A Matter of the Heart

    "But Daniel set in his heart that he would not defile himself with the king’s choice food or with the wine which he drank; so he sought permission from the commander of the officials that he might not defile himself. Now God granted Daniel lovingkindness and compassion before the commander of the officials, and the commander of the officials said to Daniel, 'I am afraid of my lord the king, who has appointed your food and your drink; for why should he see your faces looking more haggard than the youths who are your own age? Then you would make me forfeit my head to the king'” - Daniel 1:8-10.

    God was carrying out His long promised judgment and discipline on His Old Testament children Israel. He had chosen them to share the good news of His coming Messiah with the nations of the world... "He says, 'It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to cause the preserved ones of Israel to return; I will also give You as a light of the nations so that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth'" - Isaiah 49:6. But they had consistently rebelled against Him in substituting other gods in their worship, elevating themselves into the place of gods, and disrespecting the value of human life. As a loving Father, God had warned them and now was disciplining them... "For whom Yahweh loves He reproves, even as a father reproves the son in whom he delights" Proverbs 3:12 (see also Hebrews 12:6). While many were praying for a revival His mercy, few were answering His call for a personal return to holiness and righteousness. To be holy and right with God is truly a matter of the heart.

    "But Daniel set in His heart that he would not defile himself" - Daniel 1:8. Daniel understood that in order for a nation to be set apart from other nations unto the special privilege and responsibility of the Lord's work, the individual hearts of the members of that nation must be set apart unto the Lord. Perhaps he was raised in a holy family or he discovered and surrendered to the truth of God's Word as he heard it. Despite the collapse and captivity of the nation around him, and despite his own personal enslavement to a foreign culture, Daniel was still "set in his heart" to remain set apart to His true Heavenly Father. As a result, despite his physical imprisonment in Babylon, he was in the perfect position to be used of God as a prophet to foreign kings and officials, an exhorter of the remnant of God's faithful children, and a witness to the unholy culture that surrounded him.

    Let's face the truth. Today, America has become a reflection of the same sins that had consumed Israel. In addition, many in America are vocally and violently attacking Israel and defending her terrorist enemies. There are many faithful New Testament children of God ("as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name" - John 1:12) praying for a national revival. I hope you are among them. But God is still searching for individuals who are willing to surrender their hearts to Him, to be set apart and available to be His prophets, exhorters, and witnesses to the collapsing culture that surrounds them, wherever He may place them. To be like Daniel, we must be set in our hearts that we will not defile ourselves, because to be part of the answer to the prayer for revival is truly a matter of the heart.

Living a Holy Life in an Unholy World

    "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the vessels of the house of God; and he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, and he brought the vessels into the treasury of his god.

Then the king said for Ashpenaz, the chief of his officials, to bring in some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal seed and of the nobles, youths in whom was no defect, who were good in appearance, showing insight in every branch of wisdom, being thoroughly knowledgeable and discerning knowledge, and who had ability to stand in the king's palace; and he said for him to teach them the literature and tongue of the Chaldeans. And the king appointed for them a daily ration from the king's choice food and from the wine which he drank, and appointed that they should be educated three years, at the end of which they were to stand before the king. Now among them from the sons of Judah were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Then the commander of the officials set names for them; and for Daniel he set the name Belteshazzar, for Hananiah Shadrach, for Mishael Meshach, and for Azariah Abed-nego" - Daniel 1: 1-7.

    If we are reading and studying the Bible systematically, we have just completed the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, and Ezekiel. The focus of the Holy Spirit-inspired prophets that God used to produce these holy words was the rebellion of God's old covenant children Israel. They also highlighted the sins of the nations that surrounded Israel. All of these nations had two major sins in common. They worshiped idols, sometimes even imagining themselves to be equal to or greater than God... "Therefore, this is what the Sovereign LORD says: Because you think you are as wise as a god, therefore, behold, I will bring foreigners upon you, the most ruthless of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and defile your splendor" - Ezekiel 28:6-7. They also turned their backs on Israel, rejoicing in Israel's suffering under the judgment of God... "For thus says Lord Yahweh, ‘Because you have clapped your hands and stamped your feet and were glad with all the scorn of your soul against the land of Israel, therefore, behold, I have stretched out My hand against you, and I will give you for plunder to the nations. And I will cut you off from the peoples and make you perish from the lands; I will destroy you. Thus you will know that I am Yahweh’” - Ezekiel 25:6-7. Living in the shadow of impending judgment must have been terrifying and difficult, but God promises to help those who are living a holy life in an unholy world.

