This year, I have almost no idea what’s going on politically. I know one of the librarians at my local library is up for re-election to the school board. I know there’s some kind of anti-pornography state issue on the ballot. Beyond that, I’m not attuned to the scene.

I used to be a hardcore political junkie. Not anymore. I was already on the disillusioned side when I foolishly thought I could help a worthy candidate win, the only candidate in my nearly 45 years of life that I thought was 100 percent right for office. But as many times as I called his campaign headquarters, no one bothered to even send me a sign for my yard. Needless to say, my candidate got crushed. Demolished. Annihilated. Disintegrated down to the atomic level. He didn’t even leave behind a puff of smoke. Cursed be the fool who dares to speak his name in good company.

You know, that kind of loss.

I missed being able to cast my vote in the 1980 presidential election by a week. I’ve been casting them without fail since. But I don’t look forward to it like I used to.

I don’t talk about politics here at Cerulean Sanctum. Plenty of Christian blogs do. Despite the fact that Christians often love to mobilize on this political issue or that, I’ve learned a few things in my life that I wish weren’t true, but are:

1. Christians love to get pumped up for politics, yet they’re nearly always disappointed with the ultimate outcome, even when they think they’ve initially won.
2. You can fight, fight , fight against a perceived sin via politics, but even if the sin loses in the short term, it wins in the long term 90 percent of the time.
3. It’s amazing how quickly a “Christian” candidate, who talks like Mr. Smith on his way to Washington, winds up compromised.
4. On the most fundamental levels, today’s Republicans are yesterday’s Democrats, while today’s Democrats are yesterday’s Socialists. I don’t want to think what ten years from now will look like.
5. It used to be about the power of ideas to shape the future. Now it’s just about money.
6. When self-interest is all that drives candidates, then our political system no longer works. And it sure seems to me that self-interest is all that drives today’s politicians.
7. It’s discouraging to think that the last great statesman this country produced may have been Henry Clay. Lincoln may be in that company, too. Still, that’s a long, dry spell with no hope of getting better if the current crop of midgets running for office is any indication.
8. I wonder what the women who fought for the right to vote would say if they knew that every study done continues to show that women vote largely for the candidate deemed most physically attractive.
9. It amazes me how congressmen talk about voting their conscience, yet nowadays every vote comes down to party line. Just where are they breeding these conscience clones with their polar-opposite magnetic drifts? And aren’t congressional representatives supposed to represent the will of their constituency rather than their own personal conscience?
10. The devil’s bought a lot of souls through the political department store.

Politics used to be a big deal for me. Now it barely registers.

I guess, as I see it, the problem comes down to a kingdom issue. Which kingdom am I called to support with the time and skills God has given me? His Kingdom or some other kingdom?

It’s not about loyalty, either, but making the best use of the time we have. I can still be a good citizen of my country. I just don’t have to let my citizenship overwhelm me.

Evangelical Christians float adrift. Plenty of them are disillusioned with politics—and for good reason. It worries me, though, that they won’t drift back to what matters most to God, but will instead tie up to some other dock. Heck, even disillusionment is its own dock. Tie up to that one and any number of unfortunate outcomes may come to pass.

Politics isn’t the answer to our collective ennui in the United States. Getting back to the truths of God through His methods rather than politics is.

As conservative as I am, perhaps I’ve become more interested in conserving the granite-like truths of an eternal City on a Hill than the shadows and fog of an impermanent Capitol Hill.