American News Commentary

(2) The Constitution of the United States. Just as in the Declaration

of Independence, the heart of the Constitution is found in its opening

statement: "We the People of the United States, in order to form a

more perfect Union . . ." Those first 3 words, "We the People,"

are the most important words in the Constitution, and reflect the equally

important words of the Declaration of Independence, that the power of

government comes from "the consent of the governed." Thus these

two founding documents of this nation express the same conviction that

as Abraham Lincoln said, this government is "of the people, by the

people and for the people."

And concerning the people for whom the Constitution was intended,

John Adams, the nation's second president, said in 1798: "We have no

government armed with power capable of contending with human

passions unbridled by morality and religion ... Our Constitution was

made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate

to the government of any other." But through recent years there has

developed a practice by members of the various branches of our

government to consider the Constitution a "living document," subject to

changes dictated by changes in current day culture, customs and morality.

But such developments were foreseen by our Founding Fathers -- first

with respect to those who advocate extreme divergent meanings to the

document's words, Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1823 that it was "made

for men of ordinary understanding and should therefore, be

construed by the ordinary rules of common sense ... their meaning

is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make

anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure."

In that same year Jefferson wrote, "On every question of construction

carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted,

recollect the spirit manifested in the debates and instead of trying

what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, conform to the

probable one in which it was passed." And a year later, in 1824,

James Madison wrote, "I entirely concur in the propriety of resorting

to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by

the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And

if that is not the guide in expounding it, there may be no security."

We have seen in our own time how ignoring this advice from our

Founding Fathers has caused so much damage to the nation's Christian

ministry by the misinterpretation by the Supreme Court of the First

Amendment to establish the concept of a "separation of church and

state." As a reminder of actual wording of the First Amendment, it

merely states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an

establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."

It is impossible to find the word or the concept of "separation" in the

First Amendment.

(3) The Great Commission of Jesus Christ. It is interesting that this

aspect of the ministry of the Christian Church has moved into the religious

news in recent days. Next week the Southern Baptist Convention -- by

far the nation's largest Protestant denomination -- will be observing its

annual meeting in Orlando, FL, and one of the major discussions will be

concerning the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force report. There

are favorable and unfavorable reactions to the Task Force report, but

the encouraging fact is that the Great Commission has been brought to

the attention of this very large denomination, with the prospect that a

plan or program to fulfill this directive of Jesus Christ will emerge from

the annual meeting.

By way of reminder, the Great Commission is the term used to express

the words of Jesus in His final hours before His ascent into heaven, and

as recorded in the Gospels of Matthew (28:19-20) and Mark (16:15).

In total, the Great Commission is as follows: "Go ye into all the world,

and preach the Gospel to every creature, and teach all nations,

baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the

Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have

commanded you." There are some Christians who have emphasized

only the preaching of the Gospel portion, ignoring the emphasis of Jesus

on baptizing and teaching -- in other words, making disciples.

What binds these three documents together? It is very simple and

very obvious: it is the fact that America was founded as, and remains,

a Christian nation. The essential principle upon which the Declaration

of Independence was based was that all men are endowed with certain

unalienable rights by God, the Creator, and that our government was

established to secure those rights.That document was followed by the

Constitution, which included in the very first Amendment, as the principal

element in the Bill of Rights, the guaranteed freedom of worship. And

finally, the Great Commission is the directive given to His followers by

Jesus Christ, the Founder of the Christian faith. It gives us our "marching

orders" as Christians, to preach, teach and make disciples in all the world.

The Christian identity of this nation is not something new. In 1775 Patrick

Henry, one of the Founding Fathers, said, "It cannot be emphasized too

clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by 'religionists.'

but by Christians -- not on religion, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

Nearly 120 years later, in 1892, in the case of Church of the Holy Trinity

vs United States, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision,

including this statement:: "This is a religious people. This is historically

true. From the discovery of this continent to this present hour, there

is a single voice making this affirmation ... we find everywhere a

clear recognition of the same truth ... that this is a Christian nation."

That Supreme Court decision has never been reversed. A few years later,

in 1898, Dr. Charles Galloway delivered a series of 5 lectures at Emory

College (now Emory University) in Georgia, founded in 1836 as one of

the many colleges established by American churches. His theme for the

series was "Christianity and the American Commonwealth" and the

printed volume of those lectures has been described as "One of the best

summaries of the impact of Christianity on America." (Gary DeMar,

2005) In those lectures, Galloway concludes: "This, then, is a Christian

nation, constructed by a Christian people, and for Christian ends,

their religion the common law of the land."

These facts stand in sharp contrast to the often repeated boast by Barack

Hussein Obama that America is no longer a Christian nation, as he

continues in his catering to those of the Islamic faith, the Muslims among

whom he was raised.

Hard times for the president -- losing in the polls and the press.

The Rasmussen daily presidential rating shows Obama retaining the

negative double digit scores in the -15 (or lower) range he has held

for the past few months . . . down sharply and steadily from the +21

rating he started with on his inauguration day, 2009. And despite the

planned intensive persona appearance tour to try to sell the American

people on the "wonders" of Obamacare, overall 58% of Americans

favor its repeal -- a sharp departure from the principle of the Declaration

of Independence, that Government would operate with the consent of

the governed.

And it isn't only the public opinion polls where Obama finds himself and

his agenda rejected, even the elite, main-line media which has always

been blindly approving whatever he said and did is now speaking out

against him. Just two examples -- there are more to be discovered --

(1) David Broder, in the Washington Post: "Nothing is going to help

Obama unless and until the engineers come up with a method for

shutting down this gusher of pollution. He clearly couldn't prevent

it, and he was slow in signaling its severity. But he owns it now and

until it is over, the man who aspired to be the next John Kennedy

or maybe Franklin Roosevelt will have to hope he doesn't end up

as Jimmy Carter."