Liberty and Justice for All | Faith & Freedom Series 3 | James Buntrock

This message explores the connection between faith, liberty, and America’s history, tracing key moments from the nation’s founding through the Great Awakenings and the Civil War. Through stories of individuals such as Abraham Lincoln and John Peter Muhlenberg, it highlights how spiritual renewal, moral conviction, and perseverance have influenced both personal lives and the direction of the country. Along the way, it examines the relationship between faith, education, law, and culture, while addressing challenges that can weaken those foundations. At its heart, this is an encouraging reminder that lasting change begins with individuals who are willing to stand for their beliefs, remain engaged in their communities, and help inspire renewal in future generations.

Transcript

Welcome And June Night Plans

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This is a great audience here tonight. I see some new faces who who haven't been here on previous nights. And so I say welcome to everyone who's here. Again, this is the third in a series of three of these that we're doing this month. The next Wednesday that we do is uh the next Wednesday, which will be Wednesday number four in June, is gonna be a great awakening movie, it's gonna be shown right here. And so invite people. This is a this is a witness, this is a testimony of our nation, and and uh uh we get to show it and show it off. And so even if you had them have have watched the movie, I think it's worth watching again, so I hope everybody comes back. As incentive for those who have registered for and attended all four of these nights in June, um, we have a piece of uh colonial currency right down here on the table. It's from Pennsylvania, and it's dated 1773. And so for those who have registered for and attended all four nights, we'll put your name in a drawing, and after we watch that movie on the last night, we will draw a name out of that, and somebody in this room will walk home, we'll go home with that currency uh as our gift to you, and so that's your reward for being faithful. Um you know, we're in a time of revival right now. I I see signs of revival in the nation, and then the churches are reviving, and you know, you got student groups that are reviving, and mass baptisms happening, and the whole movement uh, you know, it the the acceleration of the movement uh at the passing of uh Charlie Kirk, you know, it's just exploded since then. The things that the devil meant for harm has rather turned out to the furtherance of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so things are reviving, people are reviving. Um, but when that revival spills out into the nation, into the culture, then we can have an awakening. And I'll tell you that this nation is in desperate need of another awakening. And so we've talked about the first great awakening, and it resulted in us being a nation for the very first time. We'll talk a little bit about the second great awakening tonight. Um we began, and I'm let me give a brief review of what we've gone over in night one and night two, because some of y'all haven't been here for all of these, and I'm not gonna go into great detail. I encourage you to go back and watch the live stream. Uh, it's on YouTube and it's on our Facebook channel. Um you can go back and watch that in its entirety, night one, night two. It's better to watch it in order because these things are building on themselves. And so as we start all of these, I'll just start out with our uh primary verse out of Psalm 78. This is the reason why we're doing what we're doing, why we're presenting these. In Psalm 78, uh, this is God's warning uh to the Israelites. Uh he said, here he commanded, so Psalm 78, uh verse 5, he commanded our fathers that they should make them known to their children, talking about the testimonies of God, that they should make them known to their children, the children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children, that they may set their hope in God and not forget the works, but keep his commandments. And so from generation to generation, they told these testimonies, the amazing things that God has done. And God has done some amazing things uh for our nation in the beginning and our founding. And we talked about some of those miracles, and we'll talk about uh uh another one here tonight. In verse 41, it says, Yes, again and again they tempted God and limited the Holy One of Israel. And you think about God being limitless. Well, he puts limits on himself. He will not violate his word. That's a limit. He is a God who cannot and will not lie. That's a limit. And he will bless people as far as he can, as far as he can be justified in doing so, but when they violate his word continually and they forget his works and start to pull away and retreat from God, he cannot be a blessing to them, cannot bless them and still be justified. So it says, yes, again and again, they tempted God and limited the Holy One of Israel, and they did not remember his power, his wonderful works to the children of men. And so we're gonna

