Home of the brave?

...I wonder if I live there anymore.

I grew up in the USA during the Reagan era. The misery index was shattered by the Space Shuttle launch, the death-defying President, a new optimism and exploding economy, Olympic victories, the fall of communism; it was indeed Morning in America. Remember the Moral Majority? It was an exciting time to be an American. There was a soaring sense of national pride and enthusiasm. Christians were finally waking up and becoming a positive part of this change. We had a President who was a masterful communicator- inspiring, motivating, encouraging with his wit, candor, and patriotism. In some ways this era was an eight-year pep rally for a nation that had been in doldrums for decades.

Let me stop you right there. Some of you have already begun a list in your minds of what was wrong with that time, with that President. I am not going to dispute this with you; I would be wrong to excuse the sins of any one or any nation. What I will say is this: we were no longer ashamed to be Americans; we held our heads high and worked hard to grow, thrive, succeed, achieve. And we did just that! There were horrible terror attacks, the threat of nuclear annihilation, new epidemic diseases, the Challenger disaster. If you are old enough, do you even remember fallout shelters or the AIDS scare or the terror attack on our Marines in Lebanon? Those memories and fears have faded, scrubbed by the effervescent enthusiasm that we would overcome. Nothing paralyzed us. When Reagan called the Soviet Union an Evil Empire, and later said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" we cheered-and believed. The wall fell in 1989.

Back to your list. Is it still important?

Now, back to the present day. Thinking about what is going on in our nation right now, what is different? Are you afraid of H1N1, economic collapse, terror attack, China? Do you think we need to withdraw from war because we cannot afford to spread ourselves thin? Do you fear what will happen to America if we don't have Obamacare-or if we do? We fear that the economy won't recover because of Obama's policies, or because Congress won't let him implement all of them. Either way, we're wrong-we should have long ago buckled up, got to work, and made the economy better despite what anyone else did about it.

I wonder if I live in America anymore. That nation is still the wealthiest, most powerful nation in world history. She has no significant enemies. She has the most productive workforce in the world, and far and away the best military. Since I grew up? Soviet Union, gone. Eastern Bloc, gone. Japanese economic power-virtually gone. Saddam? Gone. Osama? Gone. Taliban and AlQuaeda? Essentially gone. AIDS? Fading memory. Threat of nuclear annihilation? Are you kidding me?

Yet we are more afraid of one smuggled 'dirty bomb' than of the 30,000 large nuclear warheads the Soviets had aimed at us, and more afraid that China's economy will surpass ours with their cheap dollar-store junk. We are afraid to let our kids play in the yard because they might get hit by a car or fall off their bikes. Congratulations, 9-11 terrorists. Nineteen young men defeated the USA. The elephant is now afraid of the mouse. They killed three thousand in one day; now two million are subject to TSA search in one day-3% receiving invasive pat-downs, or... 60,000. Every day. The terrorists need not try any more to attack on an airplane because they have achieved their goal, placing us all in terror that the guy next to us has a bomb. We have managed to defeat Saddam as well as AlQuaeda despite horrible mismanagement of the war effort, without the draft, without major sacrifice, yet we feel like failures. In WWII everything you can imagine was rationed and ALL young men went off to war. ZERO cars were manufactured for 3 and a half years. Our nation, young and old, sacrificed everything, scraped pennies and bought war bonds, and sent Hershey bars and Marlboros to our boys overseas and crushed the TWO greatest enemies the world had ever seen on both sides of the world at the same time. We suffered one hundred times the casualties of the current war on terror, then turned around and rebuilt most of the world, had lots of babies, started the space race, and generally ran to win in everything.

Do I still live in the home of the brave? It would appear not. Oh, we still have men and women of courage, many of them in the military, but as a nation courage has wilted. I DO NOT fault the current President for this. Yes, he lives to play on our fears. However, they were already there before we elected him.

Once upon a time, we would have looked at China and said, "We can do better!" The competition would have improved our character and driven China to improve theirs. We would have looked at terrorists and said, "Let's roll!" and we would have achieved victory years ago and brought our boys and girls home to tickertape parades. Years ago, we would have looked new diseases in the face and defeated them. Actually, we still do-as Americans have defeated most diseases in modern history-but we no longer have the courage to celebrate it. Remember polio? Didn't think so. Our President died of it during WWII, and we still won-against the Axis powers and the disease.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen! Over two hundred years ago, a ragtag group of preachers, farmers, and merchants with no army and no navy took on the greatest empire in the world WHILE occupied by them-and won. Then our nation won that empire over to be our greatest allies, and liberty spread throughout the world. The USA became the wealthiest, most powerful, and most generous nation in world history. How then have we become so afraid?

Quite frankly, the reason for this fear is simple-we as a nation refuse to fear the Lord, so he has caused us to fear everything else.

Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."