Just don't

It's been quite a few days.  It's going to be quite a few more days.  And yours truly?  Me, I voiced my opinion about what Wednesday was.  It cost me a Facebook friend who didn't appreciate my reply to his comment.  I've known this guy for a long time.  It happens, I suppose.

I got accused of being a democrat and spewing rubbish.  I did neither and stuck by my words.  They weren't meant to be cruel, mean, or incite.  They were honest and truthful.  I still stand by what I said, and it was all I need to say about this.

I have dual citizenship.  I'm An American by birth and a citizen of Heaven by adoption.  That adoption came at an unbelievable cost...the precious blood of the Lamb.  Christ Jesus died on a cross so that not only can my sins be forgiven, but at that same moment, I became an adopted child of the Ancient of Days.

I love that name for my God.  Ancient of Days.  I also love:  I AM.  OK, I'm biased...I love them all but then God is the only Father I've ever had in my life so I'm pretty partial to "Abba" in certain circumstances too.  And God, ladies and gentlemen, is still very much on HIS throne.

The pastor that leads the Bible Study at the church I've been attending for the past few months reminded me of an important fact about that citizenship:  We're to be in the world, but not OF it.

And nothing I can say is going to change that.  My friend didn't agree with my take on his comment.  He quit being my friend over it.  I get people are sensitive but I didn't understand the level of utter belief in the reality we live in until I heard this reporting today:

A woman was in shock and had to be consoled at the riot on Wednesday.  She could not understand what was happening; why the police pushed back.  "They're not supposed to shoot at us.  They're supposed to shoot at Black Lives Matter.  We're the patriots...."

My friend made a joke about "the patriots".  I now understand that maybe he wasn't joking.  

It's taken me a bit to wrap my head around all that.  And now, I think I understand the conviction of the Holy Spirit to stay out of it.  I get mad when other people get "in" it, and am I any better?  I mentioned that to another friend.  He got unfriended by his friend who made disparaging comments about his own faith.  We disagree on politics.  I'm starting to realize that among believes, I share a minority opinion because somehow the two are inexplicably linked in certain circles.  

Jesus had much to say about the rulers of the day.  I am not Jesus.  I have my opinions and sometimes, I think you find yourself in a place where you have to say something or you become complicit.  I did on Wednesday, and to certain extents, yesterday and today.  But then, the conversation in the car on the way to the bank today resulted in this:

Surrendering the Facebook page.

If I'm not mine, then that's not mine either.  And by surrender, there are better places to talk about politics and I'm exercising a newfound ability:  The ability to remain silent.

We have never had the ability to communicate with each other the way we do now, and you're starting to see the downfall of it.  You're also starting to see something else:  censorship.  While I hate to see it, the First Amendment does not guarantee your right to free speech on platforms owned by, and operated for profit, by corporations.  Your feelings might get hurt, but it's not an American platform..  You can still go scream at your government.  It happens all the time in city council chambers all across this country on a regular basis.  But Twitter belongs to twitter.  And Facebook belongs to Facebook.

And everything belongs to God.  So I'll let God worry about running America and I'll stick to uplifting things.  I wish Facebook would quit with the dating site and chat ads though.  I have enough problems without being tempted into that.