We live in a day where it seems that our country is losing its traditional religious and political moorings.
In recent years there have been attempts to remove “under God” from our Pledge of Allegiance, “In God we trust” from our currency, and monuments of the Ten Commandments from public buildings and lands. In contrast to our current position our nation’s founding fathers included a number of references to God in our four foundational documents, such as, “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.“ (The Declaration of Independence) My point is if we are merely biological accidents, a random combination of genetic material spewed out as a result of an impersonal big bang and there is no God, then our “rights” as spoken of in the Declaration of Independence do not exist.
If there is no God, there would be no right and wrong.
If there is no God, then our lives can have no real purpose or lasting significance because there was no intent or design to our existence. We are literally flukes of the universe, genetic accidents.
However, if there is a God then I was born on purpose, no matter what my siblings or parents might tell me. Psalm 139:13-16 tells me that God “knit me together in my mother’s womb,” that He oversaw my formation and my life both in length and moments.
He is the One who establishes truth, right, and wrong.
He grants life, liberty, and our ability to pursue happiness.
This God, the God of the Bible, is the one our founding fathers knew and embedded in our nation’s four great documents. (The Declaration of Independence, 1776; The Articles of Confederation, 1777; and The Constitution of the United States, 1787; and the Bill of Rights, 1791) It is a shame, our shame, that we do not spend more time in our educational processes reading and studying these precious documents that established this great nation in which we have the privilege to live.
The natural grandeur of these works derives much of that potency from the Bible and the principles established in it. I would strongly encourage you to read both. I often meet people who think God is mad at them. On the contrary, God is the One who reached out through His Son Jesus to reconcile us to Himself. He loves you and deeply desires that you know Him personally. On the third Monday of this month, we will celebrate Presidents’ Day. Perhaps this would be a good time to offer a prayer of thanks to God for His providential watch-care over those brave men and women who carved our great nation out of the ground risking their very lives to do so.
Every week, we celebrate the Lord’s Day. I would emphatically encourage you to find a church you can call home so that you can begin to know the Creator God who has given you these wonderful unalienable rights.
James Weaver is the pastor of First Baptist Church, located at 602 West St. in Cassville. He may be reached at 417-847-2965 or info@fbccassville.org.
