2,000 years ago, a young carpenter from a po-dunk town of Israel rose to the ranks of the known and stirred up the established religions of the day by claiming to be God and throwing out ideals like many of the ancient prophets did – Justice, hope, and peace (amongst other universal ideas).  Jesus is risen!

700 years ago, A guy by the name of William Wallace (if you believe the movie) cried out for the ideals of freedom for every individual against an established feudalistic order of the day that was hell bent on keeping the land owners, land owners, and the peasants, peasants.

100 years ago, two men were born, one in the north and one in the south, who believed that things were not right, but they could be.  So these men fought for equality, hope, and the American dream, both rising to national prominence, and both were shot for these ideals they were propogating.  Martin Luther King, Jr. died at a hotel on March 29, 1968 and Ronald Reagan survived an assasination attempt on March 30, 1981 (coincidentally hours before my sister, Brooke, was born).  Reagan went on to finish out 8 more years as the president of the United States.

I use these examples, not to call our new president (as of this January) any type of savior or freedom fighter or even a uniter – He’s not a savior and hasn’t been around long enough to fight for freedom or unite anyone.  But I want to continue to propagate a different message that I believe every politician, pastor, and leader should hold on to beyond this election week.

When given the choice between cynicism and hope – we will ultimately choose hope.

When given the choice between hate and love – we will ultimately choose love.

When given the choice between injustice and justice – we will ultimately choose justice.

When things aren’t going well, the temptation is to start playing the cynic and attack the opposition, but the irony is that time and after time after time the person or people who accentuate their ideals ultimately win, over those who attack the opposition.  Could it be that God created the world this way?

I know there are a lot of arguments (even good ones) against this thought process.  But the examples for ideals far outweigh the examples of playing the cynic.  Just look at the opposites of the aforementioned examples.  They are famous too:  The Pharisees, King “Longshanks”, George Wallace, and Walter Mondale.

My case is now rested.

7:45 pm – Carie and I are doing some work.  I flip on Fox News for election coverage.  Oh come on, for years I’ve been watching the other bias.

8:00 pm – Steve Bramlett called and said he was coming over.  Kentucky and West Virginia go to McCain.  Obama gets his first state:  Vermont

8:15 pm – Steve Bramlett shows up.  I feed him, although Carie made the meal.  Yummmmm Chicken pot pie.  Obama has a lot of the eastern states and New England states.  Not a shock.

8:30 pm – McCain gets Alabama and Arkansas, but Obama gets a big prize:  Pennsylvania.  Thats gonna leave a mark.Looks like John Kerry is going to win the senator race here in Mass.

8:40 pm – McCain win Georgia.  Bramlett says Obama win could be good for America.  He also wants me to mention he is not for Obama though. Okay.  bramlett is not for Obama.  Carie is almost done with her work.

8:42 pm – Incumbent republican senator for Georgia wins.

8:43 pm – Brit Hume stutters a lot.   I’m pretty sure Massachusetts went to Obama.  I CANT BELIEVE IT!

8:48 pm – Bramlett just commented on a gas can commercial with country folk music being the “stupidest commercial ever.”  I say its much better than the prostate commercial immediately afterwards.  Now Bramletts calling his woman, cilla.  She’s my facebook friend.

8:54 pm – while Carie gets up to look for a book to read and Bramlett continues to come over to our house and ignore us, talking to his girlfriend, I change the channel and see the Celtics are winning 14-13.  Go Green!

8:57 pm – Talking heads on all the networks are so irritating.  Should I change the channel to John Stewart and Stephen Colbert?

9:00 pm – results from several states come out now.  Wyoming, New mexico, Minnesota, Michigan, Rhode Island and Michigan goes to Obama.  A few states go to McCain like North Dakota and Kansas, but it looks pretty bad for McCain.

9:04 pm – skipping over to lifechurch.tv for a few.  Be right back.

9:07 pm – Having church at lifechurch.tv. Sweet worship!  Nice to know no matter what happens tonight, I serve a God bigger than all the hype and chaos of politics.

9:11 pm - Anybody have an idea where else I can surf while I’m ignoring the election?

9:26 pm – Bramlett just said that Craig Groeschel’s voice sounds like a candy bar.  WHAT?!

9:30 pm -Craig Groeschel “Pracitcal atheism – a belief in God with no real fear of Him.”

9:32 pm – McCain wins Louisiana!  Too late.

9:39 pm – I’m all about the underdog, but this race is over.  Congrats President Obama.

9:40pm – Steve Bramlett, Carie, and myself, all say good night!  Thanks for joining us.

Are you happy or miserable about the outcome?

All right, ‘fess up.  How did you vote and why?

Is to be uneducated.  Got this from Tim Stevens at Leadingsmart.com,

Tim found the info the info here.

I’m just sayin’

Presenting:

The best political article (focusing on Christians) I’ve read this year!

Your welcome.

Two close friends with opposing viewpoints who I read regularly chimed in today with some excellent writing on the Presidential election.  Please check their stuff out if you’re interested in this topic.  They are ruthlessly devoted to their ideals, and I respect the way they present them.
In alphabetical order:

Clay Davis

Eric Mill

Here we go.  This thing is about to get good.

Don MIller prays at the DNC

Ilove the web 2.0! 

This morning I was catching up on my blogs (I had about 120 I had to scroll through), and I found something very profound.  And this time, it wasn’t in Seth Godin’s blog.  If you haven’t read his blog, and you’re into Marketing even on a marginal level, go and read it right now.  Everything he writes is profound.

Anyway, back to my point.  This morning I was reading the blog of my new friend (of the last year or so) Eric.  Eric is a web developer amongst other things and has taught me a lot through the mediums of conversations and blogging about web 2.0.  One of the things Eric is truly passionate about is politics.  Eric likes democrats.

In his latest post, Eric gives a fairly even-handed review of his thoughts on McCain’s choice for running mate, and connects to the site of my best friend from high school (this has been several years by the way) Clay, who runs the site, “Reluctant Republicans”.  Clay is also truly passionate about politics.
Clay likes republicans.

As a friend of both of them, I can appreciate their thoughts on this subject and read each and every post on the subject fairly thoroughly.  But the point of this post is once again connection.
At no point in my life has Clay and Eric ever even been in the same state at the same time that I know, except for maybe this summer when Clay and his family took a vacation to NYC, but here they are, even in a subtle way, connecting their thoughts so that viewers on their blogs can see where they are both coming from. Not to mention they both have impacted my life in several ways,

I come from the end of an age where hearing from someone who differed from you was betrayal, and now its the best way to come to a conclusion.  So thank you to my friends who offer two different sides of a very important subject these days.  Also thank you to Don Miller, author of “Blue Like Jazz”, for this post in his new blog.

And thank you to you…for reading and sharing your thoughts.