The Religion That Shaped America

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Tomorrow is Independence Day. Independence Day is to our Nation what the Day of Pentecost is to Christians, a birthday celebration. And just as we have tried to keep alive in our hearts and minds the religion which came from the Lord through His apostles, so too we should strive to keep alive in our hearts and minds the ideals upon which our nation was founded.

It is reported that Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th President of the United States, seeing changes occurring in our nation became concerned and commented: “Maybe our country needs to recapture the pride of its earlier years!” I wonder how he would react if he were with us today?

Today’s downward societal riptide is very swift and strong, powered by negative attitudes toward religion, negative attitudes toward classical virtues, “relativism” in in our understanding of values, secularism, and “me first-ism”. The providential blessing of the American system of government is for the most part no longer widely appreciated nor understood by our nation’s citizens. Why is that? Quite simply because such things are no longer taught in our nation’s schools, no longer praised, and no longer respected in our own country.

As Americans we should stand firm in our advocacy for the ideals and values which gave rise to our nation, a nation that was once compared with the 12 tribes of Ancient Israel, God’s nation. The constitution of the United States of America introduced a comprehensive system of government previously unknown. So new and wonderful was this system of government that people celebrated it as a providential gift from God. And indeed it was. But like the 12 tribes of Israel, we have neglected to care for our nation’s relationship with God. We have neglected to live by God’s ordinances. And, we have largely forgotten the Author of our freedom, the One from whom this divine gift was given.

Those who brought forth this most wondrous form of government were spiritually gifted, immersed in Christian culture and blessed by God. They gave us the Constitution which guarantees the inalienable rights of every citizen. I wonder, if these framers of the Constitution were with us today, what their reaction would be seeing widespread anti-Christian attitudes, and legislators of a mindset quite different from that of the framers of the Constitution. Freedom of religion does not mean, nor was it ever intended to mean freedom from religion. Atheism, the total lack of theism, was never intended as the policy of the framers of American government. And what is worse, agnosticism and atheism has given way to hostility toward Christianity.

Those to whom we have entrusted governance have chased God away from our schools and institutions, claiming that the principle of the separation of church and state justifies their hostility toward Christianity. It does not. Far from it, what has come about in America today is very wrong and it is very dangerous. Liberty was achieved in America because the concept of liberty is rooted in natural law, God’s law. “We hold these truths to be self-evident”, the signers of the Declaration of Independence affirmed, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” If God is no longer recognized, natural law is no longer guaranteed.

The concept of natural law has been replaced by concepts of relativism and changing truth. Most young people today equate the word “providence” with a city in Rhode Island and have no understanding at all of why that city was named as it was. If a vote had been taken in our country in Eisenhower’s day, God would still be alive in the classrooms of America today. That day seems to have passed along with “The Greatest Generation”. We are in the midst of a radical cultural paradigm shift, a shift toward secularism. Much of that paradigm shift has already been accomplished.

“The Greatest Generation”, those Americans who grew up during The Great Depression and fought World War II, or whose labor helped win it, knew, as did previous generations, that America was founded by the providence of God. The majority of today’s generation has little or no concept of what that means. No other nation, no other people ever before in the history of the known world, had based their governance upon the principle that government serves the people rather than the people serving the government. This idea was, God-inspired. And for us to have lost that understanding is to have lost one of the most precious treasures of our American heritage, the bedrock and the very foundation upon which liberty was established.

What has been the result? In previous generations our jails were relatively small. Today America has one of the highest rates of incarceration in the world. It seems as if jails cannot be built fast enough. Don’t kid yourself into thinking that there is no relationship between the numbers of our citizens being incarcerated and loss of our moral compass. The rise of criminal violence in America coincided with the abandonment of faith and morals in this country. The Holy Spirit is being ignored, and that is, frankly, a sin that will lead to death, not only for individuals, but potentially for the nation. What comes next? Euthanasia of the sick and elderly? Persecution of Christians? Loss of liberty and property? Tyranny?