The personality cult, the One Great Leader Who Leads the Masses has never been a Conservative value. It certainly has never been a Christian value. The very idea of Conservatism—and especially the American type Christian Conservatism—has always been suspicious toward a system where one person focuses the hopes and the expectations of the movement and leads them according to his will or goals. Christianity has always been firm that there is only one legitimate Leader—Jesus Christ—and He leads through His Holy Spirit. All human leaders are by default imperfect, fallible, and all of them need to be under close scrutiny and healthy criticism by the very people they lead into battle.
Human talent amazes me. Totally aside from the child prodigies, we are an extremely gifted bunch. After only a couple of decades on the planet, from those who have the opportunity to apply themselves with enthusiasm to their particular area of interest, we see some incredible achievements. For the godless, this should certainly seem miraculous. But for our dark hearts it just proves how smart and wonderful we already are in ourselves. This is the ingratitude Paul speaks of.
For Christians, talent (or beauty or wealth) is just another dead giveaway of God’s existence. And God Himself almost seems to despise this early glory as a short-lived covering of wildflowers that appears suddenly after some long-awaited rain. This is the glory of youth and it is insufferably vain. It exalts itself by calling its competition dumb and ugly.
“Let his days be few, and let another take his office.” Psalm 109:8
The imprecatory Psalms seem to contradict the instruction of Christ to love our enemies. Ben Myers recently noted a campaign to pray for President Obama, to pray Psalm 109:8, that is:
Apparently some Southern Baptist pastors have been using Psalm 109:8 as a prayer for Obama’s death: “May his days be few; may another take his place of leadership. May his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.” This even inspired a line of creepy bumper stickers and T-shirts that read “Pray for Obama.” One of these pastors says: “You’re going to tell me that I’m supposed to pray for the socialist devil, murderer, infanticide, who wants to see young children, and he wants to see babies killed through abortion and partial-birth abortion and all these different things. Nope. I’m not gonna pray for his good. I’m going to pray that he dies and goes to hell.”
During the 2008 election campaign, I remember being chastised for suggesting that a McCain/Palin administration was the best choice off a “bad-or-worse” menu. As Doug Wilson put it, it was a choice between heading for the cliff at 5mph or 100mph.
“Immediately, the Spirit drove Him into the wilderness.” —Mark 1:12
NOTE: THIS POST HAS BEEN REMIXED AND INCLUDED IN GOD’S KITCHEN.
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Oswald Chambers says:
The first thing to do in examining the power that dominates me is to take hold of the unwelcome fact that I am responsible for being thus dominated. If I am a slave to myself, I am to blame because at a point away back I yielded to myself. Likewise, if I obey God I do so because I have yielded myself to Him.
When I was in sales, I was taught that it takes twelve times as much energy to gain a new client as it does to keep an existing one by letting them know they are not taken for granted. Same goes in geopolitics.
James Jordan writes:
One way to understand the relevance of Egypt [during Solomon's reign] is to contrast Egypt with Tyre. Hiram, king of Tyre, had been a loyal ally of David. He loved David. He clearly was a converted man. When Solomon came to the throne, Hiram could not do enough for him. He volunteered to help build the Temple, because Israel’s God was his God also (1 Kings 5). He showered Solomon with gifts (1 Kings 9:11, 14). If there was any nation Solomon should have allied with, it was Tyre.
“One of the most ominous events of modern history is quietly unfolding. Social science and economics come together to declare a looming demographic winter which threatens to have catastrophic social and economic consequences.”
If the data this documentary presents holds up, most of Obama’s “change” is based on hysteria that is between 1 and 3 decades old and totally debunked. The only thing going for these suicidal policies is political correctness. A good example is a recent Outloud Opinion podcast which covered the baseless ideology behind Obama’s aggressive pro-abortion policy, highlighting just one of the nutcase extremists the President continues to surround himself with. Continue reading
Mike Bull is a graphic designer who lives and works in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, Australia. His passion is understanding and teaching the Bible, and he writes occasionally for Theopolis Institute in Birmingham AL, USA.
