Special Bulletin 11-2012

 

      This is a brief on the third of seven main crises threatening our country. As a reminder, the Health Meter goes from 1 being the lowest and most dangerous, to 10 being the highest and healthiest. The Trend Arrow is for a quick reference rating with UP for getting healthier, and DOWN for getting worse. These will be followed by a commentary to explain the ratings.  

 

 

Political. Present State (3) Trend DOWN

 

      I base this analysis on two main criteria: 1) Knowledge of and devotion to complying with The Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and 2) the integrity, wisdom, and courage of our political leadership. 

 

      The reason for the first as a criteria for evaluating our political health is because The Constitution and Bill of Rights were unprecedented instruments for providing the freedom and stability that released human initiative and progress as never before, and they remain unique and exceptional. The second criteria is because you can have the best form of government but still have bad government if you do not have good people in it.

 

      After years of study, I became convinced that our founding documents were divinely inspired and were fundamentally linked to biblical principles of government and stewardship. The abundant personal writings of the Founding Fathers overwhelmingly confirm this. Seeing the Lord’s hand in our nation’s founding and development instilled in me a resolve to do all that I could to help preserve it and keep on the path to fulfilling our high calling. 

 

      Even so, America is not the kingdom of God or the New Jerusalem. The blessings we have enjoyed are offered in Scripture to any nation that will seek to do what is right in the sight of the Lord. To the degree that we have held to these biblical principles and our founding documents that enshrined them, we have prospered. To the degree that we have departed from them, we have suffered. Virtually every major crisis our nation is now facing is the result of departing from this way, and the answer to all of them is to get back on it. 

 

      Even though we have been a nation that has enjoyed divine favor for the ways that we devoted ourselves in the beginning to do what was right in the sight of the Lord, this does not mean that we did everything perfectly, and at times, terrible deeds and injustices were both done and promoted by our government and many of our people. Like Christians who backslide for a season, America has at times gone awry, but to date, it has come to repentance, rejecting and removing the unrighteousness and injustice. Then the crisis would end, and peace and prosperity would go to even higher levels.  

 

 

      The Lord said that it was out of the abundance of our hearts that our mouths speak. One of the basic signs of our decline is how politicians and the media speak of matters being “constitutional” or “unconstitutional” without any real connection to what The Constitution very clearly states, often in direct conflict with it. One would think that public office holders who must swear to defend The Constitution from enemies both foreign and domestic should at least be required to read it. It can be read in about an hour taking your time. Even “Constitutional lawyers” seem to be either completely ignorant of the document or have succumbed to the terrible arrogance of believing their knowledge and opinions to be above it. 

 

      When theologians or Bible teachers begin to claim a position to be “biblical” without it having any real connection to the Bible, then it is the beginning of heresy. One has rightly said that almost all heresies are the result of men trying to carry to logical conclusions that which God has only revealed in part. This led to the sect of the Pharisees claiming to have the greatest devotion to the written Word but being the worst at distorting it and clouding it with their own traditions. This caused them to be the most resistant to the Word Himself when He came to them. The same has been done to The Constitution. The simplicity of it without adding to it or taking away from it is its power, but it has been tragically diluted by increasingly stretched interpretations. 

 

      Our Supreme Court is not infallible. It has many conflicting decisions in its history. When Christian teachers get further from the truth, the answer is to return to what the Bible actually says. This should be done by every Christian, not just leaders. If Americans would pick up and read a copy of The Constitution, they would certainly be amazed at what has actually evolved in our government. We have gone far awry from our moorings, and the answer to almost every crisis we are now in is to return to them.

 

      Our Constitution and Bill of Rights were unprecedented when they were written, and they were the foundation of the unprecedented advancement in virtually every field that America enjoyed for so long. These were not restrictive but rather liberating. They promoted freedom in every realm, a “law of liberty,” while establishing boundaries that protected the freedom of all, as well as their life and property. These documents weren’t based on the agrarian society that existed at that time, but on human nature that has been proven in every generation of human existence, and is obviously still true today. All of this was built on the basic and revolutionary premise that government existed for the people, not the other way around. 

