In Us We Trust

In a sermon at Reston Bible Church last Sunday, Mike Minter was talking about American currency and explained how ironic it was that "the very thing we should trust in the least has written on it the very Person we should trust in the most."

And yet we still ignore Him.  We are trusting in ourselves and our money more and more, and trusting in God less and less.  Soon, He will be a figment of this country's imagination, if He isn't already.

We attempt to run as far away from God as possible, but not so far that we can't still keep the hearty image of "the man upstairs" too far from our minds -- mainly for those times catastrophe strikes and we are humbled to the point where the frailty of life is apparent and we as humans are crying out for purpose and meaning (enter, God).

You might be familiar with Social Cycle Theory, or at least the phrase "history repeats itself."  Funny how quickly hate, hurt, and death consume cultures like cancer in a fragile body when God is seen as the barrier to freedom instead of the answer.

Why do we even bother to print the words "In God We Trust" on our money?  Why does our Pledge of Allegiance pledge to remain "under God?"

Surely our forefathers would have been smart enough to write "In Us We Trust" on our money, if that was the original intention.  They would have elected for us to repeat the words "...one nation, motivated by the power of what we can do for ourselves...," if those were truly the principles upon which this country was founded.

But when disaster strikes, it breaks us, and we are lost, and in our desperation (which is coincidentally the point where we realize we are very, very small in this very large world) we pray, and start calling out to God on the news and in public forums.

And even those who question "how could God let this happen to us?" acknowledge God, even if they don't understand Him.