America - Please pray for her!
The Battle Hymn of the Republic
America the Beautiful & A special thanks for America
America! Do You Remember? "When riots were unthinkable. When you left your front doors open. When socialism was a dirty word...."
"The Declaration of Independence was approved JULY 4, 1776....
Benjamin Franklin said, "We must hang together or most assuredly we shall hang separately."
Of the 56 signers: 17 lost their fortunes, 12 had their homes destroyed, 5 became prisoners of war, 1 had two sons imprisoned on the British starving ship Jersey, 1 had a son killed in battle, 1 had his wife die from harsh prison treatment and 9 signers died during the War....
John Adams said, "...I am well aware of the toil and blood and treasure that it will cost to maintain this Declaration.... Posterity will triumph in that day's transaction, even though we [may regret] it, which I trust in God we shall not." The link to this message (American Minute with Bill Federer) is broken.
The Declaration of Independence: "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, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness...."
But the "inalienable rights" God gives to His people (believers who know and follow Him) are eternal blessings for His children, not "human rights" as defined by the world. Our "rights" are based on the life of Jesus in us, and they don't include any guarantee of social equality, earthly success, or justice here on earth. Instead we are called to "suffer with Him" as we walk with Him each day. Then, when we face of pain and injustice, He promises us His strength, peace and perseverance:
"...we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body." 2 Corinthians 4:7-10
The "rights" (or rather blessings) we have in Christ include all the privileges of being part of His family and “fellow-heirs” with Him for all eternity. For He has...
"...blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace.... In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace..." Ephesians 1:3-7
"Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
As for nations, He warned His people in Old Testament days that if they forgot Him, ignored His ways and followed “other gods,” they would surely be destroyed. The New Testament reminds us that America would face a similar end if we choose to follow the world's highway to cultural degradation rather than God's narrow way to peace and joy with Him. [See Total transformation]
Seeds of Persecution
Stimulus to ban religious worship: "President Obama's proposed economic stimulus plan makes a deliberate – and unconstitutional – attempt to censor religious speech and worship on school campuses across the nation.... The wording that specifically targets religious speech already has been approved by the majority Democrats in the U.S. House – all GOP members opposed it.
"Critics argued schools would accept any money offered, then impose a ban on religious events.... 'This is a direct attack on students of faith, and I'm outraged Democrats are using an economic stimulus bill to promote discrimination,' DeMint said."
See Don't mention Jesus
When preaching becomes a crime: "In 1774, a young James Madison, while traveling through Culpeper County in Virginia – well before he became our fourth president – passed by a jail where a number of Baptist preachers had been incarcerated for nothing more than preaching without an official government license. One of these 'criminals' preached from a window of the jail to any who would listen. Madison would never forget the dedication of those brave preachers – nor the audacity of the officials who had jailed them...." See Why "Hate crime" laws would ban Biblical Christianity
: "...our schools and colleges are fast silencing 'faith-based' expressions. So when little Sallie wanted to tell her friend about Jesus, the principal scolded her. When Antonio included a small drawing of Jesus in an Earth Day picture, the bewildered kindergartner faced humiliation. "As Christian words are confined to homes and churches (or dismissed altogether), they soon fade from public awareness. Francis Schaeffer saw this coming more than thirty years ago. In How Should We Then Live, he describes the consequences..."The Attack on the Pledge: Both Bad and Good: "First, the bad news: ...The Bill of Rights has already been revised almost beyond recognition. As leaders and teachers embraced the illusions of modern liberalism, our courts followed suit. Little by little, the original intent was forgotten, drowned in a flood of evolving interpretations and 'progressive' ideals. Now, the Constitutional edicts originally intended to protect the people from an intrusive government have become tools to do the opposite....
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But here is the good news: The bad news produces... 1. Alertness: ...we become all the more alert to deception.... 2. Insight: Reminded that we were a 'nation under God,' we look to see 'from where [we] have fallen' so that we might, at least in our own hearts, restore the early God-given zeal for following His way. ... 3. Conviction: Aware of the shifting sands of social trends, we see a deeper need to take our stand on God's unchanging truths and moral standards." See God's Warnings for our Times
. As an immigrant (Norwegian), I truly appreciate what God has given us in this country. All the more, I grieve at the erosion of Biblical values and the rising hostility toward God's unchanging truth. UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the USA: The Olympic National Park. Just a reminder that our freedom is fragile. Let's pray for God's will and protection. Reject UNESCO's "protection." : "It's easy now, in a nation awash with complaints about what our Founders did not do... to overlook how startlingly bold their views and actions were in their own day and are, in fact, even today. Who else in 1776 declared, let alone thought it a self-evident truth, that all men were created equal, entitled to inalienable rights, or to any rights at all? How few declare these views today...? Certainly not America's 20th century enemies, the Nazis and communists; certainly not today's Islamic radicals.... We are fortunate that the Founders of our nation were enlightened, generous, jealous of their rights and those of their countrymen, and prepared to risk everything to create a free republic." What Kids Would Add to Our Constitution. The following suggestions show "empathy" and "tolerance" but little understanding of our founders' intentions. Political activism seems more important than freedom. Where do you suppose they learned these values?"I WOULD make it illegal for the circus to use animals as part of the entertainment. It seems stupid that animals must be tortured just for "human" pleasure. The word "circus" is just another word for slavery! We are all animals -- some of us more than others." Diana Perez, 14
"The new amendment I came up with is that gays and lesbians are able to get married. To deny them the choice of marriage is to deny them their humanity." Joshua Dail, 14.
"The death penalty will no longer be used.... I find it an injustice to kill people for their mistakes. If you take someone's life it's just like killing one of your family because we are all brothers and sisters." Jessica Gorham, 13 .
"Every middle and low class American will receive a yearly sum of $2,500.... The rich hardly have to move a finger and they earn millions and millions. Americans that aren't rich have to break their backs every day." Mayra Carrera, 14.
"Guns should only be issued to police officers." Jen Hill, 13 .
But Laura Chew (13) knows better: "I would make it so that everyone needed to pass a test on the Constitution in order to vote. You can't make good decisions on how our government should run without having an idea of how it is run now. You can't decide the future without learning from the past." Laura Chew, 13 .
"The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; He makes the plans of the peoples of no effect.
The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of His heart to all generations.
Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people He has chosen as His own inheritance." Psalm 33:10-12
“If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? ... Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:31-39
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