The last two years have taken their toll...

Lots of us have lost friends the last couple years.  As I assess the damage looking back, it seems like it was the political plan all along.  

From the pandemic, to BLM, to the elections and everything in between, the political machine has made its best effort at dividing everything into binary polarities using the most extreme words to label everything and everyone in the worst light.  The goal is to get people to turn on each other...

Woman against Men

Gay against Straight.

Black against White.

Poor against Rich.

Liberal against Conservative.

Science against Nature.

Parents against Schools.

Vaxxed against Unvaxxed.

Masked against Unmasked.

Culture against Religion.

Biden against Trump.

Social Justice against Free Speech.

Media against Truth.

Tech Giants against Dissenting Voices.

Woke ideology against Reality.

Feelings against Facts.

Gender against Biology.

Institutions have been coerced into taking sides.  Churches have even sold out. Flags are flying all over the place.  The Pride Flag.  The Trump flag.  Let's Go Brandon flags.  Black Lives Matter flags.  Upside down American Flags.  Blue Lives Matter flags.  We Believe signs in yards.  Political banners.  Billboards screaming at you everywhere.  

Disagreement is Phobic. Everything is Racist. Freedom of Thought and Expression are violence.  Free Speech is Hate Speech.  

So it shouldn't surprises us that brother has turned on brother.  America has turned on its citizens.  Citizens have turned on the government.  Christians have turned on pastors.  Churches have turned on The Bible. Children have turned on parents.  Friends have turned on friends.  It's been cutthroat. 

And we are both wound up and wounded. Confusion and Delusion cause us to spin in circles.  We are shy to speak our minds.  We are tentative with the truth we know.  We are silent when we know something smells.  Our conscience is seared.  Our convictions are vulnerable.  We aren't sure of anything is seems.  

So they did it.  They broke us all down.  The battering ram kept plowing into the gate until it couldn't hold anymore and we caved in.  We lost our senses.  We lost our innocence.  We lost our minds.  We lost our belief in ourselves, in each other, and in God.  We don't trust our memory.  We call into question our motives.  We've been made to feel like demons and animals.  Base creatures incapable of thinking for ourselves.  

But the fabric of friendship has to be one of the greatest casualties.  The corruption of community that we relied on for foundation and orientation has crumbled.  Some have seen this as a reckoning, a cleansing, a purging.  Something to separate the chaff from the wheat, the dross from the gold, but even there we are left to posture ourselves as one or the other and we all usually put ourselves with the "more pure" in the purity contest.  So the sides still dig in their heals and live in a sort of mythology.

I could probably note some silver linings today, but I've been doing that for years to hold things together, and today I just want to acknowledge the pain of this cruel belief system that has been foisted upon us.  We have been abused by entities and institutions that are meant to protect us and they have instead preyed upon us and caused us to prey on each other as barbarians and cannibals.  Some are beginning to wake up, but most have fallen into a deep sleep, a stupor that might keep them asleep their whole life long.  It's sad to see.  The violation against humanity the last couple years has taken a toll that is incalculable.

As a leader, I sit here today thinking about the losses and just shaking and hanging my head in sorrow.  The scourge of these culture wars have hit close to home for me and I wanted to have a moment to recognize and memorialize the losses.  

"The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it this way.  But what will you do in the end?" - Jeremiah 5:31