    In far too many ways, the words of these prophets reflect the heart of America today. No longer content to be one nation under God, we have elevated ourselves above God in redefining the value of life, the makeup of the family, and gender identification. More recently too many of us are abandoning Israel, rejoicing in her afflictions, and demonstrating approval of the violent attacks against her by radical terrorists. Behold... God has not changed, "For I, Yahweh, do not change" - Malachi 3:6a. Because we do not read His Word and our pulpits fail to rightly proclaim His Word, we are blind to His impending judgment... "And I will put My glory among the nations; and all the nations will see My judgment which I have executed and My hand which I have placed on them" - Ezekiel 39:21.

    But the very next book in the Holy Bible reveals hope along with instructions for how we are to live in the light of God's impending judgment. In the midst of His judgment and discipline of His children Israel, God delivered a young man named Daniel into the hands of His enemies, prepared Him to serve as His prophet to foreign kings as well as to the remnant of His children, and used him to encourage us today to be living a holy life in an unholy world.

A Call to Prayer

 

Leonard Ravenhill’s classic book entitled Why Revival Tarries continues to challenge our generation toward revival. He reminds us of the formula for revival revealed in the past; prayer, preaching, repentance, and reformation as he writes:

“Poverty-stricken as the church is today in many things, she is most stricken here, in the place of prayer.

We have many organizers, but few agonizers; 

many players and payers, but no pray-ers; 

many singers, no clingers; 

lots of pastors, few wrestlers; 

many fears, few tears; 

much fashion, little passion; 

many interferers, few intercessors; 

many writers, but few fighters. 

Failing here, we fail everywhere."

The preaching ministry is open to a few; the ministry of prayer—the highest ministry of all human offices—is open to all. If we're willing to come together to pray we may find ourselves at stage one, at the very beginning of a much needed great awakening here in America. Will you join the Wexford chapter of God's worldwide prayer team today?

Liberty is the Gift of God

Washington is so filled with references to God and scriptural quotations that the city is virtually a Bible engraved in stone. The Washington Moment is crowned with an aluminum tip bearing the Latin phrase Laus Deo—“Praise be to God.” At its base is a 24,500-pound cornerstone with space hollowed out for a zinc case containing a copy of the Holy Bible. Up and down the giant obelisk, a host of Bible verses and prayers are etched into its walls.

Lincoln’s second inaugural address, inscribed on the wall of the Lincoln Memorial contains fourteen references to God and four Bible verses. At the National Archives, there is a bronze emblem of the Ten Commandments in the floor and the display of the original Declaration of Independence with its its four references to God:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature’s God entitle them.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.

Appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world.

with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Moses and the Ten Commandments are all over the Supreme Court Building, where every session opens with the words: “God save the United States and this honorable court.” Across the street, the US Capitol Rotunda contains eight massive oil paintings. Two portray prayer meetings and a third shows a baptism. One of the paintings has a large open Bible at the center of it where you can read the words “God with us.” Two of the paintings feature the cross being held aloft. 

At the US House of Representatives, above the speaker’s rostrum are the words: “In God We Trust.” At the US Senate you’ll see “In God We Trust” over the south entrance, and over the east entrance the phrase Annuit Coeptis—“God has favored our undertakings.” In Statuary Hall, there's a bronze statue of missionary Marcus Whitman holding a Bible; another of missionary Junipero Serra, holding a cross. Plans are underway to add evangelist Billy Graham to the Hall. 

Along the ornate Cox Corridor of the Capitol are the words “America! God shed His grace on thee.” In the private congressional chapel, a stained-glass window depicts George Washington kneeling in prayer. Over him are the words “THIS NATION UNDER GOD,” and around him in beautiful golden letters is Psalm 16:1: “Preserve me, O God, for in Thee do I put my trust.” 

