For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Eph. 6:12
Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that thou didst set thou heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words.
But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me...! Daniel 10:12-13.
If the Prince of Persia is still in the Middle-East, what is America doing in near-Babylon, and where is the Prince of Peace?
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In the minds of most Americans, every other nation is in some way considered to be either bad, secular or simply inferior to the United States of America. And Americans will readily identify those individuals or other nations that they consider to be inferior to America. Talk Show commentator Oprah Winfrey declared on her show recently, that it would have been impossible for a person of her original stature to rise to the heights that she has risen to in any other country in the world. Although I understand Oprah's patriotism, Oprah, however, is sadly misinformed.
1). Americans are clearly biased, and the fact is that Americans are in many ways all of the negative things that they accuse other people and other nations of being (there is none perfect, no not one)?
2). What spirit is driving an America that names the name of Christ, but does things in ways that are just the opposite of his teachings (particularly when America, among all nations, knows the ways of God)?
3). How and why is it that in Christian America, we can turn on our [terrorvisions] daily and witness all forms of violence, including robbery, rape, burglaries, debauchery and hatred, and I haven't even discussed America's other problems of social anomie?
4). What is holding America together? One could argue that America is being held together because the largest and most heavily-armed paramilitary civilian force over 500,000 policemen) in the world, works overtime to prevent American citizens from devouring each other. Yet we will proclaim to the world that we are the good guys, and the rest of you are the bad guys! However, we learn from scripture, that 'righteousness exalts a nation, and sin is a reproach to any people'.
According to the above scriptures, what spirit are we really of America, and what is the driving force (internally and externally), behind warring, violent and desultory America? Is it not the 'prince of the power of the air'?
Part I
America is the engine that drives the world, some say, but what is its destination?
Although spoken in terms of the world-wide economy, the phrase applies to more than commerce and trade; there is even more at stake than mammon.
If world conditions are to change at all in 2007, then America will have to change first. If America is to change at all, its people must change and in turn force America's leaders to change and to become responsive to the wishes of 'its altered people', who will have begun to turn towards obeying the word of the Lord. What we need in America is a healthy dose of realism. Our nation is awash in pseudo-patriotic apologists, who in spite of their good but naive intentions help to keep this country in stasis.
And all that does is to prevent this country and its leaders from making realistic assessments about the state of America, and the changes that will be necessary in order for America to heal. An honest assessment would help America to recognize the negative influences that America has and is having on the world, and help America to do something to about the negatives that it has introduced to the world. Why? Because the world is 'reacting' to American misbehavior(s). Many nations in the world are arming themselves (with nukes) seeking to acquire the kind of wealth, that will give them status in the world and help them to counter the American juggernaut.
Some dyed-in the wool American apologists will only speak of the purported good that America does (never without cost); they will at the same time ignore the negative impact that the ' American-engine' is having and has had on the rest of the world. Most of the world derides American comity, particularly when America and some Americans say that all that America has in mind is doing what is best for the rest of the world. To the people of Iraq many Americans would say, well yes we destroyed your country, but look on the bright side, we got rid of Saddam and someday you will rebuild your nation; and by the way, no thanks will be required! Most Iraqis would respond, but somehow we don't feel that we have been liberated or that we are free to rebuild.
The fact is that the reason that nothing changes in America is because some Americans are proponents of partial truth, and they do not want to see in changes made. The same individuals will never admit to the truth about America, even as they busy themselves pointing out the faults of other nations and people on the planet. The group of Americans, who joined in with the realistic Americans lately, those who tried to stop the war in Iraq from its onset, did not experience a change of mind for altruistic reasons. Many attributed their change of mind to practical reasons, and others because they felt that the war in Iraq was having a negative impact on their pocketbooks!
