Good morning!

Everyone spends a lot of time talking about sides in politics. “Are you for us, or for our adversaries?” That’s not the right question. 

Here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Friday, August 16, 2019
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• In case you missed it, yesterday’s edition of Texas Scorecard Radio featured an interview with FreedomWorks’ Sarah Anderson giving Tony McDonald a rundown on how Texas’ congressional delegation is performing in Washington.
     
• Whose side are they on?
      
• The Austin City Council is planning to spend a record-high $62.7 million this year to address homelessness – the equivalent of giving roughly $28,000 to each homeless person in the city. Jacob Asmussen reports city officials aren’t actually writing a $28,000 check to each homeless person. Instead, the city council is “sending pallets of tax dollars through a cash-eating maze of city administration and bureaucracy, hoping that a fraction of it eventually comes out the other side to the people on the streets.”
      
• You can guess how well that will work out... 
      
• In a new commentary, Fran Rhodes of the True Texas Project is calling on House Speaker Dennis Bonnen and GOP Caucus Chairman Dustin Burrows to resign.
      
• “I don’t expect the Republican Party to fix this, and I don’t expect the Texas House to police itself. It’s going to have to be we, the people of Texas coming together to fix this problem. So, let’s rise up and demand truth and integrity in our legislative process.” – Fran Rhodes, president of True Texas Project 

Friday Reflection

William Travis famously drew a line in the sand, asking his fellow Alamo defenders to join him in putting their lives on the line for liberty in the Lone Star State.

When it comes to choosing a side on an important debate, most politicians prefer to hang back and see where the crowd is going before they will pick a side. Unlike Travis, they want to be on the “safe” side of every side.

The politicians don’t say that, of course. They say they are being judicious, thoughtful, and diligent. Hogwash! What they are most often doing is waiting to see where the majority will land, and calculating the latest point at which they can pick a side in service to their personal ambitions.

I want to take you back a couple thousand years and 7,000 miles, to the plains of Jericho, where a pivotal question about “sides” took place. After crossing the Jordan River, the Israelites camped on those plains in preparation for God’s command that they march on the highly fortified city of Jericho.

Joshua, who had only recently taken over as the Israelites’ leader, was confronted with a mighty warrior. That he was a fearsome sight is not in question; was this simply an angelic being, or – as many theologians argue – a “pre-incarnate” visit by the Son of God? 

Either way, Joshua decided he better be on the right side of this guy.

So Joshua asks the ultimate whose-side-are-you-on-anyway question: “Are you for us, or for our adversaries?” Seems like the right question before a big fight, right?

The response probably isn’t what is Joshua was expecting: “No; but I am the commander of the army of the Lord. Now I have come.”

That answer should ring in our ears as loudly as it did for Joshua.

It doesn’t matter if someone is on our side, or if we’re on their side. The only question that counts: are we on God’s side? It’s a question we should daily, and prayerfully, consider.