More On the POTUS’ Wall

“I would build a great wall, and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me, and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great great wall on our southern border and I’ll have Mexico pay for that wall.”

“I noticed all that beautiful barbed wire going up today. Barbed wire used properly can be a beautiful sight.”

I can’t stand it when Bible-believing people (so called) do mental jujitsu with the Scriptures to back up their pre-conceived ideas. Okay, though I’m not aware of it, I’ve most likely done it myself. But I hate it especially when people twist God’s words into a shape that approximates their political party platform, as though Jesus registers Republican or Democratic. This wall thing that the POTUS has been talking about since his campaign is one of those issues. “They’re all a bunch of criminals and rapists!” he says. And it makes me crazy!

When I wrote about this a year and a half ago I was calmer and more hopeful for a return to sanity than I am now. It’s like we’re walking around in circles with moral amnesia and can’t recall the difference between truth and “alternative facts.” What gets to me most is the stubborn insistence on shallow thinking among Christians over these things. I’ve learned to expect this kind of eccentric thinking of people with no moral shore on which to moor, but I can’t understand it coming from those who have a faith in Jesus, or at least claim they do.

The president bragged that he would proudly shut down the federal government and take the credit for it if he didn’t get his wall. Now that he has actually done it he blames the democrats! If anything he said or did stunned me anymore, I’d be stunned.

“I am proud to shut down the government for border security, Chuck. … I will take the mantle. I will be the one to shut it down. I’m not going to blame you for it.” 

– – – One week later – – –

“The Democrats now own the shutdown!”

Before you stop reading here and shoot me your ready-made-for-pasting argument that says: “So you just want open borders and let anyone who wants into our country to enter?” No. I didn’t say that. Furthermore, I don’t know anyone who actually does believe that. That’s a caricature made up for making people who disagree with them sound stupid and uninformed. The actual solution, i.e., the precise details of immigration reform, is not in my pay grade. What I can say with confidence is that you can’t make a clean case from the Bible that since there were walls in the Old Testament, ergo God loves walls.

I think I did a fair job of making the point  last time  that the Jews built their wall not to keep refugees out, but to deter invading armies. But let me add a few things to my previous argument.

The Jerusalem wall only served as a deterrent to invaders so long as the Jews lived obediently to God. Once they jumped the rails of submission to him, those walls of stone were no more effective than if they were made of papier-mâché. God warned them repeatedly that they would be safe behind their walls as long as they lived righteously. If not he would use whatever and whoever he wanted to tear those walls down and hold them to account.

“If you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come on you and overtake you: … They will lay siege to all the cities throughout your land until the high fortified walls in which you trust fall down.” (Deuteronomy 28:15, 52)

I’m not saying that you can, but if you insist on making such a ludicrous claim that a straight line can be drawn between ancient Israel and modern America’s need for walls, let me say this…

When the Jews had been disobedient for generations their wall was decimated by the Babylonians, and later by the Romans. God used them as his personal wrecking crew to judge his rebellious people. If you have looked around lately, you might notice that America is not morally superior than those Jews. I suppose then that the only thing we would accomplish building our own wall would be to wall in our sin.

If God were to  judge America our wall won’t hold back his judgment. In my opinion, if he does judge us as a nation, it won’t just be for our sexual confusion or our abortion rate as some preach. Included on his list of things for which we deserve to be judged will be our treatment of people outside our borders: widows, orphans, strangers, and the poor.