In the Library of Congress there is the Giant Bible of Mainz and the Gutenberg Bible. On the ceilings and walls of the Great Hall are inscribed Bible verses like John 1:5 and Proverbs 4:7. A bronze statue of Moses stands in the Main Reading Room, and nearby are more verses—Micah 6:8, Leviticus 19:18, and Psalm 19:1. The apostle Paul gazes down from the balustrade.

The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial displays a quotation from the book of Amos. At the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, you’ll find Proverbs 28:1: “The wicked flee when no man pursueth but the righteous are bold as a lion.” The US Holocaust Memorial Museum highlights these words: “You are my witnesses—Isaiah 43:10.” 

Etched into the wall of the Jefferson Memorial is a prophetic summary and warning for all generations of America... 

GOD WHO GAVE US LIFE GAVE US LIBERTY. CAN THE LIBERTIES OF A NATION BE SECURE WHEN WE HAVE REMOVED A CONVICTION THAT THESE LIBERTIES ARE THE GIFT OF GOD?

His Kids Deserve His Truth

The teacher asks... "Can a man get pregnant?"

The world's answer here

God's answer here...

“Ask now, and see, can a man bear a child?

Why then do I see every man with his hands on his stomach like a woman in labor?

Why has every face turned pale?” - Jeremiah 30:6

Consider an education that teaches truth for your children or grandchildren.

It’s not more difficult, in fact the answers are actually much simpler…

Classical Christian Education

Your Heart is Showing

 

Most folks believe Karl Marx was an atheist. However, honest inspection of his words and actions reveal the truth that He believed in God and he hated Him. With his heart set against God, Marx became the target of Satan's affection and in his own words, Marx gave his heart to the devil.

"Thus Heaven I’ve forfeited, 
I know it full well. 
My soul, once true to God, 
Is chosen for Hell." - Karl Marx

Why did Jesus make such a big deal about loving God with all of our heart? Because we were made to enjoy and respond to the overwhelming, everlasting, loving heart of God. Whoever or whatever has our heart is revealed in our words and actions...

"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." - Luke 12:34

Karl Marx believed the devil had his heart. His Satan-inspired words and actions have influenced many who have not guarded their hearts and through them have brought much tyranny and misery to our fallen world.

Who has your heart? It shows in the way you are influencing and impacting the lives of others...

"No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us." - 1 John 4:12

Is there someone close to you who needs to experience God's love today? Be aware, to them, your heart is showing!

Revival Requires a Return to Righteous Royalty

We've been here before. In America we seem to be particularly vulnerable to worshiping our government instead of the One who truly has endowed us with our unalienable rights. We can look to history, with an honest and sincere desire to see the truth, and discover how our forebears were delivered from a precarious and foreboding time much like we are immersed in today.

Samuel Adams gave his American Independence speech shortly before the fifty-six Founders signed the Declaration of Independence. In this prophetic speech Adams said, 

“We have explored the temple of royalty (regarding many previous appeals to King George), and found that the idol we have bowed down to has eyes which see not, ears that hear not our prayers, and a heart like the nether millstone. We have this day restored the Sovereign, to whom alone men ought to be obedient.... From the rising to the setting sun, may His kingdom come.”

 The direction is clear. Who will lead the way? Those of us who have experienced the forgiveness, healing, and deliverance of the Lord as a result of our personal repentance and surrender to Him through Jesus Christ know the way back to where we belong. Let's echo the cry of the prophets throughout our great land once again...

"Come, let us return to the LORD. He has torn us to pieces; now he will heal us. He has injured us; now he will bandage our wounds." - Hosea 6:1

“Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; For I am God, and there is no other." - Isaiah 45:22

Is there someone in your life that you can nudge, inspire, redirect toward the One True God today? Become a part of the revival of America.

American Greatness Springs from Humble Leadership

President Abraham Lincoln’s words in the dark days of the Civil War speak to us today: 

"We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever known. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us then to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins and to pray for clemency and forgiveness." - Abraham Lincoln, Proclamation of a National Fast Day, March 30, 1863.

