America and Christians: Covenants with God
By Jeanne Gowen Dennis
When our guest Bill Federer mentioned that America’s Founding Fathers had made a covenant with God, it caused me to reflect about our covenant with God as believers in Jesus Christ.
In the Declaration of Independence, our Founders appealed to “the Supreme Judge of the world” for the moral virtue of their intentions. Then they declared their “firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence” as they pledged to each other “our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
Our Founders took their honor – their integrity, morality, and character – very seriously. So much so that they called it “sacred.” They had dedicated their honor to God. For what they believed was right and just, they were willing to lose all, even their lives.
As Christians, we understand that when Jesus shed His blood on the cross for the sin of the world, He fulfilled God’s covenant promises to Adam and Abraham. Jesus wielded a crushing blow to the serpent’s (Satan’s) head, and all the nations of the world are blessed through Him.
Everyone who genuinely repents of sin and turns to Jesus for salvation will live eternally in heaven with God. God gave us this free gift, and He asks our love and obedience in return.
Compared to the dedication of America’s Founders to the cause of freedom, are we Christians so devoted to Jesus that we would dedicate all we have and are for God to fulfill His purposes in us? Is integrity, morality, and character so important to us that we, too, would call it “sacred”?
Let’s examine what it means for us as 21st-Century believers to be fully dedicated to God, beginning with how we apply the Ten Commandments.
Meanwhile, as we celebrate the birth of America today, let us not forget the covenant our forefathers made with God. He has blessed this nation abundantly, because we have trusted in Him.
Take time today to thank and praise Almighty God, who alone made – and keeps – our freedom possible. May this day be a sober reminder, as more and more Americans ban God from public life, that without Him, we can do nothing (John 15:5).
© 2013 Jeanne Dennis
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Photo: Signing of the Declaration of Independence by John Trumbull, Architect of the Capitol