Monday, November 21, 2011

Proverbs 28:2 commentary; a political statement

2 ¶ For the transgression of a land many are the princes thereof: but by a man of understanding and knowledge the state thereof shall be prolonged.

Many leaders over time destroy a country by their stupidity and pride. Over time, successive leaders will, through pride, corruption, and greed fritter away a nation’s wealth or in one or more poorly thought out wars reduce a nation to poverty and helplessness. One of the stated strategies of the communist governments of the Soviet Union and Red China was to engage the United States in as many brushfire wars as possible to bankrupt and demoralize the country. One of the actions of many of our presidents after Eisenhower has been to get involved in as many brushfire wars as possible to justify some geopolitical agenda or policy. We are a bankrupt nation just as many others. So, tell me, if you can, who was the enemy; the ones who wanted to harm us or the ones who did?

It would take a great leader, Godly, moral, and with an understanding of the realities of world politics to turn our nation to a steady and sane course. Notice I did not say “turn our nation back” because we have never been on a sane course. Things got out of hand very early in our nation’s founding. The founders didn’t deal with slavery and that failure nearly ended the country’s existence as a nation, the question of how to treat the Native Americans was out of control very quickly and much to our discredit great evil was done, we had a great revival of religion that took a wrong turn and we began to think of government as God, we became an imperial power against the advice of wise Christians like William Jennings Bryan when we conquered tired Spain’s remaining colonies, we disturbed the balance of power in Europe during World War One and made World War Two possible, we let the United Nations whose founding documents and policies were written by Soviet agents dictate strategy and tactics in the Korean Conflict with every action of the United States and its allies reported to the Chinese Communists even before it happened right down to the number of artillery shells we would use, and the list goes on and on. Internally, we have had good intentioned social policies administered carelessly and wastefully so much so that we can no longer afford to care for the people these policies were meant to help.

We’ve had many leaders in office in all three branches of government who have led us down the path we find ourselves on. But, one good man of understanding and knowledge can turn us onto a path of fiscal sanity and a foreign policy that is consistent with our principles. Of course, he will have to deal with a Congress full of leaders who hunger to fill the coffers of their own supporters and to be re-elected. We need to start being careful in electing a President, though. We need someone with experience but not corruption, with understanding but not arrogance, with knowledge but also with a transparency that lets us know the real intention behind his choices. We need a man who loves Jesus Christ but does not respect political religion in the least; who desires to be a competent and honest leader of our country but not a messiah or the national pastor.

Look down the list of the kings of Israel and Judah and see how each one added his own bit of leadership to put the kingdoms in the position of receiving God’s judgment. Read the account of each one’s reign carefully and you will see a pattern of disobedience to God’s commands for them, very clearly laid out and very simple to understand in the Law given to Moses. One man of understanding and knowledge can prolong the life of the state, but is that man even in sight? Of course, it’s hard to find a leader that has qualities that the American people themselves don’t have. That’s why our country needs to be transformed from the ground up with a national revival of faith and devotion to what is right and not just what is mine. America will never get good leaders until America gets right with God. It should not be “God bless America” on the portable sign along the road but “America, bless God.”

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