and said to them, “With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)

We can’t save our nation. Not by ourselves. We need to rely on God, and trust in Him to do what’s best for us.

Yet from the days of your fathers
You have gone away from My ordinances
And have not kept them.
Return to Me, and I will return to you,”
Says the Lord of hosts.
“But you said,
‘In what way shall we return?’

(Malachi 3:7)

If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

(2nd Chronicles 7:14)

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
The people He has chosen as His own inheritance.

(Psalm 33:12)

Please pray for our country. Pray for the people, pray for the election, for current and future leaders, for the military, for those affected by the storm, and for those who need Christ in their lives. Trust in Him to do His will.

But don’t just keep it to yourself! We need to spread the word! So tell your friends. Pray with your friends. We need YOU, the reader, to help us spread the word, and get as many people praying as we can! Once again, this is the single MOST IMPORTANT thing we can do right now. So pray hard, get your friends involved, and trust in God!

Candidate Fact Sheet: Barack Obama Part 2

President Obama plans to continue his efforts to work with Congress to pass a bipartisan immigration reform, and has promised to make it a priority of his second term as president. He is focusing immigration enforcement efforts on those who endanger our communities, and is de-emphasizing low-priority cases like students, veterans, seniors, and military families. He also proposed a new rule to keep families together by allowing undocumented spouses and children of U.S. citizens to stay in the country while they begin the legal immigration process. In addition, Obama is committed to working with Congress to pass the DREAM Act (which allows qualifying undocumented youth to be eligible for a 6 year long conditional path to citizenship that requires completion of a college degree or two years of military service, information from http://dreamact.info).

President Obama wants to give women more control over their health and more opportunities. He is putting an end to the health insurance company practice of charging women more than men for the same coverage, and because of Obamacare, many insurance plans are beginning to fully cover birth control without co-pays or deductibles as part of women’s preventive care—potentially saving women hundreds of dollars every year. Obama believes a woman’s health care choices are personal decisions, best made with her doctor—without interference from politicians, and protects a woman’s right to choose. He fought back against Republican attempts to defund Planned Parenthood, one of the largest providers of women’s health services, including breast and cervical cancer screenings, and birth control.

The President publicly supports marriage for same-sex couples, believing LGBT Americans should be treated fairly and equally. He repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” so that gay and lesbian service members no longer have to lie about who they are to serve the country. He also endorsed the Respect for Marriage Act, signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, and extended hospital visitation and medical decision-making rights to LGBT couples.

Again, all this information comes directly from Barack Obama’s website : http://www.barackobama.com (In fact, much of the content is directly quoted from it.) and not our own opinions. We do not guarantee that the website authors or Barack Obama himself are telling the truth, this is simply a summary of the candidate’s self-proclaimed stance on these issues. You decide!

– Neil

Candidate Fact Sheet: Mitt Romney Part 2

Mitt Romney believes that American military power is vital to the preservation of our own security and peace around the world. Thus, he plans to ensure that our military capabilities are matched to the interests we need to protect, including increasing the Navy’s shipbuilding rate, modernizing our Air Force, Army and Marine inventories, and creating a robust, multi-layered national ballistic-missile defense system to deter and defend against nuclear attacks on our homeland and our allies.

Governor Romney also believes that it is unacceptable for Iran to possess nuclear weapons capability,  and thus plans to end Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons capability, eliminate the threat of Iranian-backed nuclear terrorism against the United States and our allies, and prevent nuclear proliferation across the Middle East.

Romney does not believe that the United States needs additional laws that restrict the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. He believes in the safe and responsible ownership and use of firearms and the right to lawfully manufacture and sell firearms and ammunition. He will, however, enforce the laws already on the books and punish, to the fullest extent of the law, criminals who misuse firearms to commit crimes.

The Governor also believes that our immigration system is broken. His plan is to grow legal immigration to grow our economy; including attracting more highly skilled immigrants, making the temporary worker visa system more functional, securing the border and discouraging illegal immigration, and opposing amnesty to illegal immigrants already in the U. S. He also will ensure that husbands, wives, and their minor children are brought together on a timely basis by eliminating the red tape which delays the processing of applications and give legal permanent residents the same priority as citizens when applying to bring husbands, wives, and minor children to the United States.

