Journey of Cross and Quill

One thing most likely to rouse me out my constant procrastinating state is the sudden compelling urge to pound out a blog entry in response to statements ignorantly spewed by either non believers or those wearing the latest style in sheepwear. The latter plagues me the most and if I were to allow myself to listen to the constant bleating I’d probably be sitting here at the desk with much more frequency. I recently allowed myself to fume while listening to the latest podcast featuring John Lofton of The American View (Listen HERE.) and although a day later I’d like to offer up a few thoughts.

My first thought while listening to this particular podcast is that if these local public servants were typical of others in employ by state and federal governments then we are in a world of hurt. It is appalling enough that students attending government run humanistic institutions of re-education, otherwise known as the public schools, lack common sense and basic knowledge. This is a case of the blind leading the blind. It’s the pied piper all over again except in this case the piper has no idea what tune he’s playing. The fish does not know it is wet and most humanists, unbelievers or “Christians” in mutton chaps, have no idea they are immersed in a humanistic worldview.

I decry humanistic influence. What humanism? I’m asked. Stop feeding into the rightwing conspiracy theory. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. As a Calvinist, I know God has made vessels unto honor and vessels unto dishonor. It’s no less frustrating. The blind cannot see no matter how much I point out the beauty of God’s law and His indescribable glory. Still, I cannot deter from the command to pursue righteousness and expose the deeds of darkness. I know not the chosen and so I must persevere in doing my part for Christendom–discipling the nations by means of the role God has given me.

There are three areas I cannot escape from: ungodly government schools and the command for parents to teach and nurture their own children, biblical law and it’s relevant application to everyday life, and the influence of Christianity on Western Civilization (especially as pertains to the United States). Dead horses may abound and I’ve a great cache of broom handles.

“You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 5:13-16 ESV)

Once Christianity was indeed the City On A Hill, its light permeating western civilization and propagating the world for Jesus Christ. It was raw, unstained by the corruption of paganism and it spread as fire is wont to do in a dry, brittle land. History now has become for us a useless tirade of dates and places unrelated and irrelevant and we indeed have exchanged the truth for a lie as we cower before the almighty alter of humanism. Once God was sovereign over every thought and action and now we have relegated the Alpha and Omega to a personal and private area of our lives. He is placed upon a shelf and brought down only for those special occasions or for times in dire need then placed in seclusion once again. We decry the omnious outpouring of immorality and corruption stretching the finger of blame at the pagans for their misdeeds without realizing we instead need to turn inward and gaze upon the dirtied reflections of our own souls. Do we not understand that by abdicating our God given responsiblities for self-government and of discipling the nations we have forfeited the very victories our forefathers have tirelessly labored for and sacrificed? Instead we have tiptoed around society giving approval to the various outworkings of sin by our silence and refusing to speak less we offend the pagan deities.

We send our children to be educated by Caesar. We elect corrupt God hating officials who have no respect for the Constitution nor even more importantly, the inspired Word of God. We compromise and give up territory that exclusively belongs to God. Approval and status mean more to us than truth. We praise God and sing hallelujah for one hour and declare ourselves good Christians. One profession of fill in the blank faith and by golly we’re good to go. There is no transformatioin of society save that of pagan institutions. Instead of tearing down those ungodly towers we baptize a brick and pass it on.

There is no knowledge of church history, no acknowledgement of God’s Providential hand, no recollection of great reformers. We have replaced serious study of the Holy Scriptures and its relevant application to all of life with a pagazined theology sprinkled in with a few pious sounding words and declared the Bible a nice book of morals and stories disconnected from reality. We kill our children and call it choice or defend those who do for it would be a monstrosity to tell someone else what to do. We vomit upon God’s created order and call it civil rights, pushing homosexual “marriage” and promiscuity and labeling dissenters bigots and prudes.

Christians has declared God’s law to be void and legalistic but openly approve of the litany of laws promulgating any and all of the whims of our pagan leaders. We decide what is just based on feeling and experience because a fixed standard of truth does not exist in our worldview.
Everyone does what is right in his own eyes and that is fine with us as long as God’s law is not promoted.

