The American Soul
The American Soul
God and State Must Not Be Separated
The divide in American society has grown so deep that peaceful coexistence between opposing worldviews seems increasingly improbable. This reality demands not just awareness but practical action from those who value liberty and traditional American principles.
Drawing from 1 John 4, we examine what it means to "test the spirits" in today's complex cultural landscape. When churches and institutions offer nothing different from what secular culture promotes, they lose their purpose and power. The radical difference of authentic Christianity isn't found in denominational squabbles but in following the principles of God and Christ that shaped our nation from its founding.
Theodore Roosevelt understood this connection perfectly when he declared, "The true Christian is the true citizen." He recognized that biblical teachings are so deeply interwoven with American civic life that removing them would leave us without moral standards. Looking at our current cultural confusion, his words seem prophetic – we've indeed lost our ability to judge both public and private morals because we've removed the biblical foundation that once guided us.
The path forward requires strengthening conservative Christian communities through communication and cooperation. Just as colonial Americans formed committees of correspondence to unite against tyranny, today's believers must build networks that transcend denominational differences. When churches focus more on promoting their particular brand than on leading people to Christ, they miss their primary purpose.
History offers us wisdom through voices like Mercy Otis Warren and Jonathan Mayhew, who understood that liberty requires vigilance and unity. Their warnings against sleeping while enemies remain watchful apply equally today. As Tolkien wisely noted through his characters, we don't get to choose when we live – only how we respond to the challenges of our time.
What small ripple of hope will you create today? How will you strengthen the moral fabric of your community? The answer to these questions may determine whether America rediscovers its soul or continues its drift from the principles that once made it great.
The American Soul Podcast
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Hey folks, this is Jesse Cope, back with another episode of the American soul podcast. Hope y'all are doing well, wherever y'all are and whatever part of the day you're in. I should appreciate you joining, giving me a little bit of your time, a little piece of your day. I will try to use it wisely. I will try to use it wisely. Hopefully it will give us all some tools for our toolbox, so to speak, and hopefully it will help us each draw a little closer to God and Jesus Christ and draw our nation here in America, or your nation, wherever you are around the world, listening back toward God and Jesus Christ. You remember the quote that we read, I think, on the last podcast by Senator Robert F Kennedy from 1966, folks, every little act that stands up for an ideal and the best ideal that's possible to stand up for are those of Jesus Christ sends out a tiny ripple of hope and you combine all those ripples together and you make a massive wave. I know that's a little different than our normal intro, but but you remember that every, every, every action you take each day, you have the ability to draw not only yourself, but as a member of your nation, wherever you are around the world or as a nation of America, you have the ability to draw yourself, and therefore your whole community state nation, a little bit closer to Christ or a little bit farther away from him. I know I'm getting way off track here, but you can think about it, folks, like a scale, like one of those old scales, right, the scales of justice, one of those old weighing scales. And each action you take is a little grain of sand and you either get to add it to the side of light and truth and God and Jesus Christ, or you get to add it to the side of darkness and hell and chaos and the devil. And if you have a bunch of people putting grains on the side of truth and justice, eventually that scale is going to start to tip. That way, father, thank you for today.
Speaker 1:Thank you for you, father, and your Son, Jesus Christ and your Holy Spirit. Thank you for your love and your mercy, your grace and your forgiveness. Thank you for all the blessings that you have bestowed upon us as individuals and as a nation. Forgive us our lack of gratitude. Forgive us our greed, our pride, our judgment of others. Forgive us our greed, our pride, our judgment of others, rash words, cowardice in our unbelief, our hypocrisy. We're not forgiving others as you have forgiven us.
Speaker 1:Help us to do a better job, father. Help us to follow the commands of your Son, jesus Christ, to love you with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength. Love our neighbors as ourselves. Bless the marriages of those who are married. Guide those who have children in raising them to know you and your son, jesus Christ. Be with those who are listening, Father. Thank you for them and thank you for this time to record the podcast.
