AS A GREAT SHAKING ROCKS THE LAND…

By Jim Jordal

See that you don't refuse him who speaks. For if they didn't escape when they refused him who warned on the Earth, how much more will we not escape who turn away from him who warns from heaven, whose voice shook the earth, then, but now he has promised, saying, "Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens." This phrase, "Yet once more," signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that have been made, that those things which are not shaken may remain. Therefore, receiving a Kingdom that can't be shaken, let us have grace, through which we serve God acceptably, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.                                       Heb. 12:25-29 WEB

This passage from Paul’s letter to the Hebrews enlightens us considerably--- if we choose to heed it. Many citizens today seem caught in a dilemma as they attempt to make their way through the growing minefield surrounding American public policy and its attempts to promote some sort of meaningful and safe world order.

Put simply, the reason we can’t seem to bring order to the earth is that we’re not interested in doing it God’s way, preferring instead the human way of awesome military power, massive productive facility, vast and often frightening technological change, unending propaganda, and wealth beyond imagining.

The “great shaking” Paul speaks of is well under way. Almost all institutional building blocks of our society endure various levels of shaking and decay. Government, the economy, the medical delivery system, education, the labor market, minority groups, finance, infrastructure, public and private debt---all reel under the stresses of inadequate funding, public distrust, revealed secrets and shaky leadership. Only the military seems relatively unaffected, and that fact alone says something very important---that we value military power as the final “fallback” position to protect our desire for world domination, couched as national security.

God has shaken the earth and its systems numerous times before, so the idea is not new. The prophet Isaiah uses it several times to signify great changes orchestrated by God. What is different today is that the shaking now is universal in scope---no one escapes because God has come forth to do exactly as the apostle Paul states: to shake systems and institutions severely enough to separate between those parts acceptable for inclusion in his kingdom and those portions not suitable.

Think about it! If righteousness, justice, mercy and truth were our main values in relating to the earth and its’ inhabitants, how well would our present systems match up? Take the distribution of income, for example. In theory, the major task of an economic system is to promote justice, freedom of choice, growth and economic opportunity as widely as possible. So how can we justify the present grossly skewed distribution of American wealth in which the top one per cent holds perhaps half our national wealth? And it’s not getting better, but worse as it seems that all income seemingly gravitates to the upper classes.

This unfortunate state of affairs (to the poor at least) arises from the fact that the system is rigged by law, regulation and custom to accomplish just that. The public looks to legislative bodies to level the playing field, but that’s virtually impossible because the function of creating law is left to those same people who benefit from it. So what options remain?

What seems needed is a complete change of values and morality in those who hold power over world systems. We’ve hoped that reason and altruism would work, but no, the system continues as before. So what is left?

What’s left is to once and for all consider God’s law as the basis for governing and protecting people from exploitation, domination and oppression. But we’re too educated to consider what God says, so the God-ordained shaking of world systems goes on at a frightening pace.

How much shaking will it take for us to finally get the idea?  I don’t know! But it does seem that disastrous affairs in Washington and elsewhere have not yet succeeded in capturing our attention. So the fateful dance goes on as evil and good separate under the hand of Almighty God.