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Whatever Happened To Christian America?

I believe that America has become a poor example of a Christian society – if not, altogether, a post-Christian society. I sometimes feel that church-goers want to appear Christian without making a knowledgeable commitment to what Christianity actually means. This cultural Christianity is merely an empty shell and church attendance a non-obligatory social atavism. Have we become pagans wearing religious masks whose meaning we no longer remember?

Even our government, which served as the model Christian republic to the nations, has fallen under the spell of the disciples of secular progressive socialism. Politicians and judges have ignored the Constitution, reinterpreted and twisted our laws, and passed legislation that renders the government openly anti-Christian. Yes, I know it is our own fault. We have voted political panderers into public office because they promised us a “free lunch” and “nanny-care.” Thus, we have sold our birthright for a mess of foul tasting stew. Our freedoms have eroded along with our commitment to Christianity.

A deliberate Christian moral consensus built America. Our Constitution was not written for a people who reject and openly oppose the Judeo-Christian tradition. With the waning influence of Biblical authority upon our society, secular progressives have welcomed the absence of absolute moral values. They use their political offices to appeal to immoral voters by promising to protect their loathsome passions through legislation.

Cultural Christianity is a dead Christianity. For the enticement of immoral pleasures and unrighteous materialism, we have abandoned God and enabled tyranny. The social consequences have been catastrophic: increased crime, drug addiction, abortions, divorce, sexual perversions, lack of respect for the rights of others, and the suppression of the knowledge of God. Parents fail to discipline their children and children refuse to honor their parents or respect authority.

We must repent of our sins and return to the God of the Bible. No election or candidate will slow our nation’s fall. A shallow Christianity and a watered-down faith will not do. We must, “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. . . .” (Matthew 6:33, ESV) “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.'” (Matthew 28:18-20, ESV)

Our arrogance has convinced us that The Great Commission of Christ applies only to sending missionaries to foreign lands and thus we have neglected our own neighborhoods. We have forgotten the great things the Lord has done among us. Our government officials have become American Pharaohs who no longer remember Joseph. We need a Christian revival in our land. Our Constitution does not work in a pagan society.

The citizens of the United States are in desperate need of Jesus Christ. False teaching is everywhere. Pray that God will raise up men who will take us to the fountain of living Gospel waters. Only God’s Truth will change men’s hearts. Only men with changed hearts can end the moral decline of our country.

2 Responses

  1. The founding fathers were not strict fundamentalist Christians, but rather were heavily influenced by deism and unitarianism, which is why they made sure to include disestablishment is the Constitution. Yes, early European settlers in America were Christian fundamentalists, but I think even you might be appalled by their ignorant, witch-burning ways. The secularization of society is not such a bad thing. Take the Taliban, replace their Islamic doctrine with Christian doctrine, and they’re still oppressors.

    A society governed by laws based on reason, that allows free expression is much better than a society governed by fundamentalist religious doctrine.

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  2. “Fundamentalist” in the modern sense of its use does not apply to the Founding Fathers. Nevertheless, most were Christian or promoted a Christian morality in government.

    The following information is from an article by Gary DeMar:

    Click to access HistoricalRevisionismChicago.pdf

    There was a worldview prior to 1787 that did not pass into oblivion when the Constitution was finally ratified in 1791. Many of the state constitutions were specifically Christian, and all were generally religious. None of this changed with the ratification of the Constitution. In fact, today the 50 state constitutions mention God using various terms such as “Supreme Rule of the Universe” and “Almighty God,” being the most common.

    Beginning in 1774, Congress appointed chaplains for itself and the army. It sponsored the publication of a Bible. Christian morality was adopted by the armed forces, and public lands were made available to promote Christianity among the Indians. John Adams, representing Massachusetts, and George Washington, representing Virginia, were present at these early congressional meetings. On March 16, 1776, “by order of Congress” a “day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer” where people of the nation were called on to “acknowledge the over ruling providence of God” and bewail their “manifold sins and transgressions, and, by a sincere repentance and amendment of life, appease his righteous displeasure, and, through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, obtain his pardon and forgiveness.”

    Congress set aside December 18, 1777 as a day of thanksgiving so the American people “may express the grateful feelings of their hearts and consecrate themselves to the service of their divine benefactor” and on which they might “join the penitent confession of their manifold sins . . . that it may please God, through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of remembrance.” Congress also recommended that Americans petition God “to prosper the means of religion for the promotion and enlargement of that kingdom which consists in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.”

    “Around the time of the American Revolution,” Robert Royal, president of the Faith and Reason Institute, writes that “a significant minority of the founders and the other colonists had been influenced by a moderate deism of the British sort that also retained strong elements of Christianity. Few, however, were deists properly speaking; most were out-and-out Christians.”

    The Founders “believed that a benevolent Supreme Being had created the universe and the laws of nature and had given man the power of reason with which to discover the meaning of those laws.” It was Benjamin Franklin who addressed the Constitutional Convention by reminding those in attendance of “a superintending Providence” in their favor that brought them to their unique place that would make history. He cited Psalm 127:1 to establish his point: “Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.” He went on to say something very nondeistic: He saw “proofs” that “God rules in the affairs of men,” and without God’s “concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel.” It was Franklin and Jefferson who called for the phrase “Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God” to be placed on the Great Seal of the United States. In addition, Franklin wanted the following to adorn the front face of the seal: Moses standing on the Shore, and extending his Hand over the Sea, thereby causing the same to overwhelm Pharaoh who is sitting in an open Chariot, a Crown on his Head and a Sword in his Hand. Rays from a Pillar of Fire in the Clouds reaching to Moses, to express that he acts by Command of the Deity. Franklin also declared, “Man will ultimately be governed by God or by tyrants.”

    In his Farewell address of 1796, Washington stated the following: Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

    The First Amendment is not dealing with church-state issues. The prohibition is against Congress and what it can’t do. The states with their religious state
    constitutions insisted on an amendment protecting them from a strong national government, including the topic of religion. The amendment prohibits Congress from establishing a religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

    David Barton writes in his book Original Intent: “The constitutional prohibition against ‘an establishment of religion’ forbade only the federal establishment of a national denomination.” Justice Joseph Story, who is considered one of the two Fathers of American Jurisprudence, wrote “We are not to attribute this [First Amendment] prohibition of a national religious establishment to an indifference to religion in general, and especially to Christianity. . . . The real object of the First Amendment was not to countenance, much less to advance, Mahometanism, or Judaism, or infidelity, by prostrating Christianity; but to exclude all rivalry among Christian sects.” In other words, as regards religion, the First Amendment was passed to prevent the federal government from choosing one Christian denomination (such as Baptists, Methodists, etc.) as the national denomination. As regards Christianity, in general, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled on February 29, 1892 in the case of Holy Trinity Church vs. United States, 143 U.S. 471, after a survey of the history and historical documents of the United States that, “these and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation.”

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