Speaker 1:Be with the people that are listening. Be with their families. Bless their marriages. Bless their children. Guide them in their work, whether it's outside the home or inside the home. Comfort them, ease the fears and anxieties and brokenness that they may have. Help them to feel your peace and your comfort and know that you want what's best for each of us. Even if we can't see it, father, even if we don't feel like it at times, please be with us. Be with our leaders. Give them wisdom and courage and a strong faith. Help them to rule in fear of you. Help us to elect men who rule in fear of you. Help us to each fulfill the roles, father, that you have for us, as men or women, as husbands or wives, as fathers or mothers, as sons or daughters. Be with our military and our law enforcement, our firefighters and our EMS. Give them wisdom and courage and a strong faith. And God, my word, are upon a place In your son's name. We pray Amen.
Speaker 1:Real quick, folks, before we get into our normal questions. Well, no, we'll do it the other way around, have you, because those are more important. Have you made time for God today? Have you made time for Jesus Christ? Have you made time to read his word, to pray, to talk to him, to tell him thank you for his blessings, to seek forgiveness for whatever sins you have committed, to pray for those around you, to pray for your enemies that one's hard. To pray for your spouse, to pray for yourself, right, and if you're married, does your spouse know it? Do you act like it? Do they go to bed each night knowing that they are your second priority each day, behind nothing except God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit? Or do they wonder Practicality? Right In the Marine Corps and I think this is true because I've got people that I've known in other branches when you came to your commanding officer with a problem, rule of thumb was to bring that commanding officer three solutions and then to tell him which solution you thought was the best you recommended, even if they were really bad solutions.
Speaker 1:Folks, you had a responsibility to bring a solution to your commanding officer. That was part of your job. If you identified a, you needed to identify a way to fix it. And so we have a problem in this nation. We have a lot of problems, but one of the ones that I talk about not infrequently on the podcast is the fact that we just we simply coexistence, peaceful coexistence, with citizens who insist on supporting leftism, socialism, communism, nazism, fascism, all that bucket of isms or Islam. It's just a pipe dream, folks. It's not feasible in the long run, and you know that because all of those ideologies it's not feasible in the long run. And you know that because all of those ideologies, they only wait for total power. That's what they're after. And once they get total power, then the persecution starts, then the enslavement starts, right. And so what should we practically be doing today to try and prepare for that eventual conflict and to strengthen our position, maybe to avoid the conflict if we strengthen our position enough that those people decide it would be better to go somewhere else to try and spread their evil.
Speaker 1:The first thing, obviously, is to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ, so reading it yourself each day, doing whatever you can. I've got a gentleman that I follow on X that goes into the prisons pretty regularly. He asks for Bibles. Find somewhere that needs Bibles. Find an organization, a Bible society, that still spreads Bibles. Talk to the Gideons Whatever you can do to spread the word of Christ in your nation. Right, folks, we don't have to always go overseas. Right, america's in some pretty. We have some pretty dark storm clouds on the horizon.
Speaker 1:There's nothing wrong with going overseas for missionary work, but if you constantly leave your house unguarded, at some point the thief is going to break in, right, and so we've got a lot of problems here in our own nation, and one of those arguably one of the biggest, is the fact that we are Bible illiterate. We don't know the Word of God anymore because we allowed it to be taken out of the schools, which that ought to be. Part of. Our fight is to rightfully get as Fisher Ames, the man that actually worded the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment, said to rightfully get the Bible back as the primary text in our schools. That ought to be part of our fight. But anywhere you can spread the Bible, whatever governing bodies you have in your town, city, county, state, you ought to be encouraging them If you live, especially if you live in a Christian area, conservative area, encouraging them to strengthen your emergency responders and your militia, your state militia, your firefighters, your law enforcement at different levels, your EMS workers, right, and communicate with other conservative Christian towns, cities, states. And the same ought to be true with the schools, whatever schools you're in, as much as you can put God and Jesus Christ back in those schools, prayer, teaching children even if it's parents coming in and teaching children, right, whatever you can do to strengthen the word of God and put the Bible back into those schools. And you ought to communicate with other schools that are doing likewise and support each other.
Speaker 1:We recently write one of the sections we read out of Mercy Otis Warren's History of the Rise, progress and Termination of the American Revolution, talked about those circular letters that went around, right, those committees of correspondence, the communication between the colonies, correspondence, the communication between the colonies. We need to communicate between the conservative Christian schools, towns, churches, huge, huge. Do you have communication with others? Does your pastor, your board of elders, your board of deacons? Do they communicate with other churches in your area? Right, and the denomination shouldn't matter. With other churches in your area? Right, and the denomination shouldn't matter. That should be completely irrelevant, folks. What should be important is are you communicating with other churches, other schools, other towns, other cities where you have people that are really really love God, really love Christ, really love America, really love liberty?
