The Either/Or Alternatives
The Either/Or Alternatives
They just do not exist in real life – really!
In a discussion of the political framework of our Right/Left Nation, moral failure is the issue. Can one be a Christian for Trump? He is, after all, flawed, in case you did not know.
“Now even the Christian culture is O.K. with it,” said Jim Daly, the president of Focus on the Family, one of the nation’s largest evangelical groups. “That’s the sadness,” he added. “The next time a Democrat in the presidency has a moral failure, who’s going to be able to say anything?”
I disagree. It is not that we live in total synthesis and that our personality can be constructed into total cooperation with all of our endeavors. Neither is it that we can be packaged in either/or alternatives. In real life, good and evil, sweet and sour, bitter and tart, smart and ignorant can and do exist within the same person.
I shall say it again: I am not a Trump fan. I doubt that I would choose him for a best friend. He lives in a world that I do not. He is arrogant, pompous and egotistical. Yes, he is a bully! I get that. I do not defend those characteristics in a person, let alone a leader. I do not condone his sexual conduct outside of marriage or his descriptions of it.
But I refuse to be pushed into an either/or dichotomy in terms of the big picture of what our nation is facing. With all of that said, I support his policies, his decisions to free the economy from government constraints, his strong foreign policy and his nominations to our Federal Courts. There is much to be praised which I chose to do while not accepting that which should be condemned. It is not an all or nothing situation.
First of all, the alternative candidate or candidates, if you will, have enough personal baggage to rival Trump, so it is not a matter of “We would have been better off with…” No, we would not! I will not be pushed into the all or nothing mold that dominates the political arguments of the day.
Pick on him all you want. You are right. He is seriously flawed. But understand that the office he holds is not a flaw free zone. It has had errant office holders before – lots of them, probably all of them.
My ground of authority for my argument dates back to King David of Israel. His record is that he was a man after God’s own heart. What? This murderer, conniver, schemer and womanizer? Yes, that is one of the grand dichotomies of history. He was a great leader who took the wife of his chief general. Then set the general up to be killed so he could have her as his own.
God did not say to him, “Good boy David. You pulled that one off. It’s OK to do these things.” Nope! Not at all. David paid a heavy penalty for his sin, and he deserved to.
So also, with Trump. He is paying for it! He is getting caught. But the worst thing we can do with him is to dump him in favor of an opposing force with policies that will destroy us as a nation. Does that mean that we have to accept his personal behavior? Not at all. It is not a matter of either/or. We can accept policy and change without accepting the behavior of the one who brings it.
