Altar Call –
0pelika-Auburn News
Walter
Albritton
July 3, 2016
God Bless America!
Every Sunday my church family sings
“God Bless America!” Every Sunday? Yes, every Sunday. Like it or not, it has
become ritual for my congregation.
I view it as a prayer in song, a prayer
of gratitude for the many ways God has blessed our land. And it is a prayer of
petition, people asking God to continue blessing America.
As we celebrate the 4th of July
we should move beyond celebration to gratitude, giving thanks to God for the
favor he has shown our nation. Fireworks are fine although it grieves me that
on this one day of the year we will spend over 600 million dollars on
fireworks. In light of our national debt that seems ridiculous.
When
our children were small we usually bought some fireworks. It seemed the thing
to do. Everybody was doing it. But I have not bought any fireworks for many
years. It is enough, and safer, to watch the dazzling displays on television.
Like
many other Americans our family will gather for a cookout on the 4th
and enjoy hot dogs, ribs, watermelon, ice cream and ice tea. We will groan
about the heat and the flies and thank God if we get a little rain.
The
celebration of this national holiday gives us a break from the heat of summer
and a chance to thank God that the great American “experiment” is still
working.
Though secularists continue to rewrite
American history, it remains true that our ancestors came to America to find
religious freedom and to establish a Christian nation. They invoked the help of
almighty God to build a nation founded on biblical principles.
While there continues to be much public
debate about the Ten Commandments, there is no doubt that our founding fathers
considered the Ten Commandments the essential foundation stones of American
government.
President James Madison, who was called
the “Father of Our Constitution,” said, “We have staked the whole of all our
political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon
the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves,
to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”
I
am convinced that the more we surrender our reverence for the Ten Commandments,
the more the moral fabric of our nation will unravel.
Ignorance is a dangerous thing. Some,
for example, believe that “separation of church and state” is part of our
constitution, but the phrase does not appear anywhere in the constitution. The
brave men who signed the Declaration of Independence did not wish for America
to be separated
from God. They
believed that America could not survive without the aid of almighty God.
Historic records affirm that they believed this. Wisely our founding fathers insisted
that “the state” should not be under the rule of “the church.”
Despite our moral slide toward
decadence, there is much about America for which we can be thankful. Every time
we handle money we are confronted with our motto, “In God We Trust.” This motto
reminds us that our trust must not be in the power of the state but in the
power of almighty God.
Religious holidays are recognized
nationally. Good Friday and Christmas are actually Christian holy days. Though
they are grossly commercialized, they are still woven into our culture,
reminding us of the birth of our Savior and his crucifixion for our sins.
Thanksgiving remains a national holiday.
From the beginning our presidents have called upon our people to give thanks to
God for our blessings on this November Thursday.
Chaplains
continue to be appointed to serve in Congress and in the Armed Forces. This
past Thursday the Senate Chaplain, the Rev. Patrick J. Conroy, included this
petition in his opening prayer in the Senate Chamber: “As all Americans prepare
to celebrate the Fourth of July, may we be forever grateful for the benefits we
share as citizens of a common Nation with uncommon diversity. Help us to work
together to build a better community as a light for the world.” And may we all
say, Amen!
I
am proud to be a citizen of a nation in which godly men of the cloth have the
honor of offering spiritual guidance to our senators and other congress
members. Thankfully our nation recognizes that our military forces need
spiritual guidance. Some of the finest men I have known have served as military
chaplains.
The phrase, “one nation under God,”
remains in our Pledge of Allegiance to the flag even though some folks want it
removed. I feel a surge of pride every time I salute the flag. Too many people
have died defending the flag for me to gaze upon it with anything but
reverence. Those who burn the flag disgrace themselves and deserve to be
punished for such sacrilege.
While secularists wish to secularize
America by removing all references to God, I do not believe they will succeed
because most Americans are not willing to renounce their godly heritage. Most
of us want to live in a nation that is “under God.”
We may then on this Fourth of July
invoke the blessing of almighty God on what William Penn called “An Holy
Experiment in Government.” This experiment remains a noble enterprise that
deserves our support and our prayers. So enjoy the fireworks and watermelons
but join me in praying earnestly, God bless America! + + +