Why Testimonies Shape A Nation

SPEAKER_00 3:50

begin tonight. And uh to my left I've got uh this monument statue. So this monument, this model of a monument is uh one that we have in. Can I get my slides pulled up? I don't I don't have control of these things yet. So while he's pulling that up, I'll just speak to this monument here. So this monument is uh uh a monument that exists in Plymouth, Massachusetts. We talked about Plymouth Rock, and uh and and that's where the pilgrims landed in America and and began um uh began their uh their stay here. So that's in Plymouth Rock, at Plymouth Rock, but about five miles away is this monument that stands about 81 foot tall. It's the largest granite monument in the nation, and most people don't know about it, haven't heard about it. And this monument tells a story, it tells, it gives the recipe. It is how how to have a prosperous, godly nation uh where you recognize that our liberty comes from God. And so at the top of this monument here, uh we've got uh uh the character called Faith right here. So this this is Faith at the top, and she's pointing upward towards the one true God, and she has under her left arm uh the Geneva Bible, and the pages of the Geneva Bible are being blown open by the wind of the Holy Spirit. We have a Geneva Bible right here on this table. All the artifacts on this table, uh I'm gonna be I'm gonna be talking about some of these things tonight. You're welcome to come up at the end and ask questions. I'll let you hold some of this stuff and put your hands on it and experience this. Uh that Geneva Bible has a date on the inside. It says it's from 1599. And I know most of y'all know the story on this Bible. It has a story. Uh, if you didn't get the story on it, I'll help you with that a little bit later tonight. So a Bible that's dated 1599, that the same printing plates that printed that Bible on this table in front of us would be the same printing plates that printed the Geneva Bible that the pilgrims brought to America. So we have a nation because of that Geneva Bible, because of this Geneva Bible right here, because the Holy Spirit breathed on it. And so we talked about faith and we talked about morality. Uh morality is the figure seated right here. And on the one side she has evangelist uh under her pedestal, and on the other side she's got the prophet uh right here, and there's some symbolisms there in her lap of the uh scrolls from Revelation and the tablet of the Ten Commandments. Um, we talked about the Mayflower Compact and the covenant that we have uh with God as a nation, all having undertaken all for the glory of the God and the furtherance of the gospel of Jesus Christ. On night two, we talked about law, and so this figure here is law, and under one side of his pedestal he's got justice, and on the other side, he's got uh um mercy, and there's a balance between mercy and justice in God's word. We can find that balance in God's word. Um it's critical that man's laws be aligned underneath God's laws, and God's laws are higher than man's laws, but when they're aligned, we can have a godly nation. Uh then we proceeded to to uh talk about education. So this lady here is the figure for education. She's got a book of knowledge in her lap, and she's teaching her tilt children, she's training her children in the way they should go, so that when they're old, they will not depart from it. Um so after that we talked about uh the separation of church and state, or the fallacy of the separation of church and state, and where that comes from. And I hope I gave you some good ammunition so because we hear this argument all the time. And we hear that this comes from the First Amendment or the Establishment Clause. It says that Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or preventing the free exercise thereof, or bridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people to peaceably assemble and petition their government for a redress of grievances. I didn't see anywhere in that establishment clause where it said separation of church and state. It does not exist there, and for good reason. And so we talked about where that came from. It came from a letter written in 1802 by Thomas Jefferson. He wrote it to the Danbury Baptist Association in response to their concern that the government would then meddle in the affairs of the church. And uh and so he wrote that statement. So then later in 1947, there's a Supreme Court case where there were five justices that were ruling one way and four justices ruling another way. So you take the four on one side and the four on the other side, and uh you end up with one guy. One guy, one vote on a Supreme Court case, one vote on one case, uh made a ruling based on one sentence that came out of one letter that was buried for 150 years that nobody cared about. And they ignored the plethora of information where we get our constitution, where our founders got their ideas from. And so it was a sad ruling out of that Supreme Court in 1947. Um we talked about the Lemon test. I'm going over this because I, you know, repetition is the engine of learning. I want you to know these things and and be able to help others with this with these truths. And so then there was a Lemon test in 1971, Supreme Court case, and it basically said that whatever law, practice, symbol, structure, uh, whatever it is, be primarily secular, and then it could be constitutional. Um then we had the Kennedy case, so this is where Coach Kennedy, so this is fast forward to 20 uh 22, just a couple uh four years ago, Coach Kennedy kneels on the on the uh 50-yard line of the football field for his high school, and he does this and he says a quick prayer, and he got fired for doing this. And his case went all the way to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court flipped the lemon test and destroyed it and did away with it. Now the standard for the for the court, now the standard for the land is if it has a long-standing history and tradition in the United States, then it has a strong presumption of constitutionality, i.e., the Ten Commandments. It's been around and part of our nation and part of our government and part of our culture a lot longer than it's been absent. It has a long-standing history and tradition in the United States, and it has a strong presumption of constitutionality, and we got to deliver almost 3,500 of these Ten Commandments posters to the Klein ISD school district, one for every classroom. And so, you know, we got education, we get through these slides here. Um, we're gonna begin tonight with Liberty.

