[Agape] Loving Your Government

If you were to turn on the radio and tune it to a country station, in about any given ten minutes, you would find homage paid to the good old USA. Country songs are filled with lyrics, lines, melodies, images, and stories that praise our country. If you were to turn on the political debates, you would see politicians arguing that their plan for our country supersedes all the rest, that they know what is best for our country, and that their plan will satisfy what our country needs. They do this, they say, because they love our country. But then, if you were to turn on the news, you would sometimes see stories and hear testimonies about ways in which our government has, intentionally or unintentionally, harmed and hurt its people. So, what stories do we listen to? Who do we believe? This content may touch on a sensitive subject, but that is the point. Especially during a time when our country prepares itself to dive into the process of electing a new leader, it is important to understand our role in relation to our government and to foster that relationship so that it can thrive. Over the past couple of weeks we have begun to understand this agape love: this selfless, active, generous, unconditional, accountable, and compassionate love. We have understood what it means for those we call close friends, family, and loved ones, but also for those who are no longer a part of our lives. This week, we have understood it in relation to those who have influenced, shaped, and transformed our lives. So, today, we will continue to understand what this agape love means for another major influencer in our lives: our government.In order to love someone well in any relationship, you must understand the one you love. You must know them well: know their strengths and weaknesses, the things that make them happy and unhappy, their desires and passions, their fears, their pain, their past, and all their hopes for the future. So, in order to love our government well, we must know and understand all the things that make up our government, our government’s history, and the ways in which our government influences and impacts our lives. This may require us to pay more attention to governmental affairs, and to read and learn about the workings of our government and our government’s history. Furthermore, this may require us to get out of our comfort zone, our place of complacency, and to ask hard questions of our government. In thinking critically of our government, in certain times we may be encouraged not to take anything we see or hear at face value. We may be driven to dig deeper, to seek out the answers to our own questions, and to initiate our own research and investigation into what our government is saying to us. In other times, we may be encouraged to support our government and support its efforts to secure and influence the lives of its citizens. But, the only way that we can think critically of our government, the only way that we can support or challenge the work of our government, is by knowing our government well. By knowing our government well, we begin to love our government well.But, loving our government does not mean that we must mindlessly accept when it does harm or when it is not acting in the best interest of its people. You see, this agape love requires action on our part to hold those who are receiving this love accountable on their end. This radical love fuels us to call out our government when it is not acting true and honorable in nature. But, the agape nature of this love requires us to do this in a selfless, humble, compassionate, and empathetic way. When we truly love our government, the actions we take in holding our government accountable will not come from a place of arrogance, self-seeking ambition, or insensitive persistence but, rather, a place from which we truly seek the best in our government. This agape love, then, will radically transform the way in which we hold our government accountable for its actions. Our political debates, our personal debates, and our attitude towards the workings of our government will shift from disdain, bitterness, haughtiness, or apathy to genuine concern, care, and compassion. When we love our government with this selfless and intentional love, we will see a shift in our thinking, so that the desire to be right and to win will turn into a will to sustain an environment that secures the best lives for our friends, neighbors, and even for the strangers in our lives. When we experience this shift in our perception of holding our government accountable, we will be able to better distinguish areas of need, uncover neglected people or issues, and collectively create solutions to remedy mistakes that may have been made by our government. So, you see, this love for our government will not send us into an apathetic state of mind, where we mindlessly follow in suit of our government, but, rather, it will encourage us and equip us to acknowledge ways that our government can improve and provide it the support it needs to make those improvements.Loving our government naturally proceeds, then, in actively participating in ways to challenge our government to be the best it can be and to support it in its pursuits to provide the best for its people. Knowing our government and keeping our government accountable can only go so far if we do not play our part. The responsibility falls on us, then, to use our voices, talents, and passions in order to respond to our government’s influence on our lives. In the relationship between us and our government, we should use our knowledge of what our government does, of its history, and of how it works in order to respond to our government. We should also use our passion, determination, and humility to get involved in community rallies, to vote in elections that we think are pointless, and to offer our intellect, our talents, and our passions in order to become active citizens in our communities, in our states, and in our nation.“We the people” need to assume our responsibility to love our government out of selflessness, out of compassion, and out of pure intention to see our nation come to the best it can be. “We the people” now holds more weight, because it forces us not only to assume our responsibility, but to act upon that responsibility, to believe in that responsibility, and to use that responsibility in order to make our government’s work better. In certain times, “we the people” may find that we wholeheartedly support our government’s work. In other times, “we the people” may find that we need to further investigate into what our government is telling us. But, always, “we the people” should initiate action to challenge our government to be the best that it can be. So, how will you assume your role? How will you take up your challenge? “We the people” are the people that have influence, that have strength, that have ideas and we are the people that can love our government through our influence, strength, and ideas.