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John 19:28-30 “After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst.  Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.  When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished:  and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.”

Jesus refused to give up until he was finished.  Only once He knew that “all things were now accomplished that the scripture might be fulfilled” did He relent to death confident that He had fully completed His earthly role.

Christians relent far too easily to the ungodly forces around us.  We passively allow our nation to slip away from its Christian heritage.  We yield to worldly influences.  We surrender to secularism.  We capitulate to calls for compromise.  We succumb to fears of being labeled fundamental. We acquiesce to arguments that oppose our biblical foundation.  We resign to relativism.  We concede to moral collapse.  We fold in the face of national failure.

The greater the fight, the more we cower in the corner.  Instead, we need to stand up and refuse to relent until we give our last ounce of energy to our role as Christian citizens.  In fact, the greater the challenge the more resolute we should become.  One of the best examples of such resolution came from the mouth of Winston Churchill in a speech to the House of Commons in the midst of the relentless German bombing of 1940:

“Even though large tracts of Europe and many old and famous States have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Gestapo and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule, we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and if, which I do not for a moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God’s good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.”

He later went on to say “This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.  Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

We have yielded.  We have given in.  We have stopped fighting, counting the costs too great.  We have finished before we have accomplished all that God intends for us.  PLEASE PRAY THAT AS AMERICAN CHRISTIANS WE WOULD NEVER SURRENDER IN OUR STAND FOR CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLES IN OUR LAND.  Never, never, never, never!

Luke 19:10 “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.”

Luke 19:45 “And he went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold therein, and them that bought; Saying unto them, It is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.”

It is no accident that Luke 9:41, the subject of my previous post, is bracketed by two verses with clear action on the part of our Saviour.  Emotion and burden were not separated from His action.   Indeed, true emotion and burden should prompt action.  Additionally, action should prompt greater emotion and burden.  They complement one another as mutually supportive and reinforcing.

Not only must Christian citizens be burdened for our country, but that emotion should prompt action.  It should make us more resolute.  It should make us more determined.  It should make us more convicted.  It should make us more courageous.  It should make us more faithful.  It should make us more humble.  It should make us more committed.  It should make us more willing to follow the Lord wherever He leads.  PLEASE PRAY THAT A DEEP BURDEN FOR OUR NATION WOULD PROMPT OUR GODLY ACTION.  Absent our action, we should question whether we truly care at all.

Luke 19:41 “And when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it”

Psalm 126:5 “They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.  He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.”

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to travel to Washington DC for the first time since beginning PLUS.  While I enjoyed several opportunities to pray for my country in our nation’s capital during that week, the one most poignant was during the first night.  The Lord had specifically tendered my heart for this occasion, and I had blocked off late-night time to go to the Lincoln Memorial for a period of reflection and prayer.  I began my time by reading the inspirational words of the Gettysburg Address and Lincoln’s Second Inaugural carved on the memorial walls.  Both flowed with the powerful emotion of a nation engulfed in a trying military conflict that would determine its continued existence.

I then sat down on a cold marble slab, enjoying the warm and cloudless night and the inspirational view down the National Mall towards the Washington Monument and the Capitol Building, flanked by the White House and the Jefferson Memorial.  It was a striking location from which to pray for our nation.  And so I prayed … and wept.  I had never wept for my country before, but emotions swept over me as I considered a nation currently engulfed in a trying spiritual conflict that will determine its continued existence.  I wept because I love my country, and I love my God, and I love a nation under God.  I wept because I have failed to serve my country and my God as faithfully as I should.  I wept because I sensed the failure of other Christians to do the same.  I wept because our collective failure has enabled a conflict of secession, as forces continue to separate our nation from the Lord.  I wept because I was deeply burdened by such truths.

I wept because I had never previously wept for my country.  I had complained.  I had been angered.  I had felt anxiety.  I had sensed a national departure from the Lord.  Yet, I had never been so burdened that I had wept.

PLEASE PRAY THAT YOU WOULD BE DEEPLY BURDENED BY OUR NATION’S DEPARTURE FROM THE LORD.  It is only through a burdened Christian citizenry that we should expect a national reconciliation with the Lord.  Our nation is worth being wept over.