Liberty Man And Broken Chains

SPEAKER_00 9:44

And so that's that's this guy right here on the front. So the first thing I notice about Liberty Man is look how stacked he is. That guy is strong. When I grow up, I'm gonna be just like him. He's at his Wheaties, yes, he has. And so this is the strong man Liberty right here. And uh you notice he's got a sword in his lap, it's in his sheath. Um, he's wearing armor. I don't know if you can see that up close in this image, but he's got the helmet of salvation, he's got the breastplate of righteousness, his loins are girded about with truth, he's got his shoes on, his feet are shod and ready to carry the gospel of peace wherever he goes. I don't know where the shield of faith is, but I do see the sword of the Spirit, and it looks like he's ready to pull that sword out should he need it. And uh, if you if you look in his left hand draped over his knee, I'm not sure if that that's the best image for that. You can see it maybe better right there. He's holding a set of shackles in his left hand that's draped over his knees. Those shackles used to be on his hands and feet, but those shackles are now broken because he has been set free. The same way that Jesus set us free from the law of sin and death. Um, in James 1.25 it says, But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does. And so there is a blessing that comes with liberty, but it requires us to not be a forgetful hearer, but a doer of God's word, to apply God's word in our life. And so whom the sun sets free is unquestionably free. That's out of John 8.36. Um, and and what is he free from right there? And so, Liberty Man, he's he was free from wicked rulers and bad government. He was free from tyranny, the tyranny from England that they recently experienced. Um he is facing this this monument in Plymouth, Massachusetts, is facing east, and you'll note that his eyes are wide open and he's intently looking and he's watching. He's not in a battle position, he's seated, he's in a peaceful position, but he is ready on a moment's notice to draw that sword and go to battle and and defend the things that uh are worth defending. And so he's wearing the Ephesians 6 armor of God, he's facing England, the chains are broken off of his wrists and ankles, he's been set free, and you see over his right shoulder there is a claw of a lion draped over his shoulder. Well, the lion was a symbol of Great Britain or England. And so you'll notice that is the skin of the lion, and you look under his right elbow there, and you see the head of the lion. He has skinned that animal and defeated that beast, and the claw is draped over his shoulder, and uh and he's wearing that. That is his trophy right there, the skin of the lion. Um under the pedestal on his right side is the word tyranny, and you can see figured right pictured right there is the figure of a man with his enemy uh laying on his back. The the man has got his sword drawn, and his foot is on his enemy, and so he's pressing his enemy into the ground, he's got his sword drawn, and he's ready to uh take the man's head off right there. And that's that's a violent image, and and God bless it. You know, David was a violent man too, and he was somebody who knew how to get ahead in life. And and I I I appreciate the story of David and Goliath. But uh, you saw what I did there, yep. All right, so we've got tyranny, and and he's you know, this is not a person, but this is this is the a spiritual warfare that we're in. And tyranny is a demonic thing. And so on the other side, you've got peace. And so the image right here is is a lady, the it really it's I believe it's the the wife of the liberty man, the strong man liberty. It's the wife there, and she's got a basket full of uh food and gifts, and she's ready to bring these back home to her family and friends, and it's a it's a peaceful time uh for her. Why? Because he's in a ready position and he's watching and uh and he's keeping the enemy at bay. In uh 1 Peter 5.8, it says, Be sober and be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, walks about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. So you know that the lion is also an imagery here for the devil, and not just Great Britain. Um in James 4.7 it says, Submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. And so it requires some resistance on our side to put the devil to flight. Um as liberty looks outward, he's ready to defend his faith. He's ready to defend this Bible under her arm, he's ready to defend faith, that Bible, his belief. He's ready to defend uh um morality right here. He's ready to defend everybody on here, he's ready to defend the godly laws, the laws that are aligned under God's word. He's ready to defend those, he's ready to defend his kids and the education of his children. And so he's ready on all fronts. And I can tell you that liberty would never hand his kids over to a government or a culture that was trying to undermine everything that he and his wife were trying to install in his kids. He would never hand them over, he would never give them up. He's ready to go to war. And so the biblical responsibility of education belongs to the parents, and the and the responsibility of the family belongs to the parents. And so he's ready to defend all these things. Now, liberty is not free, and we know this, and it's a little bit of a cliche here, but liberty is not free. In the days of the American Revolution, the enemy was Great Britain, England. And uh the fight to gain our liberty required the lives and fortunes and sacred honor of so many, and more than just the declaration signers. And

