Soap Box

I got home in the late evening yesterday and caught the local news and of course a lot of it was devoted to reporting the incredible devastation the huge tornadoes in Oklahoma left behind.

Homes were reduced to piles of sticks, what were thought to be strong, stable buildings looking as if they'd been bulldozed, power outages, water cut off, people with no place to go after losing everything they had ever accumulated, and of course, worst of all the loss of life and especially the children.

And of course, there were feats of heroism, teachers risking life and limb to protect their charges, police and firemen rushing among the ruins looking for signs of life, everyday citizens digging through the rubble looking for their neighbors.

And then the announcer started talking about the effort the folks in the Nashville area were making to make a difference, truckloads of food and water headed for the ravaged area, little children holding hand made signs expressing their support for the people of Oklahoma, citizens volunteering to drive equipment out to feed the people and aid in the cleanup. People reduced to tears of emotion.

And I'm sure this was repeated all around the nation.

As I watched it was indelibly impressed upon my heart, "this is America, this is the real America, people with vast social and political differences, different races and ethnic backgrounds and religions, but united by the one common denominator, that under the superficial shell of diversity, they are all Americans who care what happens to other Americans.

This is the America under God, which is beyond the reach of politics, who don't trust or depend on the snail paced bureaucracies of the federal government to take care of our brothers and sisters in need, men and women of action, motivated by compassion and the belief that to see a need you can supply and not meet it is wrong.

There is another America you seldom see in the media. An America of good citizens who work hard, pay their taxes, raise their children to be good citizens, the people who make this nation work, not dependent on entitlements or subsidies.

They don't whine or sit around complaining about their situation if they lose their job, they're on the street the next day looking for another one and stay with it until they find it.

They raise the crops, move the freight, operate the heavy equipment, keep the books, enforce the laws, build tall buildings and a million other things, bound together by a deep seated sense of responsibility and common decency.

They're a special breed, a people set apart, the ones who support the charities, the true humanitarians, anonymous, unheralded, under the radar, who do good because they believe it's their duty and can't stand to see human suffering.

People whose sense of right is isolated from the red tape of big government, who spend their own time and money to be the first ones to get there and the last ones to leave. The private sector does a far better job of seeking out and supplying need than the regulation, paper bound bureaucracies of state or federal government.

There are many donation-supported entities that do excellent work and are on the scene before government agencies get through the first set of forms.

CBN's Operation Blessing and Franklin Graham's Samaritan's Purse have trucks on the site of disasters as soon as the storm settles. Feed the Children is another first responder and is passing out food to the hungry while the bureaucrats are still trying to make political hay talking about what they're going to do.

You only have to see hundreds of unused FEMA house trailers rotting in a field beside the highway to understand the political patronage and opportunistic profit seekers that hound any government program to see the gross inefficiency of agencies where nobody is in control and waste is standard procedure.

America is still out here, still working, still caring, still bearing the weight of this nation on their shoulders, their hands on the wheel trying to pull this nation out of the tailspin it's in.

They are the salt of the earth.

God, give them strength.

What do you think?

Pray for our troops and the peace of Jerusalem.

God Bless America

Charlie Daniels​