Hit the nail on the head...

What is the problem with America today?  It is amazing to me that if you ask 10 different people this question you will get a variety of answers.  From the extreme leftists to the extreme rightists answer will include government, politics, economy, religion, conservatism, liberalism, education...  on and on the reasons will emerge.

But I ask myself, what is the problem today, and I realize that it is much the same as it was in the perfect garden of Eden.

Man, myself included, chooses to look at their own mistakes, failures, shortcomings, sin, and attempts to find reasons why they are not to be blamed for it.  We want people to recognize us as something that at our core none of us is.  We long to be esteemed by others as blameless (or at least limited in our scope of error).  Yeah, we will all recognize ourselves as not perfect, but at least better than most.

Here is where the truth must set in, and where the glory of the Gospel is so beautiful.  I am neither blameless, nor perfect.  I am completely guilty.  Within the lowest parts of my heart is the capacity to do atrocious things.  And, to be honest, at the highest levels of my heart, I am still messed up in the way that I think and believe.  I am by nature selfish. I care about me more than anyone or anything else.  I don't want to, but it is my natural bent.

But that is why the Gospel is so amazing.  What human, if given the understanding of not only the private thoughts and actions of anyone else and given the scope of the capacities that lies within the heart of another person, would choose to sacrifice themselves daily in the place of another?  Yet God, who knows me inside and out, sees the private actions, hears the private thoughts, chooses to love me unconditionally, completely and sacrificially.  My actions of defiance, my thoughts of selfishness, my rebellion of heart are seen clearly - even before I engage in them, and is responded to by a loving, forgiving God.

What is the problem with America today?  We need to see ourselves as God does and recognize our need for Him.  Then we need to see others in light of who we truly are and love them as Christ loved us.  This will end the blame game, because I am as much at fault as anyone else.

If Christ, who is God, could leave heaven and walk alongside the broken, the fallen, the sinner, and love them by humbling Himself and dying on the cross for us, how much more do we need to humble our arrogant and selfish hearts and sacrifice ourselves, our popularity, our attention, our affection from others, etc. for the sake of making His name great.

I need to work on this today.