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Written by: Rex M. Rogers

Published: 25 November 2024

Let’s consider some ways we can participate in “thanks giving” during Thanksgiving.

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #180 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

Thanksgiving is a rare precious tradition that combines Christian theology and the best of Americana.

God told us to “give thanks in all circumstances.” (1 Thess. 5:18).

He said, “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.” (1 Tim. 4:4-5)

And we’re commanded to “enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him; bless his name!” (Ps. 100:4)

The Pilgrims celebrated what’s considered the First Thanksgiving with Native American neighbors in Plymouth Colony in 1621.

October 3, 1789, President George Washington issued a Thanksgiving Proclamation, recommending the People of the new United States express their sincere and humble thanks to the Lord. 

October 3, 1863, with the nation riven by Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation designating “the last Thursday of November, as a day of Thanksgiving.” 

Certainly, other countries have their own versions of harvest festivals or days of giving thanks, although they may not be exactly the same as the American Thanksgiving. For example:

• Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving on the second Monday in October. While it has similar themes of giving thanks for the harvest, it has a different historical origin—linked more to the early French settlers in Canada and the end of harvests in late fall.

• In Liberia, a country founded by freed American slaves, Liberians celebrate Thanksgiving on the first Thursday in November, mirroring the American tradition, though it has its own unique history and customs.

• Many countries have harvest festivals or days of gratitude, like the British Harvest Festival or “Brits-giving,”which celebrates the harvest season and is similar in spirit to Thanksgiving, but it doesn't have the same historical narrative tied to it.

So, while the American version of Thanksgiving is distinctive in its historical and cultural context, the idea of giving thanks and celebrating the harvest is a theme that resonates in many parts of the world.

But the Pilgrim Thanksgiving at Plymouth Colony was special in several ways:

1. “Pilgrims were singularly motivated by a quest for religious freedom.” Most other pioneers to the New World looked for gold or furs or land.

2. “Pilgrims stand out for they succeeded in maintaining the longest-lasting and most equitable peace between natives and immigrants in the history of what would become the United States.” 

3. The Pilgrims rejected “socialism (in favor of) the adoption of private enterprise.  
   1. After the meager Thanksgiving harvest, the second season of collective farming and distribution proved equally disappointing. 
   2. Governor Bradford had seen enough, recording that the system ‘was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort.’ 
   3. So, before the 1623 season he scrapped socialist farming and replaced it with private ownership of land for each of the families. 
   4. As a result of becoming responsible for their own welfare and gaining freedom to choose what to grow for consumption or trade, the Pilgrims’ productivity surged.”

Sometimes, we hear that the holidays, Thanksgiving included, is a difficult time for some people, not a time of joy but of pain and sorrow. This is because holidays are generally considered times for family and friends and if you happen to be a person whose relationships have broken down for any number of reasons you may very well be alone. This is a way for the rest of us who are blessed to minister to those in need by inviting them to socialize with us, whether at the Thanksgiving dinner or otherwise. Being alone is not a plus in the human experience.

Then what about Thanksgiving Day traditions – other than giving thanks, eating, and football – what other fun and fellowship do families pursue on this special day?

• Well, it is interesting to note that in 1956, the business Swansons developed the famous TV dinners off leftovers from Thanksgiving meals.

• Pumpkin pie is as associated with Thanksgiving as are turkeys.

• According, to plumbing company Roto-Rooter, the day after Thanksgiving is “far and away the busiest day of the year.” The company warns to be extra careful with turkey grease, potato peels, rice, and stuffing, as they are sure to clog your drain or overwork your garbage disposal.

Stores all across the country have some of their biggest sales the day after Thanksgiving. Now known as Black Friday, this day is almost a holiday in itself. While this shopping tradition has changed with the rise of e-commerce, people still stand in line for hours early in the morning to get great discounts and start their Christmas shopping.

Some people, especially those who supported the losing candidates during the 2024 U.S. presidential election, are now saying that family and friends with whom they disagree politically should not be invited to Thanksgiving festivities. In other words, if you are conservative or Republican, you distance yourself from family and friends who happen to be liberal, progressive, or Democrat, and vice versa. This point of view absolutizes politics, making political matters the end-all, be-all of life, and it perpetuates division and social disintegration.

