Turning a 'fast' into a feast.

Zechariah 8:16-23

'If you love truth and peace and don't plot evil toward your neighbor and do not lie about your neighbor (because the Lord hates all that) then your times of fasting will become times of celebration - joyful and glad occasions, happy festivals. Therefore love truth and peace.'

That's my paraphrase of these verses in Zechariah chapter eight.

There's one more part of this passage that is especially intriguing. Verses 20-23 talk about the inhabitants of many cities and powerful nations coming and saying that they have heard that the Lord is with you.

A couple of phrases come to mind - "Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is Peace;" and, "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, in that you love one another."

This is an address to a nation about national relationships. My, my, my...where do we start? Let's see, perhaps we could start with 'loving truth and peace.' We could follow that closely with not plotting evil toward neighbor nations.

We could talk about 'doing good' and 'feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, healing the sick...' We should be talking about things such as whether it is a basic human right to expect health care, education, basic shelter and nutrition. If we have the ability, capability and capacity, how can we as Christians Biblically justify denying these to any of the children and impoverished people of the world?

If we provide these basics with a spirit of truth and peace, what would this do to national relationships? Now don't tell me it won't work...this is God's command (Re: Zechariah 8:16-23). This command wasn't in reference to friendly nations - there really weren't 'friendly' nations around Israel. This has to do with a novel concept called "love your enemies, do good to those who persecute you and revile you..."

Our 'Christian' political leaders would say this is impractical and won't work. That's the amazing thing about being Christian in deed and not merely in political affiliation - God works through the good deeds of His people. We are to be "Doers of the Word and not hearers only."  We are not to be counted among those whose 'lips profess but their deeds deny...'

We need to 'try God' by obedience to His mandates and see if He 'will open the windows of heaven and pour out blessings more than we can contain.' We can NOT Biblically expect God to bless America as long as America is treating the rest of the world the way we currently are.

Why wait until we've ravaged a country with our bombs before we invest in reparations? Let's do something really novel and skip the war - let's take capital, technology and human resources into trouble spots and rebuild their country without killing them off first.

Let's love and lift up those who think we don't like them and don't care what happens to them. What momma and daddy is going to hate you if you heal and feed their sick and hungry little one? It's better to give dignity than to give offense.

'What have you done if you do good to those who do good to you, even the heathen do that.' The test of our relationship to Christ is when we do good to those who hate us and have done all manner of evil toward us. THAT is when the power of Christ overcomes the evil of the world.

One might say to the U.S. of A., don't knock it until you've tried it.