“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo.
“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” – J. R. R. Tolkien
With what I have seen transpire in my lifetime, I cannot fathom a quote more applicable to my life than the one shown above. In my life, the most devastating attack on U.S. soil since WWII occurred, the first black president was elected, two war criminals were punished for their crimes against humanity, a con-artist scammed an entire nation, an intangible currency reached $42,000 per unit, a criminal was made into a martyr, transsexualism and gender identity have been thrust onto children, impassioned civilians stormed Congress, devastating shootings have broken out across the country, and states have been given back the right to choose to allow murder. I have watched all of this unfold and many other defining things that have led up to these grander ideas. Although not all of these are bad, as I reflect on the consequences of some of these events, all I can think to say are the words found in Isaiah 6:5 – “Woe to me! I am destroyed, for my lips are contaminated by sin, and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin.”
Beware, those who call evil good and good evil who turn darkness into light and light into darkness, who turn bitter into sweet and sweet into bitter – Isaiah 5:20
My heart mourns because we are living in a time when it seems like everyone is calling evil good whether they hold said evil passionately or simply allow it because: “I can’t let my religious views affect my opinions.” So many of us Christians have fallen captive to the trap of thinking that allowing our religion to affect our politics, to affect the battles that we fight on behalf of our nation, is a violation of Church and state. This is not true and never will be! The nature of Christianity is to build a relationship with God and allow Him to change every aspect of our life. We cannot fall prey to compromising our morals to bullshit arguments or for the sake of efficacy in law. What we have been commanded by the all-powerful God of the Universe who wills our very existence is not up to interpretation – it is black and white. There is no grey with God, you are either hot or cold. But if you are lukewarm, then you’ll be spit out because the god you serve is not god, but rather an idol crafted by your own hubris and bullshit reasons of “etiquette.”
You shall have no other gods before me – Exodus 20:3
One thing that gives me hope is seeing more and more individuals frustrated with how much ground the enemy has taken in politics and watching Christians fight back being “the light of the world.” It gives me hope. My prayer for the Christians of the world is: for them to be bold in truth and to lead the world away from evil and back to innocence, to try to restore the world to an Eden state where we do not run from the light, but rejoice in being in it, and to not be ashamed of the sin we carry, but to allow His glory to burn it all away.
Do everything without murmuring or questioning [the providence of God] so that you may prove yourselves to be blameless and guileless, innocent and uncontaminated, children of God without blemish in the midst of a [morally] crooked and [spiritually] perverted generation, among whom you are seen as bright lights [beacons shining out clearly] in the world [of darkness]
– Philippians 2:14-15