A Pastor Chooses Battle Over Comfort

SPEAKER_00 15:23

so here we've got pictured a Lutheran pastor, his name is John Peter Muhlenberg. Uh this is uh uh January 21st, 1776. John Peter Muhlenberg was a legislator in Virginia, and uh after he finished serving on his legislative term uh that cycle, he came home to his congregation and uh and he gave what's now known as his his farewell sermon. And so he preached a message out of uh Ecclesiastes chapter 3. It says there was a time and a purpose for everything under the sun. At this point, um, Lexington and Concord had already been attacked, Boston had been blockaded by the British Navy, Charleston had been burned, the battle at Bunker Hill had been fought, and the public stores of gunpowder in Virginia had already been seized by Great Britain, and so they're in a high threat level environment here, and so he comes home from legislature and he preaches his nice message out of Ecclesiastes 3: Time and a purpose for everything under the sun. He gets to the end of that, and you can see he's pulling his robes off, his clerical robes, and he reveals his Continental Army soldiers' uniform. And he says there's a time to preach, and there's a time to fight, and the time to fight is right now. And then he promptly recruits 300 members of his congregation to go to war with them, to go to war against the greatest military power on earth. Now, Muhlenberg's brother, uh Frederick, did not have the same mindset that John Peter did. Um Frederick had a church down in New York, in New York City, and uh when he learned of Peter's actions in Virginia, he was very critical and very opposed of his brother's involvement in the conflict, and he wrote to him and said, You would have acted for the best if you had kept out of this business from the beginning. I now give you my thoughts in brief. I think you are wrong in trying to be both soldier and preacher together. So that was the brother. Um, John Peter Muhlenberg replies back, I am a clergyman, it is true, but I am a member of society as well as the poorest layman, and my liberty is dear as dear to me as any man. Shall I then sit still? Heaven forbid it. I am called by my country in its defense. The cause is just and noble, and so far I am from thinking that I act wrong, I am convinced it is my duty to do so, and duty I owe to God and my country. And so the two parted ways, and John Peter Muhlenberg goes to war, and he was very successful. He led members of his congregation uh in in several battles, and and uh and and the brother, you know, has got his arms crossed up there in New York until until the British arrived in New York, 1777, a few months later. And they burned and vandalized 19 churches, his own as well. And so Frederick was forced to flee his own church that was just destroyed by the British. At that moment, Frederick, brave Frederick, decided at that moment that he should then get involved. A little late to the party, but he then got involved. And so, you know, this the idea here is we can wait till this stuff is on our doorstep and then get in the fight, or we can be like Liberty Man here, poised and ready, always watching, being a vigilant observer, the sword in hand, ready to do battle at a moment's notice and repel evil should it come. And so that's the that's the difference between the two. There's a scripture in Romans 12, 18, it says, if it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. The unwritten part is, and if it's not possible, give them hell. If it is possible, as much as depends on you. In other words, you don't have to be a doormat. We don't have to take stuff, we don't have to concede ground. Everything that God has given us, we don't have to back up from. We have staked our claim. Jesus has paid for our liberty. We are free. I can do everything this word says I can do. And if anyone tries to back me off of that, there will be hell to pay. And so don't concede ground. Don't give up. If it is possible, as much as depends on you, but they're coming for us. They're coming for you, and they will not share this nation with you. And when I say they, I say those that are influenced by the Antichrist spirit. They will not share this place with you. They want to destroy you. The devil walks about as a roaring lion. Remember the lion skin, seeking whom he can devour. Don't be one of those whom he can devour. And so we've we've talked about some of these quotes already, but I'll just remind you of them tonight. John Adams

Faith Morality And Constitutional Freedom

SPEAKER_00 20:02

says that our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people and is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. That's what they're saying right here. And so, you know, those are Christian men who are given these quotes right here. So let's go to somebody else who wasn't so Christian. Um, this is Alexis de Tocqueville, uh, a French political philosopher, and he came to America to study the the living standards and the social society of America. And uh and in in his in his writings, what he discovered and what he printed and quoted says, it is it is it it is natural that they should hasten to invoke the assistance of religion, for they must know that liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith. So this is an unbeliever who's writing his observations about America, that they should invoke the assistance of religion, for they must know that liberty, we're talking about liberty tonight, and liberty cannot be established without morality, and morality can't exist without faith. And so all of this is tied together. Faith and morality are the foundation of our republic, and they are necessary for a society if it is to be free. John Jay was our first uh Supreme Court justice. Um And he's quoted as saying, providence. Now, when you hear see them write providence in their old timey writing, they're referring to God. Let me just clear that up right there. This isn't chance, this is providence. They're talking about God. So he says, Providence has given to our people the choice of our rulers. And it is the duty of a well, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers. People talk negatively about a litmus test for, you know, well, you shouldn't judge people based on their religion. You know, if they're willing to serve in government, we should elect them. No. This thing is meant to be operated by Christian people who have godly morals and faith in the one true God. And so Providence has given to our people the choice. God has given us a choice of our rulers. And it is our duty and privilege and in our best interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians to serve in office. Alright, so these are some basic things right here. This right here is James Kent. So he served in 1811, New York Supreme Court. So this is a court case, peoples versus Ruggles. Ruggles had been publicly slandering the Bible in the tavern. And so he got hauled in for that. And this is what the court, and James Kent got to give the opinion of the court, so this is a line out of there. He says, whatever strikes at the roots of Christianity manifests in the dissolvement of our civil government. And so when people are attacking Christianity, they're attacking our civil government. They're attacking our civil society. When people are attacking Jesus, they're attacking Christianity. I want you to equate that with they're attacking our liberty. They're attacking our morality. They're attacking our law. They're attacking our education. They're attacking our Christian form of government. Now we do not have a theocracy, but we have a government that was given to us by God. It is a godly form of government, and it is intended and best operated when Christians are in office. And so there is a culture today that is striking at the roots of Christianity, and I just want you to recognize and know that they're when they do, they're attacking liberty. They're attacking all the figures on this right here. And you better have your sword ready to do battle. And I'm not talking about a pocket knife here, I'm talking about God's word. It's the sword right here. And you can answer a lot of things with God's word. In Romans 12, 2, it says, Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. And a culture that violates God's morality will destroy the civil society. And so this whole thing fails. And we know that when the society falls away from God, there needs to be an awakening. And we're talking about awakening tonight. We've had one great awakening, we've had a second one, and we're going to talk about that second one

