If you’ve learned a lot more about American history and politics than you ever wanted to know in the past few years, you may be experiencing the Red Bill Blues.
The emotional symptoms include feeling violated or betrayed, feeling stupid or gullible, feeling slightly or very guilty, feeling confused, trouble being happy, vacillating between wishing you didn’t know the truth and wanting to know more, and feeling angry.
The physical symptoms include sighing a lot, grinding your teeth, insomnia or sleeping more, overeating, craving sugar, bouts of staring into space, and a perpetual frown. Other symptoms not listed may occur.
What is the cure for finding out that you have been lied to all your life about the true history of the glorious land of freedom and opportunity and discovering that the American Dream is not for everyone, racism really is still happening, and that many awful things were done in the far and near past to create the easy life that many of us enjoy?
The cure is NOT rioting, hating, cancelling, killing, or becoming a Communist.
The cure is following Jesus. What? You’re already doing that? Are you sure? I thought I was, too. I’m not trying to point out your flaws, just saying that you might need to reassess a few things, like I did.
If you go back and read the Bible again, you might find that some of the church sermons you heard all your life were actually specifically crafted to support the goal of keeping Christians from following Jesus and keep them supporting the world system.
The church, as a whole, not every single preacher, has been co-opted by the devil to keep the powerful in power. This is nothing new. Kings and Emperors throughout history, and tribal leaders, have used religious devotion to control the people and send the people into wars.
So what is a Christian to do? How do we follow Jesus the right way? The answers are in the parts of the Bible that people love to skip over or take lightly, such as the parts about seeking first the Kingdom of God, praying for God’s will to be done, and suffering like Christ.
A Prescription for the Red Pill Blues
First, pray and ask God to reveal to you if your church is preaching and living out the Bible’s teachings. Pay attention to the sermons and Sunday School lessons. Does the message point you to following Jesus or something else? What is their definition of following Jesus? Does it match up with the Word?
Second, read your Bible again. I suggest the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), Romans, Acts, John, and Revelation, to start. Use an app and click on the verse references and read the Old Testament verses that apply.
Last, study 1 Peter and think about how different your life would look if you lived this way. Then, as you think about all the bad stuff going on in the world, you can remember that this is not your home and that your King is coming! Then, start to live this way, even though you know the truth, especially because you know the truth! People need the gospel more than anything money can buy or wars can win!
Yes, the cure for the Red Pill Blues, is the red blood of Jesus that was shed for us and for the sins that were committed in our nation in the name of conquest, greed, and colonization.
When we turn our eyes upon Jesus, all these things will pale in comparison to the greatness of knowing Him and the glorious future that awaits us in the Kingdom! God doesn’t want us to keep our heads in the sand or look away from injustice.
But he also doesn’t want us to seek help from ungodly leaders and philosophies such as social justice and socialism and Marxism. Those paths lead to a different type of evil, namely self-righteousness and judgmentalism.
The American church can go back to it’s former love and repent of her evil deeds. The American church can join the world in caring for the poor and lost and condemned. But only if we are not afraid of being persecuted. We must leave behind entertainment, comfort, and worldliness and choose the joy of knowing and serving God.
Only by seeking God’s will, not our own, can we be free from the blues caused by knowing good and evil.
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, 5 who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Peter%201&version=NIV
Thoughts? Have you been red-pilled? Did it cause you distress? How are you doing now? Maybe you have known the truth for a long time. Has anything changed in the past few years for you?
https://anchor.fm/blueskiesandgreenpastures/episodes/A-Cure-for-the-Red-Pill-Blues-S2-E4-e1d7gbr
Blue Skies and Green Pastures 
I have been reading through the Bible with our daughter for homeschooling (started last year, finishing this year). I can’t say I had a discipline of reading Scripture every day before this, but it really does have a transformative effect on the way you think and feel. We are still in the Old Testament, but that is useful for developing an eternal perspective as one civilization cracks up and new ones form, over and over and over again. The only continuity is for the people who have decided that they belong to the City of God and not some government (and certainly not any specific political personality). In fact, God routinely punishes the people who put these concerns before Him – and it’s not difficult to see that’s part of our anxiety in the present moment.
I think a lot of people would benefit from taking your advice here. When you get worked up about politics or current events, turn of the TV, pick up the Bible, and re-center your mind. And consider the possibility that if bad things are happening to your “side,” it’s possibly because you believe things that are not true and are being manipulated. Maybe you are getting a divine education without realizing it.
Bible study really can change your life and perspective if we are willing to accept it as truth .
The “true history” of our country is not BLM’s or CRT’s views, of course. Even in grade school waaay back in prehistoric days, after saying The Pledge of Allegiance and The Lord’s Prayer in school (yes, those were actually allowed and encouraged back then!!) we would get lessons that told about the good, the bad and the ugly that went into the founding of our country. We were encouraged to love our country, God and our families.
Granted, many have taken this to assume they are “christian” because they were brought up in “christian America.” Our former pastor used to say the problem with getting Kentuckians saved it that you first have to get them lost.
As for reading the Bible, a very dear friend started reading it daily with another friend over the phone, and Anita and I noticed a distinctive change in attitude and grace in this woman’s life… just from reading the Bible. It is like the old story about running water through a sieve. Not a lot of water retained but the sieve was definitely cleaner after.
Anita and I started a new Bible-reading project this year: we are reading The Complete Jewish Bible at a pace of about four to five chapters per night, reading by “chunks,” or stories rather than by arbitrary chapter assignments. Interesting to get a fuller overview of each story, especially from a Hebrew perspective. After all, our Master is a Jew.
love and prayers,
c.a.
Just to clarify, I love America and all she stands for, and I believe we have much to be thankful for and that it’s the best country in the world . The bad actors are the minority, but they have so much money and influence that they have been able to hold back what could have been even more freedom and opportunity for all. But , thanks be to God, the prayers and petitions of the people are heard by Him and there’s still hope if we do not comply with tyranny.
I knew you from your other blogs, Paula, that you love our nation.
Unfortunately, the number of “bad actors” has increased dramatically ever since FDR instituted socialism under the guise of Social Security.
Like any exponential curve, it started out very slowly but has picked up speed as more people than ever want the government to pay them for living. 😔
So sad; pray for the nation.