God’s Hope Turns Horror into Glory

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Today’s reading: Joel 2: 28-32

Patriotic holidays are troubling for me.  Today is the 4th of July, and I would like to forget that much evil has been committed on behalf of The United States’ Declaration of Independence.  But The Truth won’t let me do that.

That document immediately sparked a viscous war, of course, and hardly a year has gone by since 1776 in which the United States has not been involved in some other bloody conflict.

And not all of those fights can truthfully be said to have been heroic, or even justified. Innocents across the world — and the decades — have suffered and died because of the “pride” we will celebrate today.

The very men who signed the Declaration, and later the Constitution, were not even willing for the lofty freedoms listed in these documents to apply to all people. Slavery remained a staple of this nation for nearly 100 more years! And Native Americans were certainly not treated as equals as our nation emerged.

Just as with King David, and many other great Biblical figures, the U.S.A. is as flawed as it is grand. So declaring an unconditional love for this nation is difficult for me today. I love God. But there are times when I have hated this country.

Today’s reading helps me resolve this conflict.  These verses are a blessed reminder that God turns all horrors into glory.

“I will show portents in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes.

“Then everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the LORD has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the LORD calls.” (Verse 30-32)

Wars and other injustice are no match for God. He will always win!

 If I were to pull out history’s abacus and calculate the good of our nation while subtracting the bad, I’m certain the result would be overwhelmingly positive.  So, troubled as I am over our nation’s various displays of the devil’s work through the years, I will celebrate today after all. God is good and, therefore, so is the U.S.A.

Thanks be to God for His eternal displays of the fireworks we know as hope. May I always be able to find them during times of despair.