Chapter 25: Today's Black Regiment. I wish that the disgraceful episode of the Black Regiment was something that occurred only in a small window of past history, but we have our own Black Regiment with us today. The only difference is that today, the Black Regiment is composed not only of ministers, but also Christian authors and Christian textbook publishers. These ministers, authors, and publishers glorify the colonial pastors who perverted the gospel in order to tickle the ears of their hearers.
They also misrepresent the facts about the Revolutionary War and the events that led up to it in order to paint it as a holy cause. For instance, in their book The Light and the Glory, Peter Marshall, a minister, and David Manuel wrote the following: "As usual, American opinion on this mounting crisis was strongly shaped by the ministers. Those men of God who were American-born and not in Crown colonies, such as Georgia and Virginia, were becoming nearly unanimous in their support of resistance.
Thanks to the Great Awakening, there was now a new generation of committed clergymen sawed throughout America, many of them men of considerable spiritual depth and maturity. As the list of intolerable acts mounted, so did their remonstrations. It was almost as if they had George III in the front row of their congregations and were trying to make him see the error of his ways. But if the king saw any of their sermons, he took no notice.
Like Pharaoh, unto whom many sermons likened him, his heart was hard and growing harder." So those preachers who prostituted the gospel for political expediency were men of considerable spiritual depth and maturity? No, they were men of straw, ear-ticklers. The authors are right in saying that the ministers shaped public opinion, but that is hardly praiseworthy because they persuaded the colonists to flout Christ's laws.
After praising the colonial ministers, the authors go on to defend those Christians who disobeyed God's word. When does tyranny become tyranny? Is there a time when it is not only morally correct but the will of God for one to resist legally constituted authority? Of all the questions we faced, this last was the one we dreaded the most, for a strong case could be made against America's ever having come out from under the mother country's authority. A strong case can be made?
That's like saying a strong case can be made from Scripture that adultery is wrong. Submission to government is more than a strong case. It's one of the most direct commandments in the New Testament: "Whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God" (Romans 13:2). Next, Marshall and Manuel take the Scriptures out of context themselves, just as did the colonial ministers.
If God did intend this land to be a new Israel, then each major step in the implementation of this plan would have to conform with His righteousness. A holy end, no matter how sublime, could never justify unholy means. The more we debated this, the more mired down we became, so we prayed to be shown the way out of this mental swamp.
And that same morning in Florida, in which we had been unable to discern the true nature of the Puritans' call, the Holy Spirit went on to show us why America had to resist, why for them to do anything less would have been the gravest disobedience. This part of the revelation began with a verse of Scripture coming to Peter's mind, which, when we looked it up, was Galatians 5:1, and which proved to be the key to all that followed: "For freedom, Christ has set us free.
Stand fast, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery." It's bad enough that colonial ministers pulled up Galatians 5:1 during the midst of the controversy with England, but to use that fallacious argument today is indefensible. And for the authors to claim that the Holy Spirit directed them to use the Galatians argument is unconscionable. They knew full well the colonial preachers had used that same argument.
In short, many Christians today are no more honest with God's word and with historical facts than they were in Samuel Adams' day. What we still have today are ear-ticklers for Christ. Falsifications in Christian textbooks. What are we to think of history books written by Christians, particularly textbooks for our children, that misrepresent the facts? What are we to think when they even publish outright falsehoods to justify the colonists' disobedience to Christ?
My wife and I homeschooled our children using an eclectic blend of textbooks from various Christian publishers: Christian Light Education, Rod and Staff, Pathway Publishers, Bob Jones, and Abeka. We found that each publisher has its strengths and weaknesses. However, we found serious issues with the American history textbooks of Bob Jones and Abeka. Both publishers put out high-quality textbooks, and I can hardly recommend their textbooks for most subjects.
It's only with their American history textbooks that I take issue. Furthermore, it's quite possible that other Christian publishers with whom I'm unfamiliar do even a worse job than Bob Jones and Abeka. The reason I'm singling out these two publishers is that we used some of their textbooks to homeschool our children. My complaint is not that their American history textbooks merely contain errors. We're all fallible and subject to mistakes. I doubt that there are any American history textbooks without errors.
And it's not that secular textbooks do a better job. I have found numerous errors and outright lies in the secular American history textbooks used in public schools. However, I do expect a Christian publisher to be intellectually and spiritually honest. There is no excuse for any publisher, particularly a Christian publisher, to blatantly slant the facts or publish falsehoods. Furthermore, a Christian publisher should never glorify disobedience to God's commandments.
However, I have set forth below numerous examples where Bob Jones and Abeka, American history textbooks, have been guilty of all of these things. The Stamp Act: The Claims. In The History of Our United States, published by Abeka, the authors write the following about the Stamp Act: "At that time, King George III was King of England. He decided that the colonists themselves must pay for the protection that the English army had given them during the French and Indian War.