This is not a Christian view, because it elevates temporal political ideas and angst above biblical values like love, forgiveness, tolerance, and the rest of the fruit of the Spirit. There is no reason Christian believers need separate themselves from those with whom they disagree politically, and if this means not discussing tense disagreements for a time, so be it. No matter one’s political views, what matters is the Lord, His Word, Christian teaching, and how we live out our Christian faith in family and community. Thanksgiving should be a time of gratitude, and there is much to be grateful about, whatever our politics.

In recent years, there’s been a kind of cultural backlash among some Americans against religious holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas – so much so we’ve been told to avoid celebrating Thanksgiving because Americans decimated Indians and it’s hypocritical to perpetuate a myth of good feelings, or we’ve been told not to say, “Merry Christmas” because this pushes Christianity on others. Has this trend changed? Is it changing?

I think it may be changing. There seems to be a growing awareness that our country, though strong, is also in some ways weak, for example, a declining commitment to truth and thus right and wrong, lack of respect for law and order and thus increasing crime, promotion of sexual libertinism and thus emotional damage, disease, broken families, unwanted and unloved and thus traumatized children.

Hopefully many in our country are recognizing a need to return to time-tested, values, values that reinforce families and hold a nation together. If we don’t think and act right, we won’t thrive or maybe even survive. But if we embrace a Christian moral ethic, we can flourish.

Back to gratitude. 

It is not possible to thank God “too much.” Think about a loved one, perhaps your spouse. Do you get tired of hearing that he or she loves you? Is it possible to tell your children too often that you love them?

In the Psalms, the shepherd-King David repeatedly praises and thanks the Lord for every conceivable circumstance and blessing in David’s life. This is our model. Thanks be to God the author of every good and perfect gift.

I hope your personal experience with Thanksgiving has been endearing and uplifting. Thanksgiving is a wonderful time to thank God from whom all blessings flow, to enjoy family and friends, to acknowledge God’s redemptive message of hope.

“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks” (1 Thess. 5:16-18).

Happy Thanksgiving.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. Or check my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers for more podcasts and video.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024   

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/ or my YouTube Channel @DrRexRogers, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://x.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by: Rex M. Rogers

Published: 17 November 2024

American patriotism has taken a lot of hits in recent years. Should Americans be patriotic? Is there anything really to be patriotic about?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #179 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

America has been called a Christian nation, though this description has been hotly debated. 

America has been called “the first new nation” by eminent sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset. 

America has been called “The Great Experiment” by no less than George Washington.

America has been said to be great because it is good, and that it would cease to be great if it ceased to be good. 

This observation has been variously attributed to Alexis de Tocqueville and others, but whoever said it the phrase captures America’s sense of itself as the land of opportunity, the land of the free and the home of the brave, ideas rooted in the Judeo-Christian moral consensus that gave meaning and destiny to the American people their first two hundred years.

America’s experience with Christianity is an historic and storied one, not always consistent with biblical theology but one of depth, influence, and impact.

Several lines of scholarly consideration developed from America’s unique experience with religious liberty and the impact of Christianity: 

• American exceptionalism, the idea America developed from a set of values that became a creed affirming what the Founders considered self-evident truths, that human beings are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, among these are life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, equality before the law, justice, individual responsibility. It is an historical interpretation and cultural philosophy that bespoke America’s sense of itself as different, special, and “the last best hope of earth.”

• American imperialism,in the late 19^thand 20^th Centuries an extension of American ideals and power across the world, some say to protect freedom, others say to dominate. It captures an American view of its purpose as special, different, or above.

• Christian nationalism, the idea America was created by Christians and should be run by Christians without separation of church and state. It is a political ideology that conflates the cross and the flag, in essence looking upon the USA as a kind of theocracy. This point of view distorts both the Gospel and democracy.

