WHO SUCCEEDS PRESIDENT OBAMA?

Lawsuits are raging throughout America demanding that President Obama disclose his citizenship.

He has refused to make such disclosure from the inception of his presidential campaign. There is an increasing outcry for his resignation in the absence of proof of American citizenship. If his office becomes vacant for ANY reason, here is a partial list of his successors, in line of succession:

(1) Vice President and President of the Senate Joe Biden
(2) Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi
(3) President pro tempore of the Senate Robert Byrd
(4) Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
(5) Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner
(6) Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
(7) Attorney General Eric Holder
(8) Secretary opf the Interior Ken Salazar
(9) Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack

WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO OUR KIDS?

The consequence of America's parents abandoning our children, who are our sacred trust from God, to the godless public school system was powerfully forecast by the father of the Protestant Reformation:

I AM MUCH AFRAID THAT SCHOOLS WILL PROVE TO BE GREAT GATES OF HELL UNLESS
THEY DILIGENTLY LABOR IN EXPLAINING THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, ENGRAVING THEM IN THE HEARTS OF YOUTH. I ADVISE NO ONE TO PLACE HIS CHILD WHERE THE SCRIPTURES DO NOT REIGN PARAMOUNT. EVERY INSTITUTION IN WHICH MEN ARE NOT INCREASINGLY OCCUPIED WITH THE WORD OF GOD MUST BECOME CORRUPT.

Martin Luther

Dr. Luther thus summarized the biblical mandates from God Himself to parents:

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it (Prov. 22:6).

And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might (Deut.6:5). And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart (Deut. 6 :6) And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up (Deut.6:7). And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates (Deut.6:9).

It is imperative that "love" is not understood to be a term denoting soft sentimentalism. Rather, it is a full-action mandate from God to all believers known in contemporary terms as "tough love".

This is love, that we walk after His commandments (2 John 6). To make God's definition of love absolutely clear, the Lord exhorts: He that saith, I know [love] him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth [Christ] is not in him (1 John 2:4).

My son, attend to my words; incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart from thine eyes; keep them in the midst of thine heart. For they are life unto those that find them, and health to all their flesh. Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life (Prov. 4, 20-23).

Without the Word [truth] of God being instilled in the hearts of youth, they will be no match for the corruption and misery brought by the devil:

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter 5:8).

The famous theologian, D. James Kennedy, DD, summed up the consequences of the abandonment by parents of America's school system, which resulted in the disarming (of vigilance) of our youth:

"Little wonder that the Dewey-ite secular humanists who have led education in this country for the past 50 years have helped to produce a veritable slime pit of immorality, drug addiction, sexual perversion, permissiveness, and diseases of every sort...Effects that, according to the eminent educator, Professor Jacques Barzun, have resulted in turning the once proud and efficient public school system of the United States "into a wasteland where violence and vice share the times with ignorance and idleness".

The above described tragedy and travesty to America's youth and school system and to the national security of America itself, is what the Christian home-school associations are desperately attempting to counter.



Sources of quotes upon request, most from the book America - A Call To Greatness

Jesus Christ, Author Of Liberty?

What did Jesus Christ declare about Himself directly and through the prophets?

II Cor. 3:17 Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. Christ declared himself to be the Author of liberty.

Gal.5:1 Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. Again, Christ declared Himself to be the Author of liberty. It is argued, correctly, that this verse refers to both Spiritual liberty from the bondage of sin and corruption, and political freedom. In the wake of Spiritual liberty comes the revelation and power of truth, which is the mortal enemy of political tyranny. Irresistibly, when Spiritual truth (Christ) gains its foothold, political freedom results.

John 8:32 Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Christ is truth.

14:6 I am the truth... He declared Himself to be the truth.

CHRIST'S MISSION STATEMENT: (Luke 4:18)
[He] hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor;...to preach deliverance to the captives, and the recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are oppressed.

Jesus Christ and America's political liberties, in particular our priceless personal freedoms, are inseparable. On July 4, 1821 John Quincy Adams, sixth President of the United States, summed up the conviction of the founders: "The highest glory of the American Revolution was this; it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity".

French historian and statesman Alexis deTocqueville, after visiting America and searching for the source of her great prosperity, invincible strength, and personal freedoms wrote: "Americans combine the notions of Christianity and of liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive of one without the other".

COULD AMERICA HAVE BEEN FOUNDED BY ANOTHER RELIGION?

Today it is widely taught that "All religions are basically the same," that their prophets teach the same basic moral and legal codes. But, are they the same? Except for similar moral codes, can any "religion" be equated to Christianity?