Mitt Romney is pro-life. He believes life begins at conception and wishes that the laws of our nation reflected that view. However, since the country remains so divided on the issue, he believes that the right next step is for the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade – a case of blatant judicial activism that took a decision that should be left to the people and placed it in the hands of unelected judges. With Roe overturned, states will be empowered through the democratic process to determine their own abortion laws and not have them dictated by judicial mandate. He also supports banning federal funds for abortions, ending funding for abortion advocates like Planned Parenthood, and protecting the right of health care workers to follow their conscience in their work.

On the related issue of stem cell research, Romney believes America cannot condone or participate in the creation of human life when the sole purpose of its creation is its sure destruction, and instead supports adult stem cell research and alternative methods for deriving pluripotent stem cells.

Finally, Mitt Romney supports traditional marriage—the joining together of one man and one woman—and will defend the Defense of Marriage Act as well as championing an amendment to the Constitution defining marriage as one man and one woman.

Again, all this information comes directly from Mitt Romney’s website : http://www.mittromney.com (In fact, much of the content is directly quoted from it.) and not our own opinions. We do not guarantee that the website authors or Mitt Romney himself are telling the truth, this is simply a summary of the candidate’s self-proclaimed stance on these issues. You decide!

– Neil

Candidate Fact Sheet: Barack Obama Part 1

Election time is here! Obama is once again up for election. However, what are his plans should
he win? Obama believes that he can help our help recover our economy, lower taxes, lower the deficit, help our healthcare and rebuild America.

Obama plans to help our economy by giving Americans more jobs and to stop outsourcing jobs
overseas to other nations. This will create more opportunities and higher paying jobs for the middle
class. He wants to do this by:

1) Eliminating tax breaks for companies shipping jobs overseas.
2) Creating incentives for businesses to bring jobs back to America.
3) Pass Wall Street reforms to make sure the government will not have to bail out big banks again.

Obama wants to help lower healthcare for Americans. He has already begun to start his plan but he
wants to add a few more touches. His touches are:

1) Enacting the Affordable Healthcare Act which hold private insurances companies accountable
and keep them from abusing coverage plans.
2) Stopping insurance companies from charging women more than men for the same coverage.
3) Have insurance companies cover preventive care (birth control) for women.

Obama wants to lower taxes on the American middle class. At the same time he wants to reduce
the deficit and start paying off America’s debt. He wants to do this by:

1) No household making over $1 million a year should pay a smaller share of their income in taxes
than a middle-class family pays.
2) Investments in education, manufacturing, and infrastructure, while bringing discretionary
spending to its lowest level as a share of the economy.
3) A balanced plan of spending cuts and increased revenue that reduce the deficit by $4 trillion
over the next decade.

Obama wants to end the war in Afghanistan and bring our soldiers home. He wants to start to
rebuild a nation that has been at war since 2001. His plan is as follows:

1) Withdraw all troops in Afghanistan by 2014 and turn the security of the Afghanistan to the
Afghans people ending the war in that country.
2) Secure all vulnerable nuclear materials to keep them out of the hands of countries such as North
Korea and Iran.
3) Strengthen America’s alliances with NATO and within the UN.

All the information gathered here has come from http://www.barackobama.com/ . There is
so much more information out there to access. All of Obama’s voting records and opinions on
various issues throughout his political career can be found at http://www.ontheissues.org/
Barack_Obama.htm . I encourage you to do your own research on Obama and find the facts before you vote this election.

– Marcus Teske

Candidate Fact Sheet: Mitt Romney Part 1

Romney has a five point plan that he thinks will solve the debt crisis. He believes that he can fix the mess that America is in, and get us back on our feet.

Part one involves bringing America to complete energy independence by the year 2020. There are many natural resources here in America, and he wants to take advantage of those. Using these resources will open up millions of new jobs for Americans to occupy, and we will save billions of dollars by getting our resources here, instead of sending overseas for them.

He wants to do this by:

(1) Increase access to domestic resources

(2) Eliminate restrictions destroying the coal industry

(3) Streamline permitting for exploration and development

(4) Approve the XL pipeline

Part two involves increasing our trade. But doing so in a way that forces businesses to compete with each other, and also confronting countries such as China who cheat in trading to America and take jobs that could be filled by us, and using their own people instead. This will open up new jobs for Americans, and also bring in more money.

