“Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.” George Washington
Category: Government
America and Believers Go From Selfless to Selfish! (Part 3)
Personal Responsibility
Judeo-Christian tradition insists on personal responsibility, meaning that each individual is responsible for the consequences of both selfless and selfish behaviors. Each individual will enjoy the benefits of selfless behaviors and live with the extended pain of the selfish behaviors, without external intervention.
Secular Humanism minimizes personal responsibility and readily accepts claims shifting the blame to others. Government programs, euphemistically called ‘entitlement programs,’ often pay for and therefore reward the consequences of sin. Examples include the vast bureaucracies designed to support divorce, government-financed abortion, child care, and alternative lifestyles. The table compares the ultimate outcomes of both lifestyles. In effect, the government is saying we are entitled to sin.
|
Selfless Living Assures |
Selfish Living Breaks Down |
|
Bullet proof marriage |
Marriage |
|
Cohesive family |
Family |
| Sustainable culture |
Culture |
|
National Stability to Posterity |
Nation |
Sin hides in the darkness; love thrives in the light. Sin and love always have opposing consequences that ripple through the third and fourth generation. Selfish behavior puts career first. Selfless behavior puts family first.
To fully understand the benefits of selfless living contrasted with the ultimate pain of selfish living, we must understand the enormity of the gap between good and evil; God and Satan; and love and sin. Compare sinfulness and godliness.
Sinfulness
Sinfulness is a mindset predisposed to sin and satisfying the needs and desires of self. Sin is natural and reinforced by modern culture. Sin is driven by pride, always selfish and at the expense of others, typically many others. Sinfulness leads to the addictive use of technology, sex without marriage, cohabitation, abortion, giving up a child for adoption, premature use of a nursing home, divorce, adultery, illegal drugs, gambling, pornography, gay/lesbian couple adoption, excessive materialism, time/money devoted to self-indulgence, and the avoidance of marriage and children.
Abortion is a crime against God and the unborn baby; it is not birth control
Sin blocks or destroys a person’s desire to share faith with others; Love magnifies (amplifies) the desire to share faith. Love simply overflows from the selfless believer.
Godliness
Judeo-Christian godliness is a mindset predisposed to love and satisfying the needs and desires of others. Due to inborn pride, godliness is unnatural. It usually grows slowly and can only be protected and reinforced by surrounding oneself with likeminded believers. God never intended the believer to stand alone.
One cannot live for God, family, and others apart from the enabling power of the Holy Spirit, especially in today’s “everybody’s doing it” culture. Believers must be surrounded by faithful people who do not engage in the self-centered lifestyle. Standing alone against powerful Humanistic cultural pressure, constantly amplified by the news and advertising media, commercial entertainment, politicians, and academia, is a bit like spitting into an oncoming tsunami.
God blesses the life of those who wait and their descendants through the third and fourth generations with:
- Fullness of marriage
- Devotion of children
- Comfort of lasting love
- Certainty of faithfulness
- Less stress
- Less anxiety
Compare God’s many blessings with the modern predisposition to sacrifice marriage, by avoidance or divorce, and sacrifice children, by not having them or by allowing them to be raised by strangers. How many of the selfish behaviors have you personally experienced? How many have you actively or tacitly endorsed among your friends (HINT: Silence is an endorsement.)?
Has the comfort of other compromisers scarred your conscience or is there still room for the piercing conviction of God’s Word? The transformation to a true Judeo-Christian culture can only happen one person at a time. It begins with YOU. You MUST take a stand, supported by other believers, rather than compromise and seek the support of other compromisers. Spread God’s love every waking moment and vote for candidates of strong character.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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Politics and Religion are Inescapably Linked
Have you ever heard someone say, “I never talk about politics or religion?” Good heavens, why not? Those two define who you are, what you think, choices you make and how you act. If those discussions are off limits, what is left to talk about—the weather, sports scores, latest fashions, and what’s for dinner? How boring is that?
The self-imposed boundary is particularly egregious for Judeo-Christian believers. “I never talk about politics or religion” is something a Judeo-Christian believer must never say. It is a betrayal of God, faith, and other believers. Capitulation to political correctness—which always sugar coats the poison pill of sin—substantially interferes with the believer’s relationship and obligations to God. Political correctness is simply the Humanist’s tool designed to shut down the Judeo-Christian worldview. Consider God’s commands in Deuteronomy:
Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds…Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the door frames of our houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many… [Deuteronomy 11:18-21 NIV]
We are commanded by God to talk about scripture virtually all the time, teach it to our children, and advertise it outside our home. It is not possible for a believer to be completely saturated with God’s words and His love, without that love spilling out in every area of life. Just to make sure, God warns anyone suppressing His love, because of political correctness. “Be careful, or you will be enticed to turn away and worship other gods and bow down to them. Then the Lord’s anger will burn against you…and you will soon perish from the good land the Lord is giving you.” [Deuteronomy 11: 16-17 NIV]
To have an impact on our surrounding culture, we must be able to freely, enthusiastically, and lovingly discuss politics and religion. When political correctness silences the Judeo-Christian worldview, the Humanist worldview aggressively fills the vacuum with little opposition or hindrance.
Politics is an expression of religion which is an outgrowth of our worldview. All political issues have spiritual roots. Our religious and political views emerge from one of just two worldviews that are an earthly manifestation of the eternal battle between good and evil, God and Satan.
Consider the graphic. It qualitatively displays the conservative to liberal religious spectrum horizontally and the conservative to liberal political spectrum vertically. Conservative religion and conservative politics at the lower left visually exhibit the Judeo-Christian worldview. Why? Because the believer relies on God (not government). Government is sharply restrained by the U.S. Constitution. It is the only worldview that assures a sustainable American culture, where the family reigns supreme, God-given freedom is treasured, and the passions of men are voluntarily restrained by their faith in God.
In contrast, Humanist religion and liberal politics at the upper right visually display the ultimate Humanist worldview that God does not exist. Man has declared himself to be his own god. The Humanist relies on government (not God). Growth of government is largely unrestrained, because of the belief that the “best and brightest,” whoever they are, should be vested with whatever authority and resources are necessary for them to make decisions for the rest of us.
