Anointed

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. 

 - From Luke 4

I marvel at the childish way people screw up the message of the Gospel. And I am not talking about believers. At least they're trying to understand it. They may be willfully stubborn, in maintaining their biases. They're human. But they put themselves in a position to hear the Gospel regularly, and that is good. 

No, rather, I am referring to doubters in our culture, and the ostensible believers that align with them. 

Like the Adversary tempting Christ, or the Serpent in the Garden tempting Eve; doubters try to quote Scripture. They love the references to caring about immigrants, replete throughout the Old Testament. And they're right to remind us of that. But it is the only thing they talk about, because they just want to score debate points. They don't care about becoming better people, themselves. They're just contrary. 

One of my favorites is the classic "why would a loving God . . . ?", especially when regurgitated by everyone from doubters, to scoffers, to agnostics, to atheists (and to their curious allies within the Church). It's not a direct quote of Scripture, per se - - - but it is a direct inference to the Biblical dictum that God is Love. And, if I may, so many of the corps of doubters fall easily within the Left end of the political spectrum. 

Of course, we would first need to run a thirteen week seminar on the true definition of Love, but for now we can just settle on Christ's own words, describing the point of His ministry. Look at his priorities:

• The poor
• Captives
• The blind
• The oppressed

This is right out of the Left's playbook! No, I take that back. It is not out of their playbook. It's out of their talking points. If they really cared about the truly needy, they would find an organization that has been chartered around caring for others (the Church), and work together! They would NOT waste so much time picking at faults and making judgments. 

To people on the Left that love to stick your finger in the eyes of Christians: Leave them alone. They're doing the best they can (just as you are). Focus on their Founder and Leader, Jesus Christ, and follow HIS teachings. He was talking about the things that you claim most concern you, two thousand years before you were born!