Scripture: Psalm 133:1 – “How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!”
Now that the election is over, at least the voting part, we have entered the tabulation phase. It is likely that it may be a while before we figure out who the “winners” and the “losers” are. The winners will crow, and the losers will either lash out in anger or sink into morose introspection as to how it all could have gone wrong. Then both sides will get ready for the next contest.
This is a great way to approach a football game, but it is not a great way to think about ourselves as a society. If you have attended any of our board game nights, you may know that I enjoy them greatly and that I have a very extensive collection at home. These days, games can be categorized as competitive games and cooperative games. In a competitive game, like Monopoly or Chess, there is a winner and a loser. Sometimes victory is based on skill, other times on luck, and sometimes on guile and deception. Seeing the world like a competition makes us see other people as foes, as threats to our victory, and as obstacles that we must overcome to realize our goals. This is a natural way to look at the world, but it is not the way that God sees it.
Cooperative games are different. A famous game of the genre is “Forbidden Island”, in which players are treasure seekers trying to grab four treasures off an island before it sinks into the sea. The deck is stacked against them, and they must plan and work together to succeed. Seeing the world in this way still requires us to be courageous and wise, but it sees other people as part of our victory and as part of the solution to the goals that we all share.
Psalm 133 says, “How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!” Looking at the political landscape of the recent past and likely future, we are still going to be divided. But if we are serious about finding that good and pleasant life, we need to see the world more like God sees it, one in which all of God’s children are precious and in which happiness and justice depend on us recognizing that commonality and acting upon it.
While the pageantry and spectacle of things like political elections or sporting events fire us up, the real change is going to going to happen when we slow down and listen to the voice of God within us calling us to love another. God calls us to make a small but decisive step every day into realizing love and unity in our hearts, our homes, and our communities. Each day we can take one more step into widening the circle until all of us feel that love, see our common challenges, and realize that with God, we are all winners.
Prayer – Prince of Peace, forgive me for the times when I see other people as enemies or obstacles and give me the grace to live into your love every day. Amen.
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