Repackaging ideas

I was listening to some of the political speeches yesterday and heard something I want to talk about today. I will assure you that I will not mention names here, that's not my goal. But I heard something interesting....I heard one of the politicians repackaging ideas. He said something that caught my attention because I had never heard it before. It was a very well crafted selection of words. This politician said, "I will pursue economic justice!"

When I heard that I said out loud, "WHAT?" Because these two words do not go together. I had never heard them used together, so I thought....what is he REALLY trying to say? Then it came to me, he's using this phrase "economic justice" to describe socialism. He could never say he will pursue socialism in this country, but cloak the same idea in a confusing package of words, and presto changeo.....we have the same old philosophy in a new word package that offends no one...most people really don't even think about what was said.

This same thing is happening all across our culture...the repackaging of words and ideas. We are wrapping old ideas or even rejected ideas in new clothes and selling them to the public. The rhetoric is amazing, and honestly I admire the guy for coming up with such a subtle way of selling socialism.

But my problem isn't so much with politicians as it is with those of us in the Christian world. We have become very good at doing the same thing. New word combinations to say something everyone would reject if they understood what you meant. It's like chocolate covered asparagus! You might be able to get people to try it, but when all is said and done it's still asparagus!

So listen carefully to what people say. There's a lot of repackaging going on.