However sound your reasoning may be when it comes to conversations pertaining to politics and culture, inevitably it goes back to a comment that John Adams made when he said, “Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

He was right.

The Rule of Law and Moral Absolutes have no substance if your philosophical paradigm is based on the notion that you are your own bottom line. In that light, however effective we may labor to be, as far as being knowledgeable and articulate when it comes to championing the Conservative Christian mindset in the context of current events, our primary duty and our most effective strategy is to pray according to 2 Chronicles 7:14.

I see on various websites rhetorical questions coming from Liberals asking how anyone could support President Trump or why someone would question the validity of the Socialist approach to government?

I’ve seen on social media websites a myriad of threads commenting on Homosexuality and other behaviors that are specifically labeled by God as utterly toxic, saying that these lifestyles are justified by a person’s right to be happy and regardless of how you feel, if their behavior is not directly affecting you, than what business is it of yours?

These topics are not merely “moral” or “political” in a general sense. If your perspective on a particular issue runs contrary to what God has expressly documented in His Word, than you’re contesting God Himself and not just the School Board or the Supreme Court. In other words, many of the personalities you encounter who proudly fly the flag of liberal convictions are philosophically invested in a platform that maintains mankind as his own absolute which makes this a spiritual battle and not a mere debate.

That doesn’t mean every Republican is always right and every Democrat is always wrong. Nor does it mean that Trump is a saint and Biden is a reprobate. What it does mean is that you have to kick the tires and determine whether or not God has a particular take on the issue at hand and support those whose platform is consistent with Biblical Absolutes and be ready to explain, not just the theological merits of the direction you’re advocating, but the practical benefits as well (1 Pet 3:15).

And you don’t want to be fixated on just “winning” the argument as much as you want to be promoting what’s True.

The biggest problem with our country right now is not how we’re “divided” or “domestic terrorism.” Our biggest obstacle is our failure to take sin seriously.

But here’s the kicker…

You can’t expect to significantly influence those who approach themselves and the world around them who maintain an indifferent attitude towards the empty tomb (2 Cor 4:4). If the issue bleeds into a spiritual sphere (which it inevitably does [Eph 6:12]), than while you do have the responsibility of being aware and accurate (1 Chron 12:32), in order to be effective, you’re going to need some Holy Ghost Rocket Sauce if you’re going to make a difference and not just an appearance (Prov 25:11; Is 55:10-11; Matt 10:20).

And while the Bible may or may not resonate as an objective Authority in the mind of your audience, you can point to our nation’s heritage as it’s documented in our national archives and imprinted in our capitol’s architecture.

Here is a portion of “American Concrete…“

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When it comes to the topic of our nation’s Christian heritage, you have two main schools of thought:

• The liberal mindset that insists our forefathers viewed religion as something to be negotiated as an administrative duty
• The Conservative Christian platform that maintains an aggressive acknowledgement and pursuit of God’s Assistance characterized the collective perspective of the founding fathers

Much of the controversy stems from a ruling given by the Supreme Court in 1947 and the way they interpreted a phrase used by Thomas Jefferson in a letter he wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association in Connecticut in 1802. They declared that Jefferson’s usage of the term “the separation of church and state” constituted “the authoritative declaration of the scope and effect” of the First Amendment.¹ Since then, that ruling has become the standard by which all public expressions of religious convictions have been measured, leading to an ever increasing limitation being put on the acknowledgement of God in governmental agencies as well as an ever lengthening shadow of doubt being cast on our nation’s religious heritage.

The debate is, at times, passionate and you’ve got buffoons on both sides of the aisle. The venom and the inaccuracies can culminate in a spectacle that can make it difficult to know which argument is correct.  But there is a bottom line that transcends the way in which a solitary statement can be potentially dissected to the point where its meaning becomes illusive. That bottom line is to consider, not only the comment that was made, but also:

• the context of that comment
• the character of the person speaking
• the cultural backdrop that made what that person said both relevant and influential

In other words, rather than just scrutinizing what was said, look at also why it was said, to whom was the person speaking and who was it that made the comment. At that point, you’ve got a full color, three dimensional rendering of what was stated as opposed to an intentionally cropped, black and white snapshot.

Using that kind of approach, let’s take a look at Thomas Jefferson and his exchange with the Danbury Baptists.

