Here’s What Secularists Are Trying to Do to Our Nation’s History
Secularists have difficulty embracing the facts of history, that those with spiritual mission established America. As the Mayflower Compact stated: “Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith.”
Although the evidence is overwhelming, America’s Christian heritage is forbidden to be taught in public education and universities. The secular prefer to rewrite history, stating that secularists and religiously neutral people founded America.
In a recent NPR interview, Professor John Fea of Messiah College in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, minimized the influence of biblical Christianity in the founding of America. “There are a lot of arguments that say, ‘This was just in the air. The Bible would have influenced their construction, even though it’s never mentioned,’ he says. ‘But as a historian, I need a smoking gun. Maybe they left it out because they deliberately wanted to leave it out.'”
Apparently, even though the Founders wrote Christianity into the State Constitutions and Charters of all 13 original colonies, that does not meet the requirements of evidence. What does Fea do with the following documentary evidence?
- Virginia Charter (1606) “… propagating of Christian Religion to such People as yet live in Darkness.”
- Delaware Charter of King Adolphus (1626) “… further propagation of the Holy Gospel.”
- Massachusetts Constitution (1780) Part 1, Article 3, “Every denomination of Christians … shall be equally under the protection of the law and no subordination of any one sect or denomination to another shall be established.”
- Pennsylvania Constitution (1968) Article 1, Section 3: “All men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their won consciences.”
- North Carolina Constitution (1971) Article 11, Section 4: “Beneficent provision for the poor, the unfortunate, and the orphan is one of the first duties of a civilized and a Christian state.”
Here are a couple more examples:
1. “The Christian History of the U.S. Constitution,” says: “Among the more notable ventures of the Congress was an effort to see about the printing of a Bible, as the supply from England had been cut off by the fighting. In October 1780, Congress adopted a resolution recommending that ‘such of the states that may find it convenient … take proper measures to procure one or more new and correct versions of the Old and New Testaments to be printed.’ Congress also approved, as a matter of course, chaplains and religious services for the soldiers.”
2. “Conservatism, Religion, and the First Amendment” says: “In addition to appointing chaplains, resorting to prayer, and seeing about the printing of the Bible, Congress took still other measures to advance the interests of religion [Christianity]. It passed, for instance, the Northwest Ordinance to manage the territories beyond the Ohio River, saying it did so, among other reasons, for purposes of promoting, ‘religion and morality.’ The committee approving the legislation (with Madison as a member) stipulated that, in the sale of lands in the territory, Lot N29 in each parcel, ‘be given perpetually for the uses of religion [Christianity].'”
3. An online exhibit at the Library of Congress, “Religion and the Founding of the American Republic,” says: “Congress appointed chaplains for itself and the armed forces, sponsored the publication of a Bible, imposed Christian morality on the armed forces, and granted public lands to promote Christianity among the Indians. National days of thanksgiving and of ‘humiliation, fasting, and prayer’ were proclaimed by Congress at least twice a year throughout the war. Congress was guided by ‘covenant theology,’ a Reformation doctrine especially dear to New England Puritans, which held that God bound himself in an agreement with a nation and its people. This agreement stipulated that they ‘should be prosperous or afflicted, according as their general Obedience or Disobedience thereto appears.’ Wars and revolutions were, accordingly, considered afflictions, as divine punishments for sin, from which a nation could rescue itself by repentance and reformation.”
Our Christian, biblically-based nation’s cultural inheritance has been squandered in the last two to three generations. Thomas Paine, though no friend of Christianity, spoke wisdom when he wrote in The American Crisis, “What we obtain too cheaply, we esteem too lightly; it’s dearness only that gives everything its value.”
It looks as if America has come to her kairos, her moment in time—to be faithful to Jesus or to pagan secularism.
As we begin the New Year, pastors must begin to lay the prayer covering for the spiritual awakening and resurrection of America. We are asking the 100,000 American Renewal Project pastors to begin and lead one-hour, weekly prayer services asking God for mercy for what we, Christians, have allowed in our once Christian nation.
We desperately need a Gideon or Rahab to stand. Will you be the one to stand?
