Deep in the Heart of Texas… March 2, 2013

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“As Texas goes, so goes the United States.”

I know people often attribute that particular sphere of influence to the state of California, but the Golden State is much too taken with itself and encompassed by temporary fads and foibles to be the Pied Piper of our nation.

Texas, on the other hand, sits right in the lower middle of our country, with one eye on the south and another eye on California, and continually struggles with establishing its own identity in the midst of a topsy-turvy political climate and the latest batch of social upheaval.

Texas is an awful lot like its first President–Sam Houston. Its critics say that Texas thinks things over too much–things that should be obvious. But in the long run, it surprises everyone with some of its decisions.

That was Sam Houston. He was highly criticized for failing to come to the aid of the martyrs at The Alamo, but when he defeated the army of Santa Ana, and established a new Republic of Texas, he was lauded and praised–UNTIL 1861, when he refused to join the Confederacy against the Union, and was ousted from the office of Governor.

That’s Texas. Unlike other parts of the country, if you can go to Texas and make a good point about a good idea–and not be high-falutin’ about it–the average Texan will give you an ear and maybe even a hand.

Right now our country is being inundated with a “stop” philosophy, which is causing all of the populace to be confused as to what path to pursue towards excellence.

Even in Texas, the national scream of “Stop feeling!” is being heard. Yes, we are trying to limit the amount of emotion we have, while simultaneously making folks overly emotional about things that don’t really matter. You can’t tell people to “stop feeling” without ending up with frustrated souls.

So as I go deep into the heart of Texas, I’m going to encourage my brothers and sisters here to start feeling again. It isn’t manly OR womanly–it’s just HUMANLY necessary.

We also have a loud yell crossing the country to “stop believing.” I don’t know if I have ever seen such a wave of both religion and atheism overpowering the dialogue in this country quite like it is today. Organized religion and unorganized agnosticism continue to battle on television and in the entertainment field, stealing away the power of believing from human beings. And what is believing? Believing is finding something good to do in life and sticking with it for a while to see if it makes things better.

Our faith system is a throw-away. We have boiled down a spiritual experience to a series of social issues rather than “loving our neighbor as ourselves.” Simultaneously, the worship of science and technology is causing many of our young people to completely abandon faith in favor of cynicism.

So I’m going deep into the heart of Texas to tell people to start believing again–AND to keep it simple. That way the results will show up sooner.

Of course, another problem is that we’ve stopped reasoning and insist that our opinions must be right because … well, because WE thunk it up. Honestly, there are a lot of things I think, folks, that are neither worthy of conviction nor needful for you to ever hear.

I contend we need to start reasoning again. Reasoning is when we ask the brain to do something OTHER than think–a bit of elastic and compassion added. Because quite honestly, many of the things we’re debating are absolutely ridiculous. We are NOT going to limit the freedom of any group of people no matter how many times the Bible or even the liberal cause may insist it needs to be done. We are NOT going to go against the Constitution, but instead, must find a way to do the best we can to maintain freedom for all of our citizens without having some of the crazier members of our club kill off our family members.

It will take reasoning. People will have to stop identifying themselves as Republican, Democrat, conservative, liberal or some other faction. Our first status will need to be that of human being–and then we need to listen with THOSE ears instead of using brains stuffed with cotton, protecting us from new ideas.

So I have come to Texas to tell my dear Lone Star friends to start reasoning again. It was God‘s idea. “Come, let us reason together,” saith the Lord. I guess if God’s willing to sit down, talk and negotiate–who do we think WE are?

So even though the entire United States of America is being bombarded by a cacophony of voices telling us to stop feeling, stop believing and stop reasoning, I come to the great state of Texas, a place I dearly love, to talk to my friends about the power of feeling again, believing and reasoning.

Texas can lead this nation in a smarter direction. After all, when people from south of the border started moving into the state, rather than segregating them, persecuting them or throwing them into the Rio Grande, they sat down and came up with Tex-Mex food.

Pretty smart, don’t you think?

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