A Genuine Response To The State Of The Union Speech

Did you see the headlines
Little things are blown to size
It’s all around the world before you know

Last night, as I was listening to the end of President Obama’s State of the Union address and reading comments about same on Twitter, it occurred to me that I was growing very tired of it all. Tired of the endless bashing, mostly. It’s not that I’ve suddenly turned left; I thoroughly disagree with the vast majority of Obama’s philosophies, politics and practices. But that’s where it ends.

That’s where it has to end for me.

We’re living in a time
With all the borders tripped and mined
Days are gone when you could just be
Ordinary

Admitting this is probably not the best way to go as far as winning friends and influencing people on the right. In fact, that should read undoubtedly not the best way. The battle against liberalism has become a personal vendetta. Not permissible in my case. Not an option.

Another patient
On vacation
Gone for days without your medication

In my own ofttimes fumbling stumbling bumbling silly self-defeating self-destructive way I strive to live in the manner prescribed by Christ. There’s no room in there for hating people. You can decry their shortcomings all you want, always mindful that you also have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. You can even grow angry with them. Jesus Himself grew angry with people. But note what it says concerning one of these moments: “He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts…” Christ longed to bring those who opposed Him during His time on this earth to Him. It hurt that they wouldn’t budge. So it should be with us.

In the end
One decision that you make
There is a way to face it
Lose your head
Find a way to get it on
Cuz’ overnight
Everything can be
So undone

That all said, a brief overview of the speech itself. Ignoring the analysis both fawning and foul, certain themes touched on were solid — the need to create more jobs, to grow more energy independent via using nuclear power plus expanding offshore drilling efforts. Others left a sour taste, most noticeably the continued theme of Obama blaming his predecessor for everything wrong under the sun. He’s been the President for a year and will be the President for at least the next three years. There are very few of us in the workforce at any level who can’t think of some choice words for what those who held our position before us did or didn’t do. But we’re there now, and it’s our responsibility to do the work. Buck up.

Did you see the headlights
Little pair of glowing eyes
Staring at you down the lonely road

Something Obama touched on at the end of the address deserves repeating: “Democracy in a nation of 300 million people can be noisy and messy and complicated. And when you try to do big things and make big changes, it stirs passions and controversy. That’s just how it is. Those of us in public office can respond to this reality by playing it safe and avoid telling hard truths and pointing fingers. We can do what’s necessary to keep our poll numbers high and get through the next election instead of doing what’s best for the next generation. But I also know this: If people had made that decision 50 years ago or 100 years ago or 200 years ago, we wouldn’t be here tonight. The only reason we are here is because generations of Americans were unafraid to do what was hard, to do what was needed even when success was uncertain, to do what it took to keep the dream of this nation alive for their children and their grandchildren.”

We usually refer to this as ‘walking by faith’.

Did you dream you saw your life
Drawn across a sharpened knife
Made to watch as all the blood runs cold

To walk by faith means you don’t give in to fears about the present. Any one of us can name a dozen dozens reasons why we/he/she/it/they will fail. There are few things easier than picking something, or someone, apart. A lack of perfection makes that option one readily available to all about all save God alone. However, it does not entitle us to flail away at every everything. Remember what was said a moment ago? We, too, have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God? Rejecting or embracing Obama and his platform in their entirety is foolish. Instead, we should consider him as we want God to consider us. Love him or no, Obama is neither God nor out of His reach. As is the case with each of us.

Are you strong enough
Seize the moment now
There’s so little time before it’s gone
Redemption is at hand
No matter what chemical you’ve taken on
If you could use another plan
It’s got to be the genuine

You see, we’ve got this country we live in. It doesn’t really matter who’s in the Oval Office or which party is in the majority in either house of Congress. We still live here. Now, we can and do disagree on political philosophies, policies and practices. We can love or loathe whoever is in a given position in the government at any given time.

But we still live here.

It is vital for those of us who believe in Jesus to remember the priorities when it comes to people. All people. Including politicians. The most important question isn’t their position on health care, or cap and trade, or defense or any one of a multitude of issues. Certainly they’re important. But they are never the most important. The most important question is this:

What think ye of the Christ?

If someone has a honest faith, a natural byproduct will be a servant’s heart. Jesus washed the feet of His disciples the night they abandoned Him to be tortured and executed. He told them, even as He tells us, that whoever wants to be first among others must be the servant of all.

It is my prayer that the President hear his own words: “And what keeps me going — what keeps me fighting — is that despite all these setbacks, that spirit of determination and optimism, that fundamental decency that has always been at the core of the American people, that lives on. It lives on in the struggling small business owner who wrote to me of his company, ‘None of us,’ he said, ‘… are willing to consider, even slightly, that we might fail.’ It lives on in the woman who said that even though she and her neighbors have felt the pain of recession, ‘We are strong. We are resilient. We are American.’ It lives on in the 8-year-old boy in Louisiana, who just sent me his allowance and asked if I would give it to the people of Haiti. And it lives on in all the Americans who’ve dropped everything to go someplace they’ve never been and pull people they’ve never known from the rubble, prompting chants of ‘USA! USA! USA!’ when another life was saved. The spirit that has sustained this nation for more than two centuries lives on in you, its people. We have finished a difficult year. We have come through a difficult decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don’t quit. I don’t quit. Let’s seize this moment — to start anew, to carry the dream forward and to strengthen our union once more. Thank you. God bless you. And God bless the United States of America.”

It is my prayer our President humbles himself before the crucified and risen Christ the Lord. It is my prayer that from this, he will serve the people and serve them wisely.

It is my prayer that our President will embrace the genuine.

Come
If you want to come
Want you to live
Like you want to live anyway
Want you to stay
If you want to stay
One decision
One decision
The genuine

Lyrics: “Genuine” by the 77s
from the album A Golden Field Of Radioactive Crows