Wow.  Wow.  Wow.  After watching Governor Sarah Palin’s speech last night, it was obvious that John McCain has picked not only a woman with exceptional leadership qualities, but also one who possesses a natural gift for oratory, as does her opponent, Barack Obama.  Even the liberal-leaning pundits were taken by surprise with her powerful speech, calling it a “slam dunk.”  Chris Wallace even said that ‘a star was born’ and that Palin has won the hearts of the GOP.

But then Obama’s campaign released a statement noting that Palin did not write her own speech…as if that was supposed to sway anyone?  Speechwriters are paid to write speeches for candidates.  Obama has a speechwriter, but I didn’t hear anyone use that fact against him after his big speech last week.

Do you hear it?  That rumbling sound is the sound of politics being shaken to its core.  Palin is a breath of fresh air, a great leader, an excellent communicator who can help John McCain lead this country in the right direction.  Perhaps my favorite reads today have been those who are now calling her “Reagan in a skirt.”  I am looking forward to hearing her speak off the cuff.

What, exactly, is the Palin Effect?  I believe it is the sound of the prayers of warriors throughout our country who have praying for our leaders, who have seen the upside down moral “values” held by those who wish to make our government bigger and our pocketbooks smaller.  It is the sound of families of special needs children cheering because finally, in Palin, they have an advocate.  It is the sound of the middle class hockey mom cheering because finally a REAL person with a servant’s heart is working for her.

Palin calls a spade a spade.  She was not afraid to come out and speak the truth about her opponent:

… I was mayor of my hometown. And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involved.  I guess — I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities.

I might add that, in small towns, we don’t quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they’re listening and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren’t listening.  No, we tend to prefer candidates who don’t talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.

Here’s another stark look at the truth about Obama:

But listening to him speak, it’s easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or even a reform, not even in the State Senate. This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting and never use the word “victory,” except when he’s talking about his own campaign. But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed, when the roar of the crowd fades away, when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot…

… when that happens, what exactly is our opponent’s plan? What does he actually seek to accomplish after he’s done turning back the waters and healing the planet?

For those of us who want to know a little more about Palin and what she believes, there are glimmers of hope.  In a headline that probably tried to turn people “off” about her, the Dallas Morning News states:

VP pick sees creator in everything from Iraq war to gas pipeline

In the article, we learn that Palin spoke to ministry students at her church and asked them to pray for a plan to build a $30 billion natural gas pipeline in the state.  The media seems to ridicule those who pray, but guess what?  The prayers of Palin and those students allowed her to do in two years what had stalled out for twenty years!   In regards to Iraq and the war, she said

That’s what we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that plan is God’s plan.

Wow!  A leader who openly prays for guidance, who understands that a path may seem right to a man but is not right in God’s eyes.  Palin seems to understand that the Lord brings wisdom.

There has  been so much division between our two major political parties that progress is stagnant.  Rather than putting our country first, we seem to be spinning our wheels while out of control spending goes through the roof, people have to choose between paying for electricity or paying for food, we’re sending our dollars overseas to countries that don’t like us very much…the Democrats blame the Republicans for the trouble our country is in, when the truth is Republican and Democratic leaders are ALL to blame.  There’s enough bad stuff to go around.  It’s time to take responsibility, roll up our shirtsleeves, and get some real work done.  As Palin said,

Our opponents say again and again that drilling will not solve all of America’s energy problems, as if we didn’t know that already.  But the fact that drilling, though, won’t solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.

Starting in January, in a McCain-Palin administration, we’re going to lay more pipelines, and build more nuclear plants, and create jobs with clean coal, and move forward on solar, wind, geothermal, and other alternative sources. We need…

We need American sources of resources. We need American energy brought to you by American ingenuity and produced by American workers.

We may have come upon a modern-day Esther in Governor Palin.  Although we are a nation of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Agnostics, Athiests, Darwinists, Humanists, and others — the Lord loves all His creation.  Perhaps, just perhaps, the selection of Palin for VP is just one thread in the tapestry He has chosen to be woven in our lives:

From Esther 4:
All the king’s officials and the people of the royal provinces know that for any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned the king has but one law: that he be put to death. The only exception to this is for the king to extend the gold scepter to him and spare his life. But thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king.”

When Esther’s words were reported to Mordecai, he sent back this answer: “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?”

Who knows?  God does!