What's Wrong With This Country

We have fattened our hearts in the day of slaughter

Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries which are coming upon you.... You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of wanton pleasure; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and put to death the righteous man; he does not resist you. James 5: 1-6

Do the elections scare you as much as they frighten me?

Maybe it's the fact that I've just finished reading Isaiah and Jeremiah. In the calamities of Israel and Judah, I see our nation.

My prayer is: "Lord, do not give us what we deserve."

The issue is not in the politicians. Yes, many are corrupt and ensconced in their greed. 

But neither do our economic problems stem from entitlements such as welfare.

We, as a nation, want something for nothing: a free college education or free health care. If it's not free, cheap will do: cheap gas, inexpensive clothing, low mortgages. 

We live in a give-me society, and we forget everything has a cost. 

Everything.

Bernie Sanders cannot give us free health care. Someone needs to pay for it. Donald Trump cannot freely get rid of all immigrants. There's a cost. Hillary Clinton will not control Wall Street since they have already paid her off. Cruz, Rubio, Bush, Kasich. Not one of them will heal our nation.

But the issue isn't "them."  It's us.

To get cheap clothing, we buy materials manufactured overseas where de facto slavery runs the the sweat shops. 

Our cheap electronics are created under conditions in foreign countries that American law would not allow here at home.

We've lived luxuriously on the earth. Our lives are filled withwanton pleasure. Our hears, like our bodies have become obese--so I fear that God could well be leading us to the day of slaughter.

We need to think about Fair Trade. Under this principle, humans are paid a living wage under human working conditions. We must consider buying American made products, as well. For all of this, we will pay more. We will have less, but our lives will not be corrupted by greed that send politicians spiraling into finger-pointing wars all the while hiding their own corruption.

We have hope. 2 Chronical 7:14 says if we, as Christians, humble ourselves, if we pray--we can be healed.

For me, I pray every morning for our country, for God to give us what we need, not what we deserve. 

Ethically, I write about global equality and try to buy products judiciously. I'm only one person. We all need to change.

How can you humble yourself?

How Pure Is Your Religion? James 1:27

"27 Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world" James 1:27

My grandson, David, is a typical ten year old. He lives in a world of Minecraft and Clash of Clans. His family spends many a night curled up on the sofa watching their favorite movies like Star Wars. Rarely is he left alone. Only recently has my daughter allowed him to stay by himself for a few hours. I don't think he's ever walked the mile downtown alone.

A very illustrative pre-teen in an average

family, surrounded by love, compassion and protection.

The other day, The Washington Post ran a picture of a boy--no older than David, but probably around eight. He was walking through the ruins of a Syrian town. Not one building stood. The hills he climbed were the rubble of war, the remains of his village. Everything was blackened by fire, and around the corner he could face rifle fire or a bomb or the poisonous gas from the president sworn to protect this country.


I thought, "I could never let my child live under these conditions." If this was my world, I'd flee.

That's exactly what thousands of Syrians thought, and it's what they did. They ran to the shelter of the West, to towns in Serbia, Germany and France. If they got lucky, they could get to England or the United States and raise their children in saftey.

Sadly, what met them were people saying, "Go home" or "Go to another country".

President Obama wants to bring some to the United States. The loudest opponents to this are the Christians. "We don't want a Muslim here." "There'll be terrorist in the lot." "I'd be open to letting them into the United States if they were Christian."

How can we read texts like James 1:27 and deny solace to devastated peoples?
Can we gain comfort from the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10: 25-37), and then turn our backs on others?

Can we remember the Jews we turned away from our borders in the 1930s or the Japanese we interred at the end of World War II and still deny succor to refugees?

And how about those in ghettos in our own country--people denied human rights because their skin is dark? Do we forget the Civil War and the misery of slavery?

As my brother reminded me, my own family faced bias in the fifties simply because they immigrated from Belarus in 1915 and were still considered a threat.

We, as Christians, cannot be bigots. We cannot worship on Sundays and curse the people made in God's image and likeness on the next day.

A church that does not couple compassion with spirituality, is defiled.

Do you stand for pure and undefiled faith or is your religion vain?