Last week I attended a lectureship entitled “In God We Trust”. Throughout the week, I heard powerful lessons about the state of our nation and how Christians should act in our present time. One lesson in particular hit home–but probably in a different way than the speaker intended.
He was talking about the Declaration of Independence, and how our nation was in fact founded on Christian beliefs. He went through different phrases of the Declaration and picked out words such as “Creator” and “God” and “Divine Providence”. However, I was stuck on one sentence in particular. I’d like to share it with you now:
“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.”
Immediately, I thought of the state of our nation. The way groups such as the Freedom from Religion Foundation are fighting to take God out of every single part of our public lives. The way television promotes atheism and mocks God. The way our homes are destroyed by divorce and same-sex relationships. And especially the way our nation is plagued with an infanticide problem.
When you think about abortion, what do you think about? I think about all of the women’s rights group that tell us that women have a right to “choose” the kind of life they want to live. Well I completely agree. I agree that women, like men, should be able to choose for themselves the kinds of lives they want. However, when you CHOOSE to have sexual relations outside of marriage, you’re kind of choosing to deal with the consequences, aren’t you? When you go to the doctor only to find out that you have contracted a sexually transmitted disease, do you get to tell the doctor that you CHOOSE to not have that? No. You made the choice when you chose to participate in such activities. How then do we, as a nation, sit idly by when people kill their unborn babies?? Yes, you have a right to choose. You have a right to choose not to go to bed with someone that isn’t your spouse.
It is no wonder that our society is engaged in so many ‘instant gratification’ crimes. If we allow people to ‘get rid of’ the consequences of their actions when it comes to the life or death of their baby, why are we surprised when people kill other human beings because that person tried to stand in their way when they wanted to take something out of the other person’s home? Why are we surprised that there are so many DUIs and people killed by drunk drivers? Do they not have the right to choose not to accept the consequences of their actions, or are women the only ones who get to escape the consequences?
OUR DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE states that we are CREATED. We have a CREATOR. That same CREATOR gave us rights that cannot be taken away–rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Tell me, which of those rights are the unborn babies getting? Oh that’s right–none of them.
We snuff out that innocent child’s life and subsequently take away their chance of liberty from their mother’s womb and their right to pursue happiness. Our nation has decided that we are the ones who give the rights of life, liberty and happiness. WE are the ones. You see the problem with that? When our nation was started, our founders acknowledged that it was GOD who gave those rights. Today, our nation needs to realize that yet again. Because if we acknowledged that God was the one who gave those rights, there’s no way we’d think that we could be the ones to take them away.
There are so many inconsistencies in our country, but why are we surprised? Nearly every day I see statuses and statements about our country and how evil it is. I see the statements of alarm and surprise and shock. But why? Why are we shocked that a nation that has abandoned God is practicing evil deeds? The Bible tells us over and over again that Christians are to be different than the world. America is the world. America is the culture we are to be opposing and keeping out of our churches and our hearts. Don’t be surprised that people who are without Christ are acting so foolishly. It is our job to teach them. The Christians at Corinth weren’t always Christians. We know that some of them were homosexuals, adulterers, fornicators and the like before they were washed with the blood of Jesus. Christians are sent to change the world, not stand by in awe that the world can be such an ugly place. A world without God IS ugly, and we’re seeing that first hand. Now what are we doing to change that?
America needs God. The world needs God. If America and the world are going to be helped, God is the answer. Christians must stand up and take His message to those lost and dying people, otherwise nothing will ever change.
