Deuteronomy 23: You Have My Word

"If you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not be slow to keep it, because He will require it of you, and it will be counted against you as a sin."

Deuteronomy 23:21

This chapter covers quite a few topics, and I had a difficult time choosing which one to focus on for this post.  I settled on this portion about keeping vows because I've been watching political debates for a while now, and I keep getting frustrated with candidates who make vows they know they can't/won't keep.

I've been old enough to vote for the last two presidential elections.  In both cases, the candidate I voted for won the election.  Also in both cases, the promises that I had heard them speak were not fulfilled.  George W. Bush railed against nation-building, yet he sent troops halfway around the world to fight a "War on Terror" that didn't even target the people who had terrorized America.  Barack Obama promised to bring those troops home, and the first thing he did as president was send more troops away.

Of course, that's just one example from each of them.  If I wanted to list all of the shortcomings I'm frustrated about, this post would be obscenely long and nobody would read past the first paragraph.  Ultimately, the point I would like to make is that the character of a man should mean more than his promises - especially where politics are concerned, because in those situations you can almost always rest assured that the promises will not be kept.

Question of the Day:

Is there any man or woman we can trust with the power we've given to our government?  Isn't that why our founders made sure that laws, regulations, enforcement, and judgement should be handled at the most local level possible?

Prayer of the Day:

Lord, only You know what it will take to fix the problems that our country has gotten ourselves into.  Guide our hearts and minds with wisdom and caution as we prepare for another election cycle.  Rise up good men and women of character who are worthy of our trust, and expose the fraudulent nature of those who would run against them.  Amen.