Our much-expected runoff is almost here after many avoidable rigmaroles. From party manifestos, on the basis of which the electorate voted, the accent is now on two individuals whose manifestos are their curriculum vitae and what they promise to do for the nation. This is on a secular basis but we should not rule out the hand of God in all this.
The world should have been a place without evil but for the advent of the Devil (Satan) the architect of evil. Since then there has been an endless tussle between good and evil.
Those who believe in doing good belong to the Kingdom of God and those who do not fear God and do his commandments belong to the Kingdom of Evil. What Christians and Muslims have been praying for is to have a God-fearing leader as our next Head of State. It is because of the people including leaders that belong to the Kingdom of Evil that there is one continuous history of misery and wrong in Sierra Leone.
The penetrating awareness that there is but One Living God of the whole world is the glory of the Hebrews people and the reason why they rank with Greece and Rome as teachers of humanity. One God – for all. Only one! ‘’Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one” – and all other ‘gods’ are fabled deities.
It is the worshippers of the fable deities who are members of the Kingdom of evil; it is they who are involved in ritual practices, plotting to maim or kill opponents, hatred of other tribes or ethnicities and sponsors of strife from which they benefit.
During the 2007 elections that brought the APC back to power the candidate for the SLPP who is a Christian is reported to have been involved in fortifying his body for success but he lost shockingly. This is a lesson that God is a jealous God and would not support anyone that has dual relationship with him. Either you become a citizen of heaven or a citizen of hell in the Kingdom of evil.
The two candidates for whom we are to vote for are incidentally Christians. Not only that. They are reported to be members of the Catholic Church. It’s going to be difficult to choose between the two presidential flag bearers who belong to what Kingdom. Either the two of them belong to one of the Kingdoms or there is one apiece. Doubts arise because it is not everyone who professes a religion or denomination acts according to the precepts of that religion or denomination.
We take this opportunity to disabuse the minds of pseudo-theologians and non-theologians that the biblical passage in Romans 13:1. “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God and those that exist have been instituted by God,” should not be taken literally. The word LEGITIMATE before authority was omitted in translation from Greek. It is like “Thou shall not kill ….. with the key word ‘fellow human beings’ omitted. That commandment does not mean cows should not be slaughtered or mosquitoes and house flies should not be killed.
As a result of not entirely depending on the biblical statement quoted above, not all leaders are God-ordained. If it were so God would be seen as a God of evil instead of a compassionate God and a God of love.
God cannot have anointed rulers with heinous crimes against humanity like Josef Stalin, Idi Amin and Assad of Syria, to name only a few.
What we have been praying for is for our next Head of State to be one who is God-fearing.
In his wisdom God will choose the leader who belongs to his Kingdom, we hope. Otherwise he may choose the leader who belongs to the Kingdom of evil like what is happening in Syria and Russia to punish us for the unrighteousness in this nation until we repent.