Chapter 35: Do We Trust in God? "Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?" Galatians 4:16. In Jesus' day, the Jewish religious leaders claimed that if they had lived in the days of the prophets of old, they would have acted differently than their forefathers.
But Jesus rejected their claim, telling them, "You say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.' Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets." Matthew 23:30-31. If Jesus said that to them, what would He say to us? We Christians today will no doubt say that if we had lived in the days of the colonists, we would have behaved differently than they did.
We wouldn't have stolen the Indians' land. We wouldn't have been part of the horrid slave trade. We wouldn't have traded rum to the Indians. We would have truly trusted in God and obeyed His commandments. We would have acknowledged God in the Constitution and in the Declaration of Independence. However, if that's the case, why do we praise and glorify those colonists who violated God's commandments and deliberately left Him out of the Constitution?
Why do we publish textbooks that hold up those men as shining examples for our children? And why do we bristle when someone points out the colonists' lack of trust? The Battle for God. There's a battle being fiercely fought today all across America. It's a battle for the minds and hearts of Americans. The two main opponents are Christianity and secularism. This battle pits conservative Christians and biblical values against liberal humanists and modern secular values.
My dictionary defines secularism as "a system of doctrines and practices that disregards or rejects any form of religious faith and worship." As a conservative, Bible-believing Christian myself, I decry the erosion of Christian values in America. The courts have outlawed prayer in public schools and at many public events. They've banned the teaching of creation, or even intelligent design, in the public schools.
Divorce runs rampant throughout our country, and the Supreme Court has declared that women have a constitutional right to abortion. With sad eyes, I have watched these distressing events unfold during my lifetime. I wonder if the time will come when it will be illegal merely to say that abortion is murder. Even though the vast majority of Americans believe in God, Congress and the federal courts have forced federal, state, and local governments to act as though we live in an atheistic state.
But is this what the Founding Fathers intended? Absolutely not. Throughout the course of this book, I've pointed out the failure of the colonists and revolutionists to trust in God and obey Him. I've shown how they established a federal government that didn't honor and recognize God in the way it should have. However, the Founding Fathers were certainly not trying to found an atheistic state or a government that would be hostile to religion, particularly Christianity.
They weren't intending to create a nation that would push religion out of our schools, governments, and other public spheres. Otherwise, they would not have spoken out publicly about God so often and encouraged the flourishing of churches. They wouldn't have issued official days of thanksgiving and prayer, nor would they have appointed chaplains for Congress. What our nation has become with regards to Christianity is nothing like they had envisioned.
Nevertheless, if our American forefathers had fully trusted in God and been obedient to Him, perhaps we wouldn't be fighting this battle today. Whose side are we on? We can't change what went on hundreds of years ago. However, what we can do now is to make certain that we don't make the same mistakes they did. We can make sure that this time we do things God's way. And to do that means that first we get honest about our colonial forefathers.
It's fine to laud the praiseworthy things they did, but we need to distance ourselves from their actions that were in direct disobedience to God. It should fill all Christians with shame that our colonial forefathers violated our Savior's commandments in refusing to pay their taxes and responding with violence to legislation they didn't like. It should sicken us that the colonial ministers so readily shirked their duties and twisted the Scriptures in order to encourage the colonists in their disobedience.
However, as we've seen, rather than distancing themselves from such shameless twisting of the Scriptures, so many Christians today praise the clergy for what they did. Christian economist Richard J. Maybury, who writes material for homeschoolers, commends those ear-tickling preachers. Under majority rule, there is no legal requirement for the majority to be ethical. There isn't even any legal description of what is ethical. That's a colossal departure from the days of the American Revolution.
Prior to the Revolution, a clergyman named Jonathan Mayhew told the colonists they had a choice. They could obey their government's law, England's law, or their God's law, but they couldn't do both because their government's law violated God's law. In a letter written in 1818, John Adams said Reverend Mayhew's sermon, delivered in 1750, was the actual beginning of the American Revolution. What's very telling is Adams' comment that the Revolution was effected before the war commenced.
The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people, a change in their religious sentiments of their duties and obligations. Religious sentiments. The choice was a religious one. Maybury is correct in saying that it was a religious choice. But the choice Christians made was to deliberately disobey God's written word. John Adams was referring to the same sermon we noted a few chapters back.