As we pray for revival in our land, let's ask the Lord to raise up the kind of humble, God fearing leaders like Abraham Lincoln that have challenged us as God's people to obey God's call to prayer...

"If my people, who bear my name, will humble themselves, pray, seek my face and turn from their evil ways, I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin and heal their land." - 2Ch 7:14.

 A humble, honest look into HIStory reveals the truth that God responds to this kind of prayer, and just as He did before, HE will make America great again.

Precursor to the American Covenant

 

When things go wrong it seems the smart thing to do is stop, look for the cause, make corrections, and get back on course. It's obvious that things are going wrong here in America. As a nation and as individual citizens, we no longer live together like we believe that we are all created equal and endowed by our Creator with the unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We no longer see the role of government as being limited by a constitution to protecting those rights, but we increasingly see government as our enemy, threatening on many sides to take away our rights. It seems it's time to stop, make some corrections and get back on course.

But just where is the course? To rediscover the course that America should be on, a good place to start might be to re-examine our earliest agreements as they are the precursors of our American Constitution. Here's a glimpse of the Mayflower Compact, the first written, signed agreement between Christian and non-Christian citizens of the new colony of Plymouth...

"Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith, and the honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another; covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience."

The Mayflower compact is the first American covenant, between God and a group of men and women beginning life together in a new world. These forefathers and foremothers were bound together by a covenant to glorify God because they assumed that as individuals, they all existed for the glory of God. This belief was so strong that both Christians and non-Christians understood and accepted this truth...

"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the expanse proclaims the work of His hands." - Psalm 19:1

The course is clear. A rededication to the American Covenant is the best hope for a revival of the vitality of our dear republic. But before nations make such course-corrections, individual citizens must make a personal covenant to live for the glory of God...

"Whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God" - 1 Corinthians 10:31

Thus, to pray for revival in America is to pray for a personal rededication to living in both words and actions for the glory of God, and to pray for the salvation of lost souls that they may be freed to enter into the personal covenant that is the precursor to the American covenant.

 

The Interposing Hand of Heaven

 

"I take a particular pleasure in acknowledging that the interposing hand of Heaven, in the various instances of our extensive preparations for this operation, has been most conspicuous and remarkable." - Washington, Letter to Thomas McKean, President of Congress, November 15, 1781

George Washington's reflections on the most conspicuous and remarkable providence of God in the events leading up to the surrender of Lord General Cornwallis at Yorktown are the result of the following divine activity...

1. If General Washington had not decided to leave New York and march to Yorktown when he did, Cornwallis would have been reinforced.

2. If Robert Morris, the generous and capable merchant, had not used extraordinary means to raise money to pay Washington’s troops, they would have gone home rather than to Yorktown.

3. If France had not sent a fleet from the West Indies (unknown to Washington), which arrived just in time to defeat the British fleet sent to relieve General Cornwallis at Yorktown, Cornwallis could have escaped. In this battle, the French fleet, under Admiral de Grasse, soundly defeated the British, cutting off all sea routes.

4. If a sudden tornado-like storm had not stopped Lord Cornwallis in his last-minute attempt on October 16, 1781, to cross the York River and escape to New York, the war would have dragged on. - Marshall Foster, The American Covenant, the Untold Story.

Praying for revival is inviting the interposing Hand of Heaven to  break into the chaos and conflict of our nation once again. Such a request should be natural and urgent when it comes from the heart of believers who have experienced the providential Hand of God in their own lives...

"If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land." - 2 Chronicles 7:14.

Where in your heart, your home, your community, and your nation do you urgently need the interposing Hand of Heaven today?

Our Only Real Hope

 

Alexander Solzhenitsyn , in his acceptance speech for the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion (May 1983), summarized our present state well when he said...

"We are witnesses to the devastation of the world, be it imposed or voluntarily undergone. The entire twentieth century is being sucked into the vortex of atheism and self-destruction . This plunge into the abyss has aspects that are unquestionably global, dependent neither on political systems, nor on levels of economic and cultural development, nor yet on national peculiarities... Different parts of the world have followed different paths, but today they are all approaching the threshold of a common ruin.

