Political Thoughts

I'm not happy that Obama won. But neither do I think that McCain was God's gift to mankind, and much less do I think that O's win spells disaster for life as we know it. I've had enough of these ridiculous prophecies: "Socialists will overrun America! Every other child will be aborted! Taxes will rocket through the roof!" Please, people. He's only the executive. The House holds the power of the purse; the Senate has more influence on laws than the president ever will. You should be worrying about our liberal legislative branch more than our liberal president. Constitutionally speaking, Obama can't make any of that awful stuff happen unless he orchestrated a Nazi-style coup d'etat and pulled the wool over the entire nation's eyes on the force of his own rhetoric. And pardon my French, but if he pulled that off, we'd damn well deserve it.

. . .

I live on a very conservative campus. I can only imagine what an uproar there will be today. A couple thoughts on the common responses I'm seeing:

1) Fear. How about these reassuring words from Scripture? "The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps" (Proverbs 16:9). "Kingship belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations" (Psalm 22:28). "God my King is from of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth." (Psalm 74:12). If the Lord truly is King over all the earth, a paltry president should not worry us.

2) Hatred. Guess what? Obama is not the devil incarnate. He is simply a sinful man in need of God's salvation, and who knows, the Lord may be at work in him even now. I'm praying that He is. Nothing can stand before God's irresistible grace, not the most hardened heart and wayward soul. Do you think that it was any easier to save you?

. . .

All that said, I do think we're going to hell in a handbasket. Socially and politically, we have rejected so many of the foundational truths of our freedom that it would be hard to extricate ourselves from the downward spiral. Without respect for our constitution, and (more importantly) without the individual virtue that's required to make a republic work, we're never going to recover. The United States may not collapse, but it will soon look very different from what the Founders had in mind.