I see this bumper sticker all over the place. I get it. You’re a christian AND patriotic. Cool. America used to be a christian nation. I think it still is to a certain extent. But let’s look at some things that America has done.
- We have expelled a grade schooler for reading the Bible during his lunch break.
- We have made it a no-no to pray overtly in school.
- We have taken down the ten commandments from the walls in our schools.
- We have stopped the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in schools (primarily because it says ‘under God’ in it.)
When I say ‘we’ I mean that ‘we the people’ have let it happen. Consider the chart to the right. These are the 2012 statistics in the United States. Protestant religions alone were in the majority with 52.5 percent…add the Catholics and Mormons to that and it brings the majority to 78 percent. Let’s add the Jews (who believe that those ten commandments were passed down to Moses on the mountain by God Himself) to that bringing the majority to almost 80 percent.
Why then are we allowing things, that we feel are our rights, to be demonized by a minority?
The folks pushing for this stuff use arguments like, “I don’t believe there is a God so you shouldn’t be making me pray.” Or, “we need to be tolerant and not do anything that might offend someone.” These arguments are illogical but, if you say so, you make yourself intolerant and offensive. When I am told that I shouldn’t overtly give thanks to my God for the meal which He has provided for fear that it MIGHT offend someone, it is GUARANTEED to offend me.
As for being offended, folks talk like it is their right not to be offended…ummm, no. Show me, constitutionally, where the right not to be offended is spelled out. But I will show you where my right to pray to my God is.
But, for the sake of argument, let’s say that we do have the right to not be offended. Someone might say they are offended by me praying, yet I am offended when I am told I can’t…so where does that leave us? There is no logical way there can be an arrangement where nobody will get offended. So, chosing who is going to get favor a given situation presents a condition that is defined as privilege. A right cannot be treated as a privilege and still remain a right. Likewise, if a privilege is treated as a right held by all, there remains no privilege.
If a Muslim wants to lay out his rug twice a day and pray to Allah, why should I have an issue with it? I am not offended. Why should I be? It is his constitutional right. So why are folks offended when I bow my head in the Chili’s and thank my God for the food He has provided and ask that this food brings nourishment to my body and to bless the hands that prepared it? If it is because you believe that God doesn’t exist, then you are being offended by the irrelevancy of my praying to a God that doesn’t exist. To be offended by an irrelevancy is illogical. If it isn’t a case of ‘I don’t think God exists’, then you probably believe He DOES exist. If you DO think He exists, why would you have a problem with anyone praying to him? Either way, the argument falls flat.
Looks like we are more worried about what people think than what God thinks. If God doesn’t exist, then this is really one of those ‘no harm, no foul’ kinda things. However, if God DOES exist, we place ourselves in VERY dangerous territory when it comes to disregarding God in favor of people.
How about we try something different. I mean, what we have been trying apparently isn’t working.
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. – Albert Einstein
So, maybe, if we bless God, His blessings will come. Interesting idea? Not really a new one…can’t claim to be coming up with a new concept.
and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land. – 2 Chronicles 7:14
A lot of folks quote the above scripture. It is a great one to be sure. Verse 13, though, talks about what kind of things God would allow…things that would make the people WANT to humble themselves and pray. What strikes me more though is the fact that God is even having this conversation with Solomon. Solomon had just completed the temple. God was pleased with Solomon…Solomon blessed God.
So, maybe God’s blessings are sometimes conditional to our regard for Him.
As for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked, even to do according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep My statutes and My ordinances, then I will establish your royal throne as I covenanted with your father David, saying, ‘You shall not lack a man to be ruler in Israel.’ – 2 Chronicles 7:17-18
Wow. Looks like God putting conditions on things. Likewise, the reverse has conditions.
“But if you turn away and forsake My statutes and My commandments which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will uproot you from My land which I have given you, and this house which I have consecrated for My name I will cast out of My sight and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples. As for this house, which was exalted, everyone who passes by it will be astonished and say, ‘Why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?’ And they will say, ‘Because they forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers who brought them from the land of Egypt, and they adopted other gods and worshiped them and served them; therefore He has brought all this adversity on them.'” – 2 Chronicles 7:19-22
Looking at those verses, it reminds me of the list of things ‘we’ did at the beginning of this article.
America, let’s try blessing God, then it will be more reasonable for us to ask for His blessings, don’t ya think?
Very good and so true
Great, Lee!!