They say that power corrupts and absolute power absolutely corrupts. So to become King of the World for a day would do no-one any good.However, I have sometimes pondered, as a thought experiment what I might like to change, were I King for a day.
Give dignity to the unemployed
Here's a low-key change: having worked with many unemployed young men over the years, who have no motives or incentives to go to work, because the state provides extortionate amounts of money for them, I would insist that all who are able to work do so. The state should be there to help those who genuinely cannot provide for themselves, but by far the greatest proportion of unemployed young men I have known - and loved - could do some work. It may not be much work for some, it may not involve full days for others, but most could do SOMETHING.
And working would do them a world of good - love is the motive behind this King-for-a-day suggestion. Work would give them self-esteem, it would give them an opportunity to bless their society, it would at a stroke eradicate eons of personal time which presently is so easily used for ill ends, for the Devil finds work for idle hands.
This is no right-wing rant, it's a compassionate call for common sense. It is compassionate to encourage people to work, since we were created to work. In recent years, I have come across a number of cases where the Government has given thousands of pounds of back-pay to some single men. The result? Nothing but grief, for these men have no idea how to handle £10K - so it is wasted, squandered, or worse, turned into drugs/drink.
We give dignity to the habitually unemployed by putting up significant barriers to income support, such as, "You will get this week's rent after you have done XX hours of YY work this week."
Space Studies
A second low-key change I would make, if I was King for a day, would be to change the direction of space research, strange as that may seem. At the moment most of the investigations are aimed, not at finding out what is out there, but in finding the answer to one narrow question: is there life out there? By which they mean, is there a planet out there on which life could be found, an earth like planet?
There is only one reason for this question: it would give satisfaction to the atheists: "see, evolutionary theory must be true. If life evolved elsewhere, it is not unique and special on earth, not the work of a Creator, but the work of blind forces."
Due to this narrow agenda, we are failing to gather lots of information about the amazing universe around us, preferring to focus in only on this narrow quest.
Contrast (not similarities) between the animals and Mankind
The third change I would make, would be to institute new research committed to a study of all the many differences between humankind and the animals (and for scientific reasons ban the foolish notion that we are just one species of animal). Because the theory of evolution is the reigning creation myth of our culture, scientists blinded by this paradigm only seek one thing: how similar are the animals to humans? Since we are simply one step further along the biological chain the focus is on comparison not contrast! Virtually-infinite-contrast is downplayed or simply ignored.
I was reading a paper recently comparing the facial expressions of chimps and humans. Instead of the summary pointing out the radical differences between chimps and humans, it timidly and lamely focused on similarities - though the paper continually pointed out one radical difference after another!
We could go on and on! How about honest and unbiased research on the difference between men and women? It would courageously point out the vast differences all the way down to the cellular level. Although most of the genes (the codes for building the different molecular machines which run our bodies) of men and women are the same, because of the difference between male and female chromosomes, those genes are read differently in male and female bodies.
For example, Dr David C Page, a Professor of Biology at MIT has "argued that researchers and health care practitioners need to fundamentally change how they approach the study and treatments of disease to reflect differences between males and females that exist within every cell of their bodies. 'Until and unless we arrive at an appreciation of how males and females read their genomes differently — we will continue to be surprised every time we encounter a sex difference in disease incidence, severity, or response to therapy,' Page said. 'And I think we have to do something about that.'"
We live in a culture where the reigning philosophies of the day bind the hand of science! I am sure that there are scientists out there who are totally fearful of saying:
- this wonderful solar system we live in is radically different from any other we have found!
- there is a nigh-infinite chasm between animals and humans!
- there is a wonderful and significant difference between men and women
I guess what I am saying, is that if I was King for a day, I'd like the myths and lies of Western culture exposed for what they are - harmful lies.
The Power of the Gospel
But that is what the Gospel does. When the human heart is turned towards God, that person's mind is turned towards truth. And so as the Gospel is preached minds are changed, and all that a Christian would love to see changed, happens, one life at a time.
So instead of King for a day, we should instead strive to share the powerful Gospel every day.
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