It’s an interesting time to be living in Kenya today, a country boasting of two presidents, one being the embodiment of ‘freedom’ and being lawfully elected and the other whose initials may indicate ‘a ride’ claiming to have been unlawfully rigged and who proceeded to take oath as the people’s president taking people for a ride to a Canaan of sorts.
The quest for power especially in democracies, attracts all
forms of personalities. There are childhood bullies who, now grown up want to continue
slapping people around; then there are the genuinely concerned amongst us who are
visionary and objective. Then there are the wannabe’s, the psychotics who live in a world of their
own, those who feel lucky to try it out and the obviously stupid who against
all odds believe they are born leaders when everyone else thinks they are but
jokers.
The sad thing in a democracy is that sometimes it takes the
populace the experience of the guy in office to know if they got a raw deal.
America knows this first hand as ‘Wiggy’ who trumped and trumpeted his way into
the white lodgings has since been spewing venom on fellow humans and if it was his
call, he’d fire everyone from the face of the earth and alone remain to stand
as the true trump (winner) of humankind.
In Kenya, the embodiment of freedom has turned out to be
capable of curtailing freedoms and for a week we lived in information darkness as
television stations were switched off and the double named general who was
known for his ‘come baby come’ utterance was now singing ‘me gone, me gone’ as
he went ‘home’ dressed for summer to the pregnant country of Canada as one of
Kenyan dialects would translate. I think he got the better deal because the
name is what closest resembles Canaan.
When it comes to spiritual matters, as a Christian I find
the message of Christ liberating and satisfying for when the Jewish people
expected him to come as a king wielding power and authority as it would be
familiar to them, he came as a lowly son of carpenter or builder. He did not
have an army but only twelve men he had called from different sectors, a mix from
both low and high class workers, not forgetting the accountant. Being the son
of God, he did not have to contest for a position of authority but all he had
to do is exercise his authority. When he did, those that were in political and
spiritual leadership then became aware of him and were threatened.
Today, the talk on every Christian is that Christ is on the
brink of coming back which he is true, for every day we are a day close to his
return. The word is that he is coming back with power and authority. The
supposition that he will come back as political ruler is the same as what the
Jewish people had and I sometimes wonder if we would be making the big same
mistake. Is it to say that when he came the first time, he did not wield power and
authority? On the contrary. He still wielded power and authority over spiritual
things, those that determine the physical things. He went for foundational
issues. He began by breaking the forces of darkness i.e. principalities and
powers of darkness which had then crept into the foundations of the world.
For us, the same applies. We are not to be concerned yet
with quest for worldly power but our quest should be to fight principalities
and powers of darkness which hold us down and limit our full potential as
individuals and also as society. Once the foundation has been laid, the
structures for the political authority will stand. It is inconceivable that we
continue to wait for messianic leaders who will sort our problems when we have
been given all authority by Christ.
For
the Christians, the power lies within us for we know that now we possess
dominion of things below and above according to Matthew 16:19 “I will give you
the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in
heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven” and all we have
to do is exercise this authority as Christ did. We also know that we form the
body of Christ which should be at work. We do not have to wonder about any
hidden agendas from our head who is Christ for with him, there is no camouflage
and regardless, ruler-ship for us and Christ is certain.
