Saturday in D.C.

I went to Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally Saturday. I didn't want to go to D.C. by myself so asked my friend Heidi to come. She inquired on the phone what kind of a rally it was, and I said, sheepishly, that I didn't know exactly but that it was going to be good. She wanted to know the name of it. I said I wasn't sure but it was something about "8/28." She responded, "Oh, Romans 8:28." I said I didn't think so but that that was a very interesting comment.

We arrived an hour late. The entire reflecting pool area of the National Mall was packed. The adjacent fields were packed, and the tide stretched toward the Washington Monument. The Associated Press has reported that "tens of thousands" were there. That kind of cynical numbers-downplaying reminded me of Heidi's Romans 8:28 observation and made me glad that every lie will come out in the wash eventually. They lied about Jesus the whole of his ministry. And after he was raised, which was the ultimate vindication, they paid off soldiers to spread the rumor that his body had been stolen. But as the Bible says, "No weapon forged against you shall prosper" (Isaiah 54:17).

With no strollers, lawn chairs, or picket signs (remarkable, I saw not one picket signs in that sea of humanity), Heidi and I were able snake our way through the crowd to about a quarter mile from the speaker. To my amazement, we encountered no muscling or elbowing, and on the contrary, I saw plenty of people deferring to other people the right of passage.

Neither Beck nor his other speakers (among whom, Sarah Palin) mentioned a word about Mr. Obama. This concerted decision to steer clear of politics and hatefulness robbed the Huffington Post of the ability to dub the affair "political," forcing them to settle for the accusation that it was "religious." This is like when the Pharisees called Jesus a glutton and drunkard when he ate and drank, and a madman when the crowds thronged Him so that he couldn't eat---the damned if you do and if you don't approach that makes me glad for the sovereignty of God and Romans 8:28.

Toward the end, Glenn Beck told the attentive crowd that if we don't go home and let our revival meeting change our lives, by drawing near to God and by telling the truth in our daily living, then all we will have had was a good time on a Saturday afternoon.

Heidi and I stayed around for over an hour following the program, and walked up the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. We noticed that you couldn't spy so much as a candy wrapper on the lawn after the crowd had dispersed.

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