Jefferson’s Resume

Jefferson’s mental capacity and creativity went beyond mere academics. At the front door of his home, there’s a seven day clock that he designed. It’s counterweights hang on either side of the front entrance and extend through the floor. The height at which the counterweights hang indicate the days of the week that are written on the wall and beneath the floor. Monticello as a whole – the layout of the grounds and the structural design – all served as a testament to the creative intelligence and the intellectual ingenuity of their architect.

In 1962, President John F. Kennedy was speaking at a dinner in the White House honoring all of the living recipients of the Nobel Prize. He said, “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has every been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”²

Thomas Jefferson was extraordinary. Prior to earning his license as a lawyer, he had earned his college degree from the College of William and Mary, having studied Mathematics, Philosophy, Metaphysics as well as French and Greek. It was there that he would also be introduced to the writings of John Locke, Isaac Newton and Francis Bacon – great thinkers that would shape his approach to politics and America’s quest for liberty.

After writing the Declaration of Independence, he returned to Virginia where he served in the Virginia State Legislature, eventually ascending to the position of Governor. His role in crafting the new state government was significant. For nearly three years he assisted in the construction of the state constitution. His most notable contribution was the “Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom” – an accomplishment he had immortalized on his tombstone.

Jefferson was also very familiar with the Bible and the teachings of Christ. During his presidential years, he wrote a 46 page work entitled “The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth Extracted from the Account of His Life and Doctrines as Given by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.”³ Moreover, he understood the necessary role the Christian doctrine played in the formulation of a government based on the Absolutes of Scripture as opposed to the machinations of men, be they manifested in the context of royalty or enlightened reason. While he was convinced that the established clergy of the day were corrupt and the imposition of any one creed by a legislature was fundamentally flawed, it was the transcendent dynamic of the Christian doctrine upon which he founded his philosophical approach to freedom and sound government.

Jefferson’s Starting Point

It’s here where the liberal and conservative perspectives diverge. The liberal platform maintains that Jefferson’s usage of the phrase “separation of church and state” in his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association was intended to purge any mention of God in an official context, be it the Pledge of Allegiance, the display of any Christian symbols during the Holidays , prayer in schools and the list goes on and on. His previously stated comments pertaining to the Christian component of our nation’s government , the culture of the time and the audience he was addressing are all either diluted or dismissed in order to craft a liberal platform that presents America as a purely secular enterprise. Furthermore, there’s a philosophical starting point that Jefferson uses in the two documents he requested be immortalized on his tombstone that gets glossed over as though it has no real bearing on the issue. But if this is the cornerstone of his thought processes pertaining to religious freedom and liberty in general, this is a crucial piece of evidence that needs to be admitted as part of the conversation. Take a look…

In both documents, he bases one’s right to liberty on the fact that God created man to be free.

The Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States…(emphasis added)

The opening statement of Virginia’s Statute for Religious Freedom:

Whereas, Almighty God hath created the mind free;Jefferson’s sense of reason, in terms of a man’s ability to worship and live as a free entity, was founded on the manner in which God had designed him. In other words, it was the doctrine of the church that gave shape and substance
to the state.

Jefferson’s sense of reason, in terms of a man’s ability to worship and live as a free entity, was founded on the manner in which God had designed him. In other words, it was the doctrine of the church that gave shape and substance to the state. Remove the philosophical foundation of Scripture from Jefferson’s approach to liberty and you reduce the essence of our nation to a complaint rather than an Absolute. Furthermore, by insisting that there be no acknowledgement of the biblical paradigm that supports the ideological structure of our government, we invite the decay and corruption that inevitably accompanies the fallibility of a purely human enterprise.

Jefferson’s faith was unorthodox and his determination to avoid any appearance of officially sanctioning a particular denomination was nothing short of aggressive, but to twist his usage of the phrase “separation of church and state” into a quasi-legislative impetus to remove prayer from schools and strike the “one nation under God” phrase from the pledge of Allegiance, is to ignore the obvious cornerstone of Jefferson’s thought process. In addition, should the liberal perspective be embraced, you make Jefferson himself the “chief of sinners” in that he violates his own supposed conviction by invoking a overtly Christian dynamic in the very documents that define his perspective on the freedoms we enjoy.

To read, “American Concrete” in its entirety, click here…