All thinking, godly men and women know that it is sinful to own another person and mistreat them for one’s own advantage. Yet I think that with God’s guidance a better solution could have been found than to purchase “freedom” with 700,000 souls.

1. Spielberg’s Lincoln was phenomenally well made, historically believable, and artistically magnificent. Daniel Day-Lewis did a superb job of playing Abraham Lincoln.

2. Sadly, we learn from this depiction of “Honest Abe” that, like many politicians, he brokered backroom deals and led with the philosophy “the ends justify the means,” resulting in our nation being governed by “whatever works is what’s right.” I hope no aspiring pastors and politicians were watching the movie to learn leadership skills. We have enough of that mess in all the wrong places already.

3. A note to the viewer that may be so counter-intuitive as to be overlooked: The film accurately portrays the politicians’ vitriol, rage, and interpersonal verbal abuse among themselves over the contested issues. However, please note that the South had already seceded and her representatives were not present in the bitter debates. Those arguing and spewing rancor in the film about the 13^th Amendment were the representatives of the remaining states.  Just sayin’ . . .

4. The film’s reductionist argument that the war was over slavery is tantamount to saying the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in recent times were over petroleum. The larger truth is that the Civil War had as much to do with states’ rights, the burgeoning heavy-handedness of big government, and economic unfairness in government policies.

5. Many citizens in both the North and South had slaves, and many in both the North and South knew that slavery was and is evil. A solution could have been found that would have cleansed our nation of the evil of slavery without the hatred, violence, economic devastation, and the hundreds of thousands of senseless deaths that ensued. The industrializing North, which was not as dependent on the enslaved work force as the Southern plantation economies, wanted to declare slavery outlawed—an admirable desire but one that would create another evil in its place. This declaration would impoverish the southern half of the country as well as the former slaves. What if instead the declaration had been: a.) Slavery is outlawed, b.) All freed slaves will be offered employment where they currently work until/if they find other work and desire to leave, and c.) Wages of said new employees will be provided by taxes paid by every citizen of the USA in a fair distribution of the burden until the evil of slavery is a faded memory. Some would say this is too naive, too Pollyanna, and perhaps too reductionist. Maybe. But so is saying that the war was purely over slavery. There were greater issues involved, and the politicians knew it. But history is written by the victors, and rewritten by the revisionists.

6. All thinking, godly men and women know that it is sinful to own another person and mistreat him or her for one’s own advantage. Yet I believe that with God’s guidance a better solution could have been found than to purchase “freedom” with 700,000 souls.

7. I love history, and the accurate depiction of a bygone era is fascinating to me. I grew up with an almost reverential opinion of Abraham Lincoln. I knew of his poor beginnings, his wife’s troubles on multiple counts, his personal grief, his homespun humor, his wisdom and brilliant mind. All of these things made him bigger than life to me. Nonetheless, seeing how he manipulated the 13th Amendment’s into passage felt a little like a punch in the gut. Doing the right thing the wrong way feels less than honorable. Although I am thankful that all Americans have their freedom, I pray that we will always strive to govern better than that, and to be better than we were. May those who would enslave innocent people, and politicians who lead through backroom deals to their own advantage, find that there is no room for their ilk in an honest, free America. May God bless America. O Lord, send awakening and revival, cleanse us of our past sins and teach us that only the Truth shall make us free.

David Sills serves as Associate Dean and Professor of Christian Missions at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary as well as President of Reaching and Teaching International Ministries. He hold degrees from Belhaven (BA); NOBTS (MDiv); and RTS (D.Miss, PhD).  This article was originally a Facebook post and is used with permission.