Monday, October 8, 2007

Wealth and Power

After listening to a teaching by Dutch Sheets on the spirit of Jezebel I did more reading on the character of Jehu in the Bible. Jehu was the king who overthrew King Ahab’s sons and household as prophesied by Elijah. He also threw down Queen Jezebel and destroyed the prophets of Baal. He was anointed by Elijah and later by Elisha to be king and to accomplish this. What I found out by reading more was that he did not pursue and wipe out the practice of calf worship in the country. The Lord began to speak to me about this. I think most people understand that Baal worship is practiced today with abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia as well as others. He showed me that the calf worship is practiced today in the pursuit of wealth and power. The bull was a symbol of power and wealth in the ancient world, so I don't think that it is a coincidence that the symbol of a strong market on Wall Street is the bull. I am not speaking against wealth and power, because God places those in authority over us and there were many Godly, wealthy men in the Bible, Abraham and Job to name a couple. It is when the pursuit of wealth and power becomes the goal that the idolatry takes place. We are told in Proverbs 21:21 “He who pursues righteousness and love finds life, prosperity and honor.” Matthew 6:33 says “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” God will raise up to positions of power and wealth those individuals who He wants. Just as He chose David, the smallest of the sons of Jesse to be king and Gideon, from the smallest family in the least of the tribes to lead His people, so he calls people today. Too often we look at the outward appearance and “elect-ability” of an individual. We have to ask for discernment and wisdom in choosing who we support. We do not want to be guilty of supporting someone just because they are from one party or another. Some people say, better the devil you know, than the devil you don't. I personally do not want any devil representing me. We also need to continue to pray for those elected. Too many fall victim to the lure of the pursuit of wealth and power once in that position. We need to pray that they keep their focus on the maker and redeemer of all. Writing this actually prompted me to write the previous post. I don't know how often I will write to this blog, but hopefully it will be more rather than less.

Faith and Politics

This is my first post on my new blog. I am going to write about my take on faith and politics. I will leave the history to my brother in law, as he is much more versed in this than I am.

It is interesting to see both parties engaging in discourse which address matters of faith. Frankly I think neither party gets it totally right. The Republican party to get elected, has placed their emphasis on social conservatism to win the vote of conservative Christians. Being in favor of unrestrained capitalism, they tend to ignore the little guy in favor of big business. While making money is not a sin, making money at the expense of other people is not how a Christian should set up a business model. We are called to be Christ’s example in the world. He called us to look after the widows and orphans. I do not think it is the government’s job to provide charity, I think that is a clear mandate to the church from Jesus. But until the church takes this role seriously, I think there is a government role in making sure people do not slip through the cracks where health care and education are concerned. The vast majority of this however, should be done at the local and state level and not at the federal level.

The Democrats on the other hand place their emphasis on social equality and wealth redistribution to appeal to their many interest groups. Some of these groups include the pro-abortion and pro-homosexual lobby. As a result they like to cherry pick the parts of scripture they cite. They like the Sermon on the Mount, but not the parts where Paul speaks about condemning homosexuality and calling us to live righteously. They like big government because the more affect the government has in your life, the more they will have a say in how we live our lives. This is a system with very little self-responsibility or accountability.

For this reason, we can no longer just follow a party and as the saying goes, choose the lesser of two evils. We have to seek out those candidates that uphold righteousness. We cannot wait until the general election to ask God who we should vote for; we must begin asking for guidance now. We cannot be discouraged by the perceived lack of candidates; we need to ask God to raise up those candidates that He wants in office. Just as Gideon defeated the army of the Midianites with 300 men, so too we can with “the sword of the Lord and Gideon” defeat the political and spiritual enemies of the Lord in this country.

On a side, I noticed this quote by one of the Democrat candidates for President Barack Obama in an article on the CNN page.

The article stated that Democrat candidate for president Barack Obama said "We're going to keep on praising together. I am confident that we can create a Kingdom right here on Earth." Hmm, I thought the Kingdom was all ready here. This sounds a little humanistic to me.

New Blog

I have wanted to write for quite some time. I did not want to post long rants or other things that were on my mind because I wanted to keep the blog light and fun with pictures and such. This will be my forum for politcal, spiritual, and other subjects that I want to write about.