Solzhenitsyn ended his sobering address in London by directing us toward the only hope for the reformation our world, a revival of our relationship with God...

"Instead of the ill-advised hopes of the last two centuries, which have reduced us to insignificance and brought us to the brink of nuclear and non-nuclear death, we can only reach with determination for the warm hand of God , which we have so rashly and self-confidently pushed away. If we did this, our eyes would be opened to the errors of this unfortunate twentieth century and our hands could be directed to set them right. There is nothing else to cling to in the landslide: all the thinkers of the Enlightenment can give us nothing."

As we pray for revival in America, we must be ready and willing to obey the Lord's command to help others reach with determination for the warm hand of God...

"Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." - Matthew 28:19

Who can you introduce to Jesus today? 

One Nation Under God

French sociologist Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) traveled to the United States in 1831 to study its prisons and returned with a wealth of broader observations that he codified in “Democracy in America” (1835), an unbiased reflection on the great American experiment in self-government. De Tocqueville cited the First Connecticut Code as an example of the strong connection between faith and civil law in America.

In May of 1650, the General Court of Connecticut adopted what became known as the First Connecticut Code. The code was the result of work undertaken by Roger Ludlow, who, in 1646, set out to amend the preexisting Capital Laws of 1642, which were mostly borrowings from those of neighboring Massachusetts. In De Tocqueville's own words... 

"Nothing is both more singular and more instructive than the legislation of this period; there above all one finds the password to the great social enigma that the United States presents to the world in our day. Among these memorials, we particularly distinguish, as one of the most characteristic, the code of laws that the little state of Connecticut passed in 1650."

De Tocqheville noted that the legislators of Connecticut occupied themselves first with penal laws; and, to compose them, they conceived the strange idea of drawing from sacred texts... 

“'If any man [after legal conviction], shall have or worship any other God but the Lord God,' they say to begin with, 'he shall be put to death.' There follow ten or twelve provisions of the same nature, borrowed from the texts of Deuteronomy, Exodus, and Leviticus. Blasphemy, sorcery, adultery, and rape are punished by death; insult done by a son to his parents is struck with the same penalty. In this way they carried the legislation of a rude and half-civilized people into the heart of a society whose spirit was enlightened and mores mild; so one never saw the death penalty laid down more profusely in the laws, or applied to fewer of the guilty."

When he considered the development of civil laws here in America, De Tocqueville cited the actions of the pilgrims' belief that they were citizens and subjects of God first, and of the king of England second...

"Thus it is often difficult, in running through the first historical and legislative memorials of New England, to perceive the bond that attaches the emigrants to the country of their ancestors. One sees them at each instant performing an act of sovereignty; they name their magistrates, make peace and war, establish police regulations, give themselves laws, as if they came under God alone."

America has always prospered when we all agreed and lived as "One nation under God". Praying for revival is praying for a personal and nation return to the indispensable Biblical truth...

"For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ" - Philippians 3:20

The Happiest Society Never Forgets

"Finally, let us not forget the religious character of our origin. Our fathers were brought [here] by their high veneration for the Christian religion. They journeyed by its light, and labored in its hope. They sought to incorporate its principles with the elements of their society, and to diffuse its influence through all their institutions, civil, political, or literary. Let us cherish these sentiments, and extend this influence still more widely, in the full conviction, that that is the happiest society which partakes in the highest degree of the mild and peaceful spirit of Christianity."- Daniel Webster (1848). “Speeches and Forensic Arguments”, p.56

Daniel Webster said, "Let us not forget". Our forgetfulness has caught up to us. The evidence is overwhelming. He noted the connection here between happiness and partaking the mild and peaceful spirit of Christianity.

"He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments." - Ps 78:5-7

Isn't it yet time for the family and the church to come together and remind our children about the works of God? Isn't it indeed the works of God that they are studying throughout the day in school? Is there any subject under the sun that is not a work of God?

May the Lord have mercy on me and my generation for our failure to obey His command to teach our children the testimony of God that is revealed in all of His mighty creation...

"The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship." --Psalm 19:1

The peace and happiness we have lost can be recovered and offered to the next generation if we will repent and obey today. 

George Washington, Deist?

