Tag Archives: Declaration of Independence

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Look With Confidence

Even human wrath will praise You; You will clothe Yourself with their remaining wrath.. (Ps 76:10)

Doctor John Witherspoon.

American Devotional Series

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“The American Devotional Series” is designed to reinforce the way our Founders revered God as the Author of our Rights and Freedoms and how our history is frequently punctuated with bold and definitive references to Christ and the Power of God’s Word.

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He was a preacher born in Scotland in 1723. Briefly imprisoned during the Highlander uprising in 1745-1746, his was a strong and articulate voice recruited by Benjamin Rush in 1766 to preside over the then struggling College of New Jersey which would later become known as Princeton University.

The good doctor would publish The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men, a sermon he preached at Princeton just two months before he signed the “Declaration of Independence.”

In his sermon, he elaborated on Psalm 76:10 by saying this:

The truth, then, asserted in this text, which I propose to illustrate and improve, is, That all the disorderly passions of men, whether exposing the innocent to private injury, or whether they are the arrows of divine judgment in public calamity, shall, in the end, be to the praise of God: Or, to apply it more particularly to the present state of the American colonies, and the plague of war, The ambition of mistaken princes, the cunning and cruelty of oppressive and corrupt ministers, and even the inhumanity of brutal soldiers, however dreadful, shall finally promote the glory of God, and in the meantime, while the storm continues, his mercy and kindness shall appear in prescribing bounds to their rage and fury.1

In other words, there is no Power or Plan that can succeed against the intended Purpose of God – even to the point where the most diabolical scheme, however unjust or forceful it might be – it will be Divinely routed in a way where the end result will ultimately translate to something good (Ps 78:34-35; Is 26:8-9).

This is what the Psalmist meant when he said that “Even human wrath will praise you.”

It’s because every nuance of the human experience is ultimately subordinate to His Will that you can engage every aspect of your life from a position of Strength. Witherspoon emphasized that point later in his sermon by saying, “If your cause is just—you may look with confidence to the Lord and intreat him to plead it as his own.”2

Whatever challenge you may be facing today, you can confront it with the confidence founded on the Power and Sovereignty of God.

“If your cause is just…”

…look with confidence to the Lord.

1. “1776: Witherspoon, Dominion of Providence over the Passions of Men (Sermon)”, “Online Library of Liberty”, https://oll.libertyfund.org/page/1776-witherspoon-dominion-of-providence-over-the-passions-of-men-sermon, accessed January 23, 2023

2. Ibid

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All Men Are Created Equal

So God created man in His own image; He created him in the image of God; He created them male and female. (Gen 1:27)

 In his Second Treatise of Government, John Locke dismantled the flawed philosophy supporting the idea that monarchs could justify their authority over their subjects by claiming to be Divinely superior to any human court or governing body.1

He said…

For Men being all the Workmanship of one Omnipotent, and infinitely wise Maker; All the Servants of one Sovereign Master, sent into the world by his order and about his business, they are his Property, whose Workmanship they are, made to last during His, not one another’s Pleasure.2

By saying that all men were the “…workmanship of one omnipotent and infinitely wise maker,” he was stripping away the manufactured rank and title that some had asserted as a way to elevate themselves over their peers. Rather, we were to perceive ourselves as equals having been created by God in His Image for His Purpose and not our own.

John Locke

John Locke (1632–1704) was one of the greatest philosophers in Europe at the end of the seventeenth century. Locke grew up and lived through one of the most extraordinary centuries of English political and intellectual history. It was a century in which conflicts between Crown and Parliament and the overlapping conflicts between Protestants, Anglicans and Catholics swirled into civil war in the 1640s.4

Locke’s Second Treatise of Government was published in 1690 and would heavily influence the political philosophies of those who would go on to craft the “Declaration of Independence.” Some would argue that the Founders, “….succeeded admirably in condensing Locke’s fundamental argument into a few hundred words.”5

Locke had a profound impact on those tasked with crafting the “Declaration of Independence.” You can see both his verbiage and his thinking represented in the opening lines penned by Thomas Jefferson when he said: 

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.3

While many throughout history would sort men according to distinguished sounding titles and family crests, the United States built its argument on the platform that says our rights are not a king’s to dispense, but they are God’s to guarantee.

The fact that you and I are created in the image of God is what was used to ensure our Declaration resonated as a legitimate cause and not just a mere complaint.  And it’s because we bear His Likeness that this isn’t just another day and you’re not just another face in the crowd. Your life is more than your situation and you are more than your mistakes.

That’s the Reality of God and the beauty of grace.

We are not just existing, we are seen…

…and you weren’t merely “sorted…”

You were created.

Now go make a difference!

1. “Divine Right of Kings”, Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/topic/divine-right-of-kings, accessed January 22, 2023

2. “The Project Gutenberg eBook of Second Treatise of Government, by John Locke”, Gutenberg.org, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/7370/7370-h/7370-h.htm, accessed January 22, 2023

3. (n.d.). Declaration of Independence: A Transcription. National Archives. Retrieved January 14, 2023, from https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript

4. “John Locke”, “Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy”, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke/#SecoTreaGove, accessed January 22, 2023

5. “The American Constitution, Its Origins and Development”, Alfred Hinsey Kelly, Winfred Audif Harbison, W. W. Norton & Company, New York, NY, 1963, p90