Lincoln From Doubt To Consecration

SPEAKER_00 24:50

right now. But I can tell you we're in need of a third great awakening as a nation. So let's get to the second great awakening here. And so now we're going to be talking about Civil War times. A little bit about Abraham Lincoln. And this is just a battle scene from the Civil War. Somebody's Polaroid camera on the battlefield snap this one. Abraham Lincoln came from a dysfunctional family. His father was very critical of him studying him, Lincoln, studying books and reading. He thought Lincoln was lazy for doing such and ought to be doing manual labor. And so his dad was kind of a broken man and a little bit abusive. He came from a Baptist home, but you know, that doesn't that doesn't mean anything. You know, we all got problems and there's family problems there. So Lincoln came from this dysfunctional family. He at some point he just kind of moved further away from God. He lost his faith in God. And fittingly, he became an attorney. That's where he laugh. But uh by the time he was 25, he was a legislator in Illinois. Um he's just moving further and further away from God. So somewhere in this zone right here, yes, another laugh. That wasn't a joke, I was being serious, but I appreciate that. Um, by this point in time, he's just a full-on atheist. He doesn't believe that God exists in any way, shape, or form. And he becomes somebody who enjoys mocking Christians and uh and heckling them and challenging them with arguments because he's a studied, smart guy and he and he's good at arguing these things. And so for most Christians who don't know their faith, they know they believe something, but they really can't articulate it. He just rips them apart and and and by the end of it, they don't know what they believe. And he's having a good time doing that. And so that was that was where he was at at this point. Uh Lincoln at one point heard a debate between a guy named Reverend James Smith and a leading atheist of the day. So you've got this Reverend taking on the atheist guy, and so Lincoln walks up, pops his bag of popcorn to enjoy the show, but he walked away thinking that that man made a solid argument for Christianity. And it began to change his mind. Like maybe I don't know all these things exactly quite right. That was a pretty compelling argument. And so he befriends this uh Reverend James Smith. Um Reverend Smith gives him a copy of uh of his book, uh, which was titled Defending the Christian Faith. And Lincoln found that more compelling, more compelling arguments for Christianity. Uh that led to Smith becoming the family pastor, and Lincoln still isn't there yet, but you know, they're going to church and he's got a pastor now, which is a far cry from being an atheist. Um when Lincoln and Lincoln had a hard life. He had four sons, he lost three of them. Um it was he had a hard time. When Lincoln's first son died in 1850, uh Smith stepped in and preached the funeral and provided a lot of comfort to the family, and and that really deepened their bond even more. So much so that three years later, when Lincoln is still reeling from the death of his son, he reached out to this uh Reverend and just asked him for help. And and Reverend Smith was right there to help him. Um Lincoln begins to recognize that there is a God, and and the discipleship continues. And so at some point after this, um Smith, Reverend Smith gets Lincoln to uh agree to give a speech about the Ten Commandments uh to a local Bible society. And so you've got Lincoln who's you know very smart, very sharp guy, good at arguing things, very well educated, and now he's got to teach somebody something about the Ten Commandments, you know, and his audience is a Bible bunch of people who probably already know something about the Tenments, so he's a nervous wreck. And he just thinks I can't do this, I'm not, I'm not good at this. He lost all of his confidence, but Reverend Smith encouraged him. And so Lincoln ultimately gave that's that talk on the Ten Commandments and how every one of those Ten Commandments is beneficial in everyday life. And it was a very successful presentation, uh, especially coming from somebody who had moved from I'm an atheist to Ten Commandments are good and here's how they work for you in every day of life. So in 1860 he was elected president, but before the inauguration in 1861, the union fell apart. We've got civil war. And so here we got the picture, the union dissolves. They went from 36 states, states are seceding from the Union. Um he went from 36 states down to 25. Lincoln didn't want to acknowledge that they were seceding, he didn't want the split of the nation, but he's he's in a condition where the nation is broken into, and it's broken over the slavery issue. There's other things that go into this, but this is the slavery issue. Um before we get to that, so we've got a nation. So I've got I've got over here on my right, Declaration of Independence. We've got the four pages of the Constitution, and on the far left is the Bill of Rights, right up here. On the podium hanging in front of me is the draft declaration of independence. And uh the draft declaration of independence was one that was pinned by Thomas Jefferson. Um, it