Americans Know: the Need is for God

A couple of contrasting commentaries/events caught our attention. One is by Herb Meyer, a former senior official in the Reagan administration, writing in American Thinker under the title “The Only Thing that will Save Us Now is Fear Itself”; the other was Glenn Beck’s foray into Wilmington, Ohio, where his interest in the town is fueled not just by the economic hardship the townspeople have faced as lead employer DHL closed operations (8,000 layoffs) but by the way the townspeople are turning to God in prayer at this time of crisis.

Meyer ends his piece with an optimism borne of a faith in America’s ‘can-do’ spirit, but he thinks that faith can only be triggered by a sober but urgent fear spread among the people as they wake up to what has actually happened to their bankrupt country. Beck’s is more about where that can-do spirit comes from—which is a faith in God that was given freer reign by the founding of America.

Beck’s got the order right, which is why Americans throughout the country have become such huge fans of his. The American culture has been conditioned over several decades to wince and tune out if any public figure dares speak of God in relation to the solution of national or international problems. Beck’s amazing accomplishment is that he does so without denominational overtones or dogmatism. In our view, he speaks of God in the humble, reverent sense that would have been familiar to the founding fathers—which is why his message resonates with so many of founders’ spiritual descendants: called “Americans”.

Our guess is that Meyer and many others of his vintage would privately and on occasion publicly acknowledge their general solidarity with Beck, and would further acknowledge that faith in God has been an essential part of the achievements they have enjoyed in their lives. But many pundits likely find the realm of faith outside the comfort zone of a commentator’s role, sometimes based on the assumption that there are too many people ‘out there’ who don’t want to hear any such talk or don’t relate well to it.

We think a huge swath of Americans—in fact a growing majority—are perfectly comfortable with such talk, and in fact have been feeling the call to faith and prayer for their country for quite some time now.

When they watch one political party—the Democrats—get unmistakably rebuked and rejected in overwhelming numbers, and voted out of power, only to come back in a lame-duck session to do more of exactly what they have done for the two years leading up to their rejection…well, the patience and tolerance of the American people has run out.

They are witnessing a ruling class in a state of abject denial over the devastation they are wreaking on America—a ruling class that is peddling lie after lie after lie about economic recovery (there is none), national and border security (there is none), fiscal responsibility (there is none), Obama’s competence (there is none), Reid/Pelosi/Rangel ethics (there is none), global warming (there is none), media integrity and objectivity (there is none).

But what more and more Americans recognize is that many in the ruling class who are peddling these lies honestly don’t know they are lies. They have been so long without a practical, living faith and understanding of God that they truly have no idea what is good and what is evil, what is right and what is wrong, what is worthy of defense and protection and what isn’t, what is common sense and what is intellectual nonsense.

Americans know in their hearts that the remedy for this mess will not be found in some clever policy tweak, and it certainly won’t be found in socialism, communism or any other ism utterly discredited by human history. The only remedy is a nationwide return to exploring faith in God and the reasons for it in human history and the need for it NOW, and the affirmation that there is a gift of ‘grace’ in everyone that activates that faith in every era.

Christmas is in fact the single most powerful affirmation of that gift.

So thanks to Glenn Beck for having the courage to talk about faith in America, and thanks to Herb Meyer for having faith in Americans. A restoration of faith in God in America will be the restoration of America's can-do spirit, which will be the restoration of America.

Paul Gable

December 15, 2010