So after ranting and raving for several posts, you may be wondering why I don't "love it or leave it." This passage from Jeremiah seems to me to contain the most Godly wisdom for any people of faith, wherever we find ourselves.
Jeremiah 29
4 This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 7 Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."
Seek the peace - the word is "shalom" meaning health and wholeness more than the absence of conflict. One of our conflicts nationally involves different visions of what health and wholeness look like. Be that as it may, seek the vision of a better world as you see it. There is no mandate to rule Babylon, but be responsible in it and take some responsibility for it all the same.
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