Speaker 1:All right, I think we are in 1 John 4 today Testing the spirits, testing the Spirits Beloved. Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this, you know the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the Antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. You are from God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world. They are from the world. Therefore, they speak as from the world and the world listens to them. We are from God. He who knows God listens to us. He who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Speaker 1:A couple of huge things here, just even in this first little bit. Folks, if we don't, as a church, if we don't offer something different from the world, why would people be interested in coming into the church? If we don't offer anything different than what the world offers, if we're, as a church, still chasing after money, greed, power, fame, fortune, sex, drugs, alcohol, whatever, if, like, if, as a church, if we are pushing the same things that the world is pushing, why would anyone want to come in? What would be the point? There's no point. We're the same. We have to be radically different, and radically different as following the principles of God and Jesus Christ. Right, and you know that. You see, when somebody does something different, in a good way, everybody, and in a bad way. Honestly, when somebody does something really different, you notice, and then, of course, you have to decide whether that's something you're interested in or not. And that's that's the other part here.
Speaker 1:Talking about verse 5 and 6.
Speaker 1:They're from the world. Therefore they speak as from the world and the world listens to them. We are from God. He who knows God listens to us. He who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. All you have to do is preach the word of God and you get a real clear idea of who actually is interested in God and Jesus Christ and following them and loving them and who is not. None of us do it perfectly, but you get a really good idea pretty quickly and one of the greatest examples that I have seen in my life is which we talked about on the podcast quite a bit is marriage and the clearly defined roles and responsibilities of men and women. And if you start going through 1 Corinthians 7, titus 2, ephesians 5, 1 Peter 3, proverbs 5, 19, hebrews 13, 4, song of Solomon, you get a real clear idea pretty quickly of who in those men and women really want to follow God and Jesus Christ, really love God and Jesus Christ and who doesn't. Because the people that don't want to, when you start talking outlying those roles for men and women right Husband, love, nourish and cherish, Wife, submit respect to and physically satisfy the people that aren't really interested. They have a pretty visceral reaction and it becomes pretty apparent. So testing those spirits right? That's why it's so important to make sure that your church is actually preaching scripture, not denominational doctrine, not the writings of men, but scripture first and foremost. God is love, beloved. Let us love one another, for love is from God, and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. By this the love of God was manifested in us that God has sent his only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through him. And this is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. So already a couple things here, folks Love. Love doesn't mean encouraging others to continue in sin, and we've really messed up that idea both inside and outside the church today in America and really across Western civilization, encouraging people in sin is not loving. Encouraging someone to rob a bank is not loving. Encouraging someone to get an abortion is not loving. Encouraging someone to live LGBTQ lifestyles is not loving. Encouraging someone to go through a no-fault divorce just because they don't feel and love anymore is not loving. None of those things are loving. Encouraging someone to oppress the poor and the widow and the orphan, to steal, you know, to get a quote-unquote great deal off of the widow or the orphan, the poor and the needy, that's not loving. And the second thing is if God loved us so much that he was willing to send his only son, we ought to love one another. I think a lot of times, folks, I certainly forget I'm assuming some of y'all do too we forget that God gave his only son to die a gruesome death for us. You think about the fact that if you were given the choice to save somebody, if you would willingly offer up your son or your daughter to die a gruesome death to save those other people, it changes it a little bit, doesn't it? Oh, where did we go? So? Verse 12 no one has seen god at any time. If we love one another, god abides in us and his love is perfected in us. By this. We know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. We have seen and testified that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, god abides in him and he in God. I confess that, folks. I confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He died for my sins and yours. God raised him from the dead. He's my Lord and Savior. He's my only hope. He's the way that I have. That I know, even with my doubts and fears. Folks, he's the only path to God and Jesus Christ in eternity, and he's your only path too. There is no other path. There's no church denominational doctrine that can get you there. Mary Joseph, the disciples, no pope, no priest, no pastor, no false religion like Islam, buddhism, hinduism, atheism, any of that. Nothing else can get you to God and eternal life besides Jesus Christ. We have come to know and believe the love which God has for