Our Hope is in You

I’ve been trying to sort through these past couple of days since the election. I’ve just been feeling tremendously sad about this election and trying to figure out where that sadness was coming from. I’ve concluded that it’s stemming from a few things…yes, I’m not happy that Barrack is our new President and I DEFINITELY do not agree with him on numerous issues, but I’ll save that for another post. But, I’m not even as much concerned about him only because his power is limited. He can only do what God allows. My sadness stems from the public’s reaction to him winning the election and their reaction to Barack himself. On the news, out in public, on Facebook, on tv I keep hearing people make statements that are just downright disturbing to me. That’s what I want to talk about in these next couple of paragraphs:

“I’ve never felt to proud to be an American”, “I feel so patriotic”, etc. …. really? Prior to Obama being named President, you weren’t patriotic? The USA absolutely has it’s problems, but you’re telling me that the love you felt for our country on November 5th is so much greater than it was on November 4th? I certainly know that I take my country for granted, and apparently many other people do as well. If you really feel that you didn’t have reason to be patriotic prior to Obama, then I recommend that you go visit another country. Go to a country where 95% of the police are corrupt and they take bribes to look the other way when children as young as 5 years old are being prostituted out to the highest bidder. Go to a country that, 14 years ago, was ravaged by a genocide where almost a million people were slaughtered in the course of 3 months, while the government either looked the other way or participated in the killings themselves. Or how about an article I read today about a 13 year old girl in Somalia who seeked help from the government because she had been raped by 3 men. Their reaction??? Accuse her of adultery, drag her screaming and begging for mercy, in a pit in the ground where 50 men proceeded to stone her to death, all while 1,000 people looked on. Maybe before we start bemoaning how bad our government is, let’s think of the options available to us in the rest of the world. Our patriotism shouldn’t be based on a man being elected into office.

I’m also constantly hearing how ‘historic’ this election is…we now have an African American President. Sure. Absolutely. That is historic. It just makes me question people’s motives for who they voted for. Were we more concerned with making history or electing the right person? Just as much as the color of someone’s skin doesn’t make them a bad person, it also doesn’t make them a good person either, or the right person in this case. I’m certain that most people didn’t vote based on race alone, but I have heard several people and groups, prior to the election, proclaiming that, if you were a minority living in the U.S. you have no excuse to not vote for Obama. That’s one of the most ridiculous statements I’ve heard. Basically, they were telling us to vote based on skin color… how is that any different than if I were to vote for someone simply because he/she was white? There is no difference and I think that way of thinking is dangerous.

Lastly, and probably the statement that upsets me the most, is hearing people say that they now have ‘hope’. Hope for our country, hope for their children’s future and for themselves. I don’t get that… did they really have no hope before??? And, if that is the case, then don’t you think that they’ve been putting their hope in the wrong thing/person? I certainly wasn’t putting my hope, or planning on putting my hope, in McCain. My hope was, and is, in God and I was hopeful that McCain would willingly let God guide his actions and decisions. It really breaks my heart to hear people felt hopeless prior to Obama and now, all of a sudden, they have hope. Well, I hate to break it to ya, but Obama is not the Messiah. He’s not perfect and putting your hope into anything that is imperfect is really taking a risk, because you’re going to be disappointed when Obama can’t live up to your idealistic expectations of him.

I truly can’t help but think that God is grieving…not over who won the election, but over the fact that all of the praise, faith, hope, attention and trust that He is worthy of, is all going to another.

It's really important that we all start praying for our nation. Praying for the people of this nation and for our new President. I pray that he would allow himself to be guided by and make decisions according to God's will, not his own or the popular majority.