God Blessed America

At RaptureReady, there is this cartoon by John Rule, God Blessed America, that has the following captions:

• Our pets eat better than over half of the people in the world
• When there's enough to clothe a small village
• If you are an American and have any assets at all, 92% of the world's population has less than you
• If you know Jesus, you have eternal life
• We have so much to be thankful for!

In general, I find the idea of Rapture distasteful because it is cheap grace. Those who subscribe to this idea are those who are very reluctant to take up their cross and follow Jesus to the death (literally). They think they can talk the talk without walking the walk along the Via Dolorosa.

I wonder how would these Christians would pass the test of Job in the first chapter of the Book of Job.

9. But Satan answered the LORD and said, "Is it for nothing that Job is God-fearing?
10. Have you not surrounded him and his family and all that he has with your protection? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his livestock are spread over the land.
11. But now put forth your hand and touch anything that he has, and surely he will blaspheme you to your face."

Where do these Christians think all that wealth comes from? Does it float down like manna from heaven and lie on the ground waiting to be picked up? They turn a deaf ear to the anguish of the poor, near and far, as the wealth is ground out of the poor.

The sixth chapter of the Book of Jeremiah would have God say

11. Therefore my wrath brims up within me, I am weary of holding it in; I will pour it out upon the child in the street, upon the young men gathered together. Yes, all will be taken, husband and wife, graybeard with ancient.
12. Their houses will fall to strangers, their fields and their wives as well; For I will stretch forth my hand against those who dwell in this land, says the LORD.
13. Small and great alike, all are greedy for gain; prophet and priest, all practice fraud.
14. They would repair, as though it were nought, the injury to my people: "Peace, peace!" they say, though there is no peace.
15. They are odious; they have done abominable things, yet they are not at all ashamed, they know not how to blush. Hence they shall be among those who fall; in their time of punishment they shall go down, says the LORD.

For these verses speak of all who live in the Western world (including me). These was no shame over Ahu Gahrib, no repentance over the Iraq war. The scandals of Enron, WorldCom, Arthur Andersen, Bond Holdings still are there.