The elite decision-makers are convinced that the rest of us are not capable of making basic life decisions. The Humanist road is a pathway to cancerous government growth, eventual self-destruction, and chaos. The family is optional and has a structure that defies definition. Freedom arises from the grace of government and is strategically dribbled out as a means of controlling the people.
Occasionally, a Humanist with a liberal mindset, perhaps cultivated in a liberal church or by childhood memories of religious training will remind the rest of us that scripture tells us to feed the poor, clothe the naked, care for the sick, and visit those in prison. However, those admonitions were directed at individuals and small groups that later became known as churches. When the government coopts those important tasks, its actions are both inefficient and deficient.
When the government does anything, it is financially inefficient (read wasteful) and an inefficient use of the labor of the employees. More importantly, government actions are emotionally and spiritually deficient. For example, the concept of mercy is elegantly explained by Portia during her famous courtroom speech in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice:
The quality of mercy is not strain’d;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice bless’d;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes:
‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes’
The thronéd monarch better than his crown;
His scepter shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptered sway;
It is enthronéd in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice.
Portia proclaims that the “quality of mercy…is twice bless’d; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes” and is “above this sceptered sway” (above government). Finally, “It is an attribute to God himself.”
When God directly instructs us in scripture to feed the poor, clothe the naked, care for the sick, and visit those in prison each effort is intended to bless the beneficent as well as those who benefit. When the government undertakes the same activities, the people and churches are robbed of the blessings and character building opportunities that result from giving. (Personal note: I’ve never been blessed by paying taxes.).
Most schools, including Ivy League universities, were started by churches to enable people to read the Bible for themselves and build strong character. The early Ivy League universities were established to prepare young men for the ministry. Most hospitals were created by the churches. Later, the schools and health care were commandeered by the government, with honorable intentions and still later commanded by the government with less than honorable intentions.
When people claim to hold conservative religious views and liberal political views or vice versa, their faith has been compromised to accept and support some degree of Humanism. The claim to be a “moderate” is even worse.
I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were either one or the other. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. You say, “I am rich, I have acquired wealth, and do not need a thing. But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked… [Revelation 3:15-17 NIV]
Now that you understand, take a stand—for the Lord. Express your religious and political views whenever they naturally arise in conversation. Along the way, be sure to live a life that others will envy, because of your strength of character, love, and calm assurance that God still has everything under control. That way your views will be respected even if not agreed upon.
Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander. It is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil. [1 Peter 3:15-17 NIV]
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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Pastors and Politics
“I’m being accused of being controversial and political. I’m not political. But moral issues that become political, I still fight. It isn’t my fault that they’ve made these moral issues political. But because they have doesn’t stop the preachers of the Gospel from addressing them…”
“What then is wrong? I say the problem, first of all, is in the pulpits of America. We preachers must take the blame. For too long we have fearfully stood back and failed to address the issues that are corrupting the republic. I repeat Proverbs 14:34: ‘Righteousness exalteth a nation.’ Not military might, though that’s important. Not financial resources, though that has been the enjoyment of this nation above all nations in the last 200 years. But spiritual power is the backbone, the strength, of a nation.”
Rev. Jerry Falwell
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America Unmoored from Three Vital Anchors (Part 2)
Before 1960, there was a comprehensive set of laws in each state prohibiting nearly everything identified in the Bible as sin, i.e. doing something my way instead of God’s way. Why? Until that time, the American culture rested on the three rock-solid anchors, 1) the Bible (spiritual), 2) the Declaration of Independence/U.S. Constitution combination (physical/intellectual), and 3) the God-created, God-designed virtually impregnable family (emotional). The interactions among people and groups aligned with those anchors assured cohesive families and a culture that would be sustained in perpetuity.
However, long before 1960 forces began to grow and gather in a way that would create unprecedented pressures for Judeo-Christian tradition and the American culture. All three anchors would be attacked. Charles Darwin published, The Origin of the Species By Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life, in 1859. It became known as the theory of evolution, purporting that all life forms evolved by chance over extremely long periods of time. Darwin’s theory appeared to give scientific sanction to a concept that had been around for a very long time. Although it has been shown by Dr. Lloyd Stebbins and many others that evolution in its purist form is not possible, the theory of evolution became the basis for some to claim that God does not exist. The first anchor, the Bible, came quickly under attack. The theory of evolution has since become embedded throughout America’s public school systems. It is taught as factual, despite abundant flaws.
The relentless attacks on Judeo-Christian tradition were just the beginning. It was later suggested that if all life formed by an evolutionary process, then other realms of civilizational development should also be amenable to long, slow evolutionary changes.
The Founders intended and declared the Constitution to be a firm anchor-like foundational document for the American culture. They knew that although societies change over time, the self-centered essence of human nature does not change. John Adams proclaimed, “We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” [emphasis added]
If the “passions of men” were not voluntarily restrained and reigned-in by law and by Scripture, the Great American Experiment in self-government would fail. Yet, in modern times there has been a powerful movement claiming that the Constitution must be flexible and keep up with or evolve with the times. Hence, the second anchor has been subjected to ruthless attack.
The widely acclaimed, but fraudulent, Dr. Alfred Kinsey falsely claimed that the sexual and moral behavior of Americans was nowhere near the conservative Biblical beliefs that prevailed at the time. His misguided work projected an image of a coast to coast orgy. As an aggressive atheist, Kinsey’s personal mission was to destroy all the Biblical limits on sexual behavior. In his mind, morals had to evolve. His close friends in the legal profession were persuaded that the laws had to evolve to more closely match the supposed real behaviors of American society. Since then, thousands of laws prohibiting immoral behavior have been repealed.
Similarly, the family had to evolve (or devolve?) accordingly. The definition of “family” has been re-defined and diluted to the point of near non-existence. A wave of no-fault divorce laws swept the country in the 1970s and 1980s, fracturing the concept of personal responsibility and guaranteeing record high divorce rates. The United States is among the few countries with the highest divorce rates in the world. The third anchor has been unmercifully attacked.
