July is the month we celebrate our nation’s birthday, enjoy cookouts, and watch fireworks. What an incredible blessing it is to be a citizen of these United States and to enjoy all the freedoms that our ancestors shed their blood to provide and preserve. Contrary to many modern reports, our founders were, almost without exception, godly Christian men and women. While none of them were perfect, even Jefferson attended a church service in the US Capitol building two days after penning those famous words, “separation of church and state.” He even initiated the establishment of these worship services in the US Capitol building and this should make it fairly obvious what he did not mean by that now-twisted judicial concept.
Sadly, it seems that many of our religious liberties are being removed while so called free speech rights to promote pornography, profanity, and violence have greatly expanded. While we can sit around and bemoan these facts, it is more important to take action.
Too many times we Christians are guilty of criticizing our national leaders while not praying for them as the Bible commands us to do. In addition, we often expect them to lead godly and righteous lives but we do not do so ourselves. We expect them not to cheat steal or lie but we do. Ultimately our leaders are a direct reflection of the people they represent. This is a call for each of us who claims to follow Christ to truly live as Christ taught us and to refuse to compromise with evil, whether it is the viewing of the latest unclean movie or the retelling of a questionable joke. If America will ever return to its godly heritage, it will not begin in DC as a result of legislation, but in the hearts of all her people by the Holy Spirit.
In addition, Christians must be involved in government. I’m thankful for the godly voices that do represent us on county, state, and national levels and encourage others to be involved as well, but something every Christian can and must do is vote. In the last presidential election, only half of all Christians were registered to vote and of those, only about half actually voted. If we do not have the gumption to get to the ballot box, we’d better not complain about the leaders we didn’t elect nor the ungodly decisions they make while in office. Edmund Burke once said, “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who himself died to bring about positive change in this country, once said, “The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.” When moral issues such as marriage, the rights of the unborn, and religious liberties are being batted around, Christians can and must speak out. Let us pray for our nation and vote in ways that reflect those prayers and our Biblical beliefs. May America Bless God that God may bless America.
In Jesus, George