He says that the way to do this is to:

(1) Curtail the unfair trade practices of countries like China

(2) Open new markets for American goods and services

(3) Build stronger economic ties in Latin America

(4) Create Reagan Economic Zone to strengthen free enterprise around the world

Part three will increase the value of the public school systems, bringing up youth to be better prepared for the real world, and people who can do the jobs that need to be done to increase our countries income. He also wants to create better retraining programs to give the adults the chance they need to learn the skills necessary to further
this country.

The way he would do this would be to:

(1) Give every family access to a great school and quality teachers

(2) Provide access to affordable and effective higher education options

(3) Focus job training programs on building valuable skills that align with opportunities

(4) Attract and retain the best and the brightest from around the world

Part four is to cut back the deficit, which will reduce the amount of Government, keeping America a place where business can grow on its own.

He says he can do this job if he can:

(1) Immediately reduce non-security discretionary spending by five percent

(2) Cap federal spending below twenty percent of the economy

(3) Give states responsibility for programs that they can implement more efficiently

(4) Consolidate agencies and align compensation of federal workers with their private-sector counterparts

Part five will cut the taxes restricting small businesses, because they are what keep America going. They are the section that has the most employees, and the most income for the country. Cutting taxes on them will give them more room to grow and prosper.

He says he can accomplish this if he can:

(1) Reduce taxes on job creation through individual and corporate tax reform

(2) Stop the increases in regulation that are tangling job creators in red tape

(3) Protect workers and businesses from strong-arm labor union tactics

(4) Replace Obamacare with real health care reform that controls costs and improves care

These are just the facts. I got them directly from his political platform. These things listed above are what he said, not me. I’ll let you be the judge of whether or not they will work. If you want to check out his platform in more detail, I got everything from www.mittromney.com.This website has his entire platform, all of his plans for our country, everything. Check it out!

-Jody Sparks

Who Said It? (10-10-12)

The answer for last week’s poll is:

Patrick Henry

Can you guess this one?

Come back in a week to see if you were right!

The Economy

By Neil

“…All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from the defects in their constitution or confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation…”

                                                                              —John Quincy Adams, 1829

Economics. I’m sure the very word makes you tremble with excitement and anticipation…not.I imagine most people, especially teenagers, would rather read a dictionary than study economics.

You know why? Because they don’t understand it. I’m convinced that’s the reason many teenagers dislike school in general. They simply don’t understand what they’re taught. I blame a lot of that on the failures of government-run education… but that’s another topic. For now, let’s attempt to gain a basic understanding of economics.

Economics covers a vast, complex combination of people, things, and actions. Economies have existed since the beginning of human civilization, and will continue to exist until the end of time. Although most people don’t realize it, economics affects the life of every single human being on the face of the earth (with the possible exception of hermits and the like). However, with all its vastness and complexity, the basic principles of economics are surprisingly simple, while the importance of understanding them cannot be overstated. So in order to grasp the role the economy plays in our daily lives, let’s examine the basic principles of economics. (For a more detailed explanation, I highly recommend Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? by Richard Maybury, which is my source for this article).

Economics is a science, just like physics or biology. However, instead of observing the natural world, economics is a study of the relationship and interaction of people and the stuff that they own (which also includes the work that they do as well as their physical possessions). The purpose of this science is pretty obvious: the more we know about how people get stuff, the more we know how to get more stuff ourselves.

Now, although as Christians we should not seek earthly treasures (Matt. 6:19), we are to be good stewards of what we have (Matt. 25:14-30), and provide for ourselves (2 Thessalonians . 3:10). Thus, even we as Christians will benefit from knowing how to get more stuff.

There are three ways people get more stuff:

(1) going out and getting it from nature,

(2) trading something they own for something they want more, or

(3) stealing it.

Getting things from nature is how we increase the amount of possessions present in our society, so that’s a given; after all, if no one has any stuff there’s nothing to steal or trade. Stealing takes many forms, including taking things which were not intended to be available (such as illegal downloading), using deception to rip someone off in a trade, or downright theft. Of course, not only is stealing wrong, but it is widely recognized as wrong (in most forms), so as a result there are laws which prohibit it. That leaves trade, which is the main focus of economics.

