Notes from my Knapsack 10-23-2025

Jeff Gill

Election Day endorsements
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We have an election coming up on Tuesday (naturally), November 4th.

Your polling places will be open from 6:30 am to 7:30 pm that day, with some of you using early voting in downtown Newark, or absentee voting which has to be turned in by mail that day or to the drop box off Courthouse Square by 7:30 as well.

Do I have endorsements for this primary election cycle, a year before the already discussed to the point of weariness midterm elections in 2026? Sure I do.

We have a number of county and local issues on the ballot, school boards and village councils and township trustees. There are complex matters on the slate, and some pretty straightforward questions.

My endorsements: I endorse talking to someone.

"You mean a candidate for office?" one asks. Well, sure, that's a great idea. Many eligible voters don't do that; I worry about how many haven't talked to anyone. I don't mean trading barbs on a comment thread or scrolling on your phone, I mean talk to someone. A person you respect, whose opinion is worth noting. Ask them what they think. It could be a spouse, it might even be your child, and who knows, someone might talk to their neighbor, but that's my endorsement. Talk to somebody about the election.

Another electoral endorsement: read something. It could be a candidate survey in the Sentinel, Advocate, or Dispatch, on paper or online. You may find a candidate webpage or public profile, and while it's easy to say they're crafted to win the election, these platforms or pitches are information. Read them skeptically? Sure, I assume most of you read my columns skeptically, and that's how it should be. But take in some information from a coherent, solid source; read an account where you can, versus a hot take in a social media blip.

What I would also endorse: think about it. Yes, you may know who you are voting for already. Turn those choices over in your mind a bit. Take a walk, mull it over for a minute or two. Sometimes people vote against certain candidates as much as they vote for another. That's part of how the process works.

In my neck of the woods, I have the interesting advantage of knowing most of the people I have to consider on my ballot. Truthfully, I could give you at least one reason to vote for, and one to not vote, for each of them. Hey, they're people. As Madison said in Federalist Paper Number 51, "if men were angels, no government would be necessary." We ain't choosing between angels, or saints. Women and men are listed for us to pick from.

So to review my endorsements: talk to someone about the election (or more than one somebody, of course), read about the election's issues and candidate positions, and think about your vote. That pretty well sums it up. You could read the Federalist Papers, too; they're easy to find online, 85 of them, but you don't have to absorb the whole thing right now.

But you might want to give them all a look-see before next November…


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he has many endorsements of people and priorities, not all of which you get to read here. Tell him your endorsements at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads or Bluesky.

Faith Works 10-14-2025

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Jeff Gill

Donald Trump can go to heaven
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President Trump said on his way to Israel he doesn't think he can get into heaven.

To the press section of his plane, high over the Atlantic, he said "I don't think there's anything that's gonna get me in heaven. I really don't. I think I'm not, maybe, heaven-bound."

He did not appear to me to be joking or sarcastic, but rather meditative: "I may be in heaven right now as we fly in Air Force One. I'm not sure I'm gonna be able to make heaven. But I've made life a lot better for a lot of people."

My observations here are meant purely in a pastoral mode. He has a number of clergy among his advisers, and perhaps some have tried to share a better witness to him on this, but since the President of the United States has said it, as a Christian minister I need to clarify: this is not how redemption and blessing and grace work.

With all due respect, I can hear in the portion quoted above, and his statements that follow, that he's focused on fairness and balance; he moves pretty directly to complaints about rigged elections making his work hard, and the usual accusations about his opposition's competence, that the process is crooked. He feels that he's been trying to do the right thing against a tilted playing field, against enemies who don't play fair.

President Trump openly expressed his doubt he could get into heaven because he clearly is skeptical he's been able to do enough to justify himself. Good enough, so far, except none of us is.

I have good news for President Trump, and anyone else wondering about rewards and outcomes, in this life and the next. God understands all of that about what we're up against, and why we often don't overcome our own limitations. The good news is that we don't have to achieve acceptance in God's sight, or earn our reward to be in God's presence. It's called grace, offered freely, and if we accept that freely given gift, the hard work is done. But it was never our work in the first place. Christians point to Jesus, and say "he paid it all." However you understand that, the point is that the ultimate story is not up to us. God has anticipated and provided for our weakness, even our failures, and sent someone to open the door for us that we can't get through on our own.

That's the hard thing about grace. God's grace isn't fair, and is not in any immediate sense, at least, balanced. Grace isn't fair Biblically. Look at Matthew 20, the parable of the workers in the vineyard. People still argue about whether it's "fair" for the workers hired at the end of the day to get the same reward as those who've been up in the trees working all day.

Likewise, we all have the same eternity ahead of us. Those who responded to God's grace eons ago; people who have been faithful all their lives, or who have a deathbed conversion. Fair isn't the point.

Similarly, rich or poor, in elective office or out, we all have the same 24 hours in each day. With wealth, you can make use of it differently, I'll grant you, with charter jets and limousines to save time, be productive during your time, but in essence, you still have the same 60 seconds, 60 minutes, 24 hours in any given day. We are utterly equal in that. The sun moves west, it sets, and nothing you or I can do will haul it backwards in its course.

Likewise, looking on into the fullness of God's divine providence, we have each of us the same eternity. The only way it's open in any way, objectively or subjectively, is at God's gracious initiative: and that opportunity is as available to you as it is to Donald Trump.


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he trusts in Jesus to get him through all sorts of doors. Tell him where your hope is found at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads or Bluesky.