DEFINING SIN: Declaring Independence (4)

Keep yourself free from sin. [1Timothy 5:22]

JULY 4, 1776

It’s been 240 years since the Declaration of Independence was written. America declared to the entire world on the above date that it had grown to adult status and would be moving on into full independence.

It was a forced departure. The distant government had come down way too hard on individual liberties and had not appreciated what the colonists had achieved. It instead treated them as mere chattel, took them for granted, and insisted on rule simply for the sake of rule. It was dictating from afar with little or no respect for the people.

Their strong arm had the opposite effect. The American colonists thus made the right decision to secede and rid themselves of an overreaching, bureaucratic, close-minded, and entrenched power concerned only for its own interests.

Therefore, the United States of America was founded on the principles of freedom, God-given individual rights, and personal liberty at any and all costs. The only possible way to facilitate these was for Americans to say goodbye to their arrogant overlords and be willing to fight.

And now, 240 years later, on a much lesser scale but in the same spirit, the British people have said the same things to the European Union. Why? Because the leadership of the European Union has become extremely top heavy, unresponsive, dictatorial, and unappreciative of the British. As I said before, the EU needs the UK much more than the UK needs the EU. Let’s hope the United Kingdom maintains its backbone, doesn’t cave, and makes the absolute best of the current British Exit.

WHAT HAPPENED TO US?

And now, with the express agreement of the American people by voting into office those who are doing the very opposite of that which our Founders fought and died for, America has become much like the EU. America has caved in long ago to a leadership structure that is far worse than what the leadership of England was prior to the Revolution.

Has the American government at present become what it was designed by the Founders to be? Not at all, but it is not the government’s fault. The government itself is largely benign. There’s a lot of great people working in government. The Word of God says government in general is actually good and necessary. Americans should never be anti-government. But limited government is best. Limited government is the government of a free, strong, and independent people. The desire for limited government was exactly what the American Revolution was all about.

The Constitution as written by the Founders certainly advocated for extremely limited government and the promotion of great individual freedom. As the government has grown in scope and power, however, individual freedom has greatly shrunk. This is a basic mathematical corollary. When one increases the other decreases. It’s impossible to have big government and great liberty at the same time. It works the same with light and darkness.

HOW DID WE GET HERE?

On July 4, 1776 there existed a pronounced desire for individual freedom, a spirit of independence, the strength and courage to seek it, unlimited hope, a belief in the future, and tremendous opportunity. Today, there is comparatively less of all of the above. Liberty is fading.

This fade to darkness is due only to the following: A turning away from the Lord Jesus, a growing acceptance of and redefinition of sin, and a huge lessening of human morality and righteous resolve.

How did this happen? Does the escalation of America’s moral failing dovetail with the nanny state and mammoth government? Are the two related? Are they connected? There is no way the Founders envisioned our current arrangement. Individual freedom is presently not only crashing but burning.

Here’s how government growth happened in part: It responded to those lobbying the most. These are the ones who gain the most influence. This is what created the blatant dual standard of justice that has become so obvious as of late. Individual Americans have never managed to create a large enough voting bloc to lobby for their own interests and are therefore left out of the inner circle of great influence. It is in part why the great Middle Class of America that once was is no more.

Much of this has happened due to a basic Divide and Conquer strategy that has worked perfectly. Such a strategy not only promotes division, it also promotes hate.

Also, Americans put far too much trust in political parties. Political parties always have their own personal agendas and until this year, only promote their own. And even though the original framers of the government structure built it in such a way to eliminate or at least limit the inevitable greed and corruption they were all too familiar with that was used against them, the limitations have failed.

Though built with strong checks and balances to severely limit corruption, those checks and balances have largely been overcome and eliminated by corruption. It is not necessarily the case that the founding documents have changed in letter to violate the founding principles; it is that the founding principles are largely ignored. The Bill of Rights is routinely violated every day and the violations are increasing with no apparent solution in sight. Without great change, individual rights will continue being outlawed one by one. The more disruptions that take place in society, the less freedom there will be and the more individual rights will be violated, except for the rights of those in the protected class. Darkness has thus descended upon the land. The remedy?

“Let there be light.” [Genesis 1:3] [1]

Real Christianity—The Nature of the Church

PLEASE SUPPORT THIS POWERFUL SERIES:

DEFINING SIN: The New “Evil is Good-Good is Evil” Paradigm (1)

DEFINING SIN: The Lord Jesus Endorsed the Old Testament Definition of Sin (2)

DEFINING SIN: The Growing Movement To Ban the New Testament as Anti-Semitic Hate Speech (3)