The Greatest Threat to Christianity

Posted by Phil Whitaker on March 12, 2009 under Why | Be the First to Comment

The church of Jesus Christ has had a long and easy road in America. We were founded so solidly on Biblical morality and inherent freedom that we soon began to think that what came easily was automatic and required no effort on our part. There have been several times in American history that we have fallen for this lie, and had to be jarred back into reality.

The first time was in our colonial days when commerce increased and life was good for most people. The freedom afforded those brave souls who launched out into the unknown of this new world brought prosperity and comfort. Unfortunately, that generation failed to communicate the truth of the source of real freedom to their children. The next generation became self centered and dependent on their “culture” for values. There was little to anchor them against the inevitable tyranny of a selfish government thirsty for funding and drunk on political power and control. When the spiritual awakening began across New England in the early 18th century, renewed faith and devotion to the Bible as an authoritative standard of life fueled the hearts and minds of a generation of patriots who threw off tyranny and gave birth to a truly American idea – the purpose of government is to protect rights given to us by Almighty God, not to grant rights at the whim of fallible human agents.

The undeniable intervention of Divine Authority that directed the American Revolution set America on a pathway to become the greatest and most powerful nation on earth. There had never been a nation founded on the ideas of individual freedom and Divine authority in each citizen’s heart before 1776. The idea of individual equality, and personal responsibility protected by government authority had never been tried. Throughout the remaining years of the 18th century, and the first half of the 19th century, America grew due to this renewed freedom. Again, we failed to pass along to coming generations the source of our freedom. This allowed selfish men consumed with a lust for individual power to promote the evil of slavery under the guise of economic necessity. America suffered terribly under the load of this awful sin until a new awakening brought commitment to its abolishment. It took a terrible war for us to learn that lesson, and many years after that war before we began to fully dowse our culture in freedoms true light.

When we renewed freedom’s light, prosperity returned. What we know as the industrial revolution in the latter part of the 19th century lifted this land to new heights of power, prosperity, and opportunity. We should have known what was coming. We should have seen from the past what would happen if we did not pass to the next generation the truth about freedom’s heart. Men are free only as they commit themselves to the worship and service of a loving and Almighty God who is the Author of our freedom. We should have seen it, but we did not. By the mid 20th century, America was once again consumed with prosperity, pride, and government power. A great depression was used as an open door by selfish politicians to increase government’s intrusion into the lives and minds of men. Control increased, regulation spread, and prosperity suffered as individual freedom and responsibility was choked off. This time, we woke to find ourselves threatened by a tyrant the likes of which we had never known. A horror so unspeakable, that for years we denied its existence. Adolph Hitler sought to restore the world domination of the Roman Empire under the iron hand of a conquering Nazi regime. He actually convinced many of his countrymen that one small group of people was responsible for all the evils they faced. Under his hand, over 6 million humans were slaughtered in the name of government. The world recoiled at his power, and but for the overstepping of his ally Japan in the attack on American forces in Hawaii, we may never have been forced to confront him.

Once we confronted Hitler and the evil he promoted the long struggle and near defeat on many occasions awakened another spiritual turning in America. In the mid 20th century, churches grew, values flourished, and prosperity again turned upward in unparalleled fashion. But prosperity built on itself is a house set on a moving foundation. Liberality of values rose out of an easy life, and a false belief in individual freedom replaced individual responsibility. We began to think that freedom was the right to do as we pleased, rather than the truth that freedom is the opportunity to do what is right.

Now in the beginning of the 21st century, churches are declining. Culture is flowing powerfully toward collapse, and radical Islamic terrorists threaten our very existence. Into the growing void of fixed values, steps a powerful deliverer. The chasm between faith and reality created by lax theology is being bridged. That bridge is being built by an increasingly powerful government machine promoting itself as the solution to poverty, inequality, and public safety. That bridge is a lie! It does not lead to freedom from our need, it only leads to complete dependence on government to supply our needs. That supply will never be complete because they have no resources but ours. Anything a government gives, it has taken from someone else.

Unless America wakes from the contented slumber of complacency soon, we will find that this nation founded on liberty and “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal” has been replaced. That new world will be one in which government is the final authority, and continued freedom depends on compliance with that government’s values. The gospel of Jesus Christ will find no place in that world, because the gospel is the enemy of tyrants, and the antithesis of government control.

We need an awakening. We need a revival. We need a recommitment of our lives to the effective, relevant  communication of the gospel of Christ and the heart changing power of the Holy Spirit. Believers need to know what they believe and why they believe it.

How will this story end? It will end the way you say it will. If you decide to ignore reality and continue to search for success over significance, it will end badly. But if you decide to do what is right, believe what is true, and promote righteousness no matter what anyone else does, it will end in a return to Spirituality founded on an infallible inspired Word of God. This personal revival in the hearts of millions of Americans will fuel a return to Constitutional freedom, and America can be great once again. The choice is not Democrat or Republican. It is not about right or left, it is about right or wrong. It is not the President who will determine the future of America, it is you.

May God bless His Word, and may we determine to be a land that God will be pleased to once again bless.
Phil Whitaker
A Virginia Patriot.

Contact Phil Whitaker in Richmond, VA
vapatri8@comcast.net