A few years back I contributed to a book regarding the shape of the future with respect to this decade. From memory I was the only European writer. The focus was the west but with a core perspective on the USA. That is a huge challenge to write with respect to a land that you are not married to, and certainly in recent years I have tried to be restrained. I think we have limited rights to speak into anything that we do not have responsibility for (and I also think it is important to know what we are responsible for). So here I proceed with care and if truth be out if these days are momentous in the USA it is because of the huge shifts in the western world.
In that book as I focused toward 2020 I suggested we would have martial law implemented in certain cities and that the US$ would not be the currency for exchange. So we wait but such issues are not so far away as they seemed some 7 years ago.
These are momentous days with major changes all around us (e.g. the banning of people from 7 nations for national security’s sake when the number of terrorist attacks from those nations on US soil has been precisely 0 / nada / none).
Beliefs are important. I do not believe that Matt. 28 (all authority) nor Rev. 4 (exposing Caesar and all other Imperial thrones as but a parody of the throne of heaven) allows me to look to No. 10, Moncloa Brussels, the White House as being the key to change. I actually consider that a deception.
Of course legalisation is important, and the Hebrew Scriptures are evidence of that with so much of the (imperfect) laws of God being civil and legislative laws for society. But, if connecting with the throne room of heaven is the key and Jesus rose with all authority then we have to go much deeper.
Abortion, the treating of the unborn as non-persons, is a huge blight on society. Yet as Derek Flood sensitively wrote this week be is pro-life but not pro-law. A touchy issue and one we will probably always find disagreement over but we are up against something much greater and deeper than simply a law. Economic issues (when in scripture is the economic state not the heart of the issue?) are always a factor. But for me there is a deeper issue that is firmly our responsibility. What we sow is what is reaped in society. If we can dehumanise lives, and can even more seriously do so by assuming we are the goodies, and those of other nations and creeds are the baddies then we are feeding from, and feeding the spirit that dehumanises the unborn. Yes I am troubled that we don’t connect the dots. And deeply troubled when the line of good and evil runs between us and ‘them’. This is what feeds what is both a myth and anti-Christian, the myth of redemptive violence. That we can do to others what they cannot do as we are the good ones. Indeed Jesus said that we were to do to others what we desire them to do to us, and the others extended to include enemy love.
I am deeply concerned about our world. Terrorist attacks are so likely, indeed in Spain if not this year then next, unless…
Unless we ban them and build a wall? No. Unless we take responsibility for what we have created. Christendom is the source of violence, at least my conviction. So it is not about a ban or a wall. There will be attacks unless we take responsibility. One by embracing those who are blanketed as the problems, and by travelling to such places as Granada to repent of what was done in history. 1492, a momentous time when Muslims were conquered by the cross (which cross?), Jews were expelled and Columbus sailed for God and Queen, again with the conquest justifying all kinds of violence.
Legislation? Indeed wise legislation needs to be put in place. But Gayle and I have a lot of focused work ahead. Gladly, for we take responsibility.