By Joel A. Hess –
I was thinking about what to write today. Should I comment on Trump or Hillary? Should I explore the effects of Obama’s and certainly president Hilary’s legal gestapo on the Church? Should I grumble about American society’s fall from an aspiring civilization to blatant, unapologetic navel gazing? Oh, how I could fill this page with rantings.
But I am tired. I am helpless. I am weak and worn. I am frightened and worried. So instead, I’m going to rest and take it easy. They say to write about what you know. I’m going to write about whom I know. I’m just going to write about Jesus on this election Tuesday.
He saved me, after all. He saved me from the abyss, from myself, from death, and even Satan.
Yet He was never elected.
Jesus is not a philosophy, though He begets one. Jesus is not a political party. He is not an idea up in the clouds that no one can quite get their heads around. He is not a utopia that always seems one step away, or just over that dune.
Jesus puts footprints in the sand that still can be found throughout the world.
Jesus says, “For God so loved the world (republican and democrat, pro-life and pro-abortion, pretty good people and awful sons of bitches, perverts, addicts—fill in the blank) that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”
Jesus didn’t just talk a bunch of campaign slogans. He did what His billboards said. He loved the world. He loves the world. He put His words in blood and flesh on the cross. He still puts His words in blood and flesh in bread and wine so that you may know for certain you are forgiven. He was condemned so that we might not be. He had no problem hanging naked between two deservedly condemned criminals for all the world to see (and the world is still talking about it, whether they like it or not). That’s history. It happened—for you.
He rose again three days later. It’s not really up for debate like Hillary’s emails or Trumps crude comments. Too many people saw it. But the Good news is that He is just the first of many. Many will follow. Maybe tomorrow. I will be there! He chose me!
John marveled as I do, saying, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are.”
And despite all this mess, despite all these silly promises of making things better, I know it will be better one day. It really will be! A day is coming when there will be no more death, cancer, suicides, accidents, Alzheimer’s, and depression. There will be no more sin, abortions, divorce, loneliness, narcissism, greed, walking by the hungry and hurting snickering, treating people like animals. There will be no more Satan, nor evil.
And there will be no more wondering and fearing who the next president will be.
