Picking the Wrong Opponent
There’s a story about two men sitting on a porch one summer evening. Soon a small dog came wobbling down the street and fell at the bottom of the steps in a disheveled heap. “That little dog looks awfully beat up,” observed one.
“Oh, that’s my dog,” said the other. “He comes home looking like that almost every night after he gets into fights with other dogs in the neighborhood.”
“Well, he must not be much of a fighter,” said the friend.
“Oh, he’s a very good fighter, but he’s a very poor judge of opponents.”
Need we be reminded again that an all-out war is on to eliminate God and, in particular, Jesus Christ and the Christianity He personifies from public displays and discourse? From the highest offices in America to the rabid minorities that have become the news media darlings, the hostilities are being ramped up feverishly.
But need we also be reminded that, like the little dog, the purveyors of anti-God belligerence have bitten off more than they can chew? They’ve chosen to pick a fight with the wrong opponent. No one can defeat the Almighty.
A Culture of Incoherence
The latest swill, as we’ve observed, is that America is no longer (nor has ever been, claim some) rooted in Christianity. The “new America” now consists of nothing more than a conglomeration of religions and ideologies that represent the new state of the world.
Consequently, everything is moving at a blistering pace into a culturally incoherent morass in the name of progress and at the expense of all that America has ever stood for. Everything that has aligned this nation with God and the precepts script-ed into the republic’s history are in serious jeopardy. Here are a few examples:
- For 42 years sponsors of the patriotic Fourth of July God and Country Festival in Idaho have included a military flyover by Air Force jets honoring the troops that have fought and died for the cause of freedom here and abroad. The event has always been regarded as a patriotic salute to those who have done so much for us. This year, however, the Pentagon decided that patriotism and Christian allegiance to America are not compatible and cancelled the Air Force’s participation.
As reported in the Idaho Press Tribune, the Pentagon complained it opted out because the event’s website “stated that this is a Christian event.” - In Tulsa, Oklahoma, Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) was jolted by the news that, after 20 years of faithful ministry in Tulsa’s tough housing projects, the organization would no longer be permitted to conduct its program. Officials informed CEF it would be allowed to go in and play games and talk about moral things, but it was strictly forbidden to mention God.
Larry Koehn, CEF’s executive director, said the organization was told that teaching Bible and discussing God with children violated a policy prohibiting religious instruction at public housing. He said housing authority officials told him the rule has “always been in effect, but it’s just never been enforced.”1 Yet CEF has had the permission and cooperation of parents who endorsed and supported the programs for two decades as good for their children. - This year the White House decided to pass on the National Day of Prayer as a public event. White House spokesman Larry Gibbs said a proclamation would be signed, but prayers would be offered privately, not as a national commitment.
- Finally, in a shocking exhibition of childishness, Democratic members of the New York State Senate refused to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance during a squabble over who would lead the legislature in Albany. One poor chap, evidently overcome by his inherent sense of respect for his country, was pulled back into his seat after he rose to recite the time-honored oath.
A New Force du Jour
And while all things Christian are being “thrown under the bus,” as people say, the allure of Islam is becoming irresistible to some. Following President Barack Obama’s June 4 concession speech to the Muslim world in Cairo, Egypt, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR, whose officials have been convicted of associating with Muslim terrorists) was to announce the launch of its “education campaign” involving the distribution of 100,000 copies of the Qur’an to local, state, and national leaders. CAIR said the move was prompted by Obama’s speech in Cairo.2
“Through this groundbreaking outreach initiative,” said CAIR board chairman, North Carolina State Senator Larry Shaw, “we hope not only to educate policy-makers and opinion leaders about Islam, but also to provide an opportunity for American Muslims to reach out to their fellow citizens of other faiths.” Shaw is both a Muslim and a Democrat.
With the current hate-crimes legislation being promoted in Washington, one can-not help but wonder if the same restrictions aimed at preventing Christians from evangelizing and mentioning God will be placed on Muslims. Not likely.
Though America is still considered the land of freedom of religion, that freedom is rapidly drying up for God-loving, Bible-believing Christians.
If the Foundations Be Destroyed
“If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Ps. 11:3).
In the currency of the incoherent, there is a myth that America was never built on the precepts of the Bible but, rather, on a secular motif fashioned by patriots with deist tendencies, such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Bible-thumpers then supposedly hijacked an essentially secular entity and imposed their religion on it.
However, history speaks for itself. The Founding Fathers of this nation left us their vision for America:
If we and our posterity reject religious instruction and authority, violate the rules of eternal justice, trifle with the injunctions of morality, and recklessly destroy the political constitution which holds us together, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us that shall bury all our glory in profound obscurity.
—Daniel Webster, Early-American Statesman
The law given from Sinai was civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes…of universal application—laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws.
—John Quincy Adams, Sixth President of the United States
No free government now exists in the world, unless where Christianity is acknowledged, and is the religion of the country.
—Pennsylvania Supreme Court, 1824
We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government, that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by the means of the Bible. For th is Divine Book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and those sober and frugal virtues, which constitute the soul of republicanism.
—Benjamin Rush, Signer of the Declaration of Independence
To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys….Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all blessing s which flow from them, must fall with them.
—Jedediah Morse, Patriot and “Father of American Geography”3
In Psalm 11 King David said, “In the Lᴏʀᴅ I put my trust; how can you say to my soul, ‘Flee as a bird to your mountain’?” (v. 1). He then extended his exclamation of trust by laying bare the ultimate prognosis of how God views destroyed foundations:
The Lᴏʀᴅ is in His holy temple, the Lord’s throne is in heaven; His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. The Lᴏʀᴅ tests the righteous [soon we may indeed suffer through some painful days], but the wicked and the one who loves violence His soul hates. Upon the wicked He will rain coals; fire and brimstone and a burning wind shall be the portion of their cup (vv. 4–6).
Two farmers lived side by side. One was a believer; the other, an agnostic. The agnostic made it a point to work his fields on Sunday then boast to the believer that his defiance of God went unanswered because he farmed on the Lord’s day and reaped a harvest as abundant as the Christian’s. “And how do you answer that?” he declared one fall day.
“There’s an easy answer to that one,” said the Christian, “and one you should be thinking about. You see, God doesn’t collect all of His debts in October. But there is a payday coming.”
As I’ve been writing this article, a verse keeps running through my mind:
Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing? T e king s of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lᴏʀᴅ and against His Anointed, saying, “Let us break Their bonds in pieces and cast away Their cords from us.” He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; the Lᴏʀᴅ shall hold them in derision (Ps. 2:1–4, emphasis added).
Just as the little dog harbored delusions about his prowess as a street fighter, was badly overmatched, and paid a high price for his poor judgment, so it is with those who deign to create a world without God. Jedediah Morse was correct. “Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown…all blessings which flow from them, must fall with them.”
But we can thank God for our tomorrows because we recognize that He is in the heavens, and His throne is the one to which we pledge our eternal allegiance.
ENDNOTES
- James Osborne, “Evangelical Group Banned From Tulsa Housing Projects, Chapter Leader Says,” June 8, 2009 <foxnews.com/story/0,2933,525424,00.html?mep>.
- Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu, “Obama’s ‘Outreach to Muslims’ Prompts Mass Koran Distribution,” June 29, 2009 <israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/132112>.
- All five quotations and more may be found on wallbuilders.com.