us. We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this, love is perfected with us so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because, as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment and the one who fears is not perfected in love. It's a great, great verse, right, there is no fear in love, and I think that applies in our relationship with God and Jesus Christ and our marriage. I just it's a great verse, folks. I'm just going to leave that one alone. We love because he first loved us. If someone says I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar, for the one who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also, and this commandment we have from him that the one who loves God should love his brother also. It's impossible to love God, folks, without obedience. It's impossible to love your spouse without obedience to God and fulfilling your God-given roles and responsibilities. It's impossible to love God without loving our brother, our sister, our neighbor and your closest neighbor, by the way, is your spouse, if you're married. If we don't love our brother, our sister, our neighbor, it's impossible to love God. Those are kind of that's definitely should give us all a little bit, at least that's definitely should give us all a little bit, at least, of pause, a little bit of history. Let's see. Oh yeah, teddy Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, the true Christian is the true citizen, lofty of purpose, resolute in endeavor, ready for hero's deeds, but never looking down on his task because it is cast in the day of small things, awake to his own duties as well as to his rights, following the higher law with reverence and, in this world, doing all that in his power lies so that, when death comes, he may feel that mankind is in some degree better because he lived. Every thinking man, when he thinks, realizes that the teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and entwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally impossible for us to figure ourselves what that life would be if these standards were removed. We would lose almost all the standards by which we now judge both public and private morals, by which we now judge both public and private morals, all the standards toward which we, with more or less resolution, strive to raise ourselves 100%. We're going to read that again on the next podcast, or some point in the next podcast. The true citizen is the true Christian folks. You cannot truly love America if you refuse to follow the principles of Christ. Even if you don't accept God, accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, which I recommend more than anything else. There is no greater decision you will ever make in your life. You cannot truly love America, love liberty, if you don't follow the principles, the general principles, not the Roman Catholic or the Greek Orthodox or the Methodist or the Baptist or the Presbyterian principles of Christ, but the general principles of Christ as laid out in Scripture. It is impossible to be the true citizen in America without following those principles. And Teddy Roosevelt here, a true Christian is the true citizen. The best of the best citizens that we have, are Christian have are Christian, not Muslim, not Hindu, not Buddhist, not Mother Nature atheist, socialist, communist, leftist, nazi, fascist, anything else Christian. Those are the only citizens, people that follow those principles of Christ, that can truly make America great again. If you really want to make America great again, folks, if that's really the top of your goal list, then the top of your goal list ought to be to make America Christian again. Make our education system it applies to all the institutions. If you really want to make education great in America again, then you need to make education Christian in America again. You want to make our military, our law enforcement, our firefighters great again, then you need to make those institutions Christian again. That's it, folks. There's no other path. That makes us great, or our institutions, or our towns, our cities, our schools, our churches right, that's sad to even say, but that's so true. You really want to make church great again, you need to make it Christian, not denominational, not based on the doctrine of men, but Christian based on scripture. And then the second paragraph, right. Every thinking man, when he thinks, realizes that the teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and intertwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally impossible for us to figure ourselves what that life would be if these standards were removed. We don't know what we are today, folks. We can't figure ourselves. We have no clue who we are today, because we have done the best we can over the last 80 years to separate the Bible out of our civic and social life, out of our private and public lives. We've done everything we can to kick God out since 1947. Since before then probably. But that Supreme Court decision was a watershed moment. Everson v Board of Education has to be overturned as soon as possible. There is no place in America for separation of God and state. They used the guise of separation of church and state, which was drastically needed, because you see what happens, as you did in Europe the Anglican Church, the Roman Catholic Church, anytime a particular denomination becomes favored by the state, the persecution that results under that church denomination. Separation of church and state is wholly different than separation of God and state. And separation of God and state is what we've been practicing in America and Roosevelt's telling us here you take those