• Civil religion, a sort of melding of a country’s dominant religious views and its political philosophy in everyday practical social life and rituals, e.g., displaying the US flag in churches, singing the National Anthem or “God Bless America” at sporting events, what sociologist Robert N. Bellah called, “an institutionalized collection of sacred beliefs about the American nation.” 

These expressions of Christianity and culture in American history offer upsides and downsides. The upside of American exceptionalism, for example, is that it gave America a purpose, a moral destiny. The downside is that it worked itself out at times in movements like 19^th Century Manifest Destiny, which in its best suit gave Americans a proactive, optimistic, forward-looking attitude, “Go West young man, Go West.” People strongly believed in the virtue and the right of the American political culture and system and that their progress was inevitable and justifiable. But in its worst suit Manifest Destiny destroyed the beaver, the buffalo, the rich prairie eventually resulting in the Dust Bowl, and the Native American population.

Historically, many indigenous, aboriginal, or other people-groups, including Native Americans, thought of themselves simply as “The People.” The Ancient Chinese referred to themselves, for example, as “the People of the Middle Kingdom,” meaning they considered themselves the center of civilization and all those around them and beyond were barbarians. 

The point is, whether American exceptionalism, Manifest Destiny, American imperialism, Christian nationalism, or civil religion, it is fairly easy to demonstrate that Americans have, like other civilizations, tended to think of themselves as remarkable. 

This, in itself, is not remarkable. It is only an issue if this sense of our own identity, as remarkable, morphs into a philosophy that we are somehow better, or above, or special, or entitled, by which we, “the people,” begin to judge and treat others as less than.

Or, this sense that Americans are remarkable becomes an issue when many in the current political environment of the 21^st Century think America is anything-but-remarkable, in fact these Americans reject their heritage and identity by attacking the values, the political system, and the spirit of what it has meant to be an American. This is remarkable.

In America’s past, Christianity was cited to justify slavery in the ante-bellum South and decimate the American Indian in the 1870s-90s, yet Christianity was also applied righteously in the abolition movement and the Civil War in the 1860s and eventually the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. The record is mixed because American Christians are, like all human beings, finite and sinful creatures. We see through a glass darkly.

However, to the good, Christianity influenced the development of American law, education, politics, economics, culture, and progress toward liberty and justice for all. The impact of scriptural values can be seen in cultural mores regarding sexuality, marriage, family and child-rearing, work ethic, property, free enterprise, public morality, social cohesion, and politics.

E Pluribus Unum, Out of Many One, served as a de facto national motto from 1782 until “In God We Trust” was officially adopted in 1956. E Pluribus Unum is a Latin phrase rooted in a Christian conception of society. Significantly, it is not E Pluribus Tantum, Only Many. The “diversity” being marketed today, often absolutized as a value with little or no concern for unity, is a recipe for social disaster.

I love my country, and I am blessed with many international friends who love their country, but it must be said, being “Christian” and being American or Lebanese or English or French or Chinese or Egyptian or any of the other 195 nations in the world is not the same thing. 

This does not mean God does not care about nations. In fact, the Scripture is chock-full of references to the Lord’s work in the midst of, despite, and through nation states. 

But God’s will and the Word of God are not the same, in fact are entirely distinct from, the presence, politics, and/or policies of nation states. God accomplishes his purposes in every age, no matter the political configurations of the time.

What then does all this have to do with the ease with which some equate their religious faith, ideology, partisanship, or demography with a morally superior, righteous, and unassailable position?

It is this: if American “Christians” carry an attitude of superiority into their ideological, partisan, or personal identity they not only sacrifice the power of the faith to change the world, they also easily fall prey to a self-appointed moral righteousness. 

In other words, one’s viewpoint is no longer just one perspective to be evaluated and debated along with many others in the marketplace of ideas. No, one’s viewpoint is non-debatable, non-negotiable, unimpeachable, inviolable. One’s viewpoint can brook no challenge, give no quarter, take no prisoners. One’s viewpoint is sacrosanct. The other viewpoints are therefore by definition not worthy, not worth hearing, and possibly so dangerous they must be silenced.