The stability of the family and sustainability of the American culture exist to the extent that we tenaciously hang on to all three anchors. Humanism attacks and undermines all three, setting adrift the ship of life, which will eventually be caught in the vortex of a perfect storm and sink. A culture without direction and purpose collapses. “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” [Proverbs 29:18 KJV]
What has been the impact on the American culture? Are believers to blame? Watch for the next blog.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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If Truth Be Not Diffused, Error Will Be
“If religious books are not widely circulated among the masses in this country, I do not know what is going to become of us as a nation. If truth be not diffused, error well be: If God and His Word are not known and received, the devil and his works will gain the ascendancy; If the evangelical volume does not reach every hamlet, the pages of a corrupt and licentious literature will; If the power of the Gospel is not felt throughout the length and breadth of the land, anarchy and misrule, degradation and misery, corruption and darkness will reign without mitigation or end.”
Senator Daniel Webster
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Christians Overdosing on Apathy!
The opposite of love is not hate,
it’s indifference.
The opposite of art (beauty) is not ugliness,
it’s indifference.
The opposite of faith is not heresy,
it’s indifference. And
The opposite of life is not death, but
indifference between life and death.
Elie Wiesel-Romanian-born journalist-author and Holocaust survivor.
America is spiraling down into the abyss of chaos. The body of believers has been overcome and remains paralyzed by indifference—a case of terminal apathy, an astonishing lack of concern. Elie Wiesel’s profound observation should be flashing in neon from every lamppost, on the bumper of every car, crackling through hundreds of cable TV channels, and splashed in banners across cyberspace.
Years ago, Dr. Francis Schaeffer proclaimed that the American culture, including (or perhaps especially) the culture of Judeo-Christian believers, has devolved into the two impoverished values of “personal peace and affluence.” A typical believer, sucked into the backdraft of the secular drift away from God, lives a life message that essentially says, “Don’t bother me while I devote my life to accumulating more and more stuff!”
Such a view, displayed more by actions than words, displaces all the wonderful Biblical values that give life the richness and security that God intended. It is the direct result of the distorted, corrupt, and spiritually bankrupt objective of materialism, combined with physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual laziness. Rampant indifference deprives life of real love, beauty, faith, and the fullness of life.
Speaking recently at a Heritage Foundation panel in Washington, DC, Timothy Samuel Shah (Associate Director, Religious Freedom Project at Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs) pleaded, “Where are the spontaneous grassroots campaigns? I don’t see them. If one-tenth of one percent of Christians in America were really outraged and mobilized we would see political action across the board.” Although his remarks were directed toward the plight of severely persecuted Christians in the Middle East they could and should equally apply to any controversy that involves a culture-busting view contrary to God’s Word, e.g. abortion, same-sex “marriage,” dilution and redefinition of the family, removing all vestiges of Judeo-Christian tradition from public view and discourse, crucial end-of-life decisions and more.
As we near the end of 2015, what does God think of humanity, His greatest creation? What will YOU say on that day when you face God and He asks, “Why did you abandon My call to be the ‘salt of the earth, the light of the world, and my ambassador’ to join the army of the indifferent?” Indifference supports the enemy at God’s expense. Consider:
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.” [2 Corinthians 5:10 ESV] “Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God?” [Romans 2:1 & 3 ESV] “You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” [James 4:4 ESV]
The power and inevitability of God’s judgment appears to be largely lost on the Judeo-Christian culture in 2015. But God does not leave us naked. We can and must understand at a soul-deep level that, “…we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” [Ephesians 6:12 ESV] When we clearly understand the spiritual nature of every battle, we can,
“…put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the
belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the
breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the
shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the
helmet of salvation and the
sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” [Ephesians 6:13-17 KJV]
When we are fully prepared, we can respond to Isaiah’s question, “Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?” [Isaiah 58:7 NIV]
However, when the government interferes with our God-given mission, Peter and the other apostles proclaim, “We must obey God rather than men! [Acts 6:29 NIV] Jesus Himself said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” [Mark 12:17 KJV]
The sanctity of life, sanctity of marriage, and the sanctity of the God-designed family ALL belong to God, not to Caesar. Freedom comes from God not from the government as do all the freedoms enshrined in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. As God’s earthly representatives, we must be willing to take a stand!
What do YOU think? What are YOU personally willing to do with respect to even one of the issues raised in the preceding discussion?
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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Americans Have Bought Into the Big Lie!
Editorial note: This writing began with another topic in mind. But the concept of the separation of church and state recurred so relentlessly that it could not be ignored. Perhaps it was the Lord’s prompting. You decide. Initially, I resisted, confident that I had a good understanding of the matter and it had already been talked to death by many others. Nevertheless, an abundance of fresh new material emerged during the writing. It became increasingly clear that the secular distortion of the separation of church and state has had profound and tragic consequence on America and even worse consequence on the body of believers. Read on. You’ll see why.
“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.” Who said it? If you thought, Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Germany’s Minister of Enlightenment and Propaganda, not quite. The quote was first spoken by Vladimir Lenin, Father of Communism. But Goebbels developed it into a highly specialized art form:
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
We tend to associate such thinking with totalitarianism. But does it happen in the United States? You bet it does! Often! Consider, for example, a perverted interpretation of the “separation of church and state.” Throughout recent generations, the lie has been repeated endlessly in court proceedings, by politicians, the media, and throughout the entire educational system.. Believers routinely parrot the secular politically correct interpretation of Thomas Jefferson’s metaphor
The separation of church and state lie has weakened America’s faith and opened the door for all manner of evil. Private immorality is possible only after compromising God’s Word. Private immorality leads to public immorality a breakdown of trust, and an erosion of integrity, which incite all other forms of wrongdoing. Civilization first decays then collapses, slowly at first, then becoming a virtual free fall. The free fall America is currently experiencing cannot last long. Unless there is direct action by believers accompanied by a spiritual awakening, oblivion is at America’s doorstep.
What happened? It is generally well known that the phrase, “wall of separation between church and state,” is not in the U. S. Constitution. President Thomas Jefferson coined the phrase in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in the State of Connecticut. To establish context, the full letter provides:
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man& his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State
Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.
“I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association assurances of my high respect & esteem.”
Thomas Jefferson Jan.1.1802
The faith held by the Founders, including Thomas Jefferson, has been widely documented and is beyond any serious dispute. Collectively, the Founders feared the European religious persecution, from which the early settlers fled.
