"Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: for he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed."
Having made his initial presentation on the certainty and the accompanying assurance of the Christian gospel, offering five points of practical application, the apostle James then launches into a warning against hypocrisy and self delusion. He makes a direct comparison between hearing and obedience on one hand, and hearing and disobedience on the other. In this manner, he is contending that the word is a mirror to the soul. It shows us exactly what and who we are in relation to the declared Word of God. The one who ignores (forgets) what he is shown in the reflection walks away without concern about what has been revealed about him, and the implication is that he does so to his own peril. He has successfully deluded himself. Conversely, the one who hears and diligently considers what has been revealed to him by the reflection, considers it, pursues obedience (is a doer), and is the one who will be rewarded. His obedience displays his acceptance of the engrafted word.
I want to suggest to you that this applies not only to us as individuals, but also to us as a culture and a nation. We have become a forgetful people. We have forgotten our roots and have become indifferent as to why we have arrived at this juncture. Those of us who have taken a look behind us, in history, have been astounded at what was accomplished in the past, particularly in the infancy of our nation. The newer, prevailing culture wants to ignore much of the importance of the influence of the Protestant churches in those very important, formative years. The fact of the matter is that the English were quite justified in insisting that many of the pastors of the time, that “black robed regiment”, were among the foremost “instigators” of what the Britons considered to be a rebellion.
To demonstrate this, I have selected some excerpts from a few of the clergymen of the colonial period. These faithful men were not at all shy about speaking to the issues and conflicts of their day, and to urge those in their audiences to faithful action.
This first section is from Samuel Davies, the pastor under whom Patrick Henry studied as a young man. Davies went on to become the president of Princeton before his untimely death at 37 years of age. These quotes come from a sermon given at the outbreak of the French and Indian War.
God has distinguished us with a religion from heaven; and hitherto we have enjoyed the quiet and unrestrained exercise of it; he has condescended to be a God to our nation, and to honour our cities with his gracious presence, and the institutions of his worship, the means to make us wise, good, and happy….
But now the scene is changed; now we begin to experience in our turn the fate of the nations of the earth. Our territories are invaded by the power and perfidy of France; our frontiers ravaged by merciless savages, and our fellow-subjects there murdered with all the horrid arts of Indian and Popish torture…
These calamities have not come upon us without warning. We were long ago apprised of the ambitious schemes of our enemies, and their motions to carry them into execution; and had we taken timely measures, they might have been crushed before they could have arrived at such a formidable height. But how have we generally behaved in such a critical time? Alas! our country has been sunk in a deep sleep; a stupid security has unmanned the inhabitants: they could not realize a danger at the distance of two or three hundred miles; they would not be persuaded that even French Papists could seriously design us an injury; and hence little or nothing has been done for the defense of our country, in time, except by the compulsion of authority. And now, when the cloud thickens over our heads, and alarms every thoughtful mind with its near approach, multitudes, I am afraid, are still dissolved in careless security, or enervated with an effeminate, cowardly spirit.
We have also suffered our poor fellow-subjects, in the frontier counties, to fall prey to blood-thirsty savages, without affording them proper assistance, which, as members of the same body politic, they had a right to expect…they are left to shift for themselves.
(Notice Davies’ concern that they had failed to love their neighbors by responding to their calamities in a more earnest and timely manner, and his expressed concern about the apathy of the populace. Nothing new here, is there? He then offers his assessment of the problem.)
We and our countrymen are sinners, aggravated sinners: God proclaims that we are such by his judgments now upon us, by withering fields and scanty harvests, by the sound of the trumpet and the alarm of war.
Pass over the land, take a survey of the inhabitants, inspect into their conduct, and what do you see? What do you hear? You see the gigantic forms of vice braving the skies, and bidding defiance to heaven and earth, while religion and virtue are obliged to retire, to avoid public contempt and insult: you see herds of drunkards swilling down their cups, and drowning all the man within them: you hear the swearer venting his fury against God and man, trifling with that name which prostrate angels adore, and imprecating that damnation, under which the hardiest devil in hell trembles and groans: you see Avarice hoarding up her useless treasures, dishonest Craft planning her schemes of unlawful gain, and Oppression unmercifully grinding the face of the poor, you see Prodigality squandering her stores, Luxury spreading her table, and unmanning her guests: Vanity laughing aloud and dissolving in empty, unthinking mirth, regardless of God and our country, or time and eternity; Sensuality wallowing in brutal pleasures, and aspiring, with inverted ambition, to sink as low as her four-footed brethren to the stall: you see cards more in use than the Bible, the backgammon table (and maybe X-box or netflix?) more frequented than the table of the Lord, plays and romances more read than the history of the blessed Jesus…
Similarly, Samuel Langdon was a pastor who eventually rose to the presidency at Harvard. The following citations come from a sermon he preached on May 31, 1775, a very short time after the beginning of the armed conflict which had been initiated on April 19 at Concord and Lexington. He first speaks of the unlawful acts and oppression of the British and the justifiable response of the colonists to aggression.
