Prominent preacher Billy Graham was involved in politics for much of preaching career, and  confessed his major life regret in an interview late in life. You would think that anyone who had personally known and associated with so many prominent people for so long, including 12 U.S. Presidents, would be proud of such hobnobbing with the political “stars” of the world. But guess what he confessed?

“If I had to do it over again, I would avoid any semblance of involvement in partisan politics.”

“An evangelist is called to do one thing, and one thing only: to proclaim the Gospel.”

Too bad he didn’t realize this until his waning years. Perhaps he had earlier in his career not fully appreciated some Biblical counsel, and the principles underlying these directives that he later more completely understood:

“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel? . . . It is not for you to know . . . you will be my witnesses . . .to the ends of the earth”—Acts 1:6-8 NIV

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations . . . baptizing them . . . teaching them”—Matthew 28:19,20 NIV

“Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well”—Matthew 6:33 NIV

“You do not belong to the world”—John 15:19 NIV

“No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service for service in the kingdom of God”—Luke 9:62 NIV

“No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer” (Jesus)—1 Timothy 2:4 NIV

It seems as if Billy Graham was saying that all of his political involvement did no good, and may have actually hurt the very cause he was trying so hard to promote. If Billy Graham would avoid all politics if he could do it over again, isn’t that reason enough to cause us to rethink our own attitude and position on this? When we seriously also factor in Bible principles that cover this, perhaps you would agree with him that it would be wise to avoid politics like a plague.

Who will run the world, then if all Christians had that attitude of political neutrality? The following principle covers this very well:

“Let the spiritually dead bury their own dead!”—Luke 9:60 NLT

There will always be plenty of worldly people to run worldly politics. Too bad that Billy Graham didn’t’t realize until late in life that all his involvement in politics was in vain.