Friday, November 30, 2007

A Parable (The Gold Standard)

Thomas Jefferson said, "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." this quote is extremely important to understand in these crucial times of our Western Culture. As the dollar is hemorrhaging, the market is dwindling, banking and housing industry bail outs are demanding, international entanglements are never-ending, and the threat of nuclear terrorism is ever looming; the responsibility for the future lies not in the hands of the presidency, the legislature, central bankers, industry leaders, or even our enemies; the future of freedom lies on the citizenry of the free.

This is not however a parable about that obligation. This is a story that must be told to the true citizenry of the free. Those citizen's of the Kingdom of God whose freedom has been muddled by their acceptance... Well, we'll get to that in a moment.

The Gold Standard:

The great king had a kingdom of wealth. The wealth of this kingdom was beyond the measure of other kingdoms. His store rooms were abounding with silver, gold, platinum, palladium, and numerous precious stones. The farthest corners in the vaults of His royal treasury had never been seen. The power, majesty and wealth of his kingdom were so inspiring that the love, joy, and peace of his people had become conjoined as the very specie of his kingdom. His kingdom's vast and endless resources, he had given to his citizenry to share as coheirs with him.

As the kingdom prospered, so did those who served as vassals to the great king. Their own dominions seemed to be filled with immeasurable wealth. The kings of the foreign nations marveled at the both the wealth and the joy of the citizenry of the king's feudal lords. The king's of the of nations inquired of their peers from the Great Kingdom into the successes of their provinces. Being honest votaries of their Lord, the vassal kings homaged their King for his power, wealth, and might.

Shortly however, after only a few generations the protégés became complacent in the pursuance of their duties and succumbed to entitlement of the power and their wealth. When the sons of the other kingdoms sought their insight to the majesty of their domain, they forsook the Great King and railed on about their own work and wisdom.

Shortly thereafter, when only a few generations had passed the once mighty kingdoms of the Great King had begun to deteriorate. Their fame of power, majesty, and wealth still lingered. Reports of love, joy, and peace were merely from the memories of the elderly and the legends preserved for bedtime stories. It seemed as though the Great King had forgotten his kingdom left to decay and atrophy. No longer did the foreign sons seek these leaders, instead these leaders sought out alliances with their neighboring peers. Promises of unified kingdoms, shared resources, and mutual benefit enticed the senses of both sides. The servants of the Great King, parceled his territories to the realms of other powers.

Shortly in time, where only a few generations had passed the regions of the Great Kingdom sat mostly ignored, populated by a faint miserable few who had not moved on. The land bore no crops, the waters polluted, the limited resources being rationed out to maintain the infrastructure. The great kingdom seemed a wasteland of emigration, barren from any sort of immigration other than transients and nomads hoping to find even a remnant of the legendary love, joy, and peace. The kingdom had become devoid of wealth, citizenry, and power.

Shortly a new idea emerged, after only a few generations leaders saw need to develop a new fiat currency for the nearly abandoned territories. Armed with their own desires to use the old kingdoms to build their own fortunes the old men forged a new empire with the vestiges of the old kingdom. Being devoid of the source of wealth that personified the old regime it was replaced with a system that unified and celebrated the individual accomplishments of it's citizens. Rules for success were codified and ratified. The leaders attracted strong, powerful, youthful orators to preach the merits of this new currency. Filled with the appearances of the old wealth Immigration once again filled the farms, cities, nooks, and crannies of the Great Kingdom.

Shortly after the initial boom, when only a few generations had passed, the new kings had built rebuilt the old lands. Superstructures towering to the heavens in name of progress, universities bearing the names of the leaders aged and laid to rest, institutions to promote the personal pursuit of all the kingdoms promised, these accomplished defined the kingdom as the sprawled across the provinces. Progress was the pulse of the new kingdom. However, inside the citizen's were tired and weighted. The towers, school, and programs were impressive to these exhausted, over taxed, over worked serfs. To the outsider the appearance of the Great Kingdom had been restored. To those laden with the mirage inside, the stress and fatigue were depressing and deadly. Though deeply entrenched in the system, most citizens had only burden and poverty. The image of the promise entrapped them to live enslaved to a dream, they could never attain. The freedom their kingdom illuminated was a special effect created by the classic obfuscation of smoke and mirrors.

Shortly in the midst of the wars, after the feuding and fighting of only a few generations had passed, the rouse was up. The inflation of the promise of the kingdom had made attainment an impossible labyrinth of disappointment. Victories had become more about a celebration of conquest against each other, than attainment of the promises. The new kingdom, with her new laws, her estranged entanglements with the foreign kings, and her paper currencies held relationship to the Great Kingdom in name only. It was at that time, as it had been in each time before, that some lost, broken, exhausted, stressed, depressed, lonely members of these feudal lords, became dispossessed and nomadic.

As the pilgrims journeyed forward toward the promise of love, joy, and peace they discovered their new world. The journey forward became easier, their loads became lighter, their dreams seemed more real. As a few individuals in each generation wrestled off the shackles of the systems and promises of their captors they traveled at great cost with greater vigilance toward the wealth, the peace, love, and joy; the moved in as citizens of freedom in the Land of the Great King. He ruled on his throne with his resources always giving them as coheirs to those who sought only Him as their king.

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