I watched a PBS special on the Navy Seals. I was deeply inspired by the level of determination in men who want to be part of a team that is considered the very best of the best; and execute their gifts in the arena of warfare--real bullets and real bombs. Inspirational also is the depth of "brotherhood" that is forged in the crucible of lethal combat and dangerous missions. The fact that men and women voluntarily give their lives for certain principles and ways of life should give us serious pause. Like Private Ryan, we should ask ourselves, "Am I a good person?" Am I worthy of what has been sacrificed for my freedom and prosperity? Am I contributing in some way to what has been bequeathed to me in the bloody fields of battle? Or am I simply a user, feeling entitled to what I have and deprived because I don't have more?...complaining that the government isn't doing more for me.
At the spiritual level [and I doubt there is, in the final analysis, any other level] Christ's life poses the same questions to us. What are we doing with the freedom He has purchased for us? I fear that our cultural decline, secular drifting, and spiritual torpor are answering the question progressively in the negative. I fear that we may decline to the point at which spiritually awakened men will not be willing to give their lives for the way that we are spending the freedom they would die for. If America ceases to be a good nation, how can we expect good men to die for it? How can we expect parents to send their sons and daughters into battles being fought so that Americans can continue to be fat, selfish, mean, lazy and greedy? When soldiers come home from war, bearing the memories of good, brave, disciplined brothers who've died beside them on the battlefield, what will they discover in this nation that was worthy of that brother's death? We who have not stood in the field of battle must fight the spiritual battles within ourselves and in our culture to insure that those who put their lives on the line can be convinced that they are fighting for a worthy cause.
One of the SEALs stated, "When I'm out there, in it [firefight], I'm not doing it for God and country. I'm doing it for the man on my right and left. I'm doing it so they can come home alive."
As worthy a cause as that seems to be, I don't think it can sustain soldiers for the long haul. I think they are going to need something beyond their brothers-in-battle to fight and die for. Otherwise, sooner or later, it begins to settle in that what their brother died for was not worthy of his death.
We must ask ourselves repeatedly, collectively and individually, "What is it that makes America worth dying for?" Is it simply freedom? Freedom to do what? Whatever we feel like doing, and in any way that we feel like doing it? What are the standards and principles by which that freedom must be structured in order to move ahead into what humans really need? Our Founding Fathers seemed to believe that religion would provide that structure and guidance. Can we trust that, without that guidance, our feelings and having the broadest possible spectrum of choices will lead us toward true prosperity? Can we trust that we will be able to make and enforce enough laws to constrain the baser drives of the human heart? Do we trust humans [based on what we see every day in our world, including grave mistakes being made by good men] unfettered by sincere religious constraints, to lead us toward a better existence? One thing we know for sure: our Founding Fathers did not.
I am so thankful for the Christian Faith. To me it seems to be the right medicine for the ails of humanity. The teachings of Christ are the purest form of Truth available on this planet, a fact that is clear to anyone who seriously contemplates them. If we ignore these teachings and His Spirit, we are left floundering in whatever is blowing around in the vast darkness of the human heart--whoever yells the loudest or attains the most power. And if His teachings are true, we will have hell to pay for it--the kind of hell we have seen repeatedly in the atheistic and misguided currents of human history.
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