While this assumption of ideological superiority is exactly what the Left and left-leaning liberalism does, no Christian who attempts to adhere to Scripture can justify such lack of humility and outright arrogance.

This assumption of unbreachable moral righteousness is also something that political conservatives must avoid. Winning is fun, and MAGA supporters earned a substantial victory in the November 2024 election, so yes, to the victor belong the spoils, and in the months ahead the conservative MAGA movement should enact its policies as supported by the American people. But they must also avoid the human desire to dance on their opposition’s logo, to vindicate themselves by quashing others needlessly, to seeking to silence other points of view. Freedom of speech means freedom to speak viewpoints others consider objectionable, Christian or conservative or liberal or left.

Scripture says, “Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,”
Col. 3:12.

The USA, God be praised, is still a land where religious liberty is honored, and with it freedom of speech. It is a place where all people, including Christians, can learn to discern how their faith can contribute to lives and culture. May this struggle, this Great Experiment, continue.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. Or check my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers for more podcasts and video.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024   

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/ or my YouTube Channel @DrRexRogers, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://x.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by: Rex M. Rogers

Published: 11 November 2024

Have you experienced adversity, trials, or tribulations in your life? Have you ever hit the wall?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #178 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

Everyone experiences adversity. It’s a part of life no one escapes. In fact, if you haven’t experienced adversity, you haven’t lived long enough.

Something unpleasant happens, often unexpected, and we suffer. Sometimes it's a mild inconvenience like a flat tire, a toothache, a stubbed toe.  Sometimes adversity is more severe like an illness or the death of a loved one. Or the car engine coughs rather than purrs, the furnace breaks down in January, we lose a job, Fido goes to his reward. Things don't work out the way we hoped or planned—instead, we experience trials and tribulations.

Robinson Crusoe learned the hard way about adversity. Remember him? At age 18 he foolishly ignored his father's advice, pursued a prodigal drunken sailor's life, aimlessly bounced around the world for a few years, and eventually was shipwrecked alone on a deserted island for what turned out to be 28 years.

Crusoe blamed God—cursed him, actually—for his predicament and lived in bitterness and despondency. Much later he began reading one of the Bibles he’d rescued earlier from the derelict ship. In time, his spiritual eyes were opened, and he accepted Christ. Eventually, he evangelized "Man Friday," the native friend he’d rescued from cannibals. When Robinson Crusoe was finally delivered at age 53, he exuberantly praised God for putting him on the island. 

To say the least this is an amazing change of heart. Crusoe goes from cursing God to worshipping God for the same predicament. It took years, new insight into God’s character, and a realistic assessment of his own attitudes, but in the end, Crusoe realized God’s seemingly cruel intervention in his life was actually a providential act of divine love and mercy. Crusoe knew that, left to his own vices, he likely would’ve died young, alone, and un-mourned in a bar fight in some far-off port. In the words of Scripture, he would have “squandered his wealth [and wasted his life] in wild living” (Lk. 15:13). 

But God had protected Robinson Crusoe from himself. What he considered affliction or adversity, God considered protection and blessing.

Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719) is a classic of English literature that upon publication immediately became what today we’d call a bestseller, and it’s never been out of print since. The book helped earn Defoe the honorary sobriquet “Father of the English Novel.” 

But Defoe was about more than fame and fortune. Defoe developed the fictional Crusoe character to help illustrate the sovereignty of God. Sovereignty, or ultimate knowledge, authority, and power, is the belief God holds everything in His hands.

In the Old Testament, Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery with evil intent. Yet God used these misguided brothers to accomplish his purposes. He placed Joseph in high Egyptian office so Joseph could later save those very brothers from famine—“You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives” (Gen. 50:20). Joseph’s adversity demonstrates that not all of our trials are due to personal sin (Jm. 1).

Job, too, experienced overwhelming adversity, none of it due to his disobedience. While it's possible to bring adversity upon ourselves by ignoring God's commands, it's also possible that many of the problems we face in our lives come upon us because we live in a fallen sinful world (Rom. 1).