The persecution emerged each time a European government adopted an official religion for a country and named the king as the head of that religion. It was a recipe for the abuse of anyone differing from the king’s interpretation of any religious matter. In Biblical times, kings often deferred to the prophet of the day, a kind of separation of church and state. But in 17-19th Century Europe, kings had no accountability. There was no check on the worst of human nature.
The Founders were determined to prevent a recurrence of the European abuses. They wanted a written guarantee that all citizens would be free to worship God in the manner of their choice, without any government interference or restrictions. It was never anticipated that the government would abandon any form of religious expression or recognition or aggressively prevent such recognition in public places.
The Founders fully and clearly intended that the government would routinely participate in non-denominational religious observances. To that end, they adopted the First Amendment to the Constitution, declaring that their legislature (U.S. Congress only) should “make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The amendment was clearly intended to protect individual freedom. It was never intended to ban religion from the public square.
Secular groups, particularly atheistic organizations have attempted to paint Thomas Jefferson as an atheist. Such claims are clearly antagonistic to the readily available public record. He was part of a three-man committee assigned to create a seal for the fledgling nation. Jefferson proposed an image of the children of Israel in the wilderness, led by a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night.
Generally, it’s best to let historical figures, such as Jefferson speak for themselves. Consider this selection of quotes:
“God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the Gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that His justice cannot sleep forever.”
Thomas Jefferson, 1781
Query XVIII, Notes on the State of Virginia.
“No power over the freedom of religion…[is] delegated to the United States by the Constitution.”
Thomas Jefferson, 1798
Kentucky Resolution
“I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
Thomas Jefferson, September 23, 1800
Letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush
“And let us reflect that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions…”
Thomas Jefferson, 1801
First Inaugural Address
“The Christian Religion, when divested of the rags in which the [the clergy] have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity of its benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind.”
Thomas Jefferson, March 23, 1801
Letter to Moses Robinson
“The Northwest Ordinance—Article III Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall be forever encouraged.”
Thomas Jefferson, signer, April 30, 1802
“My views…are the result of a life on inquiry and reflection and very different from the anti-Christian system imputed to me by those who know nothing of my opinions. To the corruptions of Christianity I am, indeed, opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian in the only sense in which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others…”
Thomas Jefferson, April 21, 1803
Letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush
“I consider the doctrines of Jesus as delivered by himself to contain the outlines of the sublimest system of morality that has ever been taught but I hold in the most profound detestation and execration the corruptions of it which have been invented…”
Thomas Jefferson, June 17, 1804
Letter to Henry Fry
The inescapable conclusion is that Thomas Jefferson’s life was driven by his faith in God and his persistent efforts to grow in godly character as expressed in the life of Jesus.
In 1840, U. S. Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story clarified the roll of the Constitution’s First Amendment:
“We are not to attribute this prohibition of a national religion establishment [in the First Amendment] to an indifference to religion in general, and especially to Christianity (which none could hold in more reverence than the framers of the Constitution)…at the time of adoption of the Constitution, the [prevailing] sentiment was, that Christianity ought to receive encouragement from the State so far as was not incompatible with the private rights of conscience and the freedom of religious worship. Any attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of state policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have created universal disapprobation, if not universal indignation.”
Joseph Story, Justice-U.S. Supreme Court
Abstracted from “A Familiar Exposition of the Constitution of the United States”
In 1892, U. S. Supreme Court Justice Josiah Brewer bolstered the argument:
“No purpose of action against religion can be imputed to any legislation, state or national, because this is a religious people.”
Josiah Brewer, Justice-U.S. Supreme Court
Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States,
143 US 457-458, 465-471, 36 L ed 226
However, a major symbolic and substantive change occurred, when the U.S. Supreme court rendered a decision in Everson v. Board of Education (1947). According to Dr. Scott Lively, (attorney, pastor and human-rights consultant) “That was the case that adopted Jefferson’s “separation of church and state” metaphor as a justification for declaring all religions to be equal with Christianity in America, and equally subservient to secular humanist authority… It intentionally and officially dethroned the God of the Bible after more than 300 years of His being acknowledged as Lord over this nation.” The clear understanding of the separation of church and state concept was consistently reinforced by the U. S. Supreme Court and many others for 147 years. With the stroke of a pen in 1947, The Supreme Court stood the concept on its head.
A new secular concept of separation of church and state was established that was exactly the opposite of the original. The government’s unbiased participation in and support of religious observances and an ironclad guarantee of freedom of religion has been replaced by a virtual ban on public religious expression, especially by government employees, anyone using government property for private functions, or any group receiving government funds.
Since the 1947 decision, the secular version of separation of church and state has become embedded in the public school systems, proclaimed by the media, and repeatedly reinforced by the Supreme Court. The government has increasingly run roughshod over religious institutions. Religion, especially, Judeo-Christian tradition has become increasingly ridiculed and denied access to the public square. The government has made every conceivable effort to isolate believers, as well as their spiritual thoughts and actions to within the four walls of their homes and places of worship.
However, some Supreme Court justices did not agree with their 1947 colleagues. In 1962, Justice Potter Stewart lamented that jurisprudence was not “aided by the uncritical invocation of metaphors like the ‘wall of separation,’ a phrase nowhere to be found in the Constitution.”
In 1985, Chief Justice Warren Burger declared:
“The Constitution does not require a complete separation of church and state. It affirmatively mandates accommodation, not merely tolerance, of all religions and forbids hostility towards any.”
Warren Burger, Chief Justice-U.S. Supreme Court,
Lynch v Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668, 669-670 (1985)
That same year, Chief Justice William Rehnquist observed:
“The establishment clause had been expressly freighted with Jefferson’s misleading metaphor for nearly forty years…There is simply no historical foundation for the proposition that the framers intended to build a wall of separation [between church and state]…the recent court decisions are in no way based on either the language or intent of the framers.”
William Rehnquist, Chief Justice-U.S. Supreme Court
Wallace v. Jafree, 472 US 38, 99
By far, the most serious threat to freedom of religion is the body of believers. They have largely bought the big lie. From casual conversations to the university classroom, believers are routinely heard advocating and proclaiming the secular concept of separation of church and state. Most are unaware of what they are doing, because the lie sounds so plausible and has been endlessly repeated since their earliest childhood, while the clergy has been virtually silent and often mislead themselves.