teachings of the Bible out and they're so mixed into our civil and social life that we won't know what to do. And we don't. We've taken them out and we have done exactly what he said. We have lost almost all the standards by which we judge both public and private morals, all the standards toward which we, with more or less resolution, used to strive to realize, used to strive to realize. Again, it's the simplest, probably, and the just most absurd example is the fact that we pretend today that men can be women and women can be men. I mean, it's just, it's mind-boggling. How did we get there. Well, we took the Bible away, we lost our minds. We don't even know how to judge private and public morals anymore. We don't know what's right and wrong because we took the truth away. We're definitely going to come back and read that again. We're going to get into back into Fox's Book of the Martyrs and we're going to jump in Persecutions. From about the middle of the 5th to the conclusion of the 7th century, proterius was made a priest by Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, who was well acquainted with his virtues before he appointed him to preach. On the death of Cyril, the sea of Alexandria was filled by Discorus. The sea of Alexandria was filled by Discorus, an inveterate enemy to the memory and family of his predecessor. Being condemned by the council of Chalcedon for having embraced the errors of Eutychus. He was deposed and Proterius chosen to fill the vacant seat who was approved of by the emperor. This occasioned a dangerous insurrection, for the city of Alexandria was divided into two factions, the one to espouse the cause of the old and the other of the new prelate. In one of the commotions, the Eutycheans determined to wreak their vengeance on Proterius, who fled to the church for sanctuary. But on Good Friday, ad 457, a large body of them rushed into the church and barbarously murdered the prelate, after which they dragged the body through the streets, insulted it, cut it to pieces, burnt it and scattered the ashes in the air. Herman Agildas, a Gothic prince, was the eldest son of Leo Vigadalus, a king of the Goths in Spain. This prince, who was originally an Arian, became a convert to the orthodox faith by means of his wife in Gonda. When the king heard that his son had changed his religious sentiments, he stripped him of the command at Seville, where he was governor, and threatened to put him to death unless he renounced the faith he had newly embraced. The prince, in order to prevent the execution of his father's menaces, began to put himself into a posture of defense, and many of the Orthodox persuasion in Spain declared for him. The king, exasperated at this act of rebellion, began to punish all the Orthodox Christians who could be seized by his troops, and thus a very severe persecution commenced. He likewise marched against his son at the head of a very powerful army. The prince took refuge in Seville, from which he fled and was at length besieged and taken at Assita. Loaded with chains, he was sent to Seville and at the feast of Easter, refusing to receive the Eucharist from an Arian bishop, the enraged king ordered his guards to cut the prince to pieces, which they punctually performed April 13, ad 586. Martin, bishop of Rome, was born at Todi in Italy. He was naturally inclined to virtue and his parents bestowed on him an admirable education. He opposed the heretics, called monothelitic elites, who were patronized by the emperor Heraclius. Martin was condemned at Constantinople, where he was exposed in the most public places to the ridicule of the people, divested of all episcopal marks of distinction and treated with the greatest scorn and severity. After lying some months in prison, martin was sent to an island at some distance and there cut to pieces, ad 655. John, bishop of Bergamo, in Lombardy, was a learned man and a good Christian. He did his utmost endeavors to clear the church from the errors of Arianism and, joining in this holy work with John, bishop of Milan, he was very successful against the heretics, on which account he was assassinated on July 11, 8683. Killian was born in Ireland and received from his parents a pious and Christian education. He obtained a Roman pontiff's license to preach to the pagans in Franconia. In Germany, at Würzburg, he converted Gozbert, the governor, whose example was followed by the greater part of the people. In two years after Persuading Gozbert that his marriage with his brother's widow was sinful, the latter had him beheaded. 86-89 was sinful, the latter had him beheaded 8689. What you start to see here at least what I start to see here is divisions in the church based not on whether you're following Jesus Christ, but whether you're following the particular denomination, their doctrine of a particular faction within the church, and you're going to see that more and more. You see it today folks. You see people that defend their denomination far more violently, stringently, are far more dedicated to seeing the promotion of their denomination over the promotion of Jesus Christ and the general principles of Christianity. And often the way you can tell that is, instead of talking about the promotion of Christians, these people will talk about the promotion of Baptists or Methodists or Roman Catholics or Greek Orthodox or whatever it is. Their comment will be oh, we need to see more Catholics, we need to see more Orthodox, we need to see more Baptists, we need to see more Church of Christ, more Lutherans, more Pentecostals, whatever it is that's showing adherence to something over Jesus Christ. The comment from those of us that follow Christ should always