All God’s Children

As this recent US election draws to a close, I think we all need our thoughts to turn not only to unity as a country, but unity with the world as a whole. I am especially mindful of this as I have plans to travel half-way around the world to Australia. I believe we Americans have a tendency to focus on ourselves and our own fortune, happiness and even problems…and not be concerned about what others around the globe struggle with, and how very much we are all dependent upon one another. The internet has definitely helped make us all become more globally aware. It amazes me that I have “friends” from Africa and India on Facebook, people I have actually met at conferences such as the National Religious Broadcasters conference this past February in Nashville, TN, who I now stay in touch with on social media.  But we also have to be more careful, I think, in this regard…I understand ISIS is trying to infiltrate our country more and more, not only by hacking into people’s computers but by actually calling and texting people’s phones. My heart breaks for everyone trying to escape the evil of ISIS…Muslims and Christians alike in the Middle East, families of young people recruited all over the world, women who are used and abused as sex slaves…the atrocities go on. Hopefully world leaders, with America on board, can work to stop them one day, although the threat is real that if ISIS is stopped, another terrorist regime will step in and replace them. When I started writing my novel, The Runaway Prophet, way back in 2011, ISIS wasn’t event an entity in the news. Of course, the Muslim Brotherhood was, anther radical terrorist organization that gave rise in part to ISIS. I write fiction, and imagined over five years ago, ‘what would happen if these terrorists actually lived and worked underground in Las Vegas, running the city and meanwhile, building a nuclear bomb under one of the casinos?’ And now, truth is just as strange (and awful) as fiction it appears. Now that our election is over, I believe all Americans should be more and more aware of and concerned about the rest of the world, the good and the bad, and be prepared for whatever might happen, no matter who will be leading us into the next four years as president. That’s what St. Paul, who was a proponent in unifying the Gentiles with the Jews in the first century BC, strived to do. “In the same way, even though we are many people, we are one body in Christ and individual parts connected to each other.” (Romans 12:5) Dear Lord, please let us all strive to care for one another throughout the world, no matter what our nationality, color or creed…help us all to use our individual gifts to help heal the world.