Veteran and Silver Star–winner Carl Spurlin turned 100 years old recently.  The article about him had a bittersweet quality because the decorated Marine said of modern America that this "isn't the country we fought for."  I honor his service and understand his misgivings.

Carl Spurlin's angst is reflected in the RCP direction polls.  Eighteen percent of Americans believe that the USA is on the right track, while 75% of us believe that the country is on the wrong track.

Earlier this summer, I took down the flagpole in my front yard.  I wasn't being unpatriotic.  The pole was not perfectly vertical.  The lean was noticeable, and that bothered me.

I was thinking of my flagpole and Spurlin this morning as I read the Bible.  In today's Old Testament reading (Amos 7:7-17), God says to Amos, "See, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel."  A plumb line (or plumb bob) is used in construction to make certain that a wall is vertically straight.

Image: Egyptian plumb bob from the time of the Bible.  Public domain.

In this passage, God tells Amos that His plumb line shows that Israel is not aligned with Him and is due for judgment.  If you are still with me, I live in the USA, and I wonder: what would God see if He put His plumb line in the middle of America?  As I think about the following institutions and individuals, I wonder how they would square with God's demanding plumb line.

· The Election of 2020

· Treatment of Hunter Biden's laptop

· The US Justice Department

· The FBI

· ABC News

· CBS News

· CNN News

· FOX News

· NBC and MSNBC News

· Facebook

· Twitter

· TikTok

· The World Health Organization

· CDC

· ACLU

· The Democrat party

· The Republican Party

· Southern Poverty Law Center

· Black Lives Matter

· Mark Zuckerberg's "assistance" in the 2020 election

· Hillary Clinton

· Joe Biden

· Donald Trump

· Kamala Harris

· Mike Pence

One of the common complaints that I hear about Congress is that its members care far too much about what the New York Times says or what The Washington Post writes about them.  Members of Congress also fret about the Twitterverse.  If Congress cared instead about God's plumb line, I believe that America's prospects would quickly improve.

As a survivor of junior high and high school, I know about the temptation to conform, AKA peer pressure.  I have "people-pleasing" genes, too.

At the same time, several of my heroes, like William Wilberforce, Harriet Beecher Stowe, William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass, and Winston Churchill, dared to speak out about the evils they saw in their time.  They certainly were not perfect people, but they cared about God's plumb line, and that is one of the character traits that made them profoundly memorable.

Ned Cosby, a regular contributor to American Thinker, is a pastor, veteran Coast Guard officer, and a retired public high school teacher.  His new novel OUTCRY is a love story exposing the refusal of Christian leaders to discipline clergy who sexually abuse our young people.  This work of fiction addresses crimes that are all too real.  He has also written RECOLLECTIONS FROM MY FATHER'S HOUSE, tracing his own odyssey from 1954 to the present.  For more info, visit www.nedcosby.com.