By Jim Mettenbrink
Before we consider the actual entrance into Jesus’ radical kingdom, we briefly review this multi-year series which began with the biblical foundation of the USA, going back years before 1776, we have considered the ups and downs of the citizenry’s faith in God and Jesus as the divine Messiah. That this occurred in any nation at all shores up the necessity of the 1st amendment to the US constitution. At least until now, we can debate any religion with our fellows without fear of government reprisal. However, the more folks trust themselves, the less God is allowed into all aspects of their lives.
The advent of godless Religious Humanism over 100 years ago, now couched as Secular Humanism to deny it is a religion but is in fact a godless religion essentially declaring man to be his own god (Humanist Manifesto; 1933). One only needs to look at the conditions of pagan-oriented societies to see they do not prosper. However, God says, “Righteousness exalts a nation, But sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverbs 16:34). Righteousness is what God, not man declares.
The Geneva Bible (1539) had been in circulation for about 50 years when the British Empire began to rise. Is there a correlation? In The Short History of England (1874), Green states, “No greater moral change ever passed over a nation than passed over England during the years (late 1500s)….England became a people of…the Bible. It was read at churches and read at home, and everywhere its words…kindled a startling enthusiasm…. the Bible remains the noblest example of the English tongue. But far greater was the effect… on the character of the people….Elizabeth might silence or tune the pulpits, but it was impossible for her to silence or tune the great preachers of justice and mercy and truth, who spoke from the Book which she again opened for her people. The whole moral effect was then produced by the Bible alone. The whole temper of the nation felt was changed….A new moral and religious impulse spread through every class….. The whole country became, in fact, a church.” Then Britain became a great empire for over 200 years spanning 25% of the earth’s land mass.
Shortly before God destroyed Judah, He declared, “The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it” (Jeremiah 18:7-10). What about the USA? Will we turn back to God?