be we need to lead more lost sheep to Jesus Christ, not to a particular denomination folks, and if it's not, that gives you a pretty good idea about the sincerity of those people. Let me see how much. Yeah, I think we'll stop there for that for today, and we'll go to Mercy. Otis Warren, and I think we're still in chapter three of History of the Rise, progress and Termination of the American Revolution. Independence was a plant of later growth, though the soil might be congenial and the boundaries of nature pointed out the event. Yet everyone chose to view it at a distance rather than wish to witness the convulsions that such a dismemberment of the empire must necessarily occasion. There's a great line in one of Tolkien's books, one of the hobbits. If you know anything about Lord of the Rings, they make the comment that they wished that they would have been born in a different time. More or less, some of y'all probably know the lines much better than I do. And the wise old wizard said you know, a lot of people wish that they were born in different times, that they didn't have to go through the troubles. But that's not ours to choose. Ours is just to do the best we can with the time that is given to us, and if you know anything about Tolkien, he was a Christian, and so that may end up being the case for us folks. That's certainly the case for people that have lived through World War I, world War II, the Depression, korean War, vietnam War, revolutionary War, civil War, all of these hard times in the history of our country. I imagine most of them would be incredibly grateful to live in a time of peace instead of war. But our choice isn't when to live. Our choice is just how to live either for Christ or for the devil. After the circulation of this alarming letter that we wrote or we saw read the other day, we wrote or we saw read the other day. Wherever any of the governors had permitted the legislative bodies to meet, an answer was returned by the assemblies replete with ecomum on the exertion and zeal of the Massachusetts. They observed that the spirit that dictated the letter was but a transcript for their own feelings and that, though equally impressed with every sentiment of respect to the prince on the throne of Britain and feeling the strongest attachment to the house of Hanover, they could not but reject with disdain the late measures so repugnant to the dignity of the crown and the true interest of the realm and that at every hazard they were determined to resist all acts of parliament for the injurious purpose of raising a revenue in america. They also added that they had, respectively, offered their most humble supplications to the kind that they had remonstrated to both houses of Parliament and had directed their agents at the British Court to leave no effort untried to obtain relief without being compelled to what might be deemed by royalty an illegal mode of opposition. By royalty an illegal mode of opposition. You just see this again and again, folks, that our founders, they did everything that they knew to do to try and reconcile with Great Britain and it just, it didn't seem to matter to really bring the left to give them what they want, even a lot of things that we should never have granted. Separation of God and state via the 1947 Supreme Court decision comes to mind. The approval of or the sanction of homosexual marriage comes to mind. This new transgender nonsense comes to mind recently, pretending that men and women are interchangeable. At some point there's just nothing else that can be offered and you realize you've already offered too much. We're going to read this note six out of this at the end of this chapter Today. I think we'll try and finish up with that. This matter had been contemplated by several gentlemen a year or two before it took place, among others by the learned Jonathan Mayhew of Boston See the annexed letter written by him soon after the repeal of the Stamp Act. The abilities, virtue and patriotism of Dr Mayhew were so distinguished that the following fragment may be pleasing and particularly impressive, as it was the last letter he ever wrote to anyone and within three days after its date, this great and good man closed his eyes on the politics and vanities of human life. Lord's Day morning, june 8, 1766. Honorable James Otis Jr. Esquire Sir, to a good man, all the time is holy enough and none too holy to do good or to think upon it. Cultivating a good understanding and hearty friendship between these colonies and their several houses of assembly appears to me to be so necessary a part of prudence and good policy, all things considered that no favorable opportunity for that purpose ought to be omitted. I think such a one now presents. Would it not be very proper and decorous for our assembly to send circular congratulatory letters to all the rest, without exception, on the repeal and the present favorable aspect of things, letters conceived at once in terms of warmth and friendship in regard to them, of loyalty to the king, of filial affection towards the mother country and intimating a desire to cement and perpetuate union among ourselves by all practicable and laudable methods. A good foundation is already laid for this letter by the late Congress, which, in my poor opinion, was a wise measure and actually contributed not a little towards our obtaining a redress of grievances. However some may affect to disparage it, pursuing this track and never losing sight of it may be of the utmost importance to the colonies on some future occasions, perhaps the only means of perpetuating their liberties. For what may be hereafter, we cannot tell, how favorable, so ever present appearances may be. It