Preface: The following post is from October 8, 2015 and was titled....Restraining Force. The past nine and a half years proved how much God's hand has been lifted....and how far removed from common grace we are. As Donald Trump moved in....was booted out....and Joe Biden then moved in and stumbled out....and Trump came back with a vengeance....the shotgun pattern described below that once described America's center is now gone. The fringe now dominates....violence and hate and mob rule....fueled by rage and anger and ignorance. It may not be the majority but as with the Bolsheviks in Russia 1917....and the National Socialists in Germany in 1933....a smaller entity has seized the day. Our heavenly Father is in control of all of this.....none of it took Him by surprise. His church is floundering right now....malnourished from lackadaisical preaching on incidentals. The glory has indeed departed. May God have mercy upon us....may it begin tomorrow....and may that mercy be upon me also.
Restraining Force
I'd like you to picture a shotgun pattern....a tight pattern where most of the holes are bunched together in the center of the target. The holes around the outer edge we'll call the fringe. Now apply this shotgun pattern to society if you will. Most of the people are tightly bunched together, so much so that the center is one large hole frayed around its edges. The holes on the outside are those people who live and believe on the fringe and they themselves can be as different as night and day...from harmlessness to criminality, and from genius to mediocrity. A portion of those on the fringe are susceptible to behaving in a criminally sociopathic way.What is happening today in America is that that shotgun pattern has become a scattergun pattern. The grouping is anything but tight with the holes spread all over the target. The same principle is at work with people on the fringe, only that percentage of people out there is much higher. The issue is not gun control, in fact in this scattergun patterned society more people need the self-protection from the more people on the fringe.
The real issue is in how a society is to maintain a tight pattern with the fewest people on the fringe as possible? A totalitarian society where guns are not permitted to anyone other than the ruling element would produce a very tight pattern...but with.no freedom, no liberty....and no life to speak of. What holds the pattern together in a free society? It's called common grace....God's restraining of evil in mankind. Our conscience is a restraining force. Government should be a restraining force. Both are given by God in varying degrees.....possible more at one time than at another time.....and different in different places within our world.
God's hand has been lifted from America and common grace along with it.....at least a great portion of it. We requested that God remove Himself or we would remove Him ourselves. Subsequently, we now have little perception of what is good and what is evil. Wisdom is extremely rare. Logic and reasoning atrophy in the recesses of our consciousness and memory. Our defensive bulwarks are collapsible as a house of cards, our ramparts scalable and our battlements mere decorations.
Common Grace serves as the choke in a shotgun that directs the pellets to the center. (If I understand the mechanics adequately) That choke has been removed. We do whatever we want and have few restrictions...and we are paying the price. The remedy for our sickness is one that we do not want to hear...and we won't even consider it......Fear God and Keep His commandments. We'll find other remedies and medicines......worthless but palatable.
