THE DIVISION
Waggle Dance
I'm amazed sometimes when I'm just sitting out in a tree and I'm watching honeybees. At first, in a bed of flowers, there's one or two, and as time passes, in half an hour to an hour, all of a sudden there's 15, 20, 30, and I don't have them known by name, but there seems to be a much larger number than what was originally there. And I ponder, how do these bees know how to get to the flower? Why are they so drawn to it?
The nectar itself has an intoxicating allure to it, much like a perfume or cologne that men or women wear to attract each other. But that only works when they're close enough to smell that perfume. How do they get the entire hive motivated to the point where they're traveling great distances and find this particular location? I've often pondered that.
So I decided to do a little research. Who knew? Bees know how to dance.
Apparently, when one of the scouts or one of the harvesters finds a good source of nectar, they return to the hive and they start performing a waggle dance. Now, a normal waggle dance will convince a few bees of something, but apparently, the more intense the dancing becomes, the more aroused the entire hive gets. The stronger the dancing, the more the bees will follow that particular individual that he's directing to that location.
Now, this may seem wonderful for the hive, and overall, that's the way nature designed things. He created bees to be able to be influenced by the waggle dance. Somewhere in their little minds, they turn off some sort of circuit and they follow that dance, hoping to find this great reward at the end of the flight.
However, sometimes that flight leads them to a field of flowers that have been covered with pesticides, slowly but surely killing the hive. Sometimes those flower beds are infested with crab spiders, which hide deep inside the flowers themselves, and as the bee enters searching for nectar, it suddenly becomes doomed. Sometimes they're led to flowers that contain very little nectar at all, but because the excitement and intensity of the dance was so powerful, the hive followed anyway.
As the Lord designed nature, He knew exactly what He was doing. He gave the bees the ability to perform this waggle dance. The amazing thing is, He also gave their minds the ability to turn that little circuit off, to be persuaded by that waggle dance dramatically, which caused me to think again, are human beings not crafted in somewhat the same way?
Is there not some sort of waggle dance that can be performed for us that will instinctively start to short-circuit our minds from our moral consciousness, what has been taught to us since childhood through scripture, moral teachings, the right and wrong our parents instructed us in? And we will leave the hive and go search out something that will be so rewarding, so delightful, so tempting, so full of promise, so full of power, so full of magnificent transformation, that we simply have to become part of that waggle dance.
I've actually answered that question in a few earlier letters. Subliminal advertisement, the use of AI, self-generated images, all of these things are a form of the waggle dance. The Marlboro Man convinced millions of people to smoke, causing early death to a large portion of the people who decided to smoke. Gambling advertisement. No one really wins money over the long run. Everyone loses. It's statistically virtually impossible not to, but along the way gambling addictions are formulated.
I remember my father, after a heart attack, standing in the hospital hallway smoking a cigarette. The doctors told him it would kill him, but the addiction, the waggle dance, was so strong that he did it anyway.
By now, you may be asking yourself where this story is going. A dear friend spoke with me recently, deeply troubled. She is a wonderful Christian woman, intelligent, disciplined, well-read, and devoted in her walk with Christ. Like me, she considers herself a Christian constitutionalist, someone who tries to let scripture, the Beatitudes, and the teachings of Christ guide her life and civic responsibility. Yet increasingly, she finds herself being told that because she does not politically align a certain way, she cannot truly be a Christian at all. And I sat there pondering, when did the waggle dance become so powerful that believers in Christ began questioning the salvation, faith, and morality of other believers simply because they did not follow the same political path?
So now what we're doing is being fed a narrative that Christians that are Democrat or moderate Republicans aren't really Christians at all. That only those who are following the person that can generate the nectar, that can generate the motivation for the waggle dance to take place, can be correct.
Let's take a break here and let's ponder some scripture. I have searched scripture trying to justly come up with some scripture that says that this can be correct. The following scriptures is all that I could find for that to support that theory.
Ephesians 5:11 says, “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness.” I've heard stories such as this used to justify why Christians should not have anything to do with Democrats. During the 1980s and 1990s there were widespread fears of Satanic ritual abuse spreading throughout parts of society. Later came theories connected to QAnon and the 2016 Pizzagate conspiracy, where people were convinced that certain political leaders and Democrats were involved in secret Satanic rituals or child sacrifice. Specific names of individuals were repeatedly listed and accused. For years the waggle dance continued, yet no factual evidence was ever produced to support those claims.
So when I go back and read Ephesians 5:11, nowhere do I find where it says Christians should reject fellowship with other Christians who believe that Christ was crucified for our sins.
Galatians 1:8, “If anyone preaches any other gospel unto you… let him be accursed,” I've heard used many times to explain why Christians should not listen to certain people because they are supposedly preaching a foreign doctrine. And I certainly agree that Christians should stand against false doctrine.