Believers are called by Scripture to be the light of the world, the salt of the earth, and ambassadors for Jesus. They can be none of these, when they have become so intimidated by political correctness that they are terrified of saying “Merry Christmas,” during the holiday season—a phrase that roughly means “I love you,” regardless of anyone’s personal religious views.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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The Thanksgiving Miracle of Five Kernels of Corn!
Most of us learned about Thanksgiving in school. You know the drill. In 1620, the Pilgrims crossed the ocean blue and experienced a devastatingly harsh winter along the Massachusetts coast. About half of them perished. Spring finally arrived and a friendly Indian named Squanto helped the Pilgrims learn how to obtain food by stomping eels out of the mud and fertilizing corn with dead fish. The following fall, they celebrated an abundant harvest with a feast that became known as the first Thanksgiving. But there is more, much more. The string of miracles is nearly endless:
- Many years before, the Separatists, later known as the Pilgrims, reached the breaking point of frustration and disappointment after enduring severe persecution by the Church of England. They “removed” to Leyden, Holland. After nearly a dozen years of severe adversity and personal toughening, it was time to leave. They came to believe the America was their “promised land.” They found their way back to England on the ship, Speedwell, prepared to join the Mayflower for the long difficult voyage to America. At Southhampton, their sponsors forcibly required them to accommodate 80 “strangers” who would later strain the best of interpersonal relationships. The Pilgrims numbers were reduced due to limited capacity on the ships. In July, 1620, they sailed west. In barely three days they had to return to England, because of structural problems with the masts on the Speedwell. Again, their numbers were reduced to stay within the carrying capacity of the Mayflower. God had sifted their numbers repeatedly. Only the hardiest of the hardy remained on the Mayflower for the epic journey.
- Crossing the Atlantic Ocean, the Pilgrims endured “seven weeks of the hell of an ill-lighted, rolling, pitching, stinking inferno” as well as tormenting by the crew. All manner of sins were brought to the surface, confessed, and forgiven. By the time they reached land, they were a spiritually cleansed and extremely close-knit group. Adversity does that.
- Mid-way across the Atlantic, they experienced a life-threatening emergency. The immense cross-beam supporting the main mast was failing. They would likely be lost at sea. After intense prayer, William Brewster had a eureka moment. He recommended using the giant iron printing press screw to support the breaking beam. It worked! Even the skeptical sailors praised God along with the Pilgrims.
- Just before landing at Plymouth in Massachusetts, they realized they were under no legal jurisdiction. To maintain order, they wrote and everyone signed the Mayflower Compact. The miracle and genius of the document is that it included many of the same principles later embodied in our founding documents.
- Their landing site was protected by Cape Cod. The site was flat, cleared, and had four freshwater streams and even a cache of corn. How could that happen? The area was previously cleared and inhabited by the Patuxet Indians, one of the few tribes known to be extremely hostile. Years before the Pilgrims’ arrival, the tribe was wiped out by a plague. Other tribes avoided the area, fearing presence of evil spirits. It was a miracle site for the Pilgrims.
- They finally set foot on land in mid-November, 1620.The first winter was extremely harsh and food was scarce. In January, the thatched roof of the Common House caught fire, a life-threatening emergency, due to their utter dependence on that building. Adversity inspired even more prayer and bound them together even tighter. By Spring, they had lost about half their number. Still the mortality rate was not nearly as high as in Jamestown, Virginia. The miracle was that half did survive.
- In their most desperate hour into their camp walked a Christian, English-speaking Indian, a Patuxet no less. Yes, you read it right. He was the Squanto of our school days lessons. He was the only survivor of the plague that killed the rest of his tribe, because he was not there. In 1605, Squanto was one of four Indians taken captive and shipped to England, where they were taught English so they could be questioned. Squanto spent nine years in England. In 1614, he was returned to America by Captain John Smith (Yes, it is the same one you remember from the Pocohontas story hundreds of miles to the South.). But Squanto was quickly captured again, taken to Spain and sold as a slave. He was bought and feed by local friars who taught him the Christian faith. Upon his second return to America, Squanto was devastated to find that his entire tribe had succumbed to a plague. Alone and wandering through the woods, Squanto was discovered by Massasoit, chief of the Wampanoags. The wise chief recognized that the Pilgrims had a desperate need and the Squanto desperately needed to be needed. Massasoit sent Squanto, the Christian, English-speaking Indian to the Pilgrims. William Brewster would later call Squanto, “a special instrument sent of God for their good, beyond their expectation.” Squanto effectively became an earthly savior. He taught the Pilgrims how to survive in a harsh, rugged, untamed wilderness.
- Following a bountiful harvest, they and about ninety Indians celebrated the feast that became known as the First Thanksgiving. The three-day celebration and the new arrivals from England consumed much of the provisions for the second winter.
- By Spring, the food ration for each individual was down to an unimaginable five kernels of corn per day. Nevertheless, they survived again and enjoyed a bountiful harvest after the second summer.
- When everyone approached the table for the Second Thanksgiving feast, they found a plate with just five kernels of corn as a reminder of God’s limitless grace even under the harshest of conditions.
Here is a challenge for you. Set this year’s Thanksgiving table with just five kernels of corn on each plate. Before enjoying the rest of the feast, share this story with your family and guests. God’s grace is truly wonderful! Tell everyone, about it, beginning with your family.
Much of this story was abstracted from The Light and the Glory, by Peter Marshall and David Manuel (1977), Fleming H. Revell Company; Old Tappan, New Jersey.
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Veterans’ (Armistice) Day!
As we commemorate this Veteran’s Day we ought to pay special attention to each and every word of the moving elegy “In Flanders Field.” It was written in 1915 by Canadian physician Lt. Col. John McCrae, who was as close as one can get to the nightmare of World War I. In it, the dead speak to us from their graves:
In Flanders Field
In Flanders Fields the poppies blow Between the crosses row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe; To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.
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“Freedom is never more than one generation from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”President Ronald Reagan
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“The fundamental basis of this nation’s laws was given to Moses on the Mount. The fundamental basis of our Bill of rights comes from the teachings we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul…If we don’t have a proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a totalitarian government which does not believe in rights for anybody except the State!”
