Re-Tracing Our Footsteps To Succeed in the Future
Faith-Based Solutions: Returning to America's Spiritual Roots for Social Change
America and the world are facing unprecedented times. We don't have to look far to see the enormity of social issues. Don't look too long, it's too depressing.
Have friends or families with issues that overwhelm anyone and everything their lives touch?
Television, cable, social media blare the stories 24/7.
The United States government carries a staggering 37 trillion dollar deficit, with 1 trillion dollars a year in interest alone to service the debt. Yet, we look to government for the answers without a second thought.
Our statistics show how abysmally those efforts have failed.
It wasn't always this way. Our challenge is that this reality is what we are living, and have been living. We have been conditioned to think it's the way it's supposed to be. We can't deny it's not working.
The United States of America operated much differently from its creation until the turn of the 20th century. Society was much stronger, more cohesive. We didn't carry the debt we do today, nor the enormity of social ills and losses.
That was a long time ago, before our time.
What was the difference then, as opposed to now?
Faith-based organizations took on the ills of society, for the most part. All but two of our colleges were seminary schools. Harvard was a seminary school! The government took on the role of protecting America in foreign and domestic fields. The government helped the needy, but that was small and insignificant in comparison to faith-based organizations. Even as a young child I can remember school prayer, Bible verses and adherence to faith. We did not have the issues we face today. We enjoyed peace and stability.
I was raised in small, rural areas. Faith-based organizations - the churches - would take care of the sick. They would feed the hungry or those fallen on hard times. They would sit with the sick, assisting in a myriad of ways. Small, rural businesses quietly paid good employees too sick to work a paycheck until they died. The neighborhood was your insurance policy. You might be poor, but you were rich when your community supported each other.
No man or woman left behind.
No bragging rights about it, just quiet servitude.
It's complicated today, isn't it? Humanity sometimes acts without any sensibility, entitlement thinking runs rampant, and there's a real sense of a tsunami headed toward us all.
As we face the tsunami of issues, we are asked to turn back to our historical roots and pivot to simplicity.
The United States government - or any government - is not designed to change people from the inside out. Only the reaching out and into the lives of the suffering and affected and disaffected by faith-based people and organizations can those lives be changed. Let's remember that - at its core- human beings need HOPE. They need to feel life is worthwhile and they are loved. They need to have principles they can count on and those espousing those principles to walk beside them for the long-haul.
They need to be taught not to expect a hand-out but a hand-up. They need to be taught the love of Christ and its principles and see it lived out. The established order of church as usual simply won't work anymore: There are too many needs on the street, too many people walking a thin, financial line.
Too many addicted people and those addictions exceed drugs. The prosperity of America and the world have led us into addictions to any and every endeavor, creation, and substance.
Only by faith in Christ and reaching out can lives be changed forever. The healing power of Christ and His Work on The Cross is redemptive, above any and all power.
"He was wounded for our transgressions, and by His stripes are we healed."
That's healing for every issue.
This effort will require a massive undertaking, bringing the best and the brightest to the table. The most brilliant can form the templates:
Housing communities for the homeless.
Orphanages for children.
Hospitals to heal the sick.
Faith-based drug rehab to change the lives of addicts.
Mental facilities to ease the streets of America and the world and to give those disturbed an environment where they can be protected from their own capabilities to harm themselves or others.
Food service for the hungry, for those not able to afford the rising cost of groceries.
Churches open to give to the community around them, as per their spiritual gifts, lead them.
Law enforcement will protect these ventures, relieved to not have chaos and havoc in the streets.
A financial system diverted off the government dole now supports these missionary efforts. And the positive results will underscore government is not designed to handle social issues, is finally free of the weight it was never supposed to carry.
Reaching out to the international communities.
African-based orphanages that have taken on the children without parents from the war in The Congo can be expertly sifted, then given the help they need in the caring for of these children.
We must prepare in The United States, and the world. We must have faith that God opens doors no man can shut and shuts doors no man can open.
That open door is the missionary field. The endeavors will be blessed by a God who is not bound by terms of history or dictators, or administration changes or even unbelief. The windows of heaven will open for these endeavors.
Can an unimpressed, overwhelmed younger generation have hope within this context? Can widespread depression be lifted as purpose for a greater good is implemented?
I would say yes.
Please give them the privilege of living in a world that eradicated homelessness, that took the time to stop and re-direct itself properly. Please give them the testimony that violence in the street gave way to peace and workability. Please give them the memories of those who cared enough to step into the problems and face it head-on, even if it cost them their lives. Let them say their lives were changed as they entered a missionary movement that didn't just preach on Sunday, but left the buildings and became an active part in the healing of broken societies.
Let them say it was God Himself that showed up through His People, and they were so moved they couldn't help but become a part of it.
It's time to do things differently.
Won't you join me in this great leap of faith!
