And Now This Word To America: Peace And Be Still!
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(OPINION) I am not a prophet. I don’t imagine you were confused about that, but I thought I’d better go on record as having said it up front of my own accord.
Right up until Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024, I had no clue how the U.S. presidential election would turn out. I knew that people’s nerves were frayed.
On election eve, talk show host Seth Meyers joked (per the New York Times): “Tomorrow is Election Day and ‘Late Night’ is officially endorsing Xanax 0.5 milligram, twice a day as needed.”
Now we know the election’s results. Donald Trump thumped Kamala Harris. In addition to winning the presidency, Republicans also won the Senate and seem likely to hold onto the House. If so, they will control all three branches of the federal government, including the U.S. Supreme Court. In my opinion, it’s never wise to hand that much power to either party, but nobody asks my opinion.
I can imagine the aftermath of this election going any of several directions, few of them salutary. The nation remains divided. There’s lots of fury and lots of fear floating around. My nonprophetic guess is that there’s going to be trouble in River City, and in a whole bunch of other cities. There may be trouble abroad as well.
I could be wrong. I’ve been wrong before. I sure hope I am now.
But please allow me to offer this humble reminder: God never panics. Let’s say it again, together this time: God. Never. Panics.
As serendipity, editorial planning or the Spirit (choose which you prefer) would have it, Election Day’s daily devotion on Catholic contemplative Richard Rohr’s website addressed that very thought.
The devotion’s text was from Mark’s Gospel, where Jesus and his disciples are traveling by boat when a terrible storm blows up, threatening to swamp and drown them. The disciples fall to pieces.
Jesus wakes up from a nap, annoyed, and tells the waves, “Peace! Be still!” The waters calm. Then he turns to his quaking followers and says, “Why are you afraid? Where is your faith?”
The devotion then quotes the late Episcopal Bishop Barbara Harris, who wrote this about the panic-stricken men: “What they did not understand, and what many today do not understand is that although we may panic in times of stress and distress, God does not share our panic.”
She continued:
“That sense of panic that gripped the disciples out there on the Sea of Galilee is pervasive in our church and in our society today. When people panic, they tend to act desperately and unreasonably. Nations panic and go to war. Then they try to get God to sanction their actions as ‘holy.’ In panic, people choose up sides in controversies and take irrational stands.”
Apparently Rohr or his editors, Bishop Harris and I at some point had had more or less the same idea.
My thoughts ran like this: We certainly are in a difficult, frustrating, scary moment. Bad things could happen. I pray they won’t — but they could.
So what are we to do? Wring our hands and swallow nerve pills like they’re Pez? Stay hopping mad at those on the other side of our political barricades? That’s sure no way to spend the next four years. That’s a recipe for madness, both personal and societal.
Here’s an alternative: We can choose to trust God.
We can lose our minds, or we can take the path of peace. We can lash out, or we can have faith that God will help us. I’ve decided to opt for the peaceful journey.
Not only does God not panic, but God is never surprised by outcomes, regardless of how greatly they startle us. God was in charge of the cosmos when W was president, and he was in control when Obama was president, and he was in control when Trump was president the first time, and he was and is in control during Biden’s current presidency.
Soon Trump will aboard again, and God will be in control then, too. He’ll see us through despite ourselves.
I love this country. My family has been here 400 years, since the Jamestown, Virginia, days. My ancestors defended this land in multiple wars. I want nothing but the best for America. I get irate when I think anybody’s taking it down a dark path.
But really, as dear as the United States is, my real home lies in the kingdom of heaven, which is not some faraway realm out beyond the Milky Way, but a true and present force right here, right now, on Earth, and in my heart. My ultimate loyalty is to that domain. And it operates by different rules than the visible kingdoms we all behold.
I don’t always trust — or even like — the president of the United States, but I absolutely love and trust the head of that other kingdom.
Being citizens of the kingdom of heaven doesn’t protect us from the mayhem that may take place in the tangible, carnal, visible world. But it means the mayhem isn’t the final word.
In the end, the kingdom of heaven will be left standing even if, God forbid, every other institution falls. Whatever happens tomorrow with the United States, at some appointed time Jesus will say once more, “Peace! Be still.” And all storms will calm. Forever.
Paul Prather has been a rural Pentecostal pastor in Kentucky for more than 40 years. Also a journalist, he was The Lexington Herald-Leader’s staff religion writer in the 1990s, before leaving to devote his full time to the ministry. He now writes a regular column about faith and religion for the Herald-Leader, where this column first appeared. Prather’s written four books. You can email him at pratpd@yahoo.com.