 

      Founding Fathers wrote in their personal letters and memoirs that they knew this government and our freedoms would not survive if: 1) we did not remain a moral, religious, God-fearing people or 2) if the people started to vote for themselves the resources of the treasury. In the last century, both of these conditions have grown to the point that they now threaten the continued existence of the Republic. We are in a crisis now that will determine if we will live or die.

 

      We now have elected officials who obviously do not take seriously their oath to defend The Constitution, or even that our government exists for the people, but rather for their own reelection. This is the result of another fundamental departure from the intended makeup of our representatives. Our government was never intended to be composed of professional politicians, but rather citizens who took office more as a duty like jury duty rather than the positions of high privilege they have now become. 

 

      For the formative years, our representatives were as likely to be a preacher as a lawyer. Just as in Scripture, the greatest leaders were those who were sought out and anointed, not those who sought the position out of their own ambition. Our leaders were intended to be servants, not potentates. We will not last much longer without this being recovered. 

 

      Now decisions seem rarely to be made with true wisdom or for the good of the country, but rather are almost all determined by political expediency. Foresight is so non-existent that virtually no problem can even be addressed until it reaches crisis level. 

 

      Even the management of the Federal Government has become so incompetent and inefficient that it has swelled to several times the size that it should be for the job that it is doing. Our government is like a head that is nearly the size of the rest of the body and still swelling. It is now so big that it is consuming the resources of the entire nation. 

 

      Duplication is so rife that several agencies can be assigned the same task, and often none of them accomplish it. No politician of either party has addressed this problem of basic management—the stewardship of the people’s resources that have been entrusted to it. It will take uncommon courage for the ones who do this because they will have to break the stranglehold of the powerful Public Service Unions. Even Franklin Roosevelt declared that Public Service Unions should not be allowed in government because of the obvious conflict of interest. 

 

 

      The “Fast and Furious” gun running operation that sent enough weapons to Mexican drug cartels to equip a small army has to be the most bizarre example of incompetence possibly in history. At worst, this is something far more sinister. Not only have some Americans lost their lives because of this incomprehensible program, but it has put countless Americans at risk. Over two years after this unimaginable folly was exposed, no one has been held accountable for it. The Administration claims people were fired for it, but this just reveals another way they have twisted the English language to confuse the American people—there is a difference between being “fired” and being “reassigned.” 

 

      Now complicity at the highest levels seems obvious when the President stepped in and claimed “Executive Privilege” to keep from giving relevant documents to the congressional committee investigating “Fast and Furious.” If you don’t have anything to hide, then don’t hide it. Already there is evidence of lying on the part of the Justice Department, and this is beginning to have the same feel as the Watergate type cover-up. 

 

      The Watergate break-in and cover-up by the Nixon Administration was a ridiculous and totally unnecessary foul-up by a Presidential campaign that had virtually no chance to lose the election. Fast and Furious seems far more sinister. What could possibly motivate our Federal Government to sell guns to Mexican drug cartels? They claimed they did this to track them to see who was getting them, but they had no plan or way to track them, and they knew when they sold them who was getting them. 

 

      At the very least “Fast and Furious” put many lives in danger and has already taken the life of one of our border patrol agents. Again, at best, this is incompetence on an incomprehensible level. There is a Federal law that requires federal officials at every level to be competent with a serious penalty for those who take a position without being competent.

 

      At worst this was treason, a betrayal of the American people by its own government officials. Why the media is not pressing its own investigation of this lends credence to the position of Pravda, Russia’s primary newspaper, which has been saying and providing much evidence that freedom of the press no longer exists in America. The most basic assertion of Pravda is based on how the Obama Administration has so effectively brought the media under its control. 

 

 

      The elections of 2010 gave a brief hope that a new class of congressmen and women were elected with a mandate to bring change, and we have hardly heard from them since they got to Washington. It is hard to decide if what the Obama Administration is doing to us is worse than the lack of courage and resolve on the part of the Congress to stand up to it. Something very weird seems to happen to everyone we send up there.

 

 

      As I have been saying for the last few elections, each one would be more important than the last one. I think this has proven true. This fall we will once again have the most important election in our lifetime. Our Republic truly is hanging in the balance. Even so, the kind of extraordinary leadership we are in such desperate need of is not likely to be able to make it through the establishment politics now prevailing.

