I was a junior in high school on January 15th, 1967 when the Green Bay Packers beat the Kansas City Chiefs before a crowd of 61,000 at a stadium that could seat well over 90,000 in the first of what would later become known as Super Bowls. Trumpeter Al Hirt was the halftime entertainment. This coming Lord's Day, or Super Bowl Sunday... depending upon the way that you look at that day, the entertainment will be Katy Perry. It will be the 49th Super Bowl. Maybe this will be a Jubilee Year for us?
It's not optimism, it's a sickness vaguely related to optimism. I'm in conversations every single day where people nonchalantly speak of what they will do three, four, five years from now without the slightest concern of the impending disasters that lie ahead. If I mention the seriousness of the situation they laugh. We think that the economy is doing well because of the stock market but former budget manager for Ronald Reagan calls these profits "totally ill-gotten gains" because of decisions by "dangerous and destructive" people at the Fed, and says that a "day of reckoning" is ahead. We are utterly defenseless as a people. We have the power but not the will nor the discernment. We are afraid of offending people who want to destroy us. We have bought a pig in a poke and are about to find out what is inside.
There is a remnant of course but we are trying to outrun an avalanche. The gospel is sold on television, hidden even in churches, banned in government and worn like a knockoff Rolex watch. Ah, but what do I know? I know that we are in trouble, that we presumed upon God for well over a century now and and He has increasingly been warning us for well over forty years while we give him about 5% of the time, if that, that we give to entertainment and sport.
The following post is from early last year:
I wouldn't even hazard a guess at how many times I have wanted to just stop reading the news of the day and I have considered ending the political content in these posts many times but as I read through Scripture every day I see warnings and judgement upon nations that had worshipped false gods and warnings and judgement upon Israel when they had turned from the only true God... the comparisons to America's rebellion against Him too similar to not attempt to bring those warnings out in these posts.
We criticize Barack Obama, and rightly so, who is the closest example to the legend that Nero fiddled while Rome burned but we ourselves are either dancing to that fiddle or to our own country music. I will never read history again where a nation collapsed and was destroyed without fully understanding how a proud people can become utterly defenseless, unaware of the dangers to them and breathtakingly naive on their own concupiscence to everything the world offers while turning in disdain at that which God told us to hold true and dear to our heart.
We live on a fault line and are building in the sand. Are there not any leaders left who can simply do what is right without putting that decision up against some political grid before doing it? Are there no news outlets left capable of serving anything but the story du jour? Are there no billionaires who realize that the moment their heart stops beating that they will stand in account before Jesus Christ? Where are the academics who realize that God gave them their ability to think? Where are the scientists who recognize their Creator?
Have we lost all sense of propriety? Is honor no longer something to be valued? Has liberty become a curse? Have we forgotten the sacrifices made for us? Have we become robots?
May God have mercy upon us. May the roar as we approach the waterfall overcome the din of applause, laughter and cheering for that which we consider entertainment and the discordant sounds of that which we put forth as conversation, dialogue and debate. May we discern the dissonance between our claim to be a constitutional republic and our actions as giving allegiance to a brutal feudal lord, the love of money.
May He humble us, have mercy upon us, permit us to reflect His thoughts once again, and remember forever how far we had fallen, how close we were to the precipice, and who alone will have saved us once again, for His purposes and to His glory.
It's not optimism, it's a sickness vaguely related to optimism. I'm in conversations every single day where people nonchalantly speak of what they will do three, four, five years from now without the slightest concern of the impending disasters that lie ahead. If I mention the seriousness of the situation they laugh. We think that the economy is doing well because of the stock market but former budget manager for Ronald Reagan calls these profits "totally ill-gotten gains" because of decisions by "dangerous and destructive" people at the Fed, and says that a "day of reckoning" is ahead. We are utterly defenseless as a people. We have the power but not the will nor the discernment. We are afraid of offending people who want to destroy us. We have bought a pig in a poke and are about to find out what is inside.
There is a remnant of course but we are trying to outrun an avalanche. The gospel is sold on television, hidden even in churches, banned in government and worn like a knockoff Rolex watch. Ah, but what do I know? I know that we are in trouble, that we presumed upon God for well over a century now and and He has increasingly been warning us for well over forty years while we give him about 5% of the time, if that, that we give to entertainment and sport.
The following post is from early last year:
I wouldn't even hazard a guess at how many times I have wanted to just stop reading the news of the day and I have considered ending the political content in these posts many times but as I read through Scripture every day I see warnings and judgement upon nations that had worshipped false gods and warnings and judgement upon Israel when they had turned from the only true God... the comparisons to America's rebellion against Him too similar to not attempt to bring those warnings out in these posts.
We criticize Barack Obama, and rightly so, who is the closest example to the legend that Nero fiddled while Rome burned but we ourselves are either dancing to that fiddle or to our own country music. I will never read history again where a nation collapsed and was destroyed without fully understanding how a proud people can become utterly defenseless, unaware of the dangers to them and breathtakingly naive on their own concupiscence to everything the world offers while turning in disdain at that which God told us to hold true and dear to our heart.
We live on a fault line and are building in the sand. Are there not any leaders left who can simply do what is right without putting that decision up against some political grid before doing it? Are there no news outlets left capable of serving anything but the story du jour? Are there no billionaires who realize that the moment their heart stops beating that they will stand in account before Jesus Christ? Where are the academics who realize that God gave them their ability to think? Where are the scientists who recognize their Creator?
Have we lost all sense of propriety? Is honor no longer something to be valued? Has liberty become a curse? Have we forgotten the sacrifices made for us? Have we become robots?
May God have mercy upon us. May the roar as we approach the waterfall overcome the din of applause, laughter and cheering for that which we consider entertainment and the discordant sounds of that which we put forth as conversation, dialogue and debate. May we discern the dissonance between our claim to be a constitutional republic and our actions as giving allegiance to a brutal feudal lord, the love of money.
May He humble us, have mercy upon us, permit us to reflect His thoughts once again, and remember forever how far we had fallen, how close we were to the precipice, and who alone will have saved us once again, for His purposes and to His glory.