With all that happens in this capricious fallen world God is never surprised. He's never taken off-guard. He's never the victim of circumstances. “Accident” and “mistake” are not words in God’s vocabulary. Indeed, the phrase “divine mistake” is an oxymoron. As the sovereign, omniscient, omnipotent, eternal God of the universe it is impossible for God to make a mistake. In point of fact, the reality of the Sovereign God and the concepts of “accident” or “error” are mutually exclusive ideas. So, for God there are no “oops.”

The doctrine of the sovereignty of God—this “No-Oops” God—is one of the most comforting teachings of Scripture. God is in control not only of creation but also of his creatures, and he never takes a misstep.

The world is a confusing mix of good and evil, beauty and ugliness. Acts of human courage and nobility coexist with unbelievable human cruelty and debauchery. It's what the Bible calls the "wheat and the weeds" (Matt. 13:24-30). In the face of this moral mixture, Christians sometimes wonder, "Is God on our side?" 

Abraham Lincoln struggled with this question in his Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865. He said, "Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained...Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other...The prayers of both could not be answered--that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes...Shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? So shall it be said 'The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'"

God works His purposes with both the wheat and the weeds. Christians will not always "win" or be blessed. Businesses owned by Christians will not always succeed. Life will not always seem "fair." Yet God will work all things, including adversities, together for good (Rom. 8:28).

Not only acts of good but acts of evil are within God’s universal and permissive will—his sovereignty. God does not cause evil. He is not the source of evil. Satan is the source, along with the evil heart of humankind. But even evil men or women committing evil acts do not catch God off-guard and do not unsettle Him in any way. Sovereignty isn’t a part-time attribute.

Consider this passage from the Psalms: “God reigns over the nations: God is seated on his holy throne. The nobles of the nations assemble, as the people of the God of Abraham. For the kings of the earth belong to God. He is greatly exalted” (47:8-9).

Psalm 52 is too long to quote. Just think about these phrases: “Why do you boast of evil, you mighty man…Surely God will bring you down to everlasting ruin” (52:1, 5).

No mass killer, no deranged gunman, no suicide bomber, no hijacker, no evildoer, no strongman, no terrorist, not even Satan himself can operate beyond the limits of God’s sovereignty.

While we are finite and cannot anticipate, much less eliminate, all risk, God is omnipotent and has us in the palm of his hands. While we may hear of random violence, nothing is ever random in the omniscient eyes of God. While we do not understand exactly how God exercises his disposition over evil in the world, knowing that he does is an immense solace. While we may at times be understandably fearful in a maniacal world, we need not live in fear. God knows when we rise up and when we lay down. We belong to the Lord, and so does history itself.

While we'll not always understand our adversity much less the soul-wrenching adversity of the complex world in which we live, we trust the Lord. He never leaves us nor forsakes us (Heb. 13:5). 

Like Robinson Crusoe we must learn to understand all things, especially adversity, from the perspective of a Christian worldview.

God is near, and he's in control. God is sovereign. What a fantastic, liberating, comforting truth.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. Or check my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers for more podcasts and video.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024  

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/ or my YouTube Channel @DrRexRogers, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://x.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by: Rex M. Rogers

Published: 04 November 2024

Ever wonder why we have nation states in the world, and are they legitimate?

Why do nations even bother to maintain borders?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #177 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

In terms of the history of the world, what we know as nation-states have not really been around that long.  

The U.S.A. was born in 1776, not 250 years old just yet, peanuts compared to the Ancient Egyptian empire’s more than 2,500 years.

But perhaps this is not an apples-to-apples comparison.

• Empires justified their rule through conquest and dynasty, while nation-states claim legitimacy largely from the shared identity of their people.
• Empires ruled over multiple ethnic and cultural groups, whereas nation-states tend to represent one primary national identity.
• Empires focus on expansive control and diverse populations, whereas nation-states focus on political unity and shared cultural identity within defined borders.

“Some scholars consider the establishment of the English Commonwealth in 1649 as the earliest instance of nation-state creation. Since the late 18th century, the nation-state has gradually become the dominant vehicle of rule over geographic territories.” This is where the U.S.A. is Exhibit A.

