Do you remember the children’s nursery rhyme that starts with, “Sticks and stones may break my bones…?” What you soon learn about that rhyme is that it isn’t true. Words can hurt and they often do.

They are the wicked lashes of whips that rip the flesh from our emotional backs and leave us scarred for life. They form chains that bind us down and hold us captive to accusations and lies. Because of them, we construct prison walls to keep us safely out of reach from people for our protection. We gather them up and build our own arsenal of verbal weaponry to use on any who we feel threaten us. Words most certainly can hurt you.

This is why James wrote, “Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom” (2:12). The law that gives freedom is the law of love. Love demands that our words be gentle and kind. Love desires that our words and actions be compassionate and merciful. Of course, those who know me are screaming, “How can you say such things? You spout unkind, fierce, rude, judgmental political comments all the time.” I have to say this is sometimes true.

However, when I rail politically, it is generally not personal, but rather ideologically. For example, when I hate on the New York Yankees, it’s not personal, I don’t know any of them. But I hate what they represent in my world, from my own point of view. I am not trying to win converts to my side on these things, I’m cheering my own team. A cheerleader at a ballgame is not there to convince the opponents fans to change allegiance. Cheering our side inspires. I want people who agree with me to make some noise!

I have a couple of friends who are strongly in the camp of the political opposition from my own. Though they disagree with me, argue and challenge me, we do not attack each other personally. Mike and Bruce are good people who think different than I at times, that doesn’t make them Philistines. I don’t treat them, nor do they treat me, with disrespect.

Love calls us to realize that our words and actions will be judged by our own hearts and by the hearts of those who hear our words and receive our actions. Remember that love judges both our words and our actions. I hope I do better this week than last.

telemicus out

These thoughts stem from someone who said to me, ‘The Bible says that God establishes all authority. If he chose Obama you should quit talking bad about his policies and get behind him or be quiet; or do you not trust God with this?” My feeling is that God also put Herod in place… but John the Baptist still opposed him publicly for his immorality. There is no doubt that we who are Christians and Americans are Christians first. In following Christ, where are our responsibilities regarding patriotism and morality?

The primary passage of this discussion says, “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God” (Romans 13:1). To disagree, even passionately, with leadership or authorities is not rebellion. Neither is it a lack of trust in God. We are not the children of the president and he is not above challenge even if established in that office by God.

God is sovereign.

Here is the short version of my argument. God, in his wisdom gave us the privilege of choosing our own leaders. About 130 million people participated in this selection process. The majority of those people claim a belief in God. When God allowed Israel to choose a king, (though he was against it) He told them, “When you enter the land the LORD your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” be sure to appoint over you the king the LORD your God chooses” (Deuteronomy 17:14-15 – emphasis mine).

You see if God gives his children the opportunity to choose their own leaders, he expects them to appoint the ones He chooses. So the responsibility is on us to seek God, to know his will and to appoint those who would honor Him. Because he chose us, through us, he establishes our leaders. We have a responsibility whomever we choose, to hold them accountable for the decisions they make.

But the truth is we neglect our responsibilities. We vote our comfort. We did not challenge the over the top spending of the Bush administration, because we were comfortable. But now the pressure is on. The comfort is lost and the spending went from over the top to ten degrees past insanity. The current friction began with concern over our comfort. But when people began to examine all that Obama intends to do and the amount of money it will take, it stopped being about comfort and started being about policies. This is largely because bad policies affect our comfort.

I don’t think Americans at Town Hall Meetings and Tea Parties showed up because they suddenly saw that our choice was not God’s choice. I wish this were true. People chose Obama because of flash, narrative, and the ‘hope and change’ mantra. But the hope is false and the change is bad. My contention is that his policies are bad for America and are dishonorable toward God and Christ.

Did God choose Obama – no, He established him. When He entrusted us with the honor of appointing our leaders, He established the ones we chose. For better or worse – God gives us what we demand. This is not true in every country, but it is true in ours. When we choose our leaders, God is allowing us to affirm Him as our Lord. When the Israelite people demanded a king - God said to Samuel, “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king” (1 Samuel 8:7). Did we as a people, in selecting the current leaders, appoint the one that God chose?