I’m writing to you from the past and the future at the same time. I do every week, but it’s never as obvious to me as an election week. I’m writing on Sunday, but you’ll know the results by the time your eyes see these words. Hopefully. So what do I say today that will still be true on Thursday? How can I speak to the future I don’t know in a clear way?
This past weekend was Halloween. My two boys were dressed up as the famed Blues Brothers. A Saturday Night Live creation of Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi, they were a stage act that became a movie. I won’t spoil it for you, but one of the famous lines they say is “We’re on a mission from God!” My youngest said that instead of “Trick or Treat” and they both enjoyed dancing to “Soul Man” a lot!
As I thought about this article, I searched my mind for what would be the same now and when you read it. The only real answer to that is God. So while this is debatably not a mission from God, directly, I do have some thoughts that could only be Him that I want to share.
I’m deeply interested in politics. I always have been because politics is people. Everything is political, but not everything is partisan. I think that’s important to note. Jesus was very political, but not partisan whatsoever. He still isn’t. I know you probably think your party is more Christ-like than the other party. It’s easy for us to get caught into that line of thinking. We start to add on to our faith: “you can’t be a good Christian if you aren’t in X party and voting for X.” I don’t care how you solve for X, adding things to what Christ has done isn’t ok. It slips into dangerous territory. I’m not fussing at you or preaching - I’ve done the SAME THING. Thankfully, someone was wise enough to speak truth in my life. Jesus alone is enough to be a Christian. Christ is sufficient.
Oh we worry, don’t we? It’s ok to love our nation and the life we live. We do not like when things aren’t what we want them to be. It’s easy to think that we control all of that, but we don’t. We participate, and I hope you did that by voting, but we don’t control it. My pastor, Rob Tucker, said something powerful in his message this week. “We don’t always have the power to control things, but we always have the power to surrender.”
Whew! Surrender is NOT a fun American word! I don’t like it at all. Even as a Christian, I struggle with surrender. I’m fine with God’s will as long as it’s also MY will! I bet you can identify with that.
There’s a decent chance you aren’t happy this week. Or maybe you are? None of it matters unless we’re willing to let God be in charge of this imperfect experiment we call the United States. We all have to surrender our pride to those that win AND those that lose. True kindness to those that think differently than us, both online and in person, will be paramount moving forward.
I know this isn’t an upbeat, heroic mission from God delivered by cool guys in fedoras and sunglasses, but God rarely works that way. However, since I’m their mom, I’ll leave you with my Blues Brothers for fun.
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