On April 6 2009, Barack Obama told the Islamic nation of Turkey at a news conference, “And I’ve said before that one of the great strengths of the United States is — although as I mentioned, we have a very large Christian population, we do not consider ourselves a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation; we consider ourselves a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and a set of values.” He essentially said that we are a nation of people who do not stand for anything except for some undefined cloud of ideals and a set of values. His words underscored the drastic and dangerous spiritual and national identity crisis that America continues to face today over a decade later.
The vast majority of the citizens of the United States consider themselves Christians, yet many would agree that the United States is not governed by the principles of the Bible because they do not live their lives that way, nor do they believe in hell, nor do they believe that parts of the Bible are intended for today. They also believe that America is the great melting pot where anyone with any belief system can come and call themselves by their native land with the word American following it. In 1787, John Jay wrote in “The Federalist 2” what it meant to be an American.
Jay wrote, “With equal pleasure I have as often taken notice that Providence (God Almighty) has been pleased to give this one connected country to one united people—a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs, and who, by their joint counsels. . .have nobly established general liberty and independence. This country and this people seem to have been made for each other, and it appears as if it was the design of Providence, that an inheritance so proper and convenient for a band of brethren, united to each other by the strongest ties, should never be split into a number of unsocial, jealous, and alien sovereignties.”
In George Washington’s 1796 Farewell Address, he said, “The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles.” America by definition of the Founding Fathers is a Christian nation governed by secular laws whose origin was the Bible. But the Christian Americans have allowed our nation, through inaction and apathy, to become a nation with an identity crisis. It is our duty upon our honor to reverse this wrong. And as Ephesians 6:13 says, “and having done all, to stand.” I keep saying this, but it is needed. We are going to have to stand or we will be kneeling to the god of government, if we are not already doing so.