But when I listen to moderate Republicans or Democrats who also profess Christianity, I do not hear a foreign gospel being preached. I hear the same doctrine: that Christ was crucified for our sins, gave His life as atonement for our sins, and that no one on this planet walks perfectly except Jesus Christ Himself. Christians may disagree politically, morally, or socially on many issues, but I do not hear some radically different gospel being preached in that statement.
I've heard 1 John 4:1, “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God,” used many times as well. And I certainly agree with that scripture. One of the strongest arguments I've heard is concerning abortion. I've heard people say that Democrats believe in abortion, and therefore they cannot truly be Christians.
Now I certainly believe abortion is an extremely difficult issue. Does a woman have constitutional control over her own body, or does society have the moral responsibility to protect a child? When does conception truly become life? When does God breathe the breath of life into a child? Those are scientific, biblical, moral, and constitutional concerns. They should absolutely be discussed. Small groups should gather together, pray, study scripture, and wrestle with those questions honestly.
But what I struggle with is this: those difficult questions do not automatically make one person a Christian and another person not a Christian. Society, the courts, churches, and families have wrestled with this issue for decades. I do not believe that problem is solved by simply accusing someone of not being a Christian because they believe abortion should remain a constitutional right.
My point is this. I cannot find a lot of scripture out there that says you have the right to judge, convict, be mean, be cruel, say hurtful things, segregate a congregation, spread hatred, dissent, and just plain cruelty toward other people. I may have missed something in my search. I would be honored if someone would direct me toward the scripture that says those type of characteristics are exactly what the Lord would like you to stand on.
Pharisees were highly knowledgeable in Jewish law and scripture. Many were sincere religious leaders, but in the Gospel accounts Christ repeatedly criticized them for being outward without inward compassion, pride, hypocrisy, legalism, public displays of righteousness, and placing burdens on others while failing to show mercy.
As I've started writing these letters, each morning in prayer and each evening in prayer, now for four weeks I've prayed this prayer: May the scales fall off our eyes. May the Lord use me to simply point out scripture and calmly and rationally have conversation without being antagonistic, attacking, or saying mean, hurtful things. Sometimes that can be a difficult path.
How do I say that I feel someone is acting like the Pharisees when even that statement itself can sound antagonistic? I've tried to soften it as much as I can with a humorous story about honeybees and about the dance, but I can't just bury my head in the sand and not approach the factual aspect of it. And this is the factual part.
What I believe is that little switch has been triggered in our brains by the rallies and the subliminal advertisement that we've listened to now for decades, where some people truly believe that sacrificial deaths of children took place at the hands of Democratic leaders, yet not one piece of factual evidence has ever been presented, but in their hearts is buried that belief.
In their hearts, someone says they are right about everything, and they follow that. They have chosen to follow that path versus the path that I try to follow, and that is simply the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes.
Are you truly going to argue with me that this is not Christ's intent for us? Are you truly going to try and convince me that God does not want us to act with the kind of Beatitudes that He preached and died for? Are you going to tell me that He hung on the cross and said to one of the sinners hanging beside Him, “Today you will be with Me in paradise,” and yet somehow we now have the right to become judge and jury over another man's heart?
We have an obligation, as Christ taught us, to be compassionate, kind, and respectful toward each other. Anyone teaching division is wrong. Not that we should not be on guard, not that we should tolerate things we know we should not tolerate, but we cannot allow the waggle dance to become so powerful that it replaces the very Beatitudes Christ Himself taught us to live by.
The waggle dance continues to go on. Narratives coming from the White House and this administration continue on a daily basis, threatening both Democrats and Republicans, demanding that loyalty be given to one individual, the source of the waggle dance. Republicans who refuse to fall in line are labeled RINOs. Some are politically targeted, pushed aside, or publicly humiliated. The question is now openly being asked throughout society, “Can a Republican defy Donald Trump and survive?”
As we go back to our hives, it's forcing the hives to be separated, weakening the integrity of the United States, weakening the integrity of Christianity itself, causing radical division amongst ourselves.
How are we going to turn the circuit back on in our minds that lets us depend on the morality of the teachings of Christ, the Beatitudes? Please read those. Please pray about it. Please reach inside yourself and pull your heart out and examine it.
In the meantime, let's continue to pray for the President of the United States, for the leadership of this country, for their moral and civic obligation to stand up and say enough of the waggle dance. Let's restore the balance of harmony and let the hive of the United States of America go out and find the wonderful pollen that Christians have to offer and reunite our society and our country.
Let's stop the division that has taken place. Let's pray that the waggle dance no longer overrides our discernment and that we truly can use the discernment God has given us and demand that honest scales are used in every administration this country elects. Not persuasion, not division, not alternate truths, but leaders who desire absolute moral accountability and the use of true scales, like the Lord says when He tells us He detests dishonest scales.
Thank you for reading. Let's be in prayer.
— Rollin E. Trueblood, USMC (Ret.)