President Harry S. Truman
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“Why may not the Bible, and especially the New Testament, without note or comment, be read and taught as a Divine revelation in the (school)–its general precepts expounded…and its glorious principles of morality inculcated?…Where can the purest principles of morality be learned so clearly or so perfectly as from the New Testament? Where are benevolence, the love of truth, sobriety, and industry, so powerfully and irresistibly inculcated as in the Sacred Volume?”
United Stated Supreme Court
Vidal v. Girard’s Executor, 1844
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Big Guns are Aimed at YOUR FAMILY! Will It Survive? (Part 4E)
The PAIN When God’s Family Turns Away from HIM
History has treated the family as a state within a state attaching to the family a certain “sovereignty.”6 G.K. Chesterton. Two people must agree to marriage; only one is necessary to guarantee a government facilitated divorce. Divorce cedes authority to the state, assuring increasing dependence on the state and perpetual domination of the wealthy over the poor and middle class. Consider that most people go to church to be married, but go to the government to be divorced. Marriage costs the state very little, but a huge tax payer-funded bureaucracy is required to support divorce. We pay billions in taxes to support the sinful choices of others. Marriage preserves freedom from government control. Divorce cedes freedom and control to the government.
Limiting sexual intimacy to the confines of marriage contributes to the permanence of the marriage. True sexual intimacy reflects the intellectual, emotional, and spiritual intimacy (bonding of two souls), which become the mortar that holds together the structure of the marriage. Physical intimacy before marriage allows two people the shallow transient pleasure of a rub and a tickle, rather than unfettered soulful bonding. But that transient experience is so powerful, so all-consuming that it becomes virtually impossible to clearly discern whether or not that partner is the best one to become an irrevocable, lifetime, “til-death-do-us-part” marriage partner.
Multiple intimate partners before marriage weaken or damage the soul and seriously inhibit the ability to make and sustain a lifetime commitment to a marriage partner. Following a series of temporary “bonds,” it becomes increasingly difficult to form the pervasive holistic bond that God intended with the one special marriage partner.
Similarly, extra-marital intimacy following the marriage creates the potential for destroying the marriage and family. The devastation painfully damages the spouse, children, siblings of the couple, and many friends. In addition, there is an immediate ripple effect among many people and an extended ripple effect through at least three or four subsequent generations. Is it worth it? Of course not! There is no way that the momentary pleasure even when repeated numerous times can justify the extended sphere of subsequent pain and suffering.
“Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for fornicators and adulterers God will judge.” [Hebrews 13:4 NAS] “Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not covet.” [Exodus 20:14 & 17 KJV] Hosea repeatedly forgave Gomer even though she was adulterous and a prostitute. [Hosea 3:3 KJV] As always, God’s moral law is an expression of His love established for our benefit.
Tasting the original forbidden fruit carried a high price. (1) “When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.” [Genesis 3:6 KJV]. Sin entered the world. Similarly, (2) “The path of the adulteress leads to death.” [Proverbs 2:16-22 KJV] “What therefore God hath joined together let not man put asunder.” [Matthew 19:6, Mark 10:9 KJV] The command is non-optional and non-negotiable.
“Lord, grant that I might not so much seek to be loved as to love.” St. Francis of Assisi “…in everything worth having, even in every pleasure, there is a point of pain or tedium that must be survived, so that the pleasure may be revived and endure.” G.K. Chesterton.
For troubled Christian marriages, counseling is not likely to be productive unless and until both parties genuinely agree that the Bible is the inspired inerrant word of God and that divorce is NOT an acceptable option under any circumstances. The agreed upon mutual view solidifies the common goal to save the marriage. In addition, the husband and wife both have an incentive to resolve troublesome issues because they both desire to enjoy the fullness and richness of the human experience. Since they have both agreed that divorce is unacceptable, the only remaining alternative is to resolve the issues. Often the resolution is facilitated if the effort is framed by the memory of why they originally chose to marry.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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“The President, who exercises a limited power, may err without causing great mischief in the state. Congress may decide amiss without destroying the Union, because the electoral body in which Congress originates may cause it to retract its decision by changing its members. But if the Supreme Court is ever composed of imprudent men or bad citizens, the Union may be plunged into anarchy or civil war.”Alexis de Tocqueville,“Democracy in America,” 1835
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Big Guns are Aimed at YOUR FAMILY! Will It Survive? (Part 4A)
In modern America, God’s grand and glorious institution, the family, is being ferociously attacked. The relentless and malicious attacks are aimed at the traditional family in general and YOUR family in particular. Enjoy and consider seriously Part 4A (1st of 6 subparts) of this vital discussion.
Part 1 identified the most aggressive and influential enemies of the traditional family and the primary targets of those groups. Part 2 profiled the stunning heavy artillery amassed by the anti-family groups and their sources of immense power, along with a challenge to protect YOUR FAMILY. Part 3 characterized a power far greater than all the combined power arrayed against us. Finally, Part 4 provides the practical, detailed strategy to protect YOUR FAMILY.
God is the Greatest Defense and the Greatest Offense
The modern American Goliath is fearsome to behold. But YOU have available far more than David’s five smooth stones. God Himself and His infinite love are far greater than all the cultural and physical weapons ever devised.
Survival Skills for YOUR Family
The forces aligned against the family are determined to weaken the family by dilution, redefinition, and government encroachment. They intend to destroy the sanctity of life, the sanctity of marriage, and the sovereignty of the family. However, there is hope. You have available an astonishing defense as well as incredibly powerful offensive weapons.
Mere intellectual agreement with the list of Judeo-Christian weapons is of little value. They are only useable to the extent of your soul-deep, uncompromising, irrevocable commitment to:
- Live a fully God-directed life in every area, all day, every day
- Visibly become the salt of the earth
- Visibly be the light of the world
- Actively be an ambassador for the Messiah, by living as an unassailable role model.
Uncompromising conviction will suppress the barrier of pride and open the conduit of your life, for God’s love to flow through. His infinite love will be manifested through YOU as humility, forgiveness, mercifulness, longsuffering, and a servant’s spirit. These are the visible components of love.
