#spendingcuts

New Post has been published on http://belizeprayernetwork.com/2013/03/wisdom-for-us-budget-weight-loss-program/

Wisdom for US budget weight-loss program

NEWS UPDATE: The deadline to avoid the sequester has passed without an agreement between President Obama and Congress to avert it. Now $85 million worth of automatic spending cuts will start taking effect. The Obama administration has some discretion on the specifics of many of these spending cuts. It will be an rigorous exercise in frugality for a president who has been finding more ways to spend than to save, while the nation has seen its debt climb over $16 trillion. It is easy to talk about cuts in general, but difficult to apply cuts to specific programs, especially when the US will eventually need more than a trilllion dollars of extra spending cuts combined with revenue per year just to balance the budget. The US will have to learn to prioritize essentials, and do without more nonessentials. Stricter budgeting can be a healthy exercise for a bloated government that risks a heart attack if it doesn’t lose a great deal of weight. But the weight loss itself can be deadly. The enemies of the US are glad that half of the cuts will hit the military, and they will attempt to take advantage of any new weaknesses and vulnerabilities. This is a time to pray for unusual wisdom, discernment and grace that only God can give.

A TIME TO PRAY: Father God, we come to You as our Creator and Provider, knowing that You love to answer prayers according to Your will. We know that many sins have brought the US into financial straits, but You are a forgiving God who always provides a way out. We come to You not asking for riches but, as Solomon did, for wisdom and discernment to make right judgments on where to apply the needed spending cuts. You answered his prayer abundantly. You even promised to give him what he did not ask, but what You knew he and his nation needed. You alone know what the US must do, and You alone know just what it really needs. So we submit the nation to You, who have established its authorities, that You will give them the wisdom they need. When they decide wrongly, we ask that You override their decisions, not only for the sake of US population of 313 million, but for the many nations in the world who are tied to the US economy. The majority of missionaries and funding for missionaries originates in the US. For the sake of Your Great Commission too, have mercy on the US. At the same time show the paths of righteousness that the US must follow in order to be restored to Your good graces. and to be a much greater blessing to the world. In Jesus’ name, amen.

A time to pray, spending cuts, sequester

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-04/automatic-spending-cuts-start-with-few-initial-effects.html

From the NY Times a few months ago:

Support for spending cuts runs strong in Chisago, where anger at the government helped fuel Mr. Cravaack’s upset victory in 2010 over James L. Oberstar, the Democrat who had represented northeast Minnesota for 36 years.

“Spending like this is simply unsustainable, and it’s time to cut up Washington, D.C.’s credit card,” Mr. Cravaack said in a February speech to the Hibbing Area Chamber of Commerce. “It may hurt now, but it will be absolutely deadly for the next generation — that’s our children and our grandchildren.”

But the reality of life here is that Mr. Gulbranson and many of his neighbors continue to take as much help from the government as they can get. When pressed to choose between paying more and taking less, many people interviewed here hemmed and hawed and said they could not decide. Some were reduced to tears. It is much easier to promise future restraint than to deny present needs.

“How do you tell someone that you deserve to have heart surgery and you can’t?” Mr. Gulbranson said.

He paused.

“You have to help and have compassion as a people, because otherwise you have no society, but financially you can’t destroy yourself. And that is what we’re doing.”

He paused again, unable to resolve the dilemma.