Responses To: Are "YOU" Concerned About Your America?

Many times I am amused at responses to my blogs and eNewsletters.   The two responses I received from the one I posted just yesterday titled "Are 'YOU' Concerned About Your America?" made me smile.  The first was from a long time Friend and Christian brother, Pastor Ike Riddle, who responded with a resounding one word reaction, "YES!"  

The other was from a man from my hometown area who will receive my eNewsletters, but will not be Friends on Facebook.  He declares himself to be a BLUE all the way, i.e., a Left-leaning Democrat. 

What is funny is that just last evening two long time Friends and Christian brethren, Jun and Rachel Quintans, stopped by to visit with Dory and me.  Knowing I am from Alabama, Jun asked me if Alabama is Democrat or Republican and I told him, "When I was a youth in the 1940s/50s, Alabama was pretty much Democrat.  However today Alabama is mostly Conservative Republican, RED through and through - but like any other part of Conservative America, there will be a sprinkling of BLUE."  

As I told Jun, if we look at a political map of America - you will find Alabama painted a bright RED.

Growing up in Alabama in the 1940s/50s, when I was of age I automatically registered Democrat.  However the day the Democratic Party nominated Lyndon Johnson to be their 1964 Presidential Candidate - that very day I went out and re-registered Republican.  I wanted nothing to do with Lyndon Johnson. 

But I must say this - If Lyndon Johnson was running against today's crop of Democratic politicians, I would vote for Johnson.  For with Johnson the Democratic Party began to sink into the Morals Septic Tank - but Democratic politicians today have taken America below the Morals Septic Tank, delving even deeper into moral decay.

It would appear that this gentleman who responded to my blog - is one of the few BLUE Democrats sprinkled into the glorious Conservative RED horizon in my home state of Alabama.  Keep in mind that this gentleman does not claim to be a Christian believer - but like most atheists and agnostics, wants to tell us what the Bible teaches - and where it, or Christian believers, is wrong.

He begins his response to my "Are 'YOU' Concerned About Your America?" blog:

His Opinion:  So what has all of this have to do with being a Christian?  Did Jesus attempt to stage a coup to overthrow Rome?  Did Jesus spend time plugging holes in borders to keep out foreigners?  Was Jesus worried about the economy?  Did Jesus spend most of his time “apologizing” for the state of human affairs under Roman rule?

Bill Gray Response:  Was Jesus a rebel?  Not in the sense that most people think of rebels - but He did show great emotion and anger.  If you recall Jesus took a rope and used it to drive the moneychangers out of the temple, telling them in John 2:16, ".  .  . Take these things away! Do not make My Father's house a house of merchandise!' "

You ask, "Did Jesus spend most of his time 'apologizing' for the state of human affairs under Roman rule?"  No, Jesus, i.e., God, actually used the Romans and the corrupt Jewish leaders - to fulfill Scripture.  In other words, the horrible human affairs under the Roman and Jewish leaders He used to prove His love for mankind - by sending the Perfect Lamb of God, His Son, as a sacrifice, a "paid in full" atonement for mankind's sin nature.

His Opinion:   Why don’t you get your head out of the ground and spread the Jesus of the Bible who you claim to believe in?  I am tired of hearing about how offended and hurt you and others like you are because you claim just Democrats are supposedly ruining this country?

Bill Gray Response:  Let's both look at the record.  Democrat JIMMY CARTER was the most inept president up to that time, driving the economy down and allowing Americans to be held hostage in the American Embassy in Iran for over a year.  His one attempt to free them ended with American military killed and Iranians laughing at America. 

BILL CLINTON spent so much time playing games with a female intern, then lying about it to the American people - that he had little time to goof up our economy.  But he did gut our military forces and capabilities. 

BARACK OBAMA was the most destructive and anti-American president in history.  He destroyed all progress made by the Civil Rights Movement of Martin Luther King - he further gutted our military - he destroyed our economy - flooded America with Illegal Aliens - and did his best to surrender America's sovereignty to the United Nations. 

And today we have the feeble Old JOE BIDEN, Mistress Cackling Kamala Harris, Granny Pelosi, and Bobble-head Schumer - all doing their best to outdo Obama and be the most destructive administration in history. 

They have done everything within their power to push:  Abortion - Same-Sex Marriage - to flood America with ILLEGALS from all over the world - they have supported their Big Daddy, China, in exporting a deadly virus to America and all the world - they have surrendered America's economy to China and her Communist allies - they have surrendered America's Oil Independence (built by President Trump) to the OPEC nations.  And they have done all that damage in less than one year.    