If so, why haven't other religions produced a declaration of independence or constitution which exalt and protect the individual, declaring that he is created in the image of God and thus has a God-given right to be politically free; made the tyrant tremble and established invincible military forces to protect those freedoms as did America's Christian founding fathers?

What's the difference? Why and how does Christianity liberate men from the bondage of sin, corruption and political tyranny while by historical and contemporary contrast other religions tend to subordinate the individual to enslaving systems of freedom-denying tyranny, or worse?

The difference lies in the person of Jesus Christ. Biblical Christianity is absolutely unique in the nature of its central personage and founder, Jesus Christ. There is none other like Him in all of history or even in all literature. Some writers, of course, presume to place Christ as merely one in a list of great religious leaders, but this is absurd. He stands in contrast to all others, not in line with them, not even at the head of the line. His uniqueness is illustrated in the following partial list of His attributes:

Anticipation of His coming. His coming was prophesied in fine detail as to lineage, birthplace, time, career, purpose, nature of death, resurrection, etc., hundreds of years prior to His actual appearance. There has never been any other religious leader - indeed, no other man - in all of history for which this was true.

The virgin Birth. Christ's virgin birth stands entirely alone; nothing like it was ever imagined elsewhere, thence He was born in a fully natural human birth with no actual genetic connection to human parents.

His Divine Human Nature. For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him (Col 1:16). Not even power-crazed tyrants and fanatics who have claimed to be god imagined that they had created the heavens and the earth and dominions and principalities.

Sinless: Of no one else in history could the claim ever be made in seriousness that he lived a whole lifetime without one sin in thought or word or deed. But this very thing was claimed by Jesus' closest friends, by his worst enemies, by the greatest of the apostles and by Jesus Himself. Peter said, He did no sin (l Peter 2:22), and John said In Him is no sin (1 John 3:5). Judas said,
I have betrayed the innocent blood (Mat. 27:4), and Pilot said, I find in him no fault at all (John 18:38).
Unique Teachings. The Sermon On The Mount is without parallel. The beauty and power of the Upper Room discourse, the compelling majesty of the Sermon on the Mount of Olives, the power of His parables, and all His other teachings are separated by a great gulf from even the finest teachings of other men.
His Unique Death. He said, It is finished, and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost (John 19:30). Literally, He dismissed His Spirit. It is evidently quite a difficult task even to commit suicide, but certainly no one can simply decide to die and then, by his mere volition, proceed to die. But Jesus did! He said, No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself (John 10:18).
His Resurrection. Other religions of the world (including Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism, Animism, Shintoism, Taoism, etc.) were founded by men who were, unlike Christ, sinful men. These founders are all in their graves, defeated by man's last enemy. Christ alone rose from the grave and defeated death.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights...". Note that Jefferson used the term created, he did not say evolved (which would imply evolutionary dog-eat-dog survival of the fittest, Darwinian style); thus our freedoms are not granted by government, but by God. The purpose of our Christian-based government is to protect those rights and freedoms.

The supreme test of any article proposed to be adopted into the new Constitution, was biblical scrutiny, that is, whether the proposed article was rooted in the truth of the Bible.

In fact, the very essence of our U.S. Constitution's system of checks and balances - legislative, executive, judicial- was derived from the Bible (Isaiah 33:22), of which the centerpiece, from Genesis through Revelation, is Jesus Christ.




Note: quote sources upon request; many from the book America - A Call To Greatness.

The Real Founder of America

Who was the real founder of America? Was it an assemblage of the Fathers, the clergy and the colonists? Was it an "expositor" of the Scriptures such as John Calvin, whose revolutionary insights crystallized into many of the personal freedoms we know today? Was it Martin Luther, who broke the papal tyranny and began the Protestant Reformation? Perhaps it was the Reverend John Wycliffe who in 1382 helped bring the Dark Ages to a conclusion by translating the Bible from Latin into English for the common man and discovered in the Scriptures the principle of government "of the people, by the people, and for the people."

In spite of their vast contributions which culminated in America's freedoms, none of these men ever claimed any role other than that of "expositor" or "translator" of the Bible. We can therefore draw no other conclusion than that Jesus Christ, beginning with the triumph of His resurrection, was the real Author of America's freedoms - the true Founder of America.

Christ was the bedrock and centerpiece of the living, power-filled (Spirit-filled) invincible faith of the Fathers. It was the colonists and their Christian clergy who brought forth our Declaration of Independence and our American Constitutional Republic.

AMERICA - OUR SACRED TRUST

Introduction

A political science professor opened his class with these words: "The history of the world is the history of a gigantic slaughter bench".

A "Slaughter Bench"?

Q: What, in that context, is a slaughter bench? A: It is a description of the unspeakable atrocities and carnage which men throughout recorded history have committed against each other both on the battlefield, and off the battlefield as in genocide of men, women and children by their own governments.

