Leading the church to action

Four years ago, AFA supporters Mark and Clovia Dupuis were discouraged by the state of the nation. While seeking to educate themselves on how they could have a kingdom impact on America’s government, the Louisiana couple prayed and fasted. During that time, Mark had an idea to create the Christian Civic Citizens Guideline. He worked daily during his lunch break until he had completed a step-by-step plan for how Christians – specifically pastors and church congregations – can get involved in government and lead others to do the same.

Pastors first

According to the Guideline, launching a Christian Civic Citizenship Ministry should begin with the pastor of a church.

“We start with addressing the pastor, because we’re hoping the pastor is the one who initiates putting the Guideline in place,” Mark said. “And the Guideline is on how to form the ministry, educating on what God has done in America and how our founders began this country.”

The pastor is then able to understand, describe, and support the biblical basis for Christian involvement in government.

Next, the pastor appoints a leader to facilitate the ministry for the entire church congregation.

“So, we have the pastor behind it, speaking from the pulpit,” Clovia added. “And when the pastor speaks from the pulpit, people listen.”

Guideline content

The Guideline covers topics such as voting and elections, biblical worldview and America’s Christian heritage, sponsoring community leaders for training in political leadership, and grassroots and community engagement. A highlight of the Guideline is that it boldly emphasizes activism within the church: promoting voter registration from the pulpit and from a table in the lobby; running quarterly voter registration drives with a goal of 100% voter registration within the congregation; and taking part in door-to-door political lobbying as well as in-phone campaigns and political donations.

“We have a big problem in this country with Christians not voting,” Mark said. “The Guideline goes through how the church can get people within the church registered to vote and to actually vote and then take that campaign into the community.”

The Guideline includes a plethora of resources that provide training and education from 20 different highly regarded organizations, including Hillsdale College (hillsdale.edu), Patriot Academy (patriotacademy.com), WallBuilders (wallbuilders.com), Liberty Counsel (lc.org), and American Family Association (afa.net). The complete Christian Civic Citizens Guideline can be downloaded for free at christianciviccitizens.com.

Involved Christians

Even with all the supporting resources, Mark told The Stand that people are hesitant about church-centered involvement in government. He points to Romans 13:1-6 as the scriptural basis for the belief that God established government authority.

“I’ve had people ask, ‘Why would we want to be involved with government?’ What God says about government is explained very well [in Romans 13:4], where government representatives are called ‘ministers’ [or servants of God, who are tasked with restraining evil and enforcing laws]. So, if they’re ministers for God, shouldn’t we be involved?

“That’s one thing we’re trying to get across: What does God say of your government? … He does say that He ordains it, [so] we should be involved. Period. And how do we do that? This Guideline will help you get there.”