Last November, I thought that many people in our nation had confused our democracy for a kingdom.
It wasn’t Barack Obama’s fault that more than 100 million people thought he was the best thing since sliced bread.
In fact, the low-key guy regularly said that his election was not because of his personality make-up but instead because of a team message that connected with so many people desiring change.
Though I think Obama uses “I” too much in describing leadership initiatives crafted and implemented by teams of bureaucrats, I don’t believe that he has a Messiah complex.
He’s a good guy with philosophical and spiritual variations from what I believe are best for the nation.
I pray often for him, even though I sometimes disagree with him.
So why this message today?
Listen to what Isaiah 2:22 says:
“Stop trusting in man, who has but a breath in his nostrils. Of what account is he?”
We humans always seem to be looking for somebody to deliver us other than the God who created us.
Israel begged God for an earthly king like the other nations had. God was their ruler and deliverer yet the miraculously delivered people believed He wasn’t good enough.
Eventually, God gave them just what they wanted — the tall, handsome, strong and too-often-wimpy King Saul.
You know the story of how that choice turned out — an embarrassing, dysfunctional mess for the nation that sometimes had Satan slapping his thigh with laughter, I’m sure.
I thank God that He sent David or the entire nation might have been wiped out.
Time after time, the people of God trusted in earthly kings for deliverance and feelings of significance rather than trust in the Ruler of the universe.
Every time, failure and suffering were the result.
Why do we continue to think that if we elect just the right president that all our problems will eventually be solved?
Why do we think that we help our nation’s long-term interests if our primary reason for voting is to defeat those with opposing philosophies?
Last November, electing John McCain or Barack Obama would not determine the destiny of our souls or the dimensions of our character or direction of our desire to bless others.
Those things are determined, instead, by the nature of our relationship with God.
No matter how charismatic or intelligent or politically correct a politician is, he or she is not God.
At any moment, he or she is just a few missed breaths from being dead.
How can such a person be seen as a surrogate for God?
How can such a person attract more loyalty and more donations and more Twitter hits than the Creator the Universe who sacrificed His only Son to provide a way for sinners to gain salvation?
It’s because we humans are messed up, that’s why.
We want the easy way out. We want a god that we elected. We want to be the boss.
Regardless of your political perspective, I encourage you to take Isaiah 2:22 to heart.
Government officials have a distinct role in God’s design for society — the provision of order and public services in a chaotic world.
When it comes to inner well-being, though, as in the realms of the spirit and soul and emotions and psyche, our hope and our direction are to be entrusted to God the Father.
We err mightily if we think that our happiness, our holiness, our mental preparedness and our eternal readiness is determined in any way by who is in the Oval Office, or the corner office, or the principal’s office or in the pastor’s office.
My favorite verse, 2 Cor. 9:8, says it is God — not any human — who is able to make all grace abound to us so that in all things, at all times, having all that we need, we will abound in every good work.
Please, dear friend, trust the One who needs no breath to remain on His throne.
As always, I love you
Martin