 

Along with most current public school and university curriculum, Biographer Barry Schwartz has stated that George Washington's "practice of Christianity was limited and superficial, because he was not himself a Christian. In the enlightened tradition of his day, he was a devout Deist". 

DEISM, noun [Latin God.] The doctrine or creed of a deist; the belief or system of religious opinions of those who acknowledge the existence of one God, but deny revelation: or deism is the belief in natural religion only, or those truths, in doctrine and practice, which man is to discover by the light of reason, independent and exclusive of any revelation from God. Hence deism implies infidelity or a disbelief in the divine origin of the scriptures.

An honest study of history with an unbiased ear for the truth reveals a different reality. Here is a reflection on the colonial army's defeat of the British at Yorktown, in Washington's own words... "

"I take a particular pleasure in acknowledging that the interposing hand of Heaven, in the various instances of our extensive Preparation for this Operation [Yorktown], has been most conspicuous and remarkable." - Letter to Thomas McKean, President of Congress, November 15, 1781

 It's obvious that Washington was very aware of and responsive to the "hand of Heaven" clearly revealed in the intervening and providential presence and work of God. A closer, truth-seeking study of history confirms the indispensable and very timely truth that God confirms his Word and reveals Himself as He...

"removes kings and sets up kings." - Daniel 2:21

Keep on seeking the truth my friends, to be free from the deception of this current age, to grow in your awareness of God's revelation and intervention in your world, and to be set apart and available to be used of God everyday. 

The Twin Pillars of Our Faith and Our Republic

 

Jedidiah Morse-clergyman, geographer, and father of the painter and inventor Samuel Morse-was a significant figure in post­ Revolutionary New England. Through his popular geography texts, he described the new nation to Americans. As a prominent Congregationalist minister, he involved himself deeply in the heated religious controversies of his day. In an election sermon in 1799, Dr. Jedediah Morse reminds us of our part in the preservation of our Christian form of government:

“Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all the blessings which flow from them, must fall with them.”

The pillars of Christianity…

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

The founders of our great republic believed that a people who obeyed these two commandments internally, in the heart, would need no other external law. Sadly, conditions today confirm the prophetic words of early American geographer and minister Dr. Jedediah Morse. 

Do our personal lives affirm that we stand on a foundation supported by the twin pillars of both our faith and our republic?

God Says, "You Make Me Laugh"

 

God laughs when anyone plots against Him...

"The kings of the earth prepare for battle; 

the rulers plot together against the LORD and against his anointed one...

 

But the one who rules in heaven laughs." - Ps 2:2,4

God laughs when our enemies come against us...

"The wicked plot against the godly; they snarl at them in defiance.

But the Lord just laughs." - Ps 37:12-13

God laughs when governments oppose Him... 

"O LORD God of Heaven's Armies, the God of Israel, wake up and punish those hostile nations. Listen to the filth that comes from their mouths; their words cut like swords.

'After all, who can hear us?' they sneer.

But LORD, you laugh at them." - Ps 59:5,7-8

God laughs when sinners refuse to repent...

"I called you so often, but you wouldn't come. I reached out to you, but you paid no attention.

 You ignored my advice and rejected the correction I offered.

So I will laugh when you are in trouble!" - Pr 1:24-26

The rebellious world around us knows well how to make God laugh, but true disciples know so much more. We know that as we love and glorify Him, we discover how to make God so happy that He sings over us with joy...

"For the LORD your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.” -Zeph 3:17

The Source of True Authority

 

Instead of Christians waiting for the Lord to return, God is waiting for the church to step into its role of taking the authority of Jesus and doing damage to Satan’s kingdom. Not by political or human energy and power, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus went on to reveal the source of our authority. It lies in His authority over all of God's enemies. He exercised this authority in His most humble and glorious work on Calvary's cross. There He disarmed and humiliated all of His enemies...

"And when he had disarmed the rulers and the authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in the cross" (Colossians 2:15).

Jesus has revealed the pathway to true authority and power over our every opposing person and circumstance, natural or spiritual. It comes to us when we follow His example,  refocus our attention from the imposing enemy, and humbly set our hearts and minds on the reality of our position in Him...

