I am Mr. Popularity!

Wow! I never thought that I would ever see the day that I could be so totally rejected! Thought I'd left all that behind after college. But here I am. I have a confession to make. I am...a conservative...and not only that but (gasp!) a Mormon. If the Mainstream Media can be believed..and they can't, I am totally out of touch, and an evil, overbearing bigot to boot! Not exactly how I view myself, but hey, I'm past 50 now. My eyesight is not so good.

Here's what I do see, though. I see some folks that may not have my country's best interests at heart soon to be running things. You know, Abraham Lincoln said that you can't fool all the people all the time. He was right. A fellow Illinoisian did just prove that you can fool 53% of the electorate some of the time. Our President-Elect is already backing off many of the more dramatic domestic promises he made. However, he appears to be poised as of this writing to honor the wishes of some members of his constituency that don't even live here in the US.

His transition team is floating a trial balloon about backing a treaty between the Palestinians and the Israelis that would take all land taken in each action since the 1967 war away from Israel and give it to the Palestinians. That's a divided Jerusalem. That is a recipe for trouble. Emboldened by their new friend in America, the Arabs might just invite another dust up, this time with technology that could make the Holy City a glowing parking lot. I wonder if the rocks on the Mount of Olives are warming up for a spectaular earthquake? Have the key holders been called to Northern Missouri? Kinda scary, huh?

I guess not if one is prepared. OK..show of hands...who here is really prepared? Not just ready for all this to be over. I would be in that category. However, I suspect that I am not nearly enough like Christ to recognize Him when He comes back. Yeah...that's what I thought. It's OK, we're supposed to help one another prepare. And man, I think its gonna get tricky holding onto that Iron Rod. And tough.

It would appear that our brothers and sisters in the Great and Spacious building have decided that they are not had as much success befouling our minds and spirits as they would like. Seems as though with the passage of Proposition 8, they feel they now have license to flow out of that building and after bathing in the filty streams they so love, will now come for the righteous (and some non-righteous...membership only puts you on their hit list) to make sure that we approve of their every whim...no matter what God may say about the matter. And if we still cling bitterly to that rod, they will get a court order to make us let go! (not bloody likely!) 6000 years of history and organization being thrown out with the bathwater AND the baby. (the baby is whole 'nother post!)

To a degree, I wish I could work up even a moderate mad about all of this. I can't. At the risk of sounding overly apocalyptic here, I get the feeling that it has to be this way. People are making choices and in many cases, their eternal beds, if you will. I suspect we may be pushing toward a turning point where once again believers of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, restored by and guided today by a Prophet of God, can be driven, injured and killed with not only impunity, but the approval of people of normal goodwill. After all, we alone (several million votes for Prop 8, and only 750,000 Mormons in California) took the right of all those poor people to be approved of in their sin. I pray that we will grasp the rod more tightly than ever before.

But now is not the time to go run for the shelter. It is time, more than ever, to be out in the community, living our testimonies so that it is indeed clear on whose side we stand. As Joshua of old said..."As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."