PART II
America expects the rest of the world to change and at the same time to remain the same, just as America is doing in one strategic area; America is doing all that it can to remain atop the 'world order'. In other words, America approves of the rest of the world improving themselves economically and culturally, however, every other nation must remain in lock-step, and submit to the desultory mandates of 'the United States of the World'. This applies to every nation of the world and even to organizations like the United Nations, 192 nations strong.
But the world is sending its own message back to the U.S.A., the world's number one protagonist nation. The world is saying that we are dynamic as well, and we will not be contained or constrained, or live our lives according to the mandates of the United States of America, simply because you have more and bigger guns.
Folks, if we believed in autonomy and freedom as much as we say that we did (something that has never been fully practiced in the USA), then we would, if anything, help each nation to find its own way, and we would respect their choices (just as God allows us to find our own way and to make our own choices). Instead the term 'democracy', and the efforts by the U.S.A. to spread democracy is nothing more than America hiding behind a euphemism in order to continue to engage in totalitarian practices. I don't believe that totalitarianism by any nation is of God!
America concluded long ago that its way (not God's way) was the right way. And America tries each and every day to force its designs upon the rest of the world (in hopes of maintaining its place at the top of the world order)!
I know that many will disagree and argue that America stopped Hitler and the III Reich. I will remind all of you that America was the last to join the fight, and I am sure that it was last to join the fight because America was engaging in many of the same practices as Hitler was, both at home and abroad. America was also actively discriminating against and murdering its own minority citizens, and pushing its expansionist agenda around the world at the same time that it joined in the fight against Hitler and the Third Reich!
We never did that you say? I encourage you to simply ask the Native Americans, blacks, the natives of Hawaii, and the other people of `the Americas, shall I go on, whether or not America was racist and as vicious as Hitler and the Third Reich. And where was the church? Much like the Church at Pergamos, in John's revelatory vision, the church was as it is today, 'settled into the world', and complicitous with the ways of the world.
Folks, God will tell us the truth no matter who or what we are, why don’t we do that ourselves before God has to, which may result in judgment being brought on America, of the kind that we have dished out on other nations. For God is not a man that he should lie, or the son of man that he should repent. I suspect that if the American engine does not 'turn over' soon, God will replace it with a new one'! And America and the world needs that, because it would appear that America, which is seeking after money and wealth (church and state), has lost sight of its true direction, not to mention that it has lost sight of the reason why God created nations and human government in the first place!
As I conclude: Many of us watched that racist and disgraceful film, 'The Birth of A Nation' at one time or another. And many of us know that this poorly conceived caricaturization of American blacks versus the good white American, was an accurate portrayal at one time of many white Americans. Sadly many of the latter were practicing men and women of gentry, Christian Americans no less. That film, not meaning to do so, demonstrated how good church going people could be totally off-base in terms of their commitment to God and his teachings; certainly they were not followers of Christ's teachings.
How schizophrenic was it that a group of Americans in the KKK would invoke the cross and the name of Jesus Christ (a Jew) while simultaneously hating Jews, and blacks? And keep in mind that kind of schizophrenia is alive and well in American religious and political circles until this day; in fact that kind of schizophrenia is interwoven into the fabric of our society today, even though many will deny it. The same group of individuals and groups will for example point out the problems of sectarianism in other nations, but they will never admit to the racial, class and sectarian problems that are prevalent in American society today.
Folks, we have witnessed the birth and rise of a 230-year old nation; is it then so far-fetched that we could also soon witness the 'death of a nation', our own? Is America dying? God shared something with me about a decade ago, and I have shared it with a few of my intimate contacts. You read it, think about it and decide what it means to you. He said, with regards to America a nation that is always invoking its 'rights', that America also 'Has The Right To Be A Nation Of Recent History'. How do you interpret that statement!
Peace & Grace
The Rev
P.S. In case you are concerned, God's preachers and his prophets have always been tasked with the responsibility of telling the truth and speaking truth to power, particularly to their own nations and countrymen and women!
Next Topic: The State Of The State Church!
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