Who Has the Promise?                                      Wednesday

     America approaches its 250th year of independence. Our history includes approximately 168 years that England ruled Americans. The total is about 418 years. 

     Human history began with Moses' account of God's creation of "man," Adam and Eve. Of course, Moses wasn't living yet, so we'll go with historians who agree that Moses was the author. How could he know, except that God revealed the beginnings. There were no calendars. Moses began writing history in 1,445 B.C. Our search found an agreeable guess of 4,000 B.C. for Adam and Eve. 

     In Genesis 12 - the "call of Abraham," who lived around 2100 B.C. Let's consider him the beginning of the Jewish people, although there was much up and down, back and forth yet to come. 

God so loved the world

     Romans evicted Jews from Israel in 70 A.D., while believing Jews (later called Christians), were going into the known world, delivering the "gospel." 2100 + 2026 = 4126 years for God's "chosen" people. And 418 years for faith in God, in America (not Christianity worldwide, 2026). 

     One Sunday sermon called on Christians to take a stand, vote, support but not worship government, and gather in church to worship. Key scriptures include 1 Timothy 2:1-2, and 2 Chronicles 7:14. 

     While we learn of hatred toward Israel, even among Americans, remember that Satan hates God's people. This explains world support even for Hamas, while wishing Israel destruction, only 78 years since they recovered from WWII. Hitler hated Jews, and Iran hates Israel. And America. Trouble may come, but so will Jesus. And He will descend to the same place he departed around A.D. 33. Not New York or Washington. Israel's return after 1,956 years is a clear sign God's plan is unfolding as Scripture reveals it. 

 

                                                                                                                                 Tuesday

Liberty Impossible Without Faith in God 

     Adding to Sunday's blog, Eric Metaxas wrote, "All the men of the Revolution understood" it was possible to be a nation without kings or bishops. 

     "Even the least religious of our founders knew that in creating a new nation, they were doing what the Israelites did when they left Egypt and made a covenant directly with God at Sinai. Both Jefferson and Franklin - when asked to provide a seal (see Monday's blog) - came up with images of the Israelites in the wilderness of Sinai."

     "The new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, marked the first time since Sinai that a people would look directly to God. Samuel Adams, before signing the Declaration of Independence, said they had 'restored the Sovereign,' meaning God. The Lord would be our only king." 

     "No matter how vital faith was, it could not be forced. Religious freedom would have to be at the heart of America. And it is. The men who risked everything to form America had no guarantee of success. If people could not choose to live by faith, freedoms would evaporate." 

     "By the grace of God our liberties are still alive," Metaxas writes. "For liberty to continue, faith must be at the heart of American culture. May the Lord bring revival to our land, that we might spread our faith and our freedoms to the whole world." 

Tomorrow: Who has the promise?

 Before you read,                                        Monday

Get a Dollar Bill

     The back of a $1 bill can teach us about the meaning of the Revolution we have inherited and are meant to pass on to the next generation. (This blog thanks to Christopher Flannery). 

     "On the right side is the front of the Great Seal. An American bald eagle bears a shield with 13 vertical stripes, clutching 13 arrows and an olive branch. The eagle's head is turned right toward the olive branch, the symbol of peace and war (we fight wars for the sake of peace) exclusively vested in Congress. A scroll in the eagle's beak reads E Pluribus Unum (out of many, one), and a crest contains 13 stars from which a "glory" emanates through a cloud."

     "On the left of the dollar bill is the backside of the Seal, a pyramid unfinished. In the Zenith an Eye in a triangle surrounded with a glory proper. Over the Eye - Annuit Coeptis (He approves of what has been started). On the base of the pyramid, numerical letters for 1776, and the motto, Novus Ordo Seclorum, meaning 'New Order of the Ages.' The pyramid signifies strength and duration. The Eye over it and the Motto allude to providence in favor of the American cause." 

     "The date is that of the Declaration of Independence and words under it mean the beginning of the new American Era. America had to win the war with England before leaders could concentrate on the Great Seal."

     "Flannery writes, 'We still live in that new American era. The early work of freedom aspiring to be worthy of divine approval is always unfinished. So long as we appeal, as in the beginning, 'to the Supreme Judge of the world, we may, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, with good hearts, pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.'" 

     Note how intelligent some of those founders were. 

  

   Liberty Is Impossible                                        Sunday

         Without Faith in God 

     Are we worshiping God today? He is the "King of Kings" and there is no earthly leader to compare. What makes America special? Eric Metaxas asks, "Would it surprise you that virtue and faith are at the heart of it all?"

