A few weeks ago, I addressed the fact that we cannot escape our civic responsibilities by saying something like “don’t blame me, I didn’t vote for him.” Corporate responsibility doesn’t work that way. But at the same time, the point needs to be nuanced.
If we vote for economic folly, even if only 51% of us did, the results will be an economic judgment. That judgment affects the whole body. If the majority of a nation decides to go to war, the whole nation is at war.
At the same time, a familiar prophetic motif in Scripture is that of marking out those faithful ones who detest the idolatries around them. From the 7,000 who did not bend the knee to Baal in Elijah’s time, to those in Ezekiel’s day who lamented over the abominations that were occurring around them daily (Ezek. 9:4).
We also see another principle in the hypothetical righteous men that Abraham hoped to find in Sodom. God sometimes averts judgment for the whole based on the faithfulness of a part.
So just as we are going to experience certain consequences for our corporate folly, so we may also pray that our fellow citizens may be spared the full force of those consequences because God determines to extend a certain measure of protection to His people. The land of Goshen was spared, even though Egypt was not.