How can we even begin to restore faith in America until we choose to come together to safely manage and ultimately defeat the pandemic. While we grew weary of focusing on it, especially this Fall, it silently raged out of control. Right now it is unleashing devastation across America.
But how can we even consider uniting to protect ourselves when we are so divided?…Eventually, when the situation is even more dire than it is now, our survival instincts will kick in. But it shouldn’t be difficult for us to quickly realize that such utter devastation would leave us in an unfamiliar world. More and more we would have to fend for ourselves to meet our basic needs. Please, let’s not go there!
Instead, I hope we can agree to a reset. I choose to begin my reset effort with this prayer: “Father Jesus, please guide me to a helpful message of unity. As you know far better than I do, unity is what we need right now. And you have the power to unite us. But because you gave us free will, it is up to us to ask for and accept your help. So, whenever needed, please remind me to ask for refills of your blessings necessary for unity — courage, love, wisdom, humility, unquestioning resolve, and a great capacity to forgive. And always bless me with an overwhelming desire to work for a level of unity that enables us to face any and all of our challenges — foremost the pandemic. Thanks, Papa!”
It isn’t necessary for us to have accepted faith in God to be able to work for unity, but I have no doubt it helps greatly. Recently I was blessed with a new mental image of how my faith helps me.…With faith, although I’m still an adult grounded in the realities of our world, I have the amazing advantage of knowing that I have the unlimited love and support of my eternal parent — Jesus. This advantage helps me feel like a child on a grand adventure with the most loving parent ever. So, while I’m still fully occupied with the earthly struggle, my mind and soul can be enjoying thought adventures from another dimension — the realm of God. Saying that this amounts to the ultimate stress reliever is putting it mildly.
I have found that the best way to use my faith is to be like a young child, knowing that I will always be okay when I’m with my parent. Not only okay, but happy. Because God likes to give surprises — this I know from experience. But exactly what the surprises will be and when they will occur remain mysteries until they show up. This has gradually led to me being able to see the wisdom of doing life with only one expectation — that is, when I stay connected with God and follow his inspirations, life is good.
Still, not everyone on the working-for-unity team will have accepted faith. Here are some wise words that should be helpful for everyone — faith or no faith. “Don’t cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.” — Aubrey de Grey. I’ve benefited from these words many times since first learning of them in May of 2019. And I hope they can now help us agree that a reset is needed in our nation.
I propose that our reset includes a commitment to being guided by truth, since it is the raw material from which successful solutions are manufactured.
Let’s now look at two models of leadership and their relationships with truth. The first one, the Jesus model, always values truth. John 16:33 contains these words of Jesus: “In this world you will have trouble.” This certainly rings true — our own life experiences, conversations with friends, and/or news reports tell us this on a daily basis. But being the good leader that he is, Jesus follows with words of promise he can deliver on: “But take heart! I have overcome the world.” Which reassure me that he is with me for the long haul. He will provide whatever guidance I need to find solutions to my problems. That is, if I ask him to and accept his help. Other Bible verses that I previously used more often as reassuring reminders of this include the following: John 14:6: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life”; Philippians 4:6,7: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”; and Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Now when I need more reassurance I just ask for it, usually with no thought of Bible verses.
Contrasting with the Jesus leadership model is the anti-Jesus model. In this one truth is of value only if it is convenient. Solutions aren’t worked for if they are too difficult or will take too long. Instead, leaders surrender and retreat, but don’t admit to it. They use every available means to distract us from the fact that they have given up — blame placing, touting conspiracy theories and other lies, casting insults, and engaging in bullying behavior. When problems affecting the whole nation seem too difficult for them to solve, they might hand them off to the governors, who then shoulder the blame if the problems aren’t solved. And they may even undermine the efforts of the governors so that the problems become more difficult to solve. They may try to do this by telling us that our freedoms are being violated if and when we follow the governors’ mandates — but they conveniently fail to tell us that these freedoms are bogus, or anti-Jesus, because there is no consideration of the harm we do to others as we enjoy them…Even our most vivid imaginations will fail to predict all of the misadventures in disastrous leadership taken by leaders of this type.
Whether a leader is of the Jesus or the anti-Jesus type has little, if anything to do with their faith or beliefs. Jesus style leaders may be non-Christian, or atheist, whereas anti-Jesus leaders may be Christian.
Of course we should quickly intervene to remove anti-Jesus leaders from their leadership roles. But we shouldn’t give up on them as individuals in need of restoration. Rather, we should unite with compassion for them and work to get them the help they need.
Returning to us followers participating in our great divide, there is much room for improvement on both sides. Both sides need to stop following anti-Jesus leadership. One side needs to stop following it into acceptance of an attitude of defeat and surrender regarding the pandemic. Refusal to accept defeat goes hand in hand with the opening of our minds to the reality of coronavirus — a necessary step leading to our decision to start protecting ourselves and others. The other side needs to accept the truth about the self-defeating tactics we too often use in our attempts to convince others of the importance of science-based solutions. Instead of using ridicule, derision, and scorn — the anti-Jesus approach, we should employ love, respect, patience, and humility — the Jesus approach. With this approach we can make statements like the following: “When I read about it, it absolutely makes sense. But I don’t remember all of the key points well enough to answer all of your questions right now. Please let me write down your questions, and I will find the answers before we resume our discussion.”
Finally, whether we’ve accepted faith or not, we should be able to see the wisdom of loving our neighbors as ourselves. With faith we can use this thought as a short prayer before our encounters with others, especially those on the other side of the divide: “Please help me love my neighbor as myself.” And without faith acceptance, we can still use the words as a mantra before such encounters: “Love my neighbor as myself. Love……”
So, with faith or without, let us join together on a great adventure in nation healing. May we never give up on America!