II Timothy 4:7 “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”

I Corinthians 12:12 “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body:  so also is Christ.”

The Constitutional federation is analogous to Christianity because that is what the Founding Fathers understood.  There are many individual courses, but one unifying Biblical faith.  There are many members, but one body.  Such a structure is characterized by the richness of diversity of character combined with a unity of doctrinal-based common purpose.  The Founding Fathers saw a proper governmental structure in the same way.

The Federalist Papers explain that government must avoid the “perpetual vibration between the extremes of tyranny and anarchy.”  In order to do so, its structure must reconcile the “advantages of monarchy with those of republicanism.”

Diversity of character is preserved in a properly constructed government by creating it as an “assemblage of societies.”  “The proposed Constitution, so far from implying an abolition of the State governments, makes them constituent parts of the national sovereignty, by allowing them a direct representation in the Senate, and leaves in their possession certain exclusive and very important portions of sovereign power.”  The variation of such an assemblage provides a richness of diversity, but requires a unity of purpose to make it resilient and meaningful.

In the forefront of the Founder’s minds was common protection.  Thus, the government must be sufficiently unified “to such a degree of power as to be able to provide for the security of the united body” against internal and external threats.  This, and other common interests, could only be secured through unity.  “The federal Constitution forms a happy combination in this respect; the great and aggregate interests being referred to the national, the local and particular to the State legislatures.”

As an “assemblage of societies,” American Christians need to unify in purpose to wrestle back our nation to its Bible-based roots.  Our aggregate interests demand that we return to a foundation that embraces Christ instead of rejecting Him.  PLEASE PRAY THAT AMERICAN CHRISTIANS WOULD UNIFY IN PURPOSE IN ORDER TO RETURN AMERICA TO ITS CHRISTIAN ROOTS.  Without sacrificing our individual character and the autonomy of the local church, we must promote our safety and security, prosperity and well-being.  Otherwise, our nation will continue towards the extremes of tyranny and anarchy against our aggregate interests.

Romans 3:10 “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one”

Romans 3:23 “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”

As the Constitutional Convention ended in 1787, a major concern remained about the possibility of State ratification.  In order to promote this one-of-a-kind document, three Founding Fathers began publishing a series of essays to explain its wisdom.  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay writing under the pseudonym ‘Publius’ authored 85 essays that better reveal the intent of the Constitution than any other source.  Their writings, now consolidated in The Federalist Papers, make clear that the Constitutional architects understood human nature from a Biblical basis.

Sin and dispute were recognized as man’s natural state.  In Federalist Number 10, Madison wrote: “So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities that where no substantial occasion presents itself the most frivolous and fanciful distractions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts.” Indeed, the Founders saw that “the latent causes of faction are thus sown into the nature of man.”  This faction is so fundamental, that it could at best only be controlled: “The inference to which we are brought is that the causes of faction cannot be removed and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its effects.”

The form of government as created by the Constitution took these important truths into account such that “ambition must be made to counteract ambition.”  In Federalist Number 51, Madison further describes the need for such a structure.

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.  If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.  In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this:  you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

It was these fundamental truths upon which the American government was formed.  They were Biblical truths known to Founding Fathers and to the majority of the colonial citizens.  It was an argument that the Federalist authors knew would resonate with the population to support the need for a “well-constructed Union” that could “break and control the violence of faction.

The entirety of the Constitution was founded on this basic Biblical truth about the nature of man.  As we drift away from a Constitutional basis, we drift away from a Biblical basis.  As we drift away from a Constitutional basis, we ignore the truths about human nature from which we cannot escape.  As we drift away from a Constitutional basis, we ignore reality and cling to fantasy.  As we drift away from a Constitutional basis, we diverge from this foundational truth that has allowed our government such success over the decades.  PLEASE PRAY THAT WE WOULD RETURN TO THE BIBLICAL BASIS OF OUR WELL-CONSTRUCTED UNION.