To the extent that others see godly character in us, they will become envious. “I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.” [Romans 11:11 KJV]
We become visible and an active positive role model as we grow in godly character. People see godly character as increased confidence, resilience in the face of daily stresses, and an inner joy that is unshakable. It is an image that is real. It provokes the jealousy described in Romans. The jealousy inspires questions about your strength of character, triggering natural and amazingly comfortable opportunities to share your faith. Now, consider the genius of God’s family.
The GENIUS of God’s Family
The traditional family is one of the most awesome, breathtaking, and vitally important of all of God’s magnificent creations! God’s multidimensional portrait of the family is so eloquent and astonishingly beautiful that it makes Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa look like a cartoon character. The extraordinarily beautiful partnership between the husband and wife springs from the holistic and pervasive appreciation of God. Here’s why:
- God’s portrait stabilizes and provides coherence to the family.
- The stabilized family builds stability and coherence into the national culture.
- A stable culture assures continuity of values across future generations.
- God’s portrait facilitates growth of the God-ordained marriage partnership and family.
- Married people are happier.
- Married people are healthier.
- Family is life’s boot camp for children, instilling virtues and guiding growth.
- True family-centered families—as opposed to career-centered family arrangements reduce crime.
- True family-centered families—as opposed to career-centered family arrangements reduce drug abuse.
- A loving family experience facilitates interpersonal relationships outside the family, enhancing the richness of career, hobby, volunteer, and recreational experiences.
- God’s portrait enables family members to practice humility, forgiveness, mercy, longsuffering, and a servant’s spirit in a loving, nonthreatening environment.
- The positive character embedded in family members—parents and children—is carried to the outside community throughout life.
- Family members learn to overcome pride by serving other family members
- The family is an incubator for building God-ordained intellectual, emotional, and spiritual views and values (character development).
- The family aligned with God’s portrait ultimately leaves the greatest of all possible legacies.
- The family aligned with God’s portrait is the married couple’s gift back to God.
- The family aligned with God’s portrait inspires frequent, comfortable, and nonthreatening opportunities for faith sharing.
Each family member is an ambassador of the family and family culture, which is a reflection of God’s presence or His absence. It is the parents’ responsibility to grow themselves from the character of natural sin-scarred man to the character of God, training their children to go with them. The parents must be what they want their children to become. If so, the children will also grow in the character of Christ and eventually pass on the godly legacy. Family is the 1) boot camp for life, 2) the training ground for building and developing character (parents and children), and 3) The God-created, God-ordained basic unit of civilization. Passing on godly character to children and as many other people as possible is life’s most important responsibility.
This life is a relay not a sprint. We accept the family and cultural baton from the last generation; guard it, protect it, and improve upon it; and then pass the baton on to the next generation. Godly growth and character are cultivated only by serving the needs of others (no shortcuts). “…the son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” [Matthew 20:28 & Mark 10:45 NIV]
The husband is responsible for material well-being and spiritual leadership, but the wife is responsible for emotional well-being and spiritual well-being as well as the distribution and use of the material gain. If a husband must work in a dirty corrupted world, his wife must make the home a spiritual shower.
The woman is the anchor (stability) and the heart (life of the home). Her responsibility is to make the home the most desirable place in the universe. The man’s job is to make hers easy by providing material resources, emotional support, and loving spiritual leadership. When the woman leaves the home for fulltime employment, the life goes out of the home like the air out of a balloon or a flat tire. The home that was once full of love becomes merely a house filled only with furniture, a place where family members only come home to sleep. To be the anchor and heart of the home, the woman must be part of a mutual ironclad, irrevocable, “’til death do us part” marriage. “What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (non-optional). [Matthew 19:6; Mark 10:9 KJV] The kids want to come home, because Mom’s there; Dad wants to come home, because his family is there. Together, Dad and Mom are superheroes.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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Christianity v. Atheism
“I myself believe that the duel between Christianity and atheism is the most important in the world. I further believe that the struggle between individualism and collectivism is the same struggle reproduced on another level. I believe that if and when the menace of Communism is gone, other vital battles, at present subordinated, will emerge to the foreground. And the winner must have help from the classroom.” Bill Buckley (1951)
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Big Guns are Aimed at YOUR FAMILY! Will It Survive? (Part 3)
In modern America, God’s grand and glorious institution, the family, is being ferociously attacked. The relentless and malicious attacks are aimed at the traditional family in general and YOUR family in particular. Enjoy and consider seriously Part 3 of this vital discussion.
Part 1 identified the most aggressive and influential enemies of the traditional family and the primary targets of those groups. Part 2 profiled the stunning heavy artillery amassed by the anti-family groups and their sources of immense power, along with a challenge to protect YOUR FAMILY. Part 3 characterizes a power far greater than all the combined power arrayed against us. Finally, Part 4 provides the practical, detailed strategy to protect YOUR FAMILY.
God’s Power and Love are Far Stronger and Longer Lasting Than Any Other
Clearly, the greatest and most complete source of information about God is the Bible. Most conservative believers would readily agree that it is the inspired inerrant Word of God.
But what happened? Have we become spiritually numbed by the uniquely American luxury of having a shelf full of Bibles and a weekly dose of sugar-coated sermons? The rampant compromises among believers scream a resounding, “Yes!” Wow! Chew on that one for a while. Perhaps, for many, the notion that the Bible is the inspired Word of God is merely intellectual assent, rather than a soul-deep conviction.
A military analogy is helpful. Anyone who has ever been in the military knows that with rare exceptions, disobeying an order is unthinkable. Obedience is deeply embedded in the military culture, because in combat there is no time to appoint a committee to study the situation. The assumption is that the highest ranking onsite officer has the greatest training and experience and therefore has the greatest probability of making the most effective decision at the lowest casualty rate.
Similarly, we are soldiers in the spiritual battle between good and evil, facing the arsenal of big guns aimed at our families. Our orders are issued by the Commanding General of the Universe. His orders are always perfect and guarantee success. They are found in the Bible.
God’s orders are often expressed as commands. If the word command is not used, the orders are nearly always written in the active voice or as an imperative. The essence of a command is that it is 1) non-negotiable, 2) not optional, 3) do it now, and 4) no excuses. Of course, His love for us is so great that He gives us the awesome gift of free will that allows us to choose to be disobedient. Nevertheless, God’s Word is directive, because He knows that the natural penalty or consequence for disobedience is painful, often rippling through many others.
