A few miles north of the city is a large dam, which from time beyond memory has contained the heavy flow of water from mountains beyond. This flow is especially swift and deep every spring.
Our city has a large number of God-people. They honor God and they honor the mayor, whom they consider God’s representative in the city.
I am a rather unimportant citizen, engaged in trade, and have never been particularly tied to these people. Nor has the mayor, except (to my way of thinking, at least) for political advantage.
You see, these God-people represent a large voting bloc, especially susceptible to the mayor’s choice of key issues. They number among them few poor (which they count evidence of God’s blessing), so they were doubtless glad when the mayor moved to change certain benefactions which the poor had received prior to his term in office. They also number few of the scorned and feared minority groups, so they were probably secretly glad when the mayor neglected these needs as well. And, as is true of all people who have possessions to protect, they were glad for the mayor’s emphasis on law and punishment.
But the mayor cultivated them, in my opinion, for one other significant reason. They accepted his leadership without question, even imparting the seal of God to actions of his that other groups seriously questioned. It was as if they considered God their mayor and the mayor their God.
I mentioned our dam at the beginning of this account. The mayor who held office immediately before this one, had tampered with it, diverting part of its flow toward the east where some small towns lie on a distant plain. Many people of all ages were killed in the resulting flood, which was ostensibly good for our city, since it protected us from them.
The mayor I’m telling you about raised even more floodgates, and even more people in the towns were killed.
With few exceptions, the God-people approved the flooding. “Has not the mayor ordered it?” they asked “and is not the mayor God’s representative in the city?”
Every year the mayor and his advisers sat down to a meal with the God-people. There were speeches and religious exercises beneficial to the mayor and to God. This, and other occasions when the mayor honored the God-people by his presence, doubtless reinforced his God-representative role in their eyes.
Then it happened.
One night a few of the mayor’s advisor's were discovered in underground tunnels beneath the city, working valves and huge pipes connected to the dam. What were they doing? At their court trials, it came out that they were diverting the dam’s flow to destroy the mayor’s enemies, those who posed a threat to his political future.
From those few men, investigation of the plot spread and involved most of the mayor’s closest advisor's. He claimed to know nothing about the plot, and praised the integrity of the friends he removed from office.
One of those removed had recently spoken to a group of God- people at the annual meal when the mayor sat down with them. “God has never been more honored in the mayor’s quarters,” he said. “A revival has been going on.”
I was talking to a God-person a few days ago. I asked him about all this: How could he reconcile what had happened his views of God? ”They’re out to get the mayor,” he answered. “It’s a shame.”
This puzzled me. So I asked another, who lives in my neighborhood. “It’s all a sign of the end times,” he said. “Revolt against the mayor’s authority. Talking about peace when there is no peace, objecting to flooding the cities of the plain when the mayor ordered it. We are not to resist authority, but to lift up our eyes and rejoice when these things come to pass.”
Since I still hadn’t gotten an answer to my question. I spoke to another God-person.
“When I was a child,” I said, “I remember hearing about men who risked their lives--and sometimes lost them--by standing up to the king and telling him that God would judge him and his people for the evil he had done. Don’t God-people ever do this today?”
“Of course not,” he said "That’s Old Testament. Today we obey the mayor, we go along with him, and we tell our good news. And speaking of good news, wouldn’t you like to become a God-person? You begin by believing that God loves you."
I excused myself on some pretext or other and came home to write this account. There’s a certain urgency in my writing; the spring and summer rains have been heavier than anyone can remember, and the dam is more full than I’ve seen it in my lifetime.
When this article appeared, Joe Bayly was a Vice President of David C. Cook Publishing and a consulting editor of ETERNITY magazine.
Reprinted by permission of the author.
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