is not the one that was signed by everybody. You can look at this up close and you'll see the the line throughs and the scribble this out and the you know they made something else bolded and they wrote something in all caps. I mean, they it was like track changes on word, colonial style, right here. And so you you're welcome to come up and look at this at the end. Um, but we didn't have to go through a war. We were so close to having some of the wording on this document, and we missed it by two states. So over here, when you see the Declaration of Independence, it says the unanimous declaration of independence. So it was all the states agreeing to all of the words on that document. If we didn't have all the states agreeing to all the words, we would not have that document. There were two states that took issue with uh some of the words on on this document. Um, and I'm gonna get ahead on the slides. Give me a second, I'm gonna slide over, jump ahead here. All right, so this is the declaration, the draft declaration that you see in front of you. And um this is the quote that I have highlighted here. If you can read that, so that's Thomas Jefferson's handwriting right there. It says, he, talking about the King of England, has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, capturing them and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the, and then it says all caps, he made them all capital letters, the Christian king. So that's sarcasm right there. He's saying that this practice is done by the quote, Christian king of Great Britain, determined to keep open a market whereby men should be bought and sold. He has prostituted this negative for suppressing every legislative attempt. In other words, they had multiple legislative attempts to end this practice. The colonies tried to end this practice multiple times, but the king would not do it. Uh multiple attempts to prohibit or to restrain his uh his his commerce, basically. And so here we are, civil war, and the nation is coming apart. And Lincoln is a broken man, he's lost his son. Um and he's recognizing that we're in trouble. And so here we've got this next slide here, and and this is this is Lincoln's reaction to what's going on. And because he's been praying for God to help, and the other side's been praying for God to help, they're both praying against each other. And he says, both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes his aid against the other. The prayers of both cannot be answered, and that of neither will be full answered. You've got countering prayers working against here. And so he's saying, This isn't gonna work. And at this point, um, he's looking out over the carnage at Gettysburg, and he said, I have been driven to my knees many times by overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. When he's at his wit's end, I got nowhere else to go. When I left home, I asked the people to pray for me. There he was on the back of a train to his constituents. Y'all pray for me now, he said. But I wasn't a Christian. He said, when I buried my son, the severest trial of my life, I still was not a Christian. But when I got to Gettysburg and I saw the graves of thousands of soldiers, I then and there consecrated myself to Christ. Yes, I do love Jesus. He looked across that battlefield and he got saved. Nobody preached a salvation sermon to him. He had just been running from God and he knew better, and he gave up on himself, and he answered the call, and he was a born-again believer. And so the next thing that he does is he issues a national day of humiliation, fasting, and and prayer. And you know, there were a lot of these, all the way, you know, there's still a we still have proclamations in prayer uh from various state governments and our national government, but uh this was Lincoln's proclamation of prayer. And basically, this says um it acknowledges that God has a side, and it acknowledges that we as a nation need to repent from what we're doing, and we need to get on God's side. That's the short of this proclamation that we haven't been doing right as a nation, and we must repent, and we've got to get on God's side. So before this, Lincoln had been having a very hard time in the Civil War. You've got the North and the South, the Confederate troops versus the U.S., and he had been losing. His losing streak was something like five or six losses to one or two wins. He was losing this war. When he issues this proclamation for prayer, and the nation prays and repents and turns around, some portion of the nation prayed and repented and turned around. Some portion got this right. Not all of them, but some portion did. When he issues this proclamation for prayer, he gives his life to Jesus. He wants this nation pulled back together and things to get back on the right side. There's a there's a moment of great awakening that's beginning to happen. Um, his winning streak started up. After that, he had nine wins and only two losses and ended the war. And then the healing of the nation can begin. When the heart of the nation turns back to God, then the healing can begin. And so I've got some things on this table, and I'll I'll show this at the end of the service here, and I'll open

