It seemed like a normal day for the town of Smithville. Until an angry man ran into the school with a gun and massacred everyone inside. People shook their heads and talked about it in whispers, saying, "They should make more laws preventing that."
Whether it be a cut in pay, a closed factory that sends the local county into a deep depression, a massacre, or the tragic death of some teenagers, whenever something affects people significantly, they declare angrily, "There should have been laws to prevent that from happening." Revolutions in Syria, slavery and persecution in Africa and the Middle East, and the most recent tyrannical dictator in The-Next-Country-Over...all cause people to cry to the American government, "Why aren't you doing something about this?"
A disturbing mode of thinking has long controlled the people of the world. It is thousands of years old, but no less hideous for being so. People of the world see their governments as there to fix all of their problems. No matter what the issue, they call on the ruling power to step in and make all of their troubles go away.
It's no wonder so many governments turn bad with the people handing them such power and looking on them with such worship in their eyes.
As I look on at today's society, this has become shamefully apparent. A people who were once known for their ingenuity and independence, who would tackle any problem facing them with grit and determination, who were renowned for such a thing called American Exceptionalism, have turned into a people who look just like everyone else in the world, a people who turn to the government and cry for it to supply their every need instead of fixing any problems that come their way with God and prayer and little else.
This attitude is nowhere more clear than in the gun issue. So many people become outraged that we don't have more gun laws whenever somebody uses a gun to kill. They clamor for the Federal Government to put more bans on guns, as if they think that would solve the problem.
Here's a simple fact: the government can't solve all your problems. No matter how many laws there are, there will always be somebody who breaks them. Even if guns are banned altogether, criminals will still find ways to find them and use them. Killers will always kill no matter how many methods of doing it the government attempts to snatch out of their hands. Laws against drugs do nothing to prevent their abuse. No matter how much power is given to the government in the name of safety, the same awful problems will continue to ruin people's lives. The government is not and can never be the people's Savior.
But there is someone who is a Savior. Someone who is all-powerful, all-worthy, and all-wise. Someone whom this nation has been turning their backs on for far too long.
His name is Jesus.
Perhaps, instead of sitting back and hoping the government can eradicate all problems, we should spread the word of Jesus instead. Let people know about the One who can set them free from all pain and fear and death. Instead of waiting for the government to get rid of the revolutions and the tyrants and the slavers, we should go and do it ourselves. Instead of trying desperately to keep guns away from killers, we should lead the killers to the One who died for their salvation. And maybe, while trying to spread God's light, we should accept that bad things will happen in this world. Killers will come. People will die. Slavery and persecution will always exist somewhere, and tyrants will never cease rising up. This world is a sinful place and the government can't change that.
But God can. And one day, this world will pass away and we will live forever in a new world that is free from sin and pain and death.
And no government will have gotten us there.
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