     He wrote If You Can Keep It and is a member of the White House Religious Liberty Commission. Views will offer Metaxas and others as we approach our 250th year of liberty. He wrote another book after his research told him "it is simply inescapable. Faith in God really is the secret at the heart of American liberty." 

     He quotes John Adams: "Public virtue is the only foundation of the republic." And George Washington: "Virtue is the necessary spring of popular government." Eric: "To be governed by a monarch (see yesterday's Views) or anyone else - simply meant obeying those authorities."

     Virtue. "To govern ourselves means doing the right thing when no one is looking, where there is no authority enforcing that behavior. Why behave virtuously? Faith. If you believe in God and want to serve him, you don't need a government to threaten you. You will do it out of love, repentance and fear of God. This was the secret." 

     Metaxas wrote, "Long before the Revolution, Pilgrams and Puritans fled England for the chance to worship God freely. Many Americans at the time of the Revolution were descendants of those devout Christians. In the 18th century there was a Great Awakening, one of the greatest revivals in history. The main figure was George Whitefield, who said we need not look to kings or bishops, but to God himself. Even kings and bishops would be judged by God.

Tomorrow: What's on a dollar bill?

 

CCP Reimagines Wealth

     A small village in 1045 B.C. became a very large but very poor city in the 20th Century A.D. Then in 1970 (give or take) President Richard Nixon - on behalf of U.S. industries - went to China to convince the communists to join the world. Wealth replaces communism. Ho ho. 

     We share what we read this week. "For decades the CCP sold the people a false promise: 'Leave the power to us, ask no questions, and we will make you richer than your parents could have imagined.' Who could have imagined Beijing, 22 million residents and about every modern activity known to man." 

     "Living standards did rise - not by central planning - but because the Party loosened its grip on the economy. Western capital, technology and markets resulted in more wealth - and the Party took the credit. Even as business - not government - brought more wealth, the Party has jailed critics, crushed dissent, and persecuted communities not interested in politics. Those with rising living standards consent."

Then Comes a Depression

     "Money is running short. Growth is fading, prices are falling, jobs for the young are scarce, and the wealthy are quietly moving their savings abroad." Views read that many young people are leaving Beijing. 

     "So, Xi Jinping is rewriting the deal, analysts have said. Instead of rich, he offers the promise of getting even: the assurance that China has risen equal of the United States, and that the 'rejuvenation of the nation, and the absorption of Taiwan, is within reach.'"  

PS. Let's not be fooled by communists running in our elections.

       Jimmy

 The Practical Justice 

     Mollie Hemingway, no relation to Ernest, we guess, is an author, columnist (not communist) and political commentator. She could write a good book about Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. So, she did.

     It's title: Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the Constitution.

     Hemingway interviewed about 100 people and joked that her reporting became "a little boring" because nearly everyone praised him. Nick Eicher wrote, "The book is a serious account of how character, conviction and prudence shape institutions." 

     A colleague of Nick's (try to keep up) describes Alito as "pragmatic, skeptical of government, skeptical of the expert class, and attentive to ordinary people." An Alito clerk found him in his office on a weekend. The justice told him, "That 30 minutes the litigant has before this court is likely one of the most important 30 minutes of his life. It's worth a little bit of my time on the weekend." 

     Hemingway said, "He is committed to constitutional text and original meaning but deeply concerned with how a ruling will work in real life. This could be dangerous. But Alito's moral seriousness binds him more tightly to the judicial role. He does not believe courts should invent rights or policies and hide them in constitutional language." 

     Eicher: "Some care only about being right. Others care only about winning." Hemingway sees Alito as "a rebuke to both errors. Values and principles are meant to benefit people. In any vocation, the question is how to serve God by serving others." 

     Sounds supreme to me.    Jimmy

 

 The Better States 

     Tuesday, we passed along what observers considered the 10 least desirable states for opportunity, education, cost of living, housing, lifestyle flexibility, etc. Today, they give us nine "better states to move to."

     Ohio is not in either group. 

     In no particular order, the better states are Georgia, Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin. 

     Minnesota??? After all that scandal we heard about? Guess we didn't get the full story. We're a little surprised South Carolina isn't on this list. We lived in Aiken for eight years on my final job and might have retired there had not close relatives drawn us to Florida. 

     You might want to avoid states where healthcare fraud schemes rise up to $6.5 billion, where voters choose communists, and where anti-Trump people mar the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Oh, wait, that's Washington, D.C., not a state. 

     As we approach our 250th birthday, our founders would not be surprised at our troubles. The 13 colonies were all Christ oriented. Today, no state claims such. 

"You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself."

- Leonardo da Vinci 

Is that true today?