EXCEPTIONALISM

EXCEPTIONALISM is the new buzz word.

Our President weighed in on the subject early in his presidency when he said "We are exceptional like the Brits think they are exceptional, the Swiss think they're exceptional, and the French (etc etc)".  Really?

This week the New York Times GAVE PUTIN OP-ED SPACE and he lectures us about how God created us all equal... therefore none are exceptional.  It's a bit galling to take God-advice from a KGB head, a supplier of chemical weapons, and a dictator whose hero is Stalin, the  killer of 20 million people.  Besides, the Russians are getting on my nerves about this subject.  Today after the shooting in the D.C. Navy yard, some Russian official mocks us by tweeting "a clear confirmation of American exceptionalism".

So how DO we define exceptionalism?   Imaginative, productive citizens?  That doesn't ring completely fair to the third world countries.  Is exceptionalism like cheering for your team/country to the exclusion of others?  That seems rather like an arrogant puffer billy.  If you believe in exceptionalism, are you saying God favors one country over another?  That wouldn't be biblical since God doesn't show favorites.

SO WHAT IS EXCEPTIONALISM?

The best explanation I have read is one by Rush Limbaugh.  HERE'S RUSHBO'S TAKE on the subject, but if you don't have time to read the whole piece...here's the essence of his description of exceptionalism:

"So what is exceptionalism?  Well, if you know the history of the world... Read your Bible, read whatever historical account of humanity you hold dear, and what you'll read about is human tyranny.  You'll read of bondage. You'll read of slavery.  The vast majority of the people, the vast majority of the human beings who have lived and breathed and walked this planet have lived under the tyranny of despots...the vast majority. 

It isn't even close. 

The vast majority of the people of this world since the beginning of time have never known the kind of liberty and freedom that's taken for granted every day in this country.  Most people have lived in abject fear of their leaders. Most people have lived in abject fear of whoever held power over them.  Most people in the world have not had plentiful access to food and clean water.  It was a major daily undertaking for most people to come up with just those two basic things.

Just surviving was the primary occupation of most people in the world.  The history of the world is dictatorship, tyranny, subjugation, whatever you want to call it of populations -- and then along came the United States of America.  Pilgrims were the first to come here seeking freedom from all of that.  They were oppressed because of their religion.  They were told they had to believe in the king and his god, whatever it was, or they would be imprisoned.

They led an exodus from Europe to this country, people of the same mind-set.  They simply wanted to escape the tyranny of their ordinary lives.  This country was founded that way. For the first time in human history, a government and country was founded on the belief that leaders serve the population.  This country was the first in history, the EXCEPTION -- e-x-c-e-p-t, except. The exception to the rule is what American exceptionalism is.

It is because of this liberty and freedom that our country exists, because the founders recognized it comes from God. It's part of the natural yearning of the human spirit. It is not granted by a government. It's not granted by Putin. It's not granted by Obama or any other human being.  We are created with the natural yearning to be free, and it is other men and leaders throughout human history who have suppressed that and imprisoned people for seeking it. 

The U.S. is the first time in the history of the world where a government was organized with a Constitution laying out the rules, that the individual was supreme and dominant, and that is what led to the US becoming the greatest country ever because it unleashed people to be the best they could be. Nothing like it had ever happened.  That's American exceptionalism.  Putin doesn't know what it is, Obama doesn't know what it is, and it just got trashed in the New York Times.  It's just unacceptable."

When I read those words above, something clicked; the words spoke to something I've been unable to verbalize.  Rush is right.  We are exceptional because we have chosen to implement God's principles WHICH WORK.  We live in the shadow of His favor...not because we are favorable people...but because His principles are true and right.  And they enable us to be the exception to the rule of mankind's tyranny.  

With such an amazing opportunity, shame on us for chucking those principles to embrace our own demise.  God HAS shed His grace on us...just as He would any nation on earth who employs truth.  

And as stewards of such great grace, let's identify with these Americans...

Mark Twain, who in 1890 said:  "We are called the nation of inventors and we are.  We could still claim that title and wear its loftiest honors if we had stopped with the first thing we invented, which was human liberty."

Ronald Reagan, on freedom:  "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.  We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream.  It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same." 

And finally, President Abraham Lincoln calls America the last best hope of earth:  “Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this Administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves... The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last best hope of earth.”