The question "Should Christians give up on the Religious Right?" is strikingly similar to "Have you stopped beating your wife?" Any response is a self-inflicted indictment.

First, I do not accept the media-invented "Religious Right" label as a correct description of believers who obey Christ's admonition in Matthew 5:13–16 to be salt and light in this darkened world. As I see it, the topic would be better titled "Should Christians give up on obeying the Lord?"

For 2,000 years, Christians have let their lights shine as soul winners, church planters, and missionaries to the world. At the same time, as the salt of the earth, they have been the conscience of the culture. That is what salt and light are designed by God to be and do. We build churches, and, from the same pulpits and pews, we concurrently oppose slavery, injustice, abortion, and immorality.

Second, the triumphant church of Christ never "gives up" on its divine mission. Neither minority status, temporary losses, defections by weary saints, "nor any other creature" cause the church to retreat. Bible students know how it all ends. We win.

Because the culture is rotting, the church does not give up. To borrow the words of President Clinton's chief spinner, James Carville, this is a time for war—spiritual war, of course!

Christians who are openly pro-life, involved in supporting the biblical family as the only model, and politically conservative are often wrongly portrayed by their Christian and secular critics as neglecting their "light ministry." This is usually a bum rap.

Drs. James Dobson, D. James Kennedy, and Pat Robertson are generally targeted, along with me, as the chief violators of the phony doctrine of separation of church and state. I do not know more ...