America: Reviving or Reshaping?
By Pastor Harold Warner
I am not an alarmist pastor marketing in the sensational to gain an audience. Neither am I like the shepherd boy in Aesop’s fable, always crying wolf. I have to tell you, though, that I have never felt the stakes higher for our nation. There is a real battle going on for the soul of America that is going to help define the direction of our future. Today, there is an all-out war to eliminate God, and in particular, Jesus Christ and Christianity, from the public square. This is part of an overall cultural shift to exclude God, the Bible, and absolutes, while enthroning man and moral relativism.
Revisionist history is putting forth the idea that America is no longer, and never has been, a nation rooted in Christianity and Biblical principles. What is being challenged through this process is America’s spiritual roots and godly heritage. Much of this is being done in the name of progress. These so-called “progressives” want to re-shape America in their image at the expense of all that America has stood for over the last two-plus centuries. They want to erase the vision the Founding Fathers had for this nation, especially the things that have aligned this nation with God and the precepts of Scripture.
Centuries ago, the psalmist asked the question almost as a lament, “If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3). There is something about good and godly foundations that are vital to righteous living which benefits society as a whole, since as Proverbs 14:34 tells us, “righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.” Freedom must be built on moral foundations or it will eventually collapse. John Adams in 1789 wrote these astounding words: “Our Constitution was designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other.” If America is to succeed, God must bless America and America must bless God!
Maybe we should let history speak for itself. That’s the problem that the progressives have: the facts keep getting in the way!
“If we and our posterity reject religious instruction and authority, violate the rules of eternal justice, trifle with the injunctions of morality, and recklessly destroy the political constitution which holds us together, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us that shall bury all our glory in profound obscurity.” – Daniel Webster, Early American Statesman
“No free government now exists in the world, unless where Christianity is acknowledged, and is the religion of the country.” – Pennsylvania Supreme Court, 1824
“We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government, that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by the means of the Bible. For this Divine Book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and those sober and frugal virtues, which constitute the soul of republicanism.” – Benjamin Rush, Signer of the Declaration of Independence
“To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys...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.” – Jedediah Morse, patriot and father of American geography.
This is not just partisan political commentary or part of the vast right-wing conspiracy, but our current Administration in Washington, D.C. and the political climate illustrates this battle. Our President, Barack Obama, campaigned on a platform of change. He continually repeated the mantra, “Change you can believe in!” The problem is he never really told us, and many people didn’t seem to care, what exactly that change would be or look like! What was clear, however, and what he enunciated, was his plan and vision to re-shape or re-make America. This is why we’re witnessing a deliberate attempt, if not an outright onslaught, to re-shape America. From debates over health care to foreign policy and our relationships with our allies to the economic foundations of capitalism which have contributed to America’s freedom and strength.
Think about this: if you want to “re-make” something then you’re admitting that there’s something wrong with the original, or with the foundations. Please, lay aside politics or popularity for a minute, because America does not need to be re-made, it needs to be revived! This is not just semantics. There is a vast difference between these two visions. To revive means literally “to make alive again,” to return to those time-tested and God-honoring foundations. To re-shape is to depart from them in favor of man’s “better idea.”
Figuring as a significant part of American history have been the religious revivals and spiritual movements that have restored us to God and His “ancient landmarks” spoken of in Proverbs 22:28. The First & Second Great Awakenings were times of real religious advance in the colonies that led to social transformation. One historian said about this, “The Great Awakening was a watershed event in the life of the American people. Before it was over, it had swept the colonies of the Eastern seaboard, transforming the social and religious life of the land.”
Personally, I was saved in 1970 during what was called “The Jesus People Movement,” in which tens of thousands of young people turned to Christ and began to follow Him. This is why I am holding to the prayer of Habakkuk 3:2: “I have heard all about you, Lord, and I am filled with awe by the amazing things You have done. In this time of our deep need, begin again to help us (revive us again), as You did in years gone by. Show us Your power to save us. And in your anger, remember Your mercy.” This should be our prayer and hope for our current president, our government and nation: revive America, don’t re-shape it!
So, where is my confidence? There is a story about two men sitting on a porch one summer evening. Soon a small dog came wobbling down the street and fell at the bottom of the steps in a disheveled heap.
“This little dog looks awfully beat up,” observed one of the men.
“Oh, that’s my dog,” said the other. “He comes home looking like that almost every night after he gets into fights with other dogs in the neighborhood.”
“Well, he must not be much of a fighter,” his friend said.
“Oh, he’s a very good fighter,” replied the other. “But he’s a very poor judge of opponents.”
Those who are promoting an anti-God posture and belligerence have bitten off more than they can chew. They’ve chosen to pick a fight with the wrong opponent, Almighty God! King David spoke to this delusion of those who would create a world without God in Psalm 2:1-4: “Why are the nations in an uproar, and the peoples devising a vain thing? The kings of the earth take their stand, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed: ‘Let us tear their fetters apart, and cast away their cords from us!’ He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord scoffs at them.”
We can recognize that God is in the heavens, and His throne is secure, and it is the one to which we pledge our eternal allegiance.