The English recognized popular sovereignty, the right of people to own their own territory and wherein the government is subject to the consent of the governed; national sovereignty, the right of people to govern themselves; and state sovereignty, right of states to govern their territories without external interference.

The impetus to create nation states involved several demographic and political components:

• Family, clan, tribe
• Common language
• Dominant religion or religious worldview
• Prevailing customs, mores, and other cultural expressions
• Shared traditions and history
• Need for protection in the face of nearby enemies
• Ethnic or racial or cultural similarity
• Borders
• Geography: natural geographic boundaries, like oceans or mountain ranges, or environmental quality of life inducements, like fresh water, tillable soil, ample growing seasons

Before the recognition of self-determinism, or consent of the governed, that emerged after the Middle Ages, governments existed as monarchies, theocratic states, and both colonial and ancient empires.

Scripture repeatedly references nations. The English word is translated from Hebrew or Greek, meaning people groups who might speak the same language, follow the same religion, or live in the same area, a somewhat broader definition than we typically think today. 

For example, along with Israel, the Bible mentions Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites as nations.

“Most manuscripts count 70 nations in Gen. 10. The Greek translation lists 72 nations.”

• 22:18: God promises to bless all nations through Abraham's seed. 
• 2 Chron. 20:6: States that the Lord rules over all the kingdoms of the nations.
• 22:27-28:States that all the nations will bow down before the Lord. 
• 82:8:Says all the nations are the Lord's inheritance. 
• 40:17:Says the Lord is over all nations and over all people.
• 28:19:God said, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.” 
• Acts 17:26:Tells us God “marked out our appointed times in history and the boundaries of our lands.”
• 13:1-7:Declares how God created governments, generally referencing a given territory or nation, for maintaining law and order, promoting the good.
• 3:16:Identifies Jesus Christ as the one through whom the nations are blessed. 

While Scripture says God will work through nations to accomplish his purposes and to bless humanity, he is not limited to nations or governments and is subject to none. That said, the Lord never condemns the idea of nation states, and is not opposed to them as such.

Nationhood involves citizenship, a type of community and sense of belonging. This does not mean, especially in the contemporary context, that everyone is the same ethnicity or race or original nationality, but for a nation to remain strong, the people must be united around common ideals, what historically in the United States we’ve called the American Dream or Americana or even e Pluribus Unum.

For the U.S.A., this means freedom of religion, freedom of speech, equality before the law, freedom of opportunity. It is these common ideals and aspirations which are most under attack these days by members of the political left, some who promote globalism, some who simply live to hate and tear down.

Nations or the people groups that comprise them can, of course, act in highly threatening, negative, even violent ways, including government sponsored racism. Nazi Germany is probably the best of the worst examples. But the point here is that leaders and perhaps their people can make immoral choices that lead to their nation acting in violent racist ways. They are acting out their worldview. It is not the nation-state as such that is ipso facto racist; it’s their worldview.

For a nation-state to exist is must recognize and maintain territorial boundaries that are recognized by other nation-states. No borders, no nation-state. No nation-state, no common purpose or accomplishments, and likely no security. 

So, the oft-stated idea being marketed today by so-called globalists, the idea that nations – especially it seems the U.S.A. – should be borderless, or if it does have borders, then the nation is somehow racist, is a false, ahistorical idea. No, the nation is simply acting in an historically demonstrable common-sense self-preservation in the interest of its self-determination. 

This is one of the ironies of the illogic of the globalist left. They argue for identity politics, for every ethnic or whatever demographic group to be able to exercise their self-determination as to where and how they want to live, but when a nation-state does this, even their own country – for example the U.S.A. securing its southern border, not allowing waves of individuals to enter illegally – the globalists call this racist.

They are anti-capitalism, pro-climate alarmism, anti-borders, pro-abortion and population decline, anti-freedom of speech and pro-government control of communications.

The socialist, globalist, left, Marxist people like John Kerry, Bill Gates, Al Gore, Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and the so-called “Squad” in the U.S. Congress, George Soros, the U.N/’s Kofi Anan, and others who’ve drunk the Kool-Aid like King Charles, Oprah Winfrey, and certainly so-called “progressives” are all-in on big, worldwide government, i.e., few or no nation-states.

