I hope someday, my kids will be scrolling through this post in January of 2020, right before the election of Joe Biden, and think: "Mom thought things were really, really bad in America. But in fact, Jesus was just about to get started helping things get very, very good."
I hope that.
But I am really doubting it will come to pass.
We can't know the future. We can't worry about it either. Well, we can, but the Lord encourages us not to.
Hebrews 13:14 says: "For this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come."
John 16:33 says: "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."
I believe the Lord gives us all of us a different "mission" in our life. We have different callings. I truly believe that I was created to LOVE. I have always wanted people to be happy. Some of this, is born from selfish desires. I want people to like me. I want to please man.
But I truly have a very sympathetic heart. I think the psychiatric term is an empath. The first time I heard this word, I thought my friend was describing something mythological or ethereal. But I have since come to understand that as an empath, I am just a highly sensitive individual. I sense what people around me are thinking and feeling. I have a great deal of empathy, often to the point of taking on the pain of others at their own expense. This emotion has been with me for as long as I can remember, and it has always exhausted me. When I am with a group of people, I am thinking about what they may be thinking and feeling nearly constantly. I want them to have peace. I want them to be joyful.
But alas, I am a human. And they are humans. And I can't control what they are feeling. And they can't control what they are feeling either.
I want world peace. I've always wanted world peace. But the truth is: this is a world of sin. Truly, as a Christian, I feel that the lack of moral absolutes our world (and specifically our country) has put into place during the last two decades specifically, will be the downfall of our country. And maybe of our world. This makes me sad. And yet I know, that Revelation prophecies about the end times. It won't be easy. There will be sin running rampant.
Truly, as I see it, the Democrats are going about things all wrong. To the opposite extreme, the Republicans are going about it all wrong. I believe the intention of both sides is rooted in what they believe is truth. However, I believe TRUTH has lost its definition. We don't allow TRUTH to be black or white anymore. If you are living YOUR "truth" then that's all that matters.
But it isn't.
You truth may be sin. The Bible, if we believe it is true, is full of sin. And sinful acts. There is black. There is white. It isn't all gray. In the end, both political parties are human beings attempting to save people from their own versions of sin. But those versions are very different.
I don't believe that we are savable on this Earth. I believe we are only savable by spending eternity with Jesus Christ. My job is to tell as many people as I can about my Jesus. Not about my political affiliations or party. ABOUT MY JESUS!
JESUS IS THE ONLY "MAN" WHO CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY OR OUR WORLD.
I understand that some people are called to enter the political realm. Others are called to be preachers. Physicians. Missionaries. John and I always thought we'd have some big calling on our lives. We thought we'd be overseas somewhere serving medically on the mission field.
But God had other ideas. He has called us, to right here, right now, on this farm, serving our local community in the midst of a pandemic. I never thought God would tell me to remain on social media and continue to speak the actual truth. Not "my" truth. But the "actual" truth as we are currently seeing it in a rural ER in East TN. John is on the front lines of a pandemic. But even more than that, we feel called to allow people to come to our farm for respite and refuge and retreat. To get rejuvenated. Reequipped. Loved. Hugged. Jesus-filled.
While the country and world has many problems, I do think that if we all focused on loving our neighbor AS OURSELVES things would be much better. I truly feel that Republicans think that they can't love Democrats. And vice versa. And this makes me sad. I don't feel it was like this twenty years ago. I truly felt like everything has gotten worse in the last twenty years. How can we be MORE racist now than we were twenty years ago? How can we love our neighbors LESS than we did twenty years ago? How have things gotten so much worse?
Sin?
Social media?
Lack of following the Word of God?
All of the above?
I feel that sin has created a huge divide. I pray our country doesn't break into pieces, but I fear it will.
And if does, I hope John and I will continue to be on our 96-aces ... loving people. Loving Jesus. And loving the whole wide world.
Again, I hope some day, I look back on this post and think: that was when everything turned around for good. We feared bad but good was right around the corner.
I pray that is the case. But right now, it feels like this has been a year of just plain ... bad.
And that it might only get worse.
But in the end John 12:46 says: "I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness. If anyone hears my words and does not keep them, I do not judge him, for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word that I have spoken with judge him on the last day."