This was the sermon in which Jonathan Mayhew twisted Romans 13 to say we only have to submit to governments if they are acting fairly and doing God's will. The reason John Adams says that Mayhew's sermon was the beginning of the Revolution is because Mayhew essentially nullified Romans 13. Up to that time, Christians hesitated to break such a specific commandment in the New Testament, but Mayhew eased their consciences. Mayhew also helped people get past other problem verses in Scripture.
He was a rationalist who openly preached Unitarianism from the pulpit and who denied the virgin birth. His influence on John Adams wasn't just in the sphere of politics, but in religion as well. For John Adams, too, became a Unitarian and stayed one throughout his life. Richard Maybury is quite mistaken when he says the colonists faced the choice of having to choose either to obey the government's laws or God's laws because they couldn't do both. God's law tells us to obey Caesar's law.
The real choice the colonists faced was whether to support armed insurrection or support the Kingdom teaching of Jesus because they couldn't do both. Our choice is still the same. We can laud the colonists for breaking God's laws, or we can stand firm for the teachings of Jesus. We can show that our ultimate allegiance is the Kingdom of God, or we can demonstrate that the United States has our ultimate allegiance.
It's too late to change what has happened in the past, but it's not too late to change our own lack of trust. If we want to win the war against godless secularism, the place to begin is to trust in God. We need to fight this battle on our knees, using the weapon of prayer, faith, and truth. Ironically, Bible-believing Christians expect unregenerate, worldly people to trust God and obey His laws concerning abortion. But how can we expect them to trust and obey God's laws if we don't do so ourselves?
So we must first learn to trust God absolutely ourselves and obey all His commandments. Then perhaps we'll be in a position to ask others to do the same. The place to start. The place to start is to teach our children to trust and obey God. We need to do this in our homes, churches, Christian schools, and homeschools. We can begin by being honest about America's history. Instead of glorifying people who disobeyed God, we can point out to our children that what the colonists did was wrong.
We can explain to our children that disobeying God's laws is never an option when we are faced with difficulties. After all, we can't teach our children to trust in God when we exalt those who didn't trust in God. It disturbs me that so many American history textbooks written by Christian publishers don't look at colonial history or the American Revolution from the point of view of Jesus.
They don't ask, "What did Jesus say is right and wrong?" or, "Is this what Jesus would have done?" Such textbooks don't ask students, "Did these actions violate Jesus' commandments?" or, "What did Jesus say about paying taxes?" No. Most Christian textbooks merely reflect the world's viewpoint of right and wrong. Most Christian schools require students to memorize the preamble to the Constitution. Instead, why don't we require our students to memorize key sections of the Sermon on the Mount?
Our students typically know more about our Constitution than they do about Jesus' teachings. They can describe many of the key events that happened in America during the first 300 years after Jamestown was established. But they have no clue as to the key events that happened during the first 300 years of Christianity beyond the events described in Acts. God commended the patriarchs of old because they had their national priorities correct.
These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, were assured of them, embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland. And truly, if they had called to mind that country from which they had come out, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country.
Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them. Hebrews 11:13-16. God calls Christians to be strangers and pilgrims in this world. That means we should view national and international events differently than does the world. And it means we behave differently than the world when faced with adversity. However, as one Christian professor has expressed it, too many people in the church are Americans who happen to be Christians. They aren't Christians who happen to be Americans.
In other words, their loyalty to the United States is greater than their loyalty to Jesus and His Kingdom. Yes, too many American Christians have their values and priorities upside down. And until we get our priorities and loyalties straight, in God we trust will be nothing more than an empty slogan on our coins. Two thousand years ago, Jesus raised up a nation of people whose ultimate loyalty was to His Kingdom, regardless of whether their earthly nation was Rome, Judea, Persia, or India.
It was a kingdom of people who viewed disobedience to Christ as the worst sort of treason possible. It was a kingdom whose citizens could truly say, "In God we trust." That kingdom is still here, and my prayer is that all people on earth who call on the name of Christ will once again give their utmost allegiance to that kingdom. When we do, like the early Christians, we will all be able to say, "The Lord is my helper. I will not fear. What can man do to me?"