One Nation "Under" God

“ONE NATION UNDER GOD”

Proverbs 14:34- I Timothy 2:1-2

INTRO. Throughout our lives we find ourselves many times being placed under certain precarious positions and circumstances but most importantly we find ourselves under certain people that brings us discomfort, displeasure and irritation.

ILLUSTRATION: “When you see a police car”-Whether we like it or not we are under the authority of those guys who ride around with the blue lights on their cars. It seems that we are under all kinds of people in our lives. Whether they be parents, bosses, our County and State officials, DMV offices, etc. You know it seems in this day in time everyone wants to be their own boss. People don’t want to be under anyone, they don’t want to be told what to do. They want the blessings, the privileges, and the benefits in life without any responsibility or accountability to anyone and many times especially God.

ILLUSTRATION: “BUY ME OUT”

As we come to yet another Memorial Day service to honor not only our men and woman who has served this country and many who are now serving our country but we must come to honor and worship the one and only God of this country.

This morning with your permission I would like to use a few inserts from a powerful message I heard from Dr Larry Thompson of FBC Fort Laurdale Florida and founder of watchman ministries.

As we come to this special service have you ever considered one of the greatest treasures we have a nation is the flag that we just pledge our allegiance to a moment ago and what it symbolizes. It was June 14, 1777 that Congress voted to design the American flag and then they introduced it to the American public on September 3, 1777. The colors were chosen with a great deal of care and thought.

I wonder how many of us really know what these colors of our flag represent. The white according to our founding fathers is and I quote “to signify the purity and the innocence of Americans.” The red is symbolic for the hardness, the baler, and the resolve of the people of this country and the blue represents the vigilance, the perseverance and the justice. There is something just perhaps you did not know. Are you aware that we did not have a formal pledge of our allegiance to the flag until a hundred or more years later. As a matter of fact it was over hundred years later when a man by the name of Frances Belema. He was the editor of a youth magazine by the name of “the youth companion”. He first introduced the pledge in 1954, almost two hundred years later that the pledge read as it now reads today “I pledge allegiance to the flag...” It is almost impossible for me to comprehend and believe that from 1954 in just a little over one decade later after we place under God in our pledge that we begin do ever thing we possible could to remove the presence of God and the influence of God from this nation. It began when the Supreme Court ruled that it is no longer admissible to have prayer and Bible study in our public schools. That decision was followed by another four years later in which the Supreme Court ruled that the Ten Commandments, the moral laws of man, could no longer be displayed in public School or any government building. We went from there to a further ruling that began to draw the circle a little wider that said that now students are no longer allowed to pray at public graduation or public athletic events. It is amazing to me as we take a look at where we have gone that we fail to understand that history and society has proved that nations and people that place themselves above God or divorce themselves from God’s presence and come to a place where they believe they are self sufficient loose all moral restraint. They force themselves into a spiritual and social confusion until ultimately there is a breakdown and a devastation and ultimate destruction of the very fiber of the nation in which they live.

Has it happened here? If you don’t want to do something don’t. If it feels good do it. If you don’t want it or if it is a nuisance at this time just kill it. If you can’t get along with it divorce it. If you can’t face it go ahead and drink it or drug it and the result in America, is crime and financial bondage and emotional dysfunctions, dysfunctional families and a spiritually and morally sick nation. How did we get to that place?

We got to that place when we as Americans who put our hands over our hearts and say I pledge, I am a part of one nation under God, literally said we don’t need you any more. AS a result of that we no longer have even that in which we pledge.