This sounds fair, but remember, the colonists believed that they were to have a part in making their own laws. This was part of the rights which Englishmen were supposed to have. King George put aside this promise when he told the British government to pass laws for the Americans to obey." The Facts. As we've discussed, neither King George nor Parliament ever asked the colonists to pay for the protection given them during the French and Indian War, even though it would have been fair to have done so.
They asked the colonists to pay only for part of what it cost to guard the new frontiers. The Stamp Act is very explicit about this. Quartering Act. The Claims.
The textbook United States History for Christians, published by Bob Jones, makes the following assertions about the Quartering Act of 1765: "Just two days after passing the Stamp Act, on March 22, 1765, Parliament passed the Quartering Act, which officially subjected the colonies to a standing army in times of peace and further required that the colonists help supply provisions for them.
Even Prime Minister Grenville admitted that the Quartering Clause was by far the most likely to create difficulties and uneasiness, especially as the Quartering of soldiers upon the people against their will is declared by the petition of right to be contrary to law. The almost simultaneous passage of the Stamp Act and the Quartering Act caused the colonists to conclude that they were being oppressed by an unlawful military occupation so that illegal taxation could be enforced." The Facts.
As we've already seen, the Quartering Act of 1765 was primarily for the purpose of temporarily housing the British troops as they passed through the colonies on their way to the western frontiers. That the colonists understood this is made very clear from Benjamin Franklin's presentation before Parliament. Parliament pointed out to Franklin that all of the money raised by the Stamp Tax would be spent in the colonies by the soldiers. Therefore, the colonies would get their money right back.
Franklin replied, "I know it is appropriated by the Act to the American service, but it will be spent in the conquered colonies (that is, Quebec and Florida) where the soldiers are, not in the colonies that pay it." So the soldiers weren't stationed in the 13 colonies, except for a very small contingent in New York, but the colonists knew that quite well. Did Grenville really say that the Quartering Act was illegal?
The quotation used in the textbook is from a letter written by Grenville to King George on March 9, 1765. It was in response to a letter written by the king to Grenville earlier that day. Lord Halifax, commander of the navy, had drafted a proposed Quartering Act that would have allowed soldiers to be housed in inhabited homes. The king had reviewed this proposed Act and had concerns about it.
So before it was presented to Parliament, he rushed a letter to Grenville with the message, "As I think that at a time like this all measures should be duly weighed before they are undertaken, I send them to you before I return them to the office." The king asked Grenville to get back to him that day if possible.
Grenville rushed a letter back to the king, agreeing with him that housing troops in occupied dwellings was a breach of English liberties and that the proposed Act should be changed to eliminate this controversial provision. The proposed bill was modified before it went before Parliament, eliminating the provision in question and making it clear that troops could be quartered only in vacant houses, and even then only as a last resort and upon fair payment to the owners.
So Grenville was not addressing the Quartering Act that eventually passed. He was addressing an earlier proposed version of the Act. Instead of exposing Grenville as a man who helped to enact an illegal law, the Facts reveal both a king and a prime minister who were very sensitive to British rights and who did not want to do anything illegal. Townshend Tariffs. The Claims. In the case of the Townshend Acts, the misinformation and falsehoods spread by Christians go from bad to worse.
The Light and the Glory claims, "New tariffs were then imposed, the most galling of which were the Stamp Act of 1765. Infuriating as this was, it was nothing compared to the Townshend Acts of 1767, imposing duties on glass, lead, tea, paper, and so forth. There was no longer any pretense of paying the cost of the British garrison.
This was for the purpose of raising revenues to pay for England's global adventures." Going further, the birth of the United States makes the claim, "Townshend's personal feelings, expressed to his friends, were that Americans were adults with ironclad principles.
If they could be made to think that one tax was internal and another external, then Townshend was certain that in time he could levy a tax on them and convince them that it wasn't a tax." The authors of United States History in Christian Perspective state, "Townshend believed that the colonists made a distinction between internal taxes (taxes levied within the colonies, such as the Stamp Tax) and external taxes (taxes levied on goods imported to the colonies).
Townshend was soon to learn that the colonists were as loathed to pay unjustly levied external taxes as they were to pay the Stamp Tax." The Facts. As we've already seen, it was Benjamin Franklin who told Parliament that the colonists made a distinction between external and internal taxes. In repealing the Stamp Act (an internal tax) and replacing with the Townshend Acts (external taxes), Parliament was only acting on what it had been told by Franklin.
It is completely false that these Acts were "for the purpose of raising revenues to pay for England's global adventures." The Townshend Tariffs were merely a replacement for the Stamp Act. The purpose was still to raise revenue to help pay for the continued defense of the American frontiers. These tariffs were hardly unjust, for the right to levy tariffs on imports had been reserved in the colonial charters. The Boston Massacre. The Claims.
United States history for Christian schools gives this description of the so-called Boston Massacre. "The angry but unarmed crowd hurled sticks and snowballs at seven soldiers under the command of Captain Thomas Preston. One of the privates, Hugh Montgomery, struck by a stick, slipped on the ice. While getting up, he fired his musket into the mob, whether in anger or by accident cannot be determined. With his shot, however, the other redcoats opened fire without orders into the face of the crowd.