Obedience to God is always much more beneficial for us than disobedience. The gap between God’s wisdom and ours is so vast that obedience should be an inescapably obvious no-brainer. But it is a lesson we need to constantly relearn, because of the relentless interference of pride.
The Bible is not simply a guidebook. Suggestions or flexible guidelines are rare. Long ago at the beginning of my engineering career, my Dad offered an important piece of advice. He said, “The boss never makes a suggestion; it may sound like a suggestion, but it’s not a suggestion.” Dad was urging me to treat my boss’s apparent suggestions as an order or direct instruction. The advice has held up well throughout my career. If it is important to treat the suggestions of an earthly boss as an order, how much more important is it to treat any of God’s apparent Biblical suggestions or guidelines as an order or commandment?
God gave us the Bible to be revered. It is our most treasured and sacred possession. If the house is on fire and you are fleeing, you cannot carry very much, but at least grab the Bible. “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” [2 Timothy 3: 16-17 KJV]
When you have soulfully restored the Bible to life’s highest priority and most treasured of all possessions, your family can survive relentless attack by the powerful and well-organized anti-family enemies. Here are the Judeo-Christian weapons.
- God’s power
- God’s infinite love
- Prayer (God’s direct personal communications line)
- Bible (God’s specific directions—not guidelines—for life)
The family must be viewed as Dad, Mom, and the children against the universe. Marriage is permanent; abortion is never an option; family and children are the highest priority in this life. No exceptions!
The wholeness and sanctity of marriage, family, and life at all stages must be unconquerable by government as God designed it and as the Founders codified it. Abraham Kuyper called it the sovereignty of the family. It is in constant tension with the sovereignty of the state. If believers are unwilling to defend God’s turf, the government will take it away. “…Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” [Mark 12:17 KJV] Every believer must deeply and irrevocably commit to never giving unto government that which is God’s.
Part 4 will conclude this series with a breathtaking strategy for successfully protecting YOUR FAMILY. It will be posted in several subparts.
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
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“In the case of Rex v. Woolston … the (New York Supreme) court said … whatever strikes at the root of Christianity, tends manifestly to the dissolution of civil government. The same doctrine was laid down in the late case of The King v. Williams…the authorities show that blasphemy against God, and contumelious reproaches and profane ridicule of Christ or the Holy Scriptures…are offenses punishable at common law, whether uttered by words or writings. … because it tends to corrupt the morals of the people, and to destroy good order. … They are treated as affecting the essential interests of civil society. … We stand equally in need, now as formerly, of all the moral discipline, and of those principles of virtue, which help to bind society together.
“The people of this state, in common with the people of this country, profess the general doctrines of Christianity, as the rule of their faith and practice; and to scandalize the author of these doctrines is not only, in a religious point of view, extremely impious, but, even in respect to the obligations due to society, is a gross violation of decency and good order. …”
Chief Justice James Kent,
New York Supreme Court
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From Ripples to Tsunami—Religious Freedom is Lost!
There has been near saturation coverage of the brief incarceration of Kim Davis. Of course, she is the Clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky who was held in contempt of court after refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Her Christian faith prohibited actions that would publically express her approval of homosexual or lesbian “marriages.”
There is no need to rehash the widespread news coverage of the event. Instead, mentally zoom out for a few thoughtful moments to consider the darker, far more widespread, and sinister cultural damage emerging from Kim’s experience and thousands of similar ones.
Often such incidents are reported by the press, including the Judeo-Christian press, ministers, and nationally known Christian leaders as “infringing on freedom of religion” or “encroaching on religious rights.” Words like infringing and encroaching suggest a nibbling away at the grander, bedrock, freedom of religion that has anchored America since its founding.
For a moment, let’s sidestep the obvious that an aggregation of nibbles eventually consumes the whole. No matter how much you may have overeaten during an annual Thanksgiving feast, you did it one bite at a time. However, there are far larger more insidious and enduring impacts.
Whenever a,
- judge issues and ruling contrary to Scripture,
- legislature passes a law that restricts religious freedom, or an
- executive (president, governor, or mayor) issues an order that interferes with the free exercise of religion,
the long-term impact on our nation, culture, and families contributes to a looming darkness.
Each of these seemingly narrowly-focused or targeted incidents unleashes ultimately the full, virtually unlimited might, of the federal government and often the full force of the best-known media to proclaim directly or indirectly any of several false and extremely alarming messages:
- God does not exist.
- If God does exist, he is somewhere in the cosmos unconcerned about our lives as individuals or collectively as a nation.
- The government is more important than God.
- The government has the authority to overrule God.
Essentially, the government is at war with God. The secular humanists (liberal/progressives) are, knowingly or unknowingly, fighting on behalf of the “‘prince of the power of the air,’ the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience…” [Ephesian 2:2 KJV] to amass as much temporal power as possible, at the expense of the people. “…because the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.” [Romans 8:7 NIV]
Meanwhile, Judeo-Christian believers have been largely shutdown by the cultural pressures of political correctness. They have become too timid to express the courage of their convictions. Far too many have lost the courage of their convictions and some have even lost their convictions. Many believers in the United States are no longer the salt of the earth or the light of the world, at least not visibly.
Apathy comes with a fearful price. Not only is the faith of believers weakened by the relentless pounding of government skepticism, but our children and grandchildren are routinely exposed to the same pounding, during the most vulnerable growing period of their lives. They are constantly exposed to the same alarming messages as everyone else.
Former President Ronald Reagan loudly proclaimed, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
As free Americans, we must aggressively fight to protect our God-given freedom with,
- persistent prayer,
- careful voting,
- letters to public figures,
- alternatives to public schools, and
- civil disobedience, as necessary.
Kim Davis opted for civil disobedience. Her actions triggered a long overdue national and very public conversation regarding the concept of same-sex “marriage.” Organized resistance to restrictions on religious freedom is no longer an option; it is inescapable—unless we want to see America irretrievably broken, another sad relic of history.
Each case like Kim’s are the ripples in the war to save America. The growing might of the massive government is the tsunami. Are YOU willing to take a stand?
What does it take to wake up the body of believers?
What does it take to wake up the clergy?
Dr. Lloyd Stebbins 