Independence From What?
Today is the 250th birthday of our country. And while we have accomplished so much more than our founding fathers could have ever envisioned, we have also moved so far away from their motivation to leave England and the driving force to achieve freedom of religion, that they wouldn’t recognize the country we’ve become.
The antisemitism, the pervasive and unreasonable hatred of Donald Trump, the entitlement attitude, the waning work ethic, and the ubiquitous lies of politicians seeking to line their own pockets, has put the USA on a downward spiral away from the only solution that can reverse these trends.
As with all endeavors of life,
problems will crop up. The first step in dealing with them is to recognize that a problem exists. Pointing the finger of blame without offering a plan to solve the problem is an admission of complicity in the cause and a tactic to divert attention.
Let’s look at just one [although it’s a big one] of our problems. National debt. When half, maybe more, of our politicians don’t seem to care about solving this problem, it won’t be solved. Politicians kicking the can down the road is the coward’s response.
Whatever happened to the days
of leaving your farm or other business and serving a couple years then returning home? Rotating people who had intimate knowledge of their constituency brought hands-on wisdom to be applied to law-making. It was not the intention of the founders to create career politicians. If we had term limits of, say, two terms (12 years), we would churn about 50% of current senators. About 10% have been in office over 25 years, and two over 40 years. It’s no wonder that we’re in the state we’re in. Where are the fresh ideas? Where the moral high road of yesterday?
Today’s title asks a question that I’ll attempt to answer. It’s ironic, but the answer is 180 degrees out of sync with original intent. The boats left Europe filled with people hoping to find a place where they could practice their faith in God the way they saw fit, without a government telling them how it should be done. Unless and until we return to “one nation under God,” we’ll continue our downward slide. The second law of thermodynamics says (in layman’s terms) that order always degrades to chaos, never the other way around. And that’s what we see in the second paragraph above.
In all fairness,
our problem is not the national debt. That’s just one of many symptoms. The problem is that we’ve not just relegated God to a secondary role, we’ve left Him in our rearview mirror years ago. Now we’re reaping the fruit of that decision. Is there a solution? Yes, but most will not embrace it.
Since we have rejected the basic moral laws that God gave Moses [the 10 commandments] for decades, and disregard the warnings of doing so, we can’t expect God to turn a blind eye and allow us to go merrily on our way without consequences. We are in the “consequences stage” now. And they will continue to get worse. But our God is a God of mercy and forgiveness. And this is a wakeup call to His people. Listen to what He told Solomon about 430 years BC: “[if] My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (2 Chron. 7:14).
Four steps to God’s promise
to heal the land. Is that a promise for today? I don’t honestly know. What I do know is that God never changes. If He promised this to Solomon, why wouldn’t it apply to America? We’ll not know unless we take the four steps (humble, pray, seek, turn). Spread the word and let’s see what God will do. Wouldn’t that be a birthday present to top all birthday presents?