Temple Baptist Church - 7-3-2016
2 Chronicles 7:14
Introduction:
A. Tomorrow, we will celebrate America’s 240th Anniversary.
1. It seems like only yesterday that we celebrated our Bi-Centennial Birthday. That was the year that I was saved. Forty years, over half of my lifetime, has now gone “under the bridge.” I never get over the greatness of this country!
2. There is no place like home and no place on earth like America. I still say, “Love it or leave it!”
3. I am a red-blooded American! I love our nation; I love our flag; I love our prosperity; I love our freedom; I love our possibilities (you can be anything that you want to be); I love the topography and beauty of America; I love the diversity of America’s people; I love the variety found in our climate; I love our form of government and hate to see the progressive, liberal left change it from capitalism to socialism.
B. The two biggest problems in America are ignorance and apathy. A roving reporter came up to a man on the street and asked, ''Do you know what the two biggest problems in America are?'' The pedestrian said, ''I don't know and I don't care.'' The reporter said, ''You have them both.” People don't know and they don't care.
1. People are ignorant of the principles upon which our nation as founded. President Obama said that America was not a Christian nation. Though America is quickly leaving its moorings found in the King James Bible, it was founded on the Bible and Biblical principles. God has truly blessed America. History is being changed and history books rewritten to remove God from our nation’s foundation.
a) We are the only nation on earth built upon the Christian faith!
b) President George Washington said, ''It would be impossible to govern rightly without God and the Bible.''
c) Present John Adams said, ''It would be impossible to govern without God and the Ten Commandments.''
d) The Pilgrim Charter of 1620 states that its purpose was ''to advance the enlargement of the Christian religion to the glory of God Almighty.''
e) Before the Pilgrims arrived on our shores they gathered below the deck of the Mayflower and signed the Mayflower Compact which revealed their intent: ''for the glory of God.''
f) In 1632 .... when Maryland was chartered as a colony, they wrote, ''We are motivated with the pious zeal for extending the Christian religion.''
g) Andrew Jackson ..the 7th President said, ''The Bible is the rock upon which our Republic rest.''
h) The last sentence of the Declaration of Independence signed 228 years ago today says, ''For the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance upon the protection of the Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.''
i) Eight days after signing the Declaration of Independence ... printed on the side of the Liberty Bell was a quote from Leviticus 25.10, ''Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.''
j) The fourth verse of the ''Star Spangled Banner'' ... our National anthem that Congress adopted in 1931, reads, ''Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation, then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, and this be our motto, in God is our trust.''
k) It is a prayer of praise to almighty God! If you're going to take prayer out of school, you have to remove our national anthem because it is a prayer to God!
l) God has blessed America because she was founded upon the promises and principles of the Word of God! Don't let some secularist tell you that America did not have a spiritual beginning! America was born out of a revival!
m) Patrick Henry, that patriot and founding father of our country said, ''It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religions but on the Gospel...”
n) The list could go on and on as I have many, many such quotes made by the founding fathers.
2. People do not care about the failing morality and political corruptness that are changing our government and laws.
a) Our nation’s laws are based upon the Civil Law of the Bible. Because of changing morals, these laws are now being changed or ignored and not enforced.
b) Our nation’s morals were once based upon Moral Law of the Bible. In today’s society, Biblical morals are mocked while perversion is on the rise and swiftly becoming the accepted as the norm.
c) Biblical Christianity is being rejected and the “gods” of other nations accepted. You cannot speak evil of their “gods” but you can say all manner of evil against ours!
C. Is there hope for America? We need to understand that our hope is not in the political realm or either presidential candidate no more than our hope was in the outgoing president. Our hope is not in Republican held house or senate as they have been totally dysfunctional. Our hope for America is in the God that helped to establish America. I believe that there is always hope but, in order to have the blessings of God, our nation MUST change her direction by repenting and turning back to God!
Psalms 33:12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.
Psalms 144:15 Happy is that people, that is in such a case: yea, happy is that people, whose God is the LORD.
Psalms 146:5 Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the LORD his God:
D. I fear that the problem with Christians today is very similar to those of the world that I mentioned above.
1. Many Christians do not know because of generations of secular education and the encroaching liberal leftist teachings of socialism and atheism.
2. Many Christians have adopted the thinking of Laodicea and the practice of Calvinism. We may not agree with the doctrine of Calvinism but we often practice it in many ways. The world is lost but I am comfortable! If the world is to be saved, let someone else win them! If missionaries get to the foreign fields, let someone else support and send them!
E. What can we do to help America?
1. Stay awake or WAKE UP! Romans 13:11 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. (Prosperity causes lukewarmness! Mankind is still dying, souls are still crying, and hell continues to open her mouth without measure.)
Isaiah 5:13-14 Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst. (14) Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it.
2. Stand Fast in the Faith! Ephesians 6:13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. (The “evil day” is here! It takes strength and integrity to stand in the midst of ridicule and attack by the world.)
3. Stand Strong in the Old Paths! Jeremiah 6:16 Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein. (The “falling away” or apostasy as we call it has been in full swing for several generations and a general forsaking of the old ways has come to pass. Now the enemy is within the local churches instead of without.)
4. Supplication! Continue to make supplications and intercessions for those in authority over us. 1 Timothy 2:1-3 I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; (2) For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. (3) For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; (If you have ever prayed for America, now is the time. This next presidential election will settle the Supreme Court one way or the other as the next president will probably appoint at least 2 new judges which will swing the balance of power one way or the other.)
5. Share the Gospel! Romans 1:14-17 I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. (15) So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also. (16) For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. (17) For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. (The lost walk all around us and their eternity is at stake. If we do not tell them the gospel story, then who will?)
6. Show the world a Difference! Titus 2:13-14 Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; (14) Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. (As we see the day approaching, there seems to be more conforming than transforming! We are the salt that adds the savor!)
