It's time to elect a new president. We have been given a couple options, both parties are working hard to distance themselves from the current administration and they are both proponents of Change. Obama has been talking about how his administration would change the current way of doing business, he wants to work for the middle class. McCain is the original maverick and wants to change how the party system works, wanting to cross party lines. We have to go to the polls in less than a month and vote for one of these men who claim their way is the way to bring change today.

When we truly look down to what the parties are planning to change, it merely comes down to a few tax laws, how we are going to deal with the war in Iraq, a few policies concerning how we deal with "pork barrel ear marked bills", etc. I don't want to down play these politicians and I encourage you to go out and vote November 4^th, but the change we need today is not going to come from either of these politicians. I believe the change we need is going to come through you, the people. It isn't a change of policy or a change of politics or a change in the way you vote.

I believe the only person who ever lived on this earth that can bring change is Jesus Christ. He came and gave a way to change our heart, a way to change a person from the inside out. Have you ever tried to change someone? It isn't something we can do, no matter how hard we sometimes would like to try. Often we try to control people when we try to change them, the difference in what Jesus did is he decided instead to love us, free us and serve us sacrificially (even with his own life). He doesn't want to make us all into mini clones of each other, instead he calls us to stop living the ways of this world. He wants us to live as he lived, and love as he loved, which includes loving our enemies.

He came to bring a new Kingdom a new administration into the world, a kingdom which is unlike any kingdom or nation that has ever been on this earth. The nations on the earth today and in the past tend to try and control the people through fear and propaganda. Even in the great nation of America we are ruled by fear, for example if we don't pay our taxes we will be audited by the IRS and what is scarier than that! As well as through propaganda which is easily spread throughout the world today through television, internet, books, etc. Essentially the nations of this world like to hold power over the people, which isn't necessarily a bad thing when it comes to running a country (I especially like the laws that ban people from killing me). The power of the Kingdom Jesus talked about came from a different source. The source of this new nation comes from loving people and serving them, encouraging people and raising them up. When the main power of the worldly government comes from controlling people the power of the nation Jesus talked about comes from people lowering themselves and lifting others up.

In this country 80% of the people claim to be Christians, though it seems like most of us are still living the ways of the world. Most of the people that claim to live as people of Christ have lost the art of following Christ (i.e. living the way he lived). We are trying to climb to the top of our world and make as much money as we can and have as much control as we can, but we don't realize that this wasn't the way Jesus Lived. The way this nation is going to change is not through a government change, not through a new policy or a new president it is through you. Change will occur through you living out this radically different kingdom Jesus called us to live. In the words of Martin Luther King Jr. maybe this country needs extremists of love. Lift up your mantle and follow Christ, he has come to set you free and bring you salvation.

I was in my Old Testament class last semester and we talked about Genesis 15. This passage describes the promises God made to Abraham (a that time Abram). This passage starts out much like many Ancient Near Eastern Treaties. Suzerain Countries (large powerful countries such as Egypt) would take on a new vassal country (lesser country) and promise them protection if they would pay homage. The exact terms would differ, but we see transactions such as these between Solomon and lesser countries such as edom later on.

When the two countries would make the treaty the vassal would cut animals in half and lay the pieces opposite of each other, sometimes on flat land and sometimes in trench for the blood to pool. The Vassal would then walk between the two slaughtered halves and promise that if they broke the treaty they made they would have to pay the penalty with blood, they would have to be cut in two.

A strange twist occurs in the biblical account. Abram sets out the animals and then falls into a great sleep. Then he hears the words of God and sees a smoking pot and flaming torch pass through the halves of the carcasses.

I think this story emphasize how great God's character is. If Abram had walked through the carcasses and later broken his promises or the faith he had put in God he or his sons would have to pay the penalty. Instead this fire (representing God's presence) passes through. Instead of the vassal/Abram taking the burden of the penalty the suzerain/God takes the burden of the promise.

Since we know that Abrahams descendants didn't stay faithful to God it makes me wonder if God or his son ever paid up? Isn't Grace Beautiful!

Text below (staring in verse 9)

9 So the LORD said to him, "Bring me a heifer, a goat and
a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon."
10 Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and
arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in
half. 11 Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them
away.
12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep
sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. 13 Then the LORD said to
him, "Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not
their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years. 14 But I
will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out
with great possessions. 15 You, however, will go to your fathers in peace and be
buried at a good old age. 16 In the fourth generation your descendants will come
back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure."
17 When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a
smoking firepot with
a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. 18 On that day the LORD
made a covenant with Abram and said, "To your descendants I give this land, from
the river [d] of Egypt to the great
river, the Euphrates- 19 the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, 20 Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, 21 Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites." (NIV)