I am not intentionally being abrasive; I am using a bit of sarcasm in my statement.  If you believe we can right the ship of state in America via the political avenue, you are misguided.  I believe that door has closed. There is hope for America and the world, temporarily.  It is not through the political.

As many know, I am a Christian, a preacher, and a staunch advocate for Constitutional purism.  I love America!  I love Freedom!  But more than anything, I love God; through that love, I love my fellow humans and want the best for everyone.  I long to see a society where we treat each other respectfully, follow ethical pathways, and return to a more moral condition.  If that is to be a reality, it cannot and will not come through politics. 

Politics is a dirty business, largely self-serving. It is food for the narcissistic to seek prominence and power.  Politics has no qualms about sacrificing lives for political position and power.  Politics is designed to divide and conquer using whatever means available in the quest for control.  Politics is not the friend of the common man.

Political Parties like Church Denominations are manmade entities that do more to separate and isolate than to unite.  Political rhetoric is akin to false advertising claims made by manufacturers of their goods.  It offers an unattainable fantasy and drives wedges through fear into the hearts of the gullible. 

Political Parties, being manmade institutions, seldom live up to their billing nor fulfill their promise.  They are flawed because the people controlling them are flawed and often driven by their thirst for power.  Man, at his best, is corrupt.  Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.  The more power available, the more likely there will be corruption, collusion, and confusion. 

The only, and I repeat, ONLY hope for America is God!  If that causes you to cease reading, that is your choice.  I defend your right to do so and even to disagree adamantly.  I hope it is not a vehement disagreement because that is part of the problem in today’s world and the political scene.  Vitriolic diatribe and hate-filled language drive people from reason to reaction.  Emotional reaction is usually knee-jerk and does not carefully count costs and weigh the options.  It reacts because it is threatened, offended, or challenged. 

Politicians in the modern era have become supersalesmen peddling their wares with utopian ideas they know will never be enacted and likely never attempted.  Every voter should carefully examine the flowery language that flows from the glib-tongued aspirants for political office.  I hear politicians that I agree with and those I do not make outlandish promises and I cringe.  It often identifies either their lack of understanding of the office they seek and its power or they are selling snake oil to the gullible. 

In the Book of Psalms, David prayed, a prayer that I pray regularly and one that the nation needs to embrace.  Psalm 139:23-24 – “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting!”  You can count on it: He knows, sees, hears, and understands people’s hearts.  He is more than willing to lead us in the right way and transform our hearts so that we can, at least, be kind to one another, if not love one another.

In the Book of Revelation, Jesus challenged the church (people) to repent and return to their first love (Him).  The Golden Rule calls for us to treat others as we desire; they treat us.  That is a straightforward declaration, and all could follow, but we adopt a modified version, “Do unto others before they do unto us.”   Rather than forgiving, we often find ourselves in the mentality of vengeance.  I had a man in the church tell me, “I don’t get mad; I get even.”  He was comfortable with that; I am not biblically, morally, socially, or societally. 

We want to see America restored to its place of prominence as the world’s preeminent superpower economically and militarily.  As many previous presidents have stated, strength is the surest way to have peace.  When America has been strong, those who wanted to destroy were hesitant to launch acts of aggression.  Strength without moral mooring leads to tyranny and despotism.  We have seen that in history.  As a nation, America stood for Freedom. 

In the past few years, we have evicted God from the public square and opened the door for ideologies anathema to biblical precepts and moral sanity eroding the foundations of our republic.  Ronald Reagan poetically lauded the beacon of freedom that shined in America, and for much of our history, that beacon has provided hope for the world.  That beacon is, at best, a flickering candle today, and the light in the Lighthouse needs to be reignited. 

The only hope for America is a return to what made us the great nation we have been and can be.  In Jeremiah, the prophet spoke for God in Jeremiah 29:12-14 declaring that if people called upon God, He would listen.  What an amazing concept.  We pray to the Creator of all things, and He listens to us!  He said that if we would seek Him, we would find Him if we seek with a whole heart.  He promised that He would restore them!  We have Hope, but that Hope is in God and God alone!

W. Robert Godfrey, the Anglican minister, said, “God is still doing His work when it seems like the heretics are having all the success.”  God has not abandoned the Throne of Heaven or people who will seek Him with their whole hearts.  He promises Never to leave us nor forsake us.  The man’s cry in Mark 9:24 could be the cry of America today.  We need to cry out with a desperate, piercing cry, “Lord, I believe; help me overcome my unbelief or weak faith.” 

America, if we become so focused on politics that we miss the condition of our hearts, we will err and continue on the path to destruction as a republic.  We cannot continue business as usual; we must take a different path.  If we continue to divide, spew forth vitriolic rhetoric, and attack each other, we will reach the point where the eruption of violence is guaranteed.  That will be the point of no return, for we will have lost our Republic and Freedom.  We can see this nation restored if we deal with the heart and return to our moral mooring. 

God bless you, and God bless America!