Here’s how it works. Say I have a forest near my house, so i decide to go cut down some trees and make some furniture for my house (a good example of getting stuff from nature). Meanwhile, you decide that you’re going to plant a garden in your backyard (again getting stuff from nature). Well, I start getting hungry after making all the furniture, and you want a place to sit down and chill after working out in your garden all day, so you offer to trade me a bushel of corn for a rocking chair. I accept, because after all, I have plenty of furniture, and you have plenty of food from your garden. Thus, the corn is more valuable to me than the chair, while the chair is more valuable to you than the corn. In the end, both of us are happier after the trade, because both of us got something we wanted more than what we had. Thus in that sense, both of us got richer. This is the basis of trade in economics: people exchanging their goods or work for other good or work that they want (or need!) more.

So where does money fit into the picture? Good question. Money is simply the easiest valuable to trade. Instead of trading chairs or corn, which are bulky and have no set value, we just trade money for what we want. Money is good because it’s liquid, which means it’s valuable, and easy to use and trade. So I give you something you want (say an iPod), and you give me something I want (money), which I can then go exchange for something else I want (like a Chick-fil-a spicy chicken sandwich!). Sounds simple right? It is. That’s a basic economy: a group of people who have all gotten things (from nature or other people) that each other wants, so they trade what they have for what they want, and everyone gets richer.

Now here’s the problem: what happens if someone (a third party) comes along and starts interfering with people’s trades, telling people what trades they can make and how they can make them. Suddenly, one or both parties aren’t getting what they want out of the trade or are getting it at too high a price. Then they either eat the loss (get poorer), stop trading (which means people don’t benefit from their product), or raise their prices (which means others pay more than they want and the cycle continues). Thus, the third-party interference causes problems in the trading, which hurts the economy and makes people poorer. The third party might also interfere by telling the people what they can use for money, often something no one wants or needs (like a piece of paper). Then they might add more and more of that money to the money supply (this is called inflation), so that each piece of money (which was already worthless) is worth even less. At that point people get more and more scared of the money, until they’re willing to exchange it for almost anything because it’s more valuable than the money (this is called runaway inflation). Again, the third party has made a complete mess of the economy.

Now why would anyone in their right mind submit to such interference? The answer: they wouldn’t… unless the third party forced it on them. Are you starting to see where this is headed? Yup, that’s right, government is the third party. You see, most governments (for various, often sinister, purposes) try to regulate the economy of their country. Many times the people even ask them to, because they don’t understand how the economy works. The bottom line is this: the economy works best if it is simply left to itself. Most of our economic problems are a result of government involvement in the economy.As Ronald Reagan so wisely observed, “Government is not the solution the the problem, government is the problem.” Outside of the punishment of actual crimes (such as stealing), the government only makes things worse all the time claiming that it’s making things better.

Of course, the more the government has control of the economy, the more control it has over the people, which is the goal of most government officials (whether they admit or realize it or not).

Thus, they push for more and more control, telling us that it’s not fair that others have more than us, and that they’ll level the playing field.

What they don’t tell you is that in order to do that (or look like they’re doing it), they will have to raise taxes and/or print more money, both of which will only make the economy worse and take away more of your money.

Most people don’t understand that when they cry “Give me more!” they are really saying “Tax me more!” As the old saying goes; “there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.”

So even though economics may not be your favorite subject, it is extremely important to understand; not all the numbers and equations, but the simple, basic concepts. The economy affects what job you get, what college you attend, what food you eat, what stuff you buy; in short, every physical aspect of your life is affected by the economy. Thus, to be wise and prepared, and not just be a helpless victim of the ever-changing world, we must know how the economy works, as well as what the government is doing with it.

This is only a brief look into the principles of economics. Although it is quite simple to understand, it takes more than one article to give a full explanation (Again, for more information I suggest you try Mr. Maybury’s great book). But suffice it to say, for people to get richer and prosperity to continue, the economy has to work properly. For it to work, it must not have interference from third parties, such as government.

If government interferes, the economy will not function as it should, resulting in poverty, high prices, unemployment, and political unrest, which usually lead to more interference, or worse. So as we examine our elected officials, let’s keep these thoughts in mind, and only support those who push for a free economy. And when people tell you that you can’t understand economics, don’t believe them. Many people don’t want you to understand. Knowledge is power.

— Neil

“A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”

                                                                              —Thomas Jefferson, 1801