As the chill wind swept the smoke away, five men lay dying in the square. The blood-stained snow became a vivid reminder that sometimes the path ahead to independence would demand everything." The Facts. The evidence presented at trial by none other than John Adams himself showed conclusively that it was not an unarmed crowd. Many of the men in the mob had heavy sticks and clubs. Private Hugh Montgomery did not slip on the ice. He was knocked down by a member of the mob.
The soldiers thought they had received an order to fire because so many of the men taunting them were telling them to fire. One of the most convicting testimonies presented at the trial was that of the surgeon who attended Patrick Carr. Carr, a colonist who came to America from Ireland, was part of the mob. He was wounded by the soldiers and died later. Here are the answers the surgeon gave to the questions that John Adams asked him at the trial. Question: Were you Patrick Carr's surgeon? Answer: I was.
Question: Was Carr apprehensive of his danger? Answer: He told me he was a native of Ireland, that he had frequently seen mobs and had seen soldiers called upon to quell them. He had often seen soldiers fire on the people in Ireland, but in his life he had never seen soldiers bear half so much before they opened fire. Question: When did you have the last conversation with him? Answer: About four o'clock in the afternoon on the day in which he died.
And he then said particularly that he forgave the man, whoever he was, who shot him. He was satisfied that the soldier had no malice but had fired to defend himself. Boston Tea Vandalism. The Claims. The behavior of the Sons of Liberty in wantonly destroying a valuable cargo of tea in the Boston Harbor is appalling. Even more shocking, however, is how Christians today voice their approval of the Boston Tea Vandalism. They defend its perpetrators and even try to minimize the whole thing as a petty affair.
For example, America Land I Love says, "Although the men involved harmed nothing but the tea, the Boston Tea Party, as it was called, outraged British authorities." Another Christian textbook says, "News of the Boston Tea Party spread quickly to the other colonies. Many colonists cheered the people of Boston for their courage.
Others wondered with fear, 'What will England do next?' The English government saw no excuse for the Boston Tea Party." Going one step further, United States history for Christian schools presents an apocryphal account of the vandalism, portraying the men as saintly choir boys. "Even a broken padlock was anonymously replaced the next day. Only one man was caught stealing tea, and he was promptly kicked off the ship. When the ships had been emptied of tea, the participants cleaned them and released their crews.
They then lined up at attention on deck, emptied any loose tea from their boots, swept it into the harbor, and marched away singing, 'Rally, Mohawks, bring out your axes, and tell King George we'll pay no taxes.' Even pro-British colonists, or Tories caustically admitted that the Tea Party had been conducted as correctly as a crime could be. Across the Atlantic, however, the incident was not regarded as a mere tempest in a teapot." The Facts. So the bad guys were the British authorities?
Apparently, they should have laughed off the affair. Do you think that's what our government would do today? We're not talking about some kind of petty vandalism here. We're talking about nearly two and a half million dollars' worth of property destroyed. Destroyed in order to protect the local smugglers. We're talking about patriotic thugs dictating who could or could not dock their ships in Boston.
We're talking about strong-armed insurrectionists who felt they had the authority to order British citizens not to pay lading taxes that had been enforced for nearly a century. And a Christian textbook has the audacity to refer to this as a mere tempest in a teapot. What these books reveal. It would be bad enough if the only problem was that the American revolutionists didn't place their trust in God and instead turned to lawlessness to achieve their aims. That would be merely a past problem.
But the malady lingers, for each generation of Christians since the Revolution has lionized the revolutionaries and given them a Christian coating. They've excused their disobedience to God and twisted the scripture in order to portray the revolutionists as Christian heroes. In other words, this present generation of Christians has no more trust in God than did those who lived at the time of the Revolution. They denounce liberals who teach situational ethics, but then they turn around and teach the very same thing.
Situational ethics is the name given to a belief system that says we can violate God's laws if we believe a more loving thing can be accomplished in doing so. Liberal Christians sometimes use this argument to justify the acceptance of abortion. The problem with situational ethics is that it says God's laws are not absolute. Furthermore, it gives people an excuse for not obeying God's laws when it so suits them. If someone wants to do something badly enough, he or she will always find a way to justify it.
Evangelical Christians are preaching situational ethics when they argue that the colonists had the right to rebel against the governing authorities because the authorities were tyrannical. One problem with that argument is that the only "tyranny" at the time of the Boston Tea Vandalism was a three-penny tax on tea. If that tyranny justified disobedience and armed rebellion, when has there ever been a situation in which Christians were not justified in disobeying their government?
More importantly, if we decide one of God's laws is not absolute, how can we argue that another one of His laws is absolute? In the end, all of His laws become mere suggestions. Nevertheless, you might be thinking, "Ah, but in this case we know God approved of what the colonists did because they ended up winning the war." But does that really prove anything?