is not safe for the colonies to sleep, since they will probably always have some wakeful enemies in Britain. And if they should be such children as to do so, I hope there are at least some persons too much of men and friends to them to rock the cradle or sing lullaby to them. This is so, so important today, folks, so extremely important. The different states, cities, towns, parishes, particularly counties, particularly between conservative Christian majority states, cities, towns and parishes, colonies, in the sense that if you replace Congress with or Parliament with Congress, and Washington DC with London. You can see a whole lot of similarities between what's going on today between those who wanted to disparage and tear down the colonies and the modern American left. It's a lot like we talk about the similarities between Britain and Germany in the 20s and 30s going into World War II, world War II and you see also down here that he says it's not safe for the colonies to sleep. I've said this on a podcast before folks. I think a lot of people really felt like this last election on the conservative side. We suddenly made it to this mythical land of permanent safety where we didn't have to worry about anything, and that's just so extremely dangerous. We always have to be concerned with God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit and the liberties in America based on the Spirit of Jesus, on the Spirit of God. There's never a time where you can sit back and relax and rest, because evil is always out on the front. You have heard of the communion of churches and I am very early tomorrow morning to set out for Rutland to assist at an ecclesiastical council, not expecting to return this week while I was thinking of this in my bed with the dawn of day. The great use and importance of a communion of colonies appeared to me in a very strong light, which determined me immediately to set down these hints in order to transmit them to you. Not knowing, but the house may be eroded or dissolved before my return or having an opportunity to speak to you. You will make such use of them as you think proper, or none at all. Another thing here, folks community of churches. We desperately need to be talking amongst churches that are truly still following the Bible and Jesus Christ, and denomination should have absolutely no factor in this. It doesn't matter whether you're Baptist or Methodist, or Lutheran or Presbyterian or Anglican or Roman Catholic or Orthodox or anything else. If that church is following Jesus Christ. We need to be communicating amongst each other, building those ties now, while we have that time. And too often, folks, there's too many Christians that are more focused on tearing each other apart. If you've got a church whose sole focus is Christ as the Son of God, who died for our sins and God raised him from the dead and he's the only path, the only path to salvation and eternal life as our Lord and Savior, we need to not be too worried about the rest of the stuff. Now, if you've got a church that's telling you you can get to heaven through Mary or Joseph or the disciples or the thief on the cross or some pope or priest or pastor or bishop or cardinal or whatever else, then you've got some problems. Or if you've got somebody telling you that, oh, this person was perfect or this person was also perfect and they didn't need Jesus Christ, then you've got some fundamental problems. But too often we focus on denominational differences that don't really matter a hill of beans, if you'll allow me to use that old country phrase to our faith in Jesus Christ. Christ has to be the focus above all else. I have had a sight of the answer to the last, very extraordinary speech, the speech of Governor Bernard, with which I was much pleased. It appears to me solid and judicious and, though spirited, not more so than the case absolutely required, unless we could be content to have an absolute and uncontrollable instead of a limited constitutional governor. That's the choice we have before us today, folks slavery and tyranny under the left, that basket of isms that we talk about so often leftism, socialism, communism, nazism, fascism, right or islam, which goes hand in glove. Those two go together really well. They like each other. They appear not to, sometimes on the surface, but all you have to do is look at the 20th century to see how well they go together Right, slavery and tyranny and just horrible suffering under them or, barring a miracle by God Almighty, a fight, want absolute and uncontrollable government. If we want limited constitutional government, then we've got to turn back to God and Jesus Christ and our founding faith and principles based on those teachings of Christ, and prepare ourselves to resist that leftism, that basket of isms in Islam, that leftism, that basket of isms in Islam. I cannot think the man will have one wise and good, much less one truly great man at home to stand by him and so open and flagrant an attack upon our charter, rights and privileges. But the less asperity in language the better, provided there is firmness in adhering to our rights and opposition to all encroachments. I am, sir, your most obedient, humble servant, jonathan Mayhew. So every year at some point we read through part of Jonathan Mayhew's sermon which is considered one of the major, if not the major spark for the revolution. We may need to go back and do that again, but pretty good letter there. God bless y'all, god bless your families, god bless your marriages, if you're married. God bless your nation, wherever you are around the world. Listen, god bless America. We'll talk to y'all again real soon. Folks Looking forward to it.