There is a “virus” that has infected many in our country and world.  It is more deadly and contagious than COVID-19.  This virus results in the disconnect condition of “Mental Myopia” in those who have been infected. It seems to have infected mostly big-city-dwellers, though not exclusively. 

This blinding virus prevents those infected from seeing the connection between a dead tree and the wood used to construct their high-rise apartment, mansion, and dining room table. They simply cannot understand the connection between sustainable forest management, which includes logging and loggers (real people and families).  To realize that logging and forest fuels management can be synonymous with caring for the Earth and can be a tool to prevent catastrophic forest fires is beyond them. 

They cannot see the connection between the metal in their fancy freezer/refrigerator and fancy car to the mining industry and the mining families.  They do not understand that the ice cream in their freezer has its origin in an animal called a cow.  They will eat it gleefully while condemning the farming/ranching industries for polluting the environment with bovine-produced methane.  

It prevents them from understanding the correlation between the food in the grocery store to the farm and the farming families who make their living outside of the big city and put food on their wood table.  

It prevents them from connecting the gas in their car and the heat from their furnace to a hard-working family in the fossil fuel industry. 

It blinds them to the truth that the little, unborn girl and boy in their mother’s womb also have individual bodies, are “persons”, and should not be sacrificed on the alter of “choice”.  The meanings and application of volition and personal responsibility are manipulated to justify murder by those infected with this virus.

This virus creates the illusion that bigger government, more bureaucratic regulation, and higher taxes results in greater freedom and prosperity.   This virus alters the mind to believe that government should not be the servant of the people but the caregiver of the people.  It prevents the ability of those who are infected to realize that every power-hungry autocrat and bureaucratic will, with a big smile, apply for the job to be their nanny and will promise Heaven on Earth, “If you give me the power”. Historian and moralist, Lord Acton (1834-1902) stated: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”  He applied this statement to mankind.  I think he was correct.

I must admit that I too, in many ways, have been infected by this virus.  This emotionally heightened and volatile political season (worldwide) will at times bring it out in me (see above).  I can demonstrate “blindness” and a callous attitude to certain situations and philosophies.  I can lack understanding and connectedness to others. I have the ability to be myopic.  It is the condition of fallen mankind of which I am a member.

 I am thankful there is a vaccine.  And I am confident it is not man-made government.

Jesus was recorded to have said: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  Matthew 11:28-30

Amid all this worldly unrest, may we “come”. May we be encouraged as we look forward to His promised virus-free world.

Mike