Civil War Relics And Slavery Draft

SPEAKER_00 35:41

this up. But I've got three pieces of lead. These are lead bullets from the Civil War. Uh, and I've got a map right here, and I'll identify where they are on the map. The round musket ball in the middle is one that came from that was found near General Lee's headquarters, which was a house out over on this end of town. Uh there's there's something called a mini ball. So these are conical-shaped bullets, and and these are significantly larger. So I have a nine millimeter round. So you look at the projectile on the end of this and compare that to these pieces of ammunition. And if you think, okay, we got to go bigger, I got a Colt 45 round right here. It still dwarfs our modern ammunition that anybody would typically carry on their person. These were brutal. And so one of these was found over here on this end of the battlefield at Colp's Hill, and another one down at uh a farm on the south end. So I'll open these up, and you guys are welcome to to see these things and hold a piece of history. But uh, I just wanted you to see the the brutality of this war and what it did to our nation. Um as we uh I showed you the the um draft declaration for of independence right here. So this again, what Thomas Jefferson wrote, this is right here. I have an I've got multiple newspapers here. So these papers right here, under these three frames, are all 1776 newspapers with various articles. Um I'm gonna read you some real stuff, some real history here. Not this not, you know, there's some interesting things here. They they bought and sold houses, and um, they had articles about the forming of a nation and a battle report of what was going on in Boston and how Washington was doing and uh the sale of a small stone house. Um there is right here wanted immediately a woman who y'all don't get embarrassed, a woman of good character who has a good breast of milk, inquire of the printer. But you think about the life that they were living. You know, dad's at home with the kids, and maybe mama got sick and died, and he's got these babies. So, you know, you got you got a nurse who needs to come in and help take care to be sold the time of a Dutch servant girl with four years and ten months left to serve. And so we had indentured servitude. So these indentured serves, when they left Europe, they came over here on a ship and they had no money to come. And so they sold themselves into slavery, into servitude, to the ship captain who had a contract with them. The ship captain brings them over to America, he sells the contract to somebody else who needs the labor. And so there's a Dutch servant girl who's got more time on her on her contract, and they're selling her for four years and ten months to be disposed of a likely stout Negro fellow, complete cooper trade by trade, and a good drummer, inquirer of the printer. And so here is a slave person who's this is this is what the king was bringing over from you know against their will. This is what these lines right here talked about the Christian king doing and bringing this over, and here's the slave trade happening still, and it was an economic thing, and it it had to be a unanimous consent, or it wasn't gonna happen at all. And so, right here I've got a New York paper, and this is from 1876. So this is a this is celebrating the 100th anniversary of our nation in New York, a newspaper, 1876, celebrating the 100th anniversary. And there's some neat pictures in here, and we'll flip through this stuff at the end, and you can see this. But this is 11 years after the Civil War is over. 11 years. The nation is still reeling from a civil war where they lost 640 some odd thousand lives. You don't just get over that. And the New York paper in celebration of our great nation could have printed the Declaration of Independence. It could have printed the Constitution. Instead, they chose to print the draft declaration. Why did they do that? They're printing what we could have had. They're printing we didn't have to do this, we didn't have to go down the road of slavery, but we had two states who wouldn't give it up, and so we got stuck with this. A hundred years later, and 11 years after the Civil War is over, they're showing this is what we could have had as a nation, and we can still go back to it. And so there's hope for our nation. And the New York paper back then was portraying the hope of our nation right there.

unknown 39:56

Amen.

SPEAKER_00 40:02

And so that's the Great Awakening, and I'll tell you, you know, the first Great Awakening, um, it was not a peaceful time. It was war. And the second great awakening, also not a peaceful time, it was war. I'm hoping for a third Great Awakening. But I'm just giving you the fair warning, these are not always peaceful times. There are people who hate us, who hate our Christianity, who hate what we stand for, they hate our liberty. And it's not always a peaceful time to go through these things, but our nation desperately needs to wake up.