We have lived to see the time when British liberty is just ready to expire; when that constitution of government which has so long been the glory and strength of the English nation, is deeply undermined and ready to tumble into ruins--when America is threatened with cruel oppression, and the arm of power is stretched out against New England, and especially against this colony, to compel us to submit to the arbitrary acts of legislators who are not our representatives, and who will not themselves bear the least part of the burdens which, without mercy, they are laying upon us.
That we might not have it in our power to refuse the most absolute submission to their unlimited claims of authority, they have not only endeavored to terrify us with fleets and armies sent to our capital, and distressed and put an end to our trade, particularly that important branch of it, the fishery, but at length attempted, by a sudden march of a body of troops in the night, to seize and destroy one of our magazines, formed by the people merely for their own security; if, as after such formidable military preparation on the other side, matters should not be pushed to an extremity. By this, as might well be expected, a skirmish was brought on; and it is most evident, from a variety of concurring circumstances, as well as numerous depositions, both of the prisoners taken by us at that time, and our men then on the spot only as spectators, that the fire began first on the side of the king's troops. At least five or six of our inhabitants were murderously killed by the regulars at Lexington, before any man attempted to return the fire, and when they were actually complying with the command to disperse; and two more of our brethren were likewise killed at Concord Bridge by a fire from the king's soldiers, before the engagement began on our side. But whatever credit falsehoods transmitted to Great Britain from the other side may gain, the matter may be rested entirely on this--that he that arms himself to commit a robbery, and demands the traveler's purse, by the terror of instant death, is the first aggressor, though the other should take the advantage of discharging his pistol first and killing the robber.
The alarm was sudden; but in a very short time spread far and wide; the nearest neighbors in haste ran together to assist their brethren, and save their country. Not more than three or four hundred met in season, and bravely attacked and repulsed the enemies of liberty, who retreated with great precipitation.
That ever-memorable day, the nineteenth of April, is the date of an unhappy war openly begun, by the ministers of the king of Great Britain, against his good subjects in this colony, and implicitly against all the colonies. But for what? Because they have made a noble stand for their natural and constitutional rights, in opposition to the machinations of wicked men, who are betraying their royal master, establishing Popery in the British dominions, and aiming to enslave and ruin the whole nation, that they may enrich themselves and their vile dependents with the public treasures, and the spoils of America.
(Langdon goes on to insist that they had not been rash, indeed they had pursued a peaceable resolve to the problems. The responses had been more vigorous oppressions.)
We have used our utmost endeavors, by repeated humble petitions and remonstrances--by a series of unanswerable reasonings published from the press, in which the dispute has been fairly stated, and the justice of our opposition clearly demonstrated--and by the mediation of some of the noblest and most faithful friends of the British constitution, who have powerfully pleaded our cause in Parliament--to prevent such measures as may soon reduce the body politic to a miserable, dismembered, dying trunk, though lately the terror of all Europe. But our king, as if impelled by some strange fatality, is resolved to reason with us only by the roar of his cannon, and the pointed arguments of muskets and bayonets. Because we refuse submission to the despotic power of a ministerial Parliament, our own sovereign, to whom we have been always ready to swear true allegiance--whose authority we never meant to cast off--who might have continued happy in cheerful obedience, as faithful subjects as any in his dominions--has given us up to the rage of his ministers, to be seized at sea by the rapacious commanders of every little sloop of war and piratical cutter, and to be plundered and massacred by land by mercenary troops, who know no distinction betwixt an enemy and a brother, between right and wrong; but only, like brutal pursuers, to hunt and seize the prey pointed out by their masters.
(Where did Langdon believe the fundamental problem lay? Listen.)
