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For Such A Time As This


"For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?” (Esther 4:14)

          I’m re-reading Total Truth by Nancy Pearcey because I have this sense that I (and many other people) need to change my worldview a little. Specifically, there are some things that I’ve tended to accept… not quite accepting that they are true, but accepting that other people believe they are true and therefore, well, is it really worth rocking the boat? I know some people would be amazed that there are any boats that I don’t rock, but to give you an example, I find nothing in Scripture that suggests that identity politics is valid. I have told people that I don’t believe there are human races, just one human race, but I still refer to hyphenated Americans. I don’t always do this – when I talk to Grace, they are all people.
          I’m struggling with this a little, because I don’t think it’s wrong to be proud of one’s heritage. I don’t think it evil to claim to be an American (or a Canadian, or a Seneca, or a Kenyan), but I’m not sure I’m right about this. I’m not joining those “citizens of the world” who want to flout the rules of all countries, I’m just not sure we’re looking at it the right way.  
          What may be the key for me came to mind while watching a Nova program called Decoding the Weather Machine. It begins with a meteorologist who struggled with the idea of global warming because he lived in an area that is conservative. He noted that the people around him don’t like the idea of more government, but that the solution (if there is one) involves what he described (if I remember correctly) the EPA times a hundred. 
          What came to mind as I listened to this part was that the issue for those people is the fact that those screaming about it are using it for political purposes. It’s not “we have to solve this problem,” it’s “the only possible solution is government control of everything.”  
          This is the same idea as identity politics – it’s all a means of this group or that group exercising control over another. This is one of the places I think I need to change my worldview, and we need to change ours. I need to reject identity politics and live out the worldview that I claim to believe: that we are all created in the image of God, to speak forcefully against people using labels to either demean others. I need to reject attempts to control. 
          How does all of this connect to the verse I chose for the day? Each of us was born for the time in which we live. If we do not stand up for the truth, who will save the people around us? If we remain silent, will we not condemn them to the lies they believe?

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