President Trump had made America's Economy the greatest it had ever been - he had Unemployment at a 50 year low - he had America firmly established as the leading nation of the world - and he finally had China, et al, standing up to the bar to pay their fair share.  In other words, President Trump had America on the road to being the strongest it has ever been in our 245 year history. 

And in his first week in office, Old Joe Biden did everything in his power to destroy all the progress which America had accomplished during the 4 year Trump administration.   

His Opinion:  Why not try and see to it that the poor are comforted by tending to their needs: Hunger, health, education, occupations?

Bill Gray Response:  How did Jesus respond to such questions?  In Matthew 26:6-11 we read, "And when Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, a woman came to Him having an alabaster flask of very costly fragrant oil, and she poured it on His head as He sat at the table.  But when His disciples saw it, they were indignant, saying, 'Why this waste?  For this fragrant oil might have been sold for much and given to the poor.'   But when Jesus was aware of it, He said to them, 'Why do you trouble the woman? For she has done a good work for Me.  For you have the poor with you always, but Me you do not have always.' "

His Opinion:  Why not try and protect people, including children, from mad men with guns instead of standing behind a misrepresented 2^nd amendment right to support unrestricted gun ownership?  Giving only “Thoughts and Prayers”  to the dead and injured…?

Bill Gray Response:  All the evil of Communism/Socialism/Naziism/Fascism BEGAN with taking guns away from the citizens.  And look what has happened in all those nations.  The most recent one, Venezuela, was for many years the most prosperous nation in South America - until Socialism took control.  Now that nation is less than a 3rd world country - it is almost, if not actually, as bad as North Korea. 

His Opinion:  Right to personal choice and personal truth, while reserving the self-righteous right to choose how other peoples lives are controlled and guided?

Bill Gray Response:  I realize that you put no value in the Bible and what it teaches, but consider this:  In every nation where Judeo/Christian morals, values, and teachings have been removed - socialism, anarchy, and moral decay soon begin to destroy that nation. 

America is strong because it was founded on Judeo/Christian principles 245 years ago - and although the Left has fought to destroy those values - America is still the strongest nation on earth.  The beliefs you espouse are a direct result of the partial moral decay birthed and nurtured by the Left over the past decades.  

His Opinion:  Is the U.S. the best country in the world that God should protect or love it and its obedience to your unsolicited and unsupported dogma more than other countries?

Bill Gray Response:   I will let the Bible speak to that question:

Psalm 33:12, "Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, The people He has chosen as His own inheritance."

Jeremiah 17:7, "Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,  And whose hope is the LORD."

His Opinion:  What is your supposed “truth” without agape love?  I see none of that in your remarks.  You seem more concerned that your god should condemn and judge those who are not of your opinion.

Bill Gray Response:   I will take these two questions in reverse:  I do not have a "god" - I worship God, the God of the universe, the God of eternity, the one and only God.  Secular folks have many gods - most often beginning with themselves.  But we who believe have only one God.

You ask, "What is your supposed 'truth' without agape love?"   I have to wonder if "agape love" is merely a phrase you have heard other non-believers tossing around - and I have to wonder if you truly know the difference between the kinds of love mentioned in the Bible.  What are the different types of Biblical love:

The first Greek word for “love” is eros, which refers to romantic, lustful, or sexual love. 

The second is storge, which refers to familial love like that of a mother for her baby, or of sibling for one another.

The third Greek word for “love,” philia, refers to friendship and camaraderie.

Then there is the true agape love when we speak of God’s love for the mankind - and the type of love that Christians are taught to emulate.

When the Pharisee asked Jesus about the greatest commandment in Matthew 22:36-39, " 'Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?'  Jesus said to him, 'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself.""    In this passage we find agape love, for it is speaking of loving God and emulating God's love - the greatest love, agape love.
 
His Opinion:  Shame on you… Shame on you… Shame on you…

Bill Gray Response:   I suppose I can only answer that one way:

Luke 6:22, "Blessed are you when men hate you, And when they exclude you, And revile you, and cast out your name as evil, For the Son of Man’s sake."

John 7:7, "The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil."

It seems that when a believer shares the Light of His Gospel - the world's only response can be to call shame down on us.  In the first century in the city of Antioch in Syria believers were first called Christians (Acts 11:26), but it was used as a derogatory name by the secular people of Antioch.  However, quickly the believers made this name a crown of glory - and since then there is nothing the world can call us that is more blessed than "Christian!"

God bless, have a wonderful, blessed day,

Bill 

Click on the image to enlarge: