We all know that the country is more divided than at any time in recent memory. It seems like the shared values that have defined the America that used to be a light to the world are no longer in play. Listening to the legacy media leads you to the loud advocates on the far left and far right are so far apart that there is no place to meet in the middle. Companies which in all the previous generations have felt no urge to take a political stand now advocate for often controversial causes.
How did we get here? More importantly, how do we get out of it? How do we adjust our careers and our businesses to survive and thrive in this muddle?
Here’s one person’s opinion.
There is a lot of blame being thrown around. Politically, those on the left continue to blame Donald Trump and the right side of the political spectrum, while those on the right blame Democratic presidents and the Democratic Congress.
As for me, I blame us.
Now, before I make the case that you and I are the problem, let me share an experience.
Some time ago, I attended a leadership conference in which one of the speakers was Dr. Peter Zhoo Xiao, Chinese PhD economist, who was sent to the US in 2002 to study the free-market system and make some recommendations to the Chinese government. Operating from purely an economic perspective, Dr. Xiao concluded that the reason the free-market system works so well in the US is because it is undergirded and supported by Christian values. Other counties who have not had the benefit of a Christian foundation and a Christian culture have not faired nearly as well. Think Russia and the Near East countries, for example.
America continues to be a place of great admiration around the world, and great attraction for people globally, because of its commitment to Christian values, according to Dr. Xiao.
File that away for a minute.
Back to the cause of the muddle. The direct cause of most economic collapses is hundreds of thousands of people trying to live beyond their means. It begins, of course, with the federal government, but it extends down to thousands of individuals who have decided it is more profitable to caste oneself as a victim than it is take personal responsibility.
It seems that a good piece of the business community has given up the discipline of adherence to good values and took the short cuts to strive for more easy money.
Look at every component of our economy, and you will see a similar story. Education, business, government, entertainment, the news media, etc. It seems like everywhere we look, our institutions and organizations are spinning out of control, infested with people willing to do whatever it takes to gain easy money, notoriety, or power at the expense of someone else.
The problem isn’t them. It’s us.
Well, Okay, it is them, too.
As a nation, we have slowly given up our adherence to the Christian values that have undergirded this country’s prosperity for the sake of the pursuit of power and easy money. Why work hard for something when you can cast yourself as a victim and demand someone else pay for you? Why work at all when the government will take money from others and give it to you? Why stick with values like integrity, hard work, and deferred gratification when you can charge it to MasterCard and worry about it later?
The consequences keep compounding way beyond just our own lives and incomes. Arnold Toynbee reflected: “Of the twenty-two civilizations that have appeared in history, nineteen of them collapsed when they reached the moral state the United States is in now”.
Our problems aren’t economic. They are spiritual.
The solution isn’t more government debt; it is a return to Christian values on the part of the mass of the population. We’ve all heard the old adage: America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.
As long as we try to find solutions in the superficial symptoms of our muddle, and not in the deeper causes, we will continue to flounder.
The symptom is unprecedented government debt. The cause, on a national level, is a quest for power and a lack of belief in the power of an individual. I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Our problems aren’t economic. They are spiritual.
It is time for this generation to rise up out of the muddle caused by spiritual indifference and begin to live lives committed to the values that produced prosperity.
While I applaud the movements in the country to become more active politically, I’d like to see just as much, if not more, energy applied to moving the country back to its roots.
The place to start is with each one of us, individually. Every single one of us should begin (or continue) to live every day committed to those values. When a couple of hundred million people refuse to go into excess debt, refuse to compromise their integrity for the sake of easy money, refuse to compromise their dignity in the cause of other people paying for you, stop chasing money and power in place of more substantial values, then our institutions will begin to heal themselves, our government will reflect our values, and the economy, as well as our personal affluence, will rebound.
The problem is us. And so is the solution.
WAS-19
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If only more could understand these truths. As a person who has watched our great nation decay over the course of my life, I find myself feeling embarrassed at the state of the nation I am leaving for my children and grand children. I should have been more outspoken and done more to share the truths outlined in this article. May God inspire more to speak the truth more often.
Amen. Thanks Gene.