But, alas! Have not the sins of America, and of New England in particular, had a hand in bringing down upon us the righteous judgments of Heaven? Wherefore is all this evil come upon us? Is it not because we have forsaken the Lord? Can we say we are innocent of crimes against God? No, surely; it becomes us to humble ourselves under His mighty hand, that He may exalt us in due time. However unjustly and cruelly we have been treated by man, we certainly deserve, at the hand of God, all the calamities in which we are now involved… Have we not departed from their virtues? Though I hope and am confident that as much true religion, agreeable to the purity and simplicity of the gospel, remains among us as among any people in the world, yet in the midst of the present great apostasy of the nations professing Christianity, have not we likewise been guilty of departing from the living God? Have we not made light of the gospel of salvation, and too much affected the cold, formal, fashionable religion of countries grown old in vice and overspread with infidelity? Do not our follies and iniquities testify against us? Have we not, especially in our seaports, gone much too far into the pride and luxuries of life? Is it not a fact open to common observation that profaneness, intemperance, unchastity, the love of pleasure, fraud, avarice, and other vices, are increasing among us from year to year? And have not even these young governments been in some measure infected with the corruptions of European courts? Has there been no flattery, no bribery, no artifices practiced, to get into places of honor and profit, or carry a vote to serve a particular interest, without regard to right or wrong? Have our statesmen always acted with integrity and every judge with impartiality, in the fear of God?
(Indeed, one may ask, have they or not?)
Also consider this from Moses Mather a pastor who was a graduate from Yale and became, as one editor puts it, “an especially obnoxious personality to Tories in his vicinity; he was even twice imprisoned for his views…” What did his views include? Consider this citation from 1775.
Slavery consists in being wholly under the power and controul of another, as to our actions and properties: And he that hath authority to restrain and controul my conduct in any instance, without my consent, hath in all. And he that hath right to take one penny of my property, without my consent, hath right to take all. For, deprive us of this barrier of our liberties and properties, our own consent: and there remains no security against tyranny and absolute despotism on one hand, and total abject, miserable slavery on the other. For power is entire and indivisible: and property is single and pointed as an atom. All is our’s, and nothing can be taken from us, but by our consent: or nothing is our’s, and all may be taken, without our consent. The right of dominion over the persons and properties of others, is not natural, but derived: and there are but two sources from whence it can be derived: from the almighty, who is the absolute proprietor of all, and from our own free consent. Why then wrangle we so long about a question so short and easy of decision? Why this mighty din of war, and garments roll’d in blood: the seas covered with fleets, the land with armies, and the nation rushing on swift destruction? Let the parliament shew their warrant, the diploma and patent of their power to rule over America, derived from either of the above fountains, and we will not contend: but if they cannot, wherefore do they contend with us? For even a culprit has right to challenge of the executioner, the warrant of his power, or refuse submission.
So, as is evident from this small sampling, the voices of the Protestant churches were hardly silent during this period. Neither could they be characterized as a sort of “follow – on action”. These men were deeply concerned and committed in addressing the issues of the day from the perspective of the Gospel of Christ. They spoke directly to the issues of sin, repentance, morality, law, justice, governance, and more. They directly charged their congregants and neighbors to action in relation to these issues in their particular circumstance, insisting that this was merely an appropriate response to the commands of Christ; to love God and keep His commandments, and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
We are involved in a war. All wars and conflicts are inherently religious. By this I mean that when nations and peoples have issues which cannot seemingly be resolved by peaceable means, it is because of irreconcilable differences in fundamental world view concepts. Every man has religious commitments to what he believes to be fundamental, absolute truth, and he holds these as such whether or not he ascribes this to Deity or other sources. Faith commitments are inescapable; it is only a matter of where that faith is placed. Davies’ and Langdon’s recognition of this nature of conflict may not correspond identically to our circumstance today, but it is nonetheless true in principal.
We are in what has been defined as a “culture war”. This is only one way of saying that the cannon have not been deployed yet. Many of us are old enough to have been involved with this war for nearly forty years. And the question needs to be asked, brethren, “Are we winning?” Is Christ the King honored more today in our land than forty years ago? Has the holocaust of abortion ceased? Has the pompous, presumptuous idolatry of the secularist state been abated? Are the enemies of Christ on the run, and the gates of the cities ruled by godly, confessing Christians? Are we secure in our persons and property? If so, then this presentation is indeed superfluous. If not, then perhaps it is high time to give heed to the exhortation of the apostle James to become one of those who “looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed”, and to heed Samuel Davies’ advice to “ all join in unanimous repentance and a thorough reformation. Not only your eternal salvation requires it, but also the preservation of your country, that is now bleeding with the wounds you have given it by your sins.”
“Dissolve and melt in penitential sorrow at his feet; and he will tell you, “Arise, be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven you.”
Amen.