Lethal Politics

Professor R.J. Rummel wrote in "Lethal Politics" (his book of 20th Century statistics about genocide and mass murder since 1900) that "... three times more men, women and children died at the hands of their own governments than in wars. Millions died by torture, beatings and starvation, genocide and executions in merciless ways. Independent of war and other kinds of conflict - governments have murdered 119,400,000 people - Marxist governments about 95,200,000 of them. By comparison, the battle killed in all foreign and domestic wars in this century total 35,700,000."

Millions died under Stalin during "The Great Terror Period". In Cambodia half the population was destroyed in Marxist Pol Pot's "Ethnic Cleansing." Marxist/communist China's Mao Tse Tung murdered over 20,000,000. Mao hunted down and murdered Christians and clergy. Hitler decreed to destroy every Jew in Europe. Millions perished. In Hitler's drive to conquer Russia ("Operation Barbarosa") 26,000,000 people were killed. In a word, more soldiers plus men, women, and children perished in the 20th century than since the beginning of recorded history. In describing military warfare alone, Major General John K. Singlaub referred to that warfare as "...the most horrible violence the minds of men can create...".

The professor was right in declaring that "the history of the world is the history of a gigantic slaughter bench". America, founded on the doctrine of Jesus Christ - the Author of liberty, is truly a sacred trust to her citizens.

Divine Blessings of Liberty

In retrospect, and even in today's world, no nation's citizens have ever been so blessed as have Americans with life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, individual freedoms and prosperity. Such previously unimagined rights were made possible at America's founding only because our government "of the people, by the people, and for the people" was structured upon a Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution that were founded upon the divine laws of the Bible.

200 Year Standoff - Freedom vs Tyranny

The miracle which has given our U.S. Constitution its endurance for over 200 years is the recognition by its Christian fathers of the fallen nature of man and his propensity toward tyranny over his fellow man. In 1877 English politician/historian, Lord Acton, wrote this now-famous statement: "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely" which has come to be accepted as a truism.

Isaiah 33:22 Executive, Legislative, Judicial

The obvious paramount question before the founders was: how could they form a government that would maximize freedom for the individual citizens, be governed by the citizens, yet not degenerate into a dictatorship such as a monarchy, oligarchy, or some form of corruption-prone tyranny over the people? They searched the Bible and found the answer in Isaiah 33:22: a trinity of checks and balances upon which they structured the Constitution: executive, legislative, judicial. That concept of protecting man against himself so that when one branch of government becomes corrupted the other two can overrule and checkmate it, was unique and unprecedented in the history of governments.

Bonded by Christian Faith

Our government and freedoms would not have been possible had the founders not been bonded by their Christian faith. In fact, the historical record shows that no proposed Article in the Constitution would be considered unless it first passed the biblical test for its origin.

For decades, enemies of America's freedoms, in an effort to confuse the American citizens and weaken their resolve to be "eternally vigilant" in the defense of those sacred freedoms, have attempted to discredit the faith of well-known fathers such as Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and George Washington.

Deists, Secularists, Atheists

The antagonists have included deists, seculars, atheists such as Marxists, agnostics, cultists and persons unlearned; that is, persons apparently committed to digging for scraps of evidence which may refute the historical record 0f the courageous Christian faith of the fathers and their willingness to die for the sacred cause of freedom. As the signers of the Declaration of Independence wrote, to that cause they committed their "lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor". Succeeding generations became the beneficiaries and the trustees of the God-give blessings of liberty.

Perhaps the Christian commitment and zeal of America's founders and her citizens could be best summarized in the July 4, 1821 Independence Day celebration words of John Quincy Adams, 6th President of the United States, son of founder John Adams:

Church & State - John Quincy Adams

The highest glory of the American Revolution was this; it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.

Also, consider the words of Alexis deTocqueville, famous French statesman and historian:

Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. The Americans combine the notions of Christianity and liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other.

Scriptures In Stone

The Bible and the righteousness of God were the centerpiece of early American life and education. In fact, the founders even carved verses from the Holy Scriptures into all of the national buildings and monuments in the capital of this nation, even into the walls of Library of Congress and the White House and later upon its completion the Washington Monument. Engraved in stone above the head of the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court are the Ten Commandments with the Great American Eagle protecting them.

Upon examination of the documents by which our land was founded, and the addresses of all of the Presidents in their inaugurals, and written into the constitutions of all fifty of our states, you will find unimpeachable evidence of the official commitment of this land to a belief in the living God, and His Son Jesus Christ.