Culture Capture And Liberty From Within

SPEAKER_00 40:32

So, what could possibly destroy liberty now? I mean, we've got this nation, we made the mistake of slavery, we got in the middle, we we had this great war, we fought over it, we've we've we've we've abolished slavery, everything is right and good again. What could possibly destroy this nation now? Well, I gave you this quote last time, but this is a quote from Antonio Gramsci. This is what could destroy the nation now, this is already at work in our nation. Socialism is the precise religion that must overwhelm Christianity. In the new order, socialism will triumph by first capturing the culture via infiltration of the schools, the universities, the churches, the media. Do we see this happening? Yes, it's it's way, we're way down the road on this. And the warning that came from Abraham Lincoln, we looked at this last time. The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next. It is critical what we teach our kids. It's critical that they understand this history that you're getting tonight and we got the past three nights. It's critical that our kids get this and that this become a regular thing in the schoolroom. The mention of God has been just pulled out of the schoolroom. Thank God we got the Ten Commandments back. As long as there's tests, we will have prayer. Kids do pray in school. We're coming back. They're beginning to wake up, and we've got to keep this awakening going. We've got to keep this going. And so here's another quote from Abraham Lincoln, again asking the question what could destroy the liberty now? He said, Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at one blow? Never. All the enemies of Europe and Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasures of Earth in their military chest, with a bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take one drink from the Ohio, or make one track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men, we must live through all time or die by suicide. And so that's his prediction right there. And we see it coming up from within. The destroyer is coming up from within. Revelation 12, 9 warned us, it talks about the deceiver here. It says, so the great dragon, talking about the devil, was cast out, that serpent of old, the devil and Satan, whom deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth. Thanks a lot. God threw him out of heaven, and he's here with his angels. And so we've got to contend with this demonic spirit. We've got to contend against the devil, and it's the Antichrist spirit that we're contending against. 2 Corinthians 4:4 talks about the God of this age who has blinded the minds of those who do not believe, lest the light of the glory of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. And the God of this world, our pastor gives this definition, it's all that floating mass of thought, opinions, maxims, speculations, hopes, impulses, aims, aspirations that are at any time current in the world. So it's basically the Antichrist spirit is affecting our culture. And whatever culture that is that's current in the world, that's what we got to contend against. Second Thessalonians chapter 2, verse 7. For the mystery of the lawless one is already at work. Only he who now restrains will do so until he's taken out of the way. Capitalized in here is talking about the Holy Spirit. Where does the Holy Spirit live? On the inside of us. We are the temple of the Holy Spirit. So he doesn't get taken out of here until we're taken out of here. And we're in cooperation with him. And so when he's restraining something, he's restraining it through people. He does things through people. He does things through us. And so I want you to add, I want you to recognize that you're part of the scripture. Only he and me who now restrains will do so until he and I are taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with his breath of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of his coming. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception amongst those who are who perish, who did not receive the love of truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie, that they may be condemned, who did not believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. They chose unrighteousness. They chose their path. And now there's strong delusion, and there's little to no hope for people who are that far gone. But our job is to restrain the Antichrist spirit, to restrain the lawless one. And so let's get caught doing our job. Romans 1.28. This is the warning that we have really for the next generation, the kids that we're talking about. We talked about education last time, but since they didn't think it worthwhile to retain a knowledge of God, he turned them over to a reprobate mind so that they would do those things which ought not to be done or are not fitting. They didn't retain a knowledge of God. The culture or the group of people who are called nuns, N-O-N-E, nun, are those that select the box, you know, when you can choose, you know, I'm Protestant or Catholic or nun. The ones that select none is a growing group of people or has been. And we've got to turn this thing around. We've got to revive, we've got to awaken, we've got to be busy about this work. We're at war with the Antichrist spirit, the lawless one. He's the deceiver. And the answer is the truth. Isaiah 60 says that we should arise and shine. And the glory of the Lord is risen upon us. Behold, darkness covers the earth, and deep darkness the people. But the Lord will arise over you, and his glory will be seen on you. How many want to cooperate with his glory? Let's be part of the next great awakening. Let's declare his glory. Our job is to be this liberty man right here. Everyone's job in here is to be that guy right there who's going to defend his faith, who's going to defend education, who's going to defend the law, who's going to defend morality, who's going to defend all these things that are precious to him that God has given. We've been charged, we've been warned. The devil's walking around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he can devour. We're supposed to resist. And so sadly, you know, this is a this is the recipe to have a godly nation right

The Pathway That Destroys Nations

SPEAKER_00 47:01

here. But also this right here is the recipe and the pathway to destroy a nation. And I'm not giving away any secrets here. But if we start with education, remember Antonio Gramsci, if we can infiltrate, well, if he infiltrates, if socialism in and just fill in the blank, it could be socialism, it could be uh the the the Islamic movement, it could be uh race wars, it could be any of these, any of these offenses. If they infiltrate our education and start filling the minds of our kids, then we end up with um we end up with an immoral society. And you cannot have a civil society with immoral people. And when you lose the morality, then you end up with laws that are unjust and ungodly, and they no longer align with God's laws here. And then the faith, you know, the faith goes away. Or at least it's not a faith in the one true God, maybe it's a faith in a in a false God, another God, an anti-God. Anything that is not the one true God, by the way, is antichrist. The Islamic religion. It's more than a religion. It is it is a political thing, it is a governmental thing, it is it is awful, and it is anti-Christ. And I know they talk about Jesus as being a prophet in in their Quran, but you know, the Quran was was written by somebody who was an ill ill illiterate pedophile. And here I've got a firsthand account in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John of Jesus. Muhammad came up with something that was written hundreds of years later. Are you gonna believe an account of somebody who wrote something down hundreds of years later and did not have a personal relationship with, or the guys that walked with Jesus every day and wrote this stuff down? And so that is anti-Christ. And so if we end up with any other faith and any other thing, then we've lost our our morality, we've lost our education, we've lost our our laws. And then what happens to Liberty Man right here? You'll end up with the beast seated in this chair. And you'll end up with the skin of the man draped over his back. That's right. I'm not willing to go there.