 

      Studies confirm that the majority of the American people are fed up with both political major parties. Usually one party falls out of favor and the other gains favor and grows, but we are now in a time when both the Democratic and Republican parties are bleeding members by the millions. Independents are now the largest bloc of voters and are the only bloc that is growing. Obviously, there is not time to field a third party for this election, but there is a desperate need for new vision and new leadership. 

 

      Just fixing the economy may give us more time, but we will end up in the same or worse place if what is causing the breakdown is not addressed and a bold new vision for the future is not presented. America is still better positioned than any other nation or bloc of nations to lead well into the future, but the bold new breed of leadership that is needed both to deal with the present crisis and chart our course into the future is still not on the radar screen.  

 

      The vacuum of leadership is not just in government but in virtually every major center of influence such as business, media, education, the arts, and the church. In Isaiah chapters three through five, we see that capricious and immature leaders are a judgment of God for the nation that falls to the ultimate depravity of calling good evil, and evil good, for dishonoring the honorable while honoring the dishonorable. This sounds like America and just about every other Western nation now, which are all suffering under the same dearth of leadership. 

 

      Over the last couple of weeks, I spoke at three Christian conferences in three different European nations. In some ways, very encouraging things are happening in Europe, and in some ways not. One of the most shocking was the way everyone referred to their spouse as their “partner.” I then heard one speaker apologize and correct himself for calling his wife his wife, and then said, “I mean my partner.” Using the terms “husband” and “wife” are now inappropriate in those countries, and some even consider it “hate speech.” As shocking as this was to witness, they are not too far ahead of us in this slide into moral confusion and depravity.

 

      One of the fundamental ways that the devil subverts and perverts is to blur the clear distinctions that God has made. Political correctness is one of the most effective “gates of hell,” or point of access for hell, into our culture. The surest sign that one has been delivered from Babylon is clear speech, and never has there been a greater need for clear beliefs, clear distinctions, and clear speech. 

 

 

      The answer is not to just seek to elect better leaders, though this is important, but far more important is we need to return to God who can alone raise up righteous, just, and wise leaders. The meltdown began when America started allowing those who reject Him to cause the nation to reject Him, removing Him from our history books, our public places, and now even public speech. Then we wonder where He is when catastrophe hits. He is where He is shown to be in Revelation 3:20, standing outside knocking to see if anyone will hear His voice and open to Him. In this age, He will not come where He is not wanted, and America has been telling Him He is not welcome here any longer.  

 

      The ultimate answer to our political crisis is the same as the answer to our Economic and our Moral and Spiritual crises—as a nation we have turned away from our God—we must turn back to Him. We are in desperate need of those with courage and prophetic clarity to both teach His ways and walk in them.

 

      When the Lord returns, He said that He would separate the nations into “sheep and goats.” According to the qualifications of a “sheep” nation, America has been one of the best in history. Certainly as a nation we have had some failures, but overall there has never been a nation to rise to the heights that we have or been one of the best at the qualifications the Lord said made one a sheep and not a goat. Then we made a turn and have started to glorify the very things that lead to one being a goat nation and suffer the ultimate judgment for it. As long as we still exist there is time to repent, but we cannot presume on how much time we have left. 

 

      We have had a tragic meltdown of our spirituality and morality in recent times, but it has happened before. Whether by revival or awakening, the nation has fallen and then turned back to the One they had abandoned, much like the cycles of biblical Israel. This time we seem to have fallen much further, much faster, but so can our recovery be greater. Don’t abandon the ship yet, but she must be turned or we will soon enter conditions we cannot survive.

 

      The whole world is entering “the valley of decision.” Because of the times we’re now in, the choices that are being made now have both faster and more extreme consequences than before. This is because we are entering the times that Jesus called “the harvest,” that would be at the end of this age. At the time of the harvest, everything that has been sown is maturing, both the wheat and the tares, the good and the evil. 

 

      We are told in Isaiah 60 that when darkness covers the earth and deep darkness the people, the glory of the Lord will appear on His people. Those who are turning to the Lord and those who are turning away from Him will become increasingly distinct. However, as we are told in verse three of that chapter the nations will come to the light. The light is going to win! Let us resolve now that our country is going to be on the winning side.

 

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