U.S. Supreme Court - America Is A Christian Nation

In fact, the 1892 landmark case of "Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States" attests specifically to the Christian founding and essence of America:

"Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian...This is a religious people. This is historically true. From the discovery of this continent to the present hour, there is a single voice making this affirmation...we find everywhere a clear recognition of the same truth...These, and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation."

Jefferson, Washington

Thomas Jefferson, often charged with being a "deist", authored the Declaration of Independence in which he wrote these words: ...all men are created equal. Note that he did not say or imply "evolved". "Created" requires a Creator.

On May 24, 1774 Jefferson led the Virginia House of Burgesses to declare a Day of Fasting, which is only observed by people who believe in a personal God.

Attesting to his personal faith, Jefferson declared "...it (the Bible) is a document in proof that I am a Christian; that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus."

George Washington, The "father" of America, kept a diary into which he wrote his prayers. Following are two excerpts:

Washington's Personal Faith

Accept me for the merits of thy son Jesus Christ.

Direct my thoughts, words and work, wash away my sins in the immaculate Blood of the Lamb, and purge my heart by Thy Holy Spirit...Daily frame me more and more unto the likeness of Thy Son, Jesus Christ, that living in Thy fear, and dying in Thy favor, I may in Thy appointed time attain the resurrection of the just unto eternal life. Bless my family, friends and kindred, and unite us all in praising and glorifying Thee in all our works.

Christ - The Actual Founder of America

In conclusion - the framers of the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, acknowledged Jesus Christ to be the Author of liberty, to the extent that historians have claimed that the actual founder of America was Christ Himself through the founders.

It has been said that America today is a beacon of hope and light in an increasingly dark and despotic world.

Christian Duty In Crisis America

Speaking of America's increasingly perilous future, a famous Presbyterian theologian, Dr. D. James Kennedy (Coral Ridge Ministries, Fort Lauderdale, Florida) summarized our nation's condition and our Christian duties:

We have lived on the sacrifices of those who have gone before, but now it comes down to us...to you and to me.

Enemy Identification By Discerning Citizens

There are many expressions such as "As goes the church, so goes the nation" which are actually indictments of contemporary "positive-only, feel-good", politically passive, financial prosperity-based politically impotent clergy, and church members who ignore the action mandates of Christ such as Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free (Gal. 5:1). By intent they turn a deaf ear to Christ's mission statement: The Son of God was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil (1John3:8). Christ is the Christian's leader and example.

Imperative For Biblical Discernment

Unless free people maintain their awareness of the ongoing battle between the forces of righteousness and evil they will lose their ability for discernment. Confusion will reign, thus they will be unable to define their mortal enemies and will become easy victims for the masters of deceit. They will be unable to obey God's mandates to be "watchmen on the wall" and to act.

Imperative For Eternal Vigilance

Our freedoms were purchased at a horrific price of blood and sacrifice, and only if that banner of courage is carried forward will America prevail in the fast accelerating struggles for our sacred trust of freedom.


NOTE: Quote sources upon request. (407) 629-5700 johnc@greatness.com www.greatness.com

Why Biblical References About Current Political Issues

The question has been raised concerning my many biblical references in my blogs about hot, sizzling, current political issues. And, they are going to get a lot hotter. That is, how could any source as seemingly ancient and outdated as the Bible apply with certainty today to our nation's life and death struggles?

Atheists, humanists, political liberals such as Marxists claim that there are no absolutes; that "the only constant is change", that everything, including ethics (sometimes termed "situational ethics"), is determined by circumstances.

By direct contrast, the Bible makes it clear that issues change, events change, circumstances change, but God is absolute, and His laws of liberty (which include the Ten Commandments upon which western civilization has been built) never change. I am the Lord. I do not change (Malachi 3:6). Heaven and earth shall pass away, ...but the word [Law] of the Lord endureth to all generations (Mat. 24:35 and Psalm 100:5).

It is noteworthy that the Bible, from Genesis through Revelation, gives many accountings of the rise and fall of nations throughout history from the creation, inevitably in cycles that can be measured by their adherence to or rejection of the Word and Laws of God. All nations that forget God shall be turned into hell (Psalm 9:17).

That is what is happening to America today. The purpose of my blogs is to demonstrate that the Laws of liberty set forth in the scriptures are as relevant today as they were in times past.

Note that throughout the Old and New Testaments God references the same Laws and offers therein the same solutions and pathways to freedom. Only the settings and circumstances change. Be careful not to confuse spiritual freedom as being distinguished from political freedom. They are inseparable because inevitably a great surge and quest for political freedom follows in the wake of spiritual freedom. America's founding fathers recognized that fact, wrote volumes about it, and even engraved passages from the Bible into the cornerstones of the federal buildings. Songs of the nation such as "My country, tis of thee" (Christ), became standards for generations.