Now you’d be forgiven if you thought, hey, this sounds like what the Bible calls the End Times, and it may be. Only God knows. Either way, these anti-nation-state trends run along the same track as anti-freedom.

There are numerous Christian intellectuals, scholars, and writers thinking aloud about these trends. Some, like columnist Cal Thomas are writing about what elections mean in this environment. Some, like brilliant Christian apologist Os Guinness are writing books about what these tectonic shifts in our culture mean.

His latest book, Our Civilizational Moment: The Waning of the West and the War of the Worlds, focuses directly on the questions: “Is the civilization in living touch with the ideas, ideals, and inspiration that created it in the first place and that it needs to continue to flourish? Or, with its roots severed, is it destined to decline and die?” Guinness broadens his discussion beyond America to think about the West, but the U.S.A. is right in the middle of this.

The U.S.A. is not listed in the Bible. We do not know if this means the U.S.A. will not exist when the End Times come, whether it will play a role God chose not to reveal, or whether it will be weaker or in some different circumstance wherein it will not play a role.

But this is not for us to determine, or even to worry about. Our calling and task remain the same: “to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with (our) God” (Micah 6:8), to “not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up” (Gal. 6:9).

At some future glorious day, the Scripture describes “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Rev. 7:9-10).

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. Or check //www.youtube.com/@DrRexRogers" style="color: #96607d; text-decoration: underline;">my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers for more podcasts and video.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024   

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/ or my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://x.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by: Rex M. Rogers

Published: 28 October 2024

Are we happy when our enemies get what we consider their “just desserts”? How do we square this with the biblical command to love our enemies?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #176 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

When I was a kid, I remember times when I came home from school and started telling my mother about some other kid who had annoyed, bothered, upset me, or otherwise got under my skin. Mom would listen to this for a while, then invariably would say, “Well, have you prayed for him?” Prayed for him? No, Mom.  I was thinking more about punching him.

This is a simple illustration of the human inclination and experience to react against other humans, to dislike them, maybe to hold them in contempt. Adults may not talk to their mothers that often, but they still react to others like I did back when. It’s in our nature, our sin nature.

On a much larger, sensitive, and dangerous level, individuals, people groups, and countries get at odds, then think, speak, and act badly, often-times violently toward others. Such is happening today in the Middle East where rockets are flying, pagers are blowing up, military units are advancing on ground, and each of several antagonists is trying to kill their enemy.

It is in this context of real-life war and danger that my SAT-7 Lebanese colleagues at our studios in Beirut recently held their weekly devotions focused on the question, “Are we happy when our enemies die?”

The fact that they did this got my attention. They are living real-life, not a parlor game. They are concerned about their safety and even more the physical safety and emotional well-being of their children. They are Christian believers now living, literally, in the midst of a war zone that is none of their doing or choosing.

Hezbollah has been launching rockets into Israel almost daily since October 2023, and Israel is now responding, surgically targeting and killing Hezbollah leaders.

Rockets hit specific buildings within the city of Beirut, not very far from our studios or where our staff live, and these rockets have killed the Hezbollah leaders at which they were aimed, but also, they’ve killed nearby civilians, innocent noncombatants. These unintended victims, so-called “collateral damage,” could be anyone. 

Our SAT-7 Christian staff wanted to apply their Christian faith to their fears, concerns, and attitudes, wanting to respond as Jesus told us to respond: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, ‘Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you’” Matt. 5:43-44.

We are to love and pray for our enemies. This is not easy to do.

I have never been in combat, but I’ve spoken with several who have survived combat, including my late father-in-law, James B. Stone, who was a U.S. Marines in the second wave of troops to beach on Guadalcanal, engaged in some of the most difficult fighting. He suffered shrapnel wounds and damaged hearing that eventually caused him to go deaf, and he came home with a Silver Star. He was a war hero who later became a Christian.

