Wall Street's Crooked Path

The confluence of two recent events has me pondering our nation's direction. The first event is the precarious dip Wall Street took yesterday amid concerns that not only the U.S., but global economies are cooling and may even stagnate within a few years.
The second event is a piece of wisdom from Abraham Lincoln shown to me by my wife:

"Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us."

So just where are we headed as an American people and upon what are we traveling? I heard the other day about ancient Myan engineers who built concourses between cities using primitive methods that outstrip any road construction methods we have today. These roads were hand-made from gravel and cobblestones, and then covered entirely with white stucco. The amazing thing is, some of these roads ran for 60 miles or more over undulating terrain and through thick jungles, but their lines are not off by even one degree. Certainly, the Myan kings could walk on those roads and know they were following a true path.

What are we walking on? I see much around us revealing "paths" that are not only crooked, but twist back on themselves, have confusing markers and often lead nowhere. Some are simply dead ends. Some display all that is wrong with our national soul, and yet we revere those actions and the ones committing them as the pinnacle of human achievement. Some display our garbage, and yet strangely we take perverse pride that our scandalous behavior is somehow more laudable than other country's. The ancient poet spoke well:

"The wicked freely strut about, when what is vile is honored among men." *

Yesterday's stock performance? A chink, a pothole at worst. There are entire canyons looming on our nation's "path," and we fret over a few hundred points lost in one day's trading. It appears the market is back on track this morning, but do we believe yesterday's drop (or an even sharper decline), is an anomaly? The events of 9/11 revealed, among other things, that the nerve centers of our national wealth are not immune to attack. The horsehair of our prosperity was never meant to hold the weight of the Damoclean sword that is national decline and failure. We rely too much on our success and talents, buying into the illusion that we are gods and the true God will not let us continue in that fairy tale for long. Let us plumb our "paths" by His schematics before they lead us into the abyss.

* Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.