For the last five weeks an African refugee from our church has been staying in our home. His name is Stephen. It is an easy hospitality for me to extend as Jane is still in the US . It is not an unselfish hospitality. Stephen cooks and I do not. For the last five days Stephen has been glued to CNN. I can hear him downstairs clapping, laughing, shouting amen. Stephen has never visited America . He was born in Cameroon . He has not seen his wife or children for ten years. His Hungarian visa does not allow him to work. For that reason he is homeless. He has precious little to celebrate.
But he is celebrating. He is celebrating because the President of the United States had an African father. Stephen’s sense of participation and enfranchisement through Barack Obama’s presidency is profound.
I share some of Stephen’s enthusiasm. Our new President is brilliant, stylish and a soaring orator. He has a beautiful family. We’ve not had a President this winsome since Ronald Reagan. No President has inspired so much hope since Franklin Roosevelt. I doubt if even George Washington himself entered office with such a tailwind. He’ll need the momentum. Oratory won’t count for much with the likes of Vladimir Putin, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Kim Jong-il.
I wish our President well. Our country wearied of the last President. Our war aims are not clear. Our economy is…well… you know. Were it not for this fresh start our country would be in near despair.
In the years I have been a Christian the Lord has blessed individuals and ministries I didn’t expect Him to bless. The Lord has blessed individuals and ministries I would not have blessed. And, candidly, He has blessed individuals and ministries I did not want Him to bless. This is so because He is wise and I am not. This is so because He is gracious and I am not. This is so because He is God.
But I do want Him to bless President Obama. The very name ‘Barack’ means ‘blessed.’ As his name is so let him be. I want that blessing because of Iraq and Afghanistan. I want that blessing because I have friends who’ve lost jobs. I want it most of all because I want African-Americans to bask in their own contribution to American achievement.
I want it for lots of reasons.
But I did not vote for Barack Obama.
And I would never vote for him.
This week he called for hope and opportunity.
This week he reached out to “gay and straight.”
In the past he has looked with favor on decriminalizing 20 million guilty who entered our country illegally.
Notably excluded from the comprehensive amnesty and good will are the only truly innocent—children yet unborn. They will be denied not only the right to live in America but the right to live at all.
They will be scorched, poisoned and dismembered in their mothers’ wombs.
Whither hope and opportunity for these?
I have heard the charges of simple-mindedness and shallowness leveled at one issue voters.
I have heard Christian opinion-makers like Jim Wallis and Donald Miller tell me there are other humanitarian issues to be considered beyond the slaughter of the unborn and the Democratic Party scores well on those.
I have Democrat friends who are godly and intelligent who tell me to get over it.
But I can’t.
And I never will.
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THE UNCERTAIN FUTURE FOR OBAMA
For many people the day January 20, 2009, date on which Mr. Barack Obama assumes the presidency of the United States, becomes an historic day. It is the first time an African-American becomes the leader of one of the most powerful nation in the world.
A crowd of people were present to see Mr. Obama assume the presidency, perhaps motivated by seeing the man who fed hopes of a nation immersed in a strong moral and economic depression.
Pastor Rick Warren began the ceremony with a prayer that really leave much to be desired. But with more gold inspiracion who was an elderly friend Reverend Luther King and who won the embrace of the president.
The new president's speech was very realistic but little motivator, something overshadowed by the cold of minus 6 degrees and the nuance that Hollywood was given to the act. However, it was clear to see there faces as well as cheerful and enthusiastic, also faces serious surrounding the president Obama.
One such face is that of former president George Bush, representing the major groups in power, and that will be closely watching Obama's intentions.
Another of the faces in the government of Israel, who is not looking to grace a descendant of the Muslim as president.
Other faces are the rulers of Arab nations, which do not look at Obama as an ally for them.
As finishing touch, faces no shortage of traditional segregationist groups, who are offended to hear that the same God in the eyes of whites and blacks.
Undoubtedly, the president Barack Obama is sitting in a chair where the sword of Damocles hanging over his head.
I hope that the Christian churches in the United States not cease to pray for their president for the American people and themselves.
You said so powerfully what I try to say when my ESL students ask me what I think of Obama. Without exception, they recoil and show their disapproval after I define abortion, a new vocabulary word. They're surprised and shocked that he would support such a thing.
I purchased a little book at a garage sale written by Ronald Reagan entitled, " Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation. In it he writes:
"...we cannot survive as a free nation when some men decide that others are not fit to live and should be abandoned to abortion or infanticide."
In the afterword, C. Everett Koop says the abortions in our country are infanticide--"The Slide to Auschwitz."
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