We call progress the overt destruction of God’s foundations and build on its rubble a city of inequity. We gaze on dung and declare it beautiful and on seeing the Cross call it excrement.
Material comforts and entertainment consume us yet thoughts of our First Love drift further from us. We have become the world and none seek after God. There is no City on a Hill. Our lights have extinguished.

Return, beloved, to that fair City On a Hill. Shed your filthy rags and bathe in the seas of grace. God’s Sovereignty remains and His Kingdom will continue to spread out over the earth. You, who were chosen of God, gather with us. Come out of the pagan nations whose destruction is certain and judgment is swift.

What I perceived as an easy project has in fact turned out to be a Pandora’s box of research. I threw together my first paper in a matter of days as procrastination overtook me and my class deadline loomed. However, a simple idea has instead expressed itself as needing further development. There can be no easy explanation of Christianity’s influence on the American Constititution without first laying the foundation of biblical principles in law and government and recalling the great Christian thinkers of times past whose work heavily influenced the writers of America’s covenant. I forsee two distinctions: biblical principles inherent in the document itself and the foundation upon which it rests.

O God, beneath thy guiding hand
Our exiled fathers crossed the sea,
And when they trod the wintry strand,
With prayer and psalm they worshiped Thee.
Thou heardst, well pleased, the song, the prayer—
Thy blessing came; and still its power
Shall onward through all ages bear
The memory of that holy hour.
Laws, freedom, truth, and faith in God
Came with those exiles o’er the waves,
And where their pilgrim feet have trod,
The God they trusted guards their graves.
And here Thy name, O God of love,
Their children’s children shall adore,
Till these eternal hills remove,
And spring adorns the earth no more.

Leonard Bacon (1802-1881)

As we turn to this Word and are instructed thereout, we discover a fundamental principle which must be applied to every problem: Instead of beginning with man and his world and working back to God, we must begin with God and work down to man-”In the beginning God!” Apply this principle to the present situation. Begin with the world as it is today and try and work back to God, and everything will seem to show that God has no connection with the world at all. But begin with God and work down to the world, and light, much light, is cast on the problem. Because God is holy His anger burns against sin; because God is righteous His judgements fall upon those who rebel against Him; because God is faithful the solemn threatenings of His Word are fulfilled; because God is omnipotent none can successfully resist Him, still less overthrow His counsel; and because God is omniscient no problem can master Him and no difficulty baffle His wisdom. It is just because God is who He is and what He is that we are now beholding on earth what we do-the beginning of His outpoured judgements: in view of His inflexible justice and immaculate holiness we could not expect anything other than what is now spread before our eyes.

From Sovereignty of God, p. 9.

I’m currently beginning research for my next paper, “The Influence of Christianity on the American Constitution.” Unlike my previous paper, this one will not be written for a class. I will periodically post updates on its progress. I forsee this one being much longer and even so I regret it will not be as thorough as I’d like. When completed, I will post the link on top of my blog as a separate page just like the previous one.

Account of the First Harvest Feast and Thanksgiving

Greg L. Bahnsen, in his book, By This Standard, writes “Will your life be founded upon the sure rock of God’s word or the ruinous sands of independent human opinion? Will your ethical decisions be crooked and inaccurate, following foolish and lawless standards, or will you wisely employ the yardstick of God’s revealed word?” [1] This is the antithesis governing every thought, every word, and every action of our lives. There is no neutrality, no straddling of the fence nor waiting by the sidelines. As Jesus Christ has said, “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.” [2]

What then are we to say to one another when the fruit is not of the vine? We are careful to step lightly, to hold back judgment lest we offend. Are we not then colluding with the darkness? To say nothing is akin to giving approval. Scripture tells us we are to expose the deeds of darkness: “Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.” [3]

The answer to every ill of society lies in the whole of the Bible. We cannot merely be New Testament Christians and leave the standards of God’s law to the ash heap of history. There is much wisdom in the beloved statutes of God. Bahnsen writes:

It is easy to see, then, that everything the Bible teaches from Genesis to Revelation has an ethical quality about it and carries ethical implications with it. There is no word from God which fails to tells us in some way what we are to believe about Him and what duty he requires of us. Paul put it this way: “Every scripture is inspired by God and profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, in order that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). If we disregard any portion of the Bible we will–to that extent–fail to be thoroughly furnished for every good work. If we ignore certain requirements laid down by the Lord in the Bible our instruction in righteousness wil be incomplete. Paul says that every single scripture is profitable for ethical living; every verse gives us direction for our lives. [4]

What Bahnsen is saying here is that the entirety of the Bible is applicable to our lives and by dimishing or completely disregarding one portion of scripture we are shortchanging ourselves and limiting the power of our shield which is used to extinguish the arrows of the evil one. He goes on:

The entire Bible is our ethical yardstick for every part of it is the word of the eternal, unchanging God; none of the Bible offers falliable or mistaken direction to us today. Not one of God’s stipulations is unjust, being too lenient or too harsh. And God does not unjustly have a double standard of morality, one standard of justice for some and another standard of justice for others. Every single dictate of God’s word, then, is intended to provide moral instruction for us today, so that we can demonstrate justice, holiness, and truth in our lives. [5]

What a power and relevant weapon we hold against the forces of darkness! We are fully equipped as the Bible speaks to every area of life, especially in areas of law, government, economics, and ethics! The sword of the Spirit, as described in Ephesians 6:17 is the Word of God. The Bible is not intended for inward piety only. It changes not only lives but cultures!

Diffuse the knowledge of the Bible, and the hungry will be fed, and the naked clothed. Diffuse the knowledge of the Bible, and the stranger will be sheltered, the prisoners visited, and the sick ministered unto. Diffuse the knowledge of the Bible, and Temperance will rest upon a surer basis than any mere private pledge or public statute. Diffuse the knowledge of the Bible, and the peace of the world will be secured by more substantial safeguards than either the mutual fear, or the reciprocal interests, of princes or of people. Diffuse the knowledge of the Bible, and the day will be hastened, as it can be hastened in no other way, when every yoke shall be loosened, and every bond broken, and when there shall be no more leading into captivity. [6]

Man’s opinion can hold no sway over the Word of God for against truth it cannot stand. Let us not then be afraid to speak up for what we know to be just and right, to expose the unfruitful deeds of the darkness, and to stand grounded in God’s Word against the masses of the ungodly. Our holy and righteous God stands before us, the war already won. Shirk not His commandments for we are more than conquerors.

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Endnotes

[1] Greg L. Bahsen, By This Standard, (Powder Springs, GA: The American Vision, Inc., 2008) 13.

[2] Matthew 12:30, ESV.

[3] Ephesians 5:11, ESV.

[4] Greg L. Bahsen, By This Standard, (Powder Springs, GA: The American Vision, Inc., 2008) 16-17.

[5] ibid. p. 17.

[6] Robert Charles Winthrop, Addresses and Speeches on Various Occasions 1835-1851, (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, and Company, 1852) 16.

Some of you have truly been brought by God to believe in Jesus. Yet you have no abiding peace, and very little growth in holiness. Why is this? It is because your eye is fixed anywhere but on Christ. You are so busy looking at books, or looking at men, or looking at the world, that you have no time, no heart, for looking at Christ. No wonder you have little peace and joy in believing. No wonder you live so inconsistent and unholy a life. Change your plan. Consider the greatness and glory of Christ, who has undertaken all in the stead of sinners, and you would find it quite impossible to walk in darkness, or to walk in sin. Oh, what low, despicable thoughts you have of the glorious Immanuel! Lift your eyes from your own bosom, downcast believer - look upon Jesus. It is good to consider your ways, but it is far better to consider Jesus. Oh, believer, consider Jesus. Meditate on these things. Look and look again, until your peace flows like a river.

It is better to trust in the Lord, than to have confidence in man.
Psalm 118:8

Romans 13:1: God establishes all government and authority.

Proverbs 21:1: God directs kings and rulers.

Daniel 2:21: God both places and disposes of all rulers and controls the times.

Acts 17:26: God determines national borders and the times set for nations.

Psalm 147:8, 15-18: God controls the weather.

Isaiah 45:7: God creates disaster and prosperity.

Proverbs 21:31: God determines the outcomes of wars.