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Zig asked what was up with mankind, that he has shown so little growth into real maturity and the wisdom and compassion it should have manifested. For what it's worth, this is one man's opinion -
An old axiom tells us that everything
rises and falls on leadership. "When the righteous are in
authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked bear rule, the
people mourn." - Proverbs 29:2 Although I don't hold him in as
high a place of regard as most of my conservative friends, it is the
stuff of 7-year-olds to see the obvious difference in the mood of the
country during Reagan's administration and its mood now. Is Mr.
Obama solely responsible for that? No, but so little can be
attributed to anything else on the national scale that the else is
irrelevant.
But this is only an explanation for the
short term. No single president or king, or a succession of them,
can explain the generation after generation of the failure of humans
to change in any fundamental way. 1000 years ago people put bars
across their doors; now, we use deadbolts.
The reason is found locally, not
nationally. It is the human heart, “deceitful above all things,
and desperately wicked”. Clark's Commentary on Jeremiah 17:9 -
“The heart is deceitful . . . lying ever at the catch; striving to
avail itself of every favorable circumstance to gratify its
propensities to pride, ambition, evil desire, and corruption of all
kinds.”
Even the best among us will, in rare
moments of blunt honesty, will say that they have learned things
about themselves that are nauseating.
This is a place no leadership can go,
and it is the failure to admit to this simple truth that forms the
basis for the lunacy of modern-day liberalism. Believing that the
state can both change the heart as well as serve as its conscience in
its stead, liberalism verbally rejects the sinfulness of man and his
need for redemption while simultaneously advocating the forced
abrogation of whatever sin du jour is irritating them by
means of government programs.
Regardless, it is solely up to the
individual to realize his need, not to change his heart, but to have
his heart changed, and I am convinced that this change only comes at
the hand of God when a person admits their guilt of sin and
receives the forgiveness that was purchased by the blood that was
spilled on the Cross. Even then, the battle against the
deceitfulness of the heart is life-long, and many times not nearly so
victorious as it should be.
Yes, we should be much wiser and more compassionate as a race, but the only one I can directly affect is me.
Yes, we should be much wiser and more compassionate as a race, but the only one I can directly affect is me.
“When a newspaper posed the question,
‘What’s Wrong with the World?’ the Catholic thinker G. K.
Chesterton reputedly wrote a brief letter in response:
‘Dear Sirs:I am.
Sincerely Yours,
G. K. Chesterton.’
That is the attitude of someone who has grasped the message of Jesus.”
–Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God