"However, stop rejoicing because the spirits are submitting to you. Instead, rejoice because your names are written in heaven" (Luke 10:20).

Rejoice today, despite your trials, that you are a child of God, seated with Christ in Heavenly places, far above the temporal affairs of this day and of this world. Surrender to your Father's overwhelming love, never ending mercy, and always working grace, and begin experiencing the authority and power of your victorious, resurrected life in Christ!

Outright Rebellion

What’s it like living with no God-centered hope or truth? It often leads to foolish, incoherent, and outright rebellion against God. Here’s an example…

In the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly’s newest commercial, one of the most heartbreaking and confusing parts of the ad is this statement: 

"Because the body you are randomly assigned at birth shouldn't determine how well you are cared for." 

This voice-over is heard while showing a woman with double mastectomy scars wearing an open robe and identifying as a man.

In using the term “randomly assigned” Lilly is  inadvertently, foolishly, or rebelliously conceding that we have a Creator, or at least an Assigner. But at the same time they are encouraging rejection of the Assigner’s body choice. This is not atheism. It is outright rebellion against God.

The truth is we are lovingly and purposefully created in the image of our loving and purposeful Creator and given a full, loving, and purposeful life in Him…

“Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it” (Ps 139:14).

“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago” (Eph 2:10).

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the LORD. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope” (Jer 29:11).

Seek and believe the truth. It will help you recognize and set you free from the foolish, incoherent, and outright rebellion of this fallen world. 

No Better Foundation

 

While it's true that America was not founded as or intended to be a Christian nation, there is overwhelming and confirming evidence that she was founded on and created to function according to Biblical truth. This fact was echoed as recently as the 1950's in a prophetic warning from a recent president.

President Harry Truman laid out the case for America’s Biblical foundations in a speech in 1950. He stood against the redacted, anecdotal, revisionist histories sweeping into America’s schools from John Dewey and the progressive, socialist academics of the time. He foresaw what could happen if we forgot our covenant with the Almighty. He said, 

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. I don’t think we emphasize that enough these days. 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.

There is no better foundation for a nation or an individual than the Word of God...

"The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever" (Psalm 119:160).

Revival in America will follow revival in the hearts of Christ followers. A national return to God will follow our return to a holy reverence and obedience to His enduring Word.

Recognizing and Rejecting Racism

 

Patrick Henry's famous give me liberty or give me death speech was not the only profound, future-shaping declaration to come from the oldest assembly of elected representatives in the American colonies. On June 12, 1776, the Virginia House of Burgesses approved George Mason’s great declaration, which states in Section 1: 

"That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity, namely the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety."

It was subsequently used by many of the colonies as the basis of their declarations and it was undoubtedly one of the documents that influenced Thomas Jefferson as he wrote the Declaration of Independence. 

Listening to it today, in the light of the many issues that are dividing and turning us against ourselves, I am moved to consider a fresh, personal definition of racism:

For me, racism is the refusal to listen to and compassionately try to understand the expression of anyone that is feeling deprived of the God-given right of life, liberty, means of acquiring and possessing property, happiness, and safety just because they are different from me.

Whenever we who call ourselves Christians commit this sin, we are scandalizing the name and reputation of Jesus Christ who left Heaven and came to Earth in order to listen to, understand, and restore to us the blessings of life, liberty, happiness, and safety that come with a justified and intimate relationship with the One that created us and endowed us with such blessings:

"Don't forget that you Gentiles used to be outsiders. You were called "uncircumcised heathens" by the Jews, who were proud of their circumcision, even though it affected only their bodies and not their hearts. In those days you were living apart from Christ. You were excluded from citizenship among the people of Israel, and you did not know the covenant promises God had made to them. You lived in this world without God and without hope. But now you have been united with Christ Jesus. Once you were far away from God, but now you have been brought near to him through the blood of Christ" (Ephesians 2:11-13).

As we pray the popular revival prayer of 2 Chronicles 7:14, perhaps God will show those of us who are called by His name where He's calling us to turn from our wicked way of racism. As we respond, not only will He fulfill His promise to hear from Heaven and heal our land, our friends and enemies alike, will notice!