Once or twice, he talked about how he and his fellows were taught to think of the Japanese during WWII, including insulting nicknames and ethnic slurs, forms of hate. Remember, the Japanese at that time were the quite capable and threatening enemy. Then he talked about how years later it was difficult to give over those deeply embedded feelings to the Lord, to not hate or not even think poorly of Japanese people, rather, to pray for them.

If we are to pray for our enemies, we first need to define what or who is an enemy. Then there are other considerations, like self-defense, war, what is a Just War, and the meaning of the Imprecatory prayers in the book of Psalms. 

Our natural response to enemies is often to fight back, get even, put them in their place, work to assure they get their “just desserts,” or to demand justice. But when we obey Jesus and respond to our enemieswith love, prayer, forgiveness and blessing, we take ourselves out of Satan’s line of fire and make room for God to handle justice as only He can. We don’t have to worry about our enemies. 

This includes those among the enemy people group who are loveable, like children, but also those who are by their attitudes and actions decidedly “unlovely,” like radicals, extremists, and terrorists. And certainly, this includes enemies who persecute others, like al-Qaeda, ISIS, Taliban, Hamas, Houthi, Hezbollah, and the Iran red guard.

In “Ezekiel 33:11, God said, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.’ God is not even happy even when an evil person dies. As Christians, we should reflect the mourning and love of our Lord, who grieves the loss of lives on both sides of the conflict.” 

Ultimately, our “enemies” are just people, just wayward individuals trapped in an “ism.” Can we then model the Lord and pray for our enemies, whatever the nature of their evil ideologies? 

This does not mean we surrender our responsibility to make judgments about right and wrong, or that we wink at wrong in some warped definition of love. No, with St. Augustine, we still “hate the sin and love the sinner.”

For me, it’s amazing to think: God cares about the “worst kind of sinner.” He can even draw people to himself who are involved in wicked aggression, for even this malevolence is not the unpardonable sin. 

The most compelling example of praying for one’s enemy was the prayer of Jesus on the cross. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” Luke 23:34. This prayer draws together three acts of the heart involved in loving our enemies: prayer, forgiveness, and mercy.

What about the other considerations? It is true that the Bible leaves room for self-defense, condemns murder but does not say, never kill, never use weapons, never go to war. There is a place in this fallen world for legitimate use of coercive force as noted in Rom 13:1-7. God says of legitimate government authority, “For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.” This teaching is not in conflict with love your enemy.

Then there is Just War theory – the right to go to war, the right conduct within a war. For Christians, Just War theory dates to St. Augustine. Thinking about when a war is just and justifiable and when it is not is one way we can love our enemies.

In the Old Testament we find what’s called imprecatory prayers. To imprecate means “to invoke evil upon or curse” one’s enemies. King David, the psalmist most associated with imprecatory verses, often used phrases like, “may their path be dark and slippery, with the angel of the LORD pursuing them” (Psalm 35:6) and “O God, break the teeth in their mouths; tear out the fangs of the young lions, O LORD!” (Psalm 58:6).

But the Psalms that include imprecations are not filled with only imprecatory prayers. In fact, there is not a single Psalm that ONLY has imprecatory prayers. 

Rather each Psalm is filled with multiple subjects that usually combine these imprecatory prayers with the hope that the psalmist has in the Lord. They do not conflict with the command to love our enemies.

How then should we pray for our enemies?

• Our own ability to forgive.
• That they come to revere and submit to God via the Gospel.
• That their sins are forgiven and that they become forgiving people.
• That they will seek to do God's will.
• That God protects them from temptation and the devil.
• That right, justice, and peace will be recognized and established.

Loving and praying for our enemies, whether personal and social or international and political is a very “un-human” thing to do, meaning our human inclination is to not love but to promote ourselves against others. But this is the point: we cannot simply decide to love our enemies and thus make it so. Rather, we need God’s love in us. “We love because he first loved us” 1 Jn. 4:19.

Finally, “may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all” 1 Thess. 3:12.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. Or check my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers for more podcasts and video.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024     

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or my YouTube channel @DrRexRogers, or connect with me at LinkedIn or X accounts.