Taking the Opportunity

Some things mean more than politics

It’s done! Thank each and every one of you so much!

A lot of people I know who are conservatives say that they don’t have any liberal or leftist friends, but I am not among that number. Aside from the fact that it’s nearly impossible for a black American to not have Democrat/liberal/leftist family members, I have a number of people who read my blather who are not conservatives.

I want all of them in my life for these reasons: they care about me and I care about them.

There’s a myth that the vast majority of military members are politically on the right. But I’d estimate that the number is about %60 right and %40 left. I spent 21 years in the USAF/USAFR, so I have a significant portion of old friends who regularly vote Democrat.

These people with whom I disagree politically have shown me friendship and love for a very long time.

Right now, I have a relatively new friend who is a leftist and ::gasp:: an atheist. He doesn’t read my blog posts unless I send him a link - not because of my political and religious views but because he’s not into the Internet at all. (I had to show him how to take a picture with his phone.) We almost never talk about God.

But, the other day, he brought up the subject of “Christian” values - by his definition, trying to do right by everyone all the time, which is something I know from experience that he tries to do. 

Now when we’ve had conversations like this before, it resulted in us talking over each other and some shouting, but this time I was silent and let him speak on his version of Christian values and his observations about the hypocrisy of many who say they are Christians - something which I have observed as well.

When he trailed off, I said that doing right as much as possible is great, but it’s not a Christian value.

“Then what is?” he asked.

“There’s only one: believing that Jesus the Christ is Lord and Savior of all mankind.”

That ended the conversation, but the Lord gave me an opening and I took it.

Later, when I was alone, I started thinking about how many people, Christian and non-Christian alike, are under the impression that one must do something other than have faith in Jesus’s finished work in order to be a Christian.

I suspect that many have turned away from the Church because they simply could not be as perfect as other Christians expected them to be. Or because they’ve watched people commit heinous acts in the name of Jesus. (This is something my friend brought up and I vehemently asserted that such people were not Christians, no matter what they say. Remember what I said about standard-bearers?)

But I adore this person and all the others who don’t believe as I do, and who still want me in their lives. And I pray for each one of them. After all, who knows what God is up to at any given moment in time? I think God puts people into the lives of Christians so that someone will pray for them.

I’m down with that and I have a long list.