Weed Legal in Alaska--Good News?

Tuesday, on a gorgeous day in Kodiak, we did it. We left our houses, hopped in our cars, showed our ID's and slipped into the booths with our black ink pens. We did it. We did something millions can only dream about. 

Eight years ago I was in Guatemala with my family for the winter. We were there during the last months of an upcoming election. The body count at that point: 30. Thirty candidates running for office, including members of their family, had been assassinated. That's how some people in Guatemala--and dozens of other countries vote---with a bullet. 

The scene yesterday at my neighborhood ballot office was like a party. Friends, neighbors, on both sides of the political fence, visited, laughed, marked their ballots, 

       

proudly slapped their "I Voted Today" stickers on their chest and went home to watch the results with their families. As for me, I went to my sons'  basketball game, then went home to an unexpected birthday party (for me--though my birthday is 3 weeks away). We ate red, white and blue parfaits and followed the national and local results on the radio. 

 I'm grateful we vote with pens and civility. But----as I write this, I am discouraged and worried. Marijuana has been legalized in a state already sunk in drugs, abuse, violence and suicide. Yes, this is exactly what we didn't need. 

      But the election of the "wrong" candidate, the passage of a bill I know will be destructive to our state and especially to the young, does not change who I am to be, who any of us are to be: people draped with the spiritual fruit of love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self-control.  NOW is just the time to be who we are called to be. 

         Can we stop being people of fear---and be people of peace and action instead? God doesn't need our candidate in office to accomplish His work and His will. God chooses whom He will, pagan or godly: Cyrus the King of Persia or Joseph the Hebrew. God doesn't align himself with any political party, or town or state. He aligns himself with the poor, the hungry and thirsty, the ones who are looking for Him, the ones who are serving Him. If the "wrong" woman or man gets that office, if the vote goes the other way, then, at the very worst,  we'll have all the more chance to serve, to speak peace, to bring justice and hope to the desperate and disconsolate. 

Keep doing the good work you are doing. And consider this proposition:



Whereas, the King is on the throne, shall His people serve Him and their neighbors with charity and joy, regardless of politics or economics, letting their light shine so radiantly that people look up and give praise to their Father in heaven?  

Would you vote "Yes!" with me on this? 

The voting is not over. It's NEVER over! When all the "Vote Here" signs are down and the media chatter quiets, (and we in Alaska scramble to meet the needs of yet more kids and adults strung out on drugs) we still get the chance every morning we rise from our beds to vote YES on this proposition, to choose again who we will be and whom we will serve.  

Choose well. Vote Yes. Every day.