… Land, that I love. Stand beside her and guide her, through the night with the light from above.

And happy birthday to you! May we celebrate today the very reason for this country’s existence which is freedom from tyranny and the birth of a new nation. We have forgotten that today is a national birthday party about “new life” and the blessings bestowed upon it from God to our forefathers and mothers through his “servants” who shaped the republic.

I was thinking about this earlier. We celebrate all kinds of things today for all kinds of reasons. Barbecues. Fireworks. Family and Friends. Sentimentality. Pride. Patriotism. Speeches. Unfortunately, there will also be heated disagreements in families and more civil unrest. The politics of the day will take over much of the conversation. However, the reason for everything USA today is this: the country was first born and did not create itself. We celebrate its life as a people of life. That life comes from God alone who is the life source in individuals as well as nations.

Oh, I can hear the rants of those who would pillory my archaic, narrow minded, unenlightened “racist, privileged” Christian view that God is critical to the story. How dare I say that the Almighty was involved in our history? How dare I be so exclusive…and … intolerant! It’s about power of the people. It’s about personal rights and social justice and moral relativism. It’s about ME! Sorry, but No. It’s about the divine power and righteous purposes of God for this arrogant blink in the universe which for His unfathomable reason He continues to love and sustain.

He has raised up nations and those who lead them since time began. It is God who causes them to exist for better and for worse. The testimony is in the Bible, especially in the p book of Daniel, the prophet who foresaw nations rise and fall throughout history. God’s providential hand is always in the life and death of nations: Jewish, pagan and modern Christian. When all those nations fail in the end, there will be only one: Christ’s kingdom, Christ’s life, Christ’s authority. Every knee will bow before Him either in worship or in damnation. His life won over death and it wins eternally.

Is it any surprise that the growing culture of death in this country wants to destroy its Christian, reliance on God foundations? Abortion even after birth, countless babies murdered for fetal tissue profit and lives of mothers destroyed, violence as entertainment, all racial injustice, euthanasia for the helpless, genocide of biological sex, (i.e., procreation). The death of reason. Lawlessness. Antifa. Marxism. Fists raised and knees taken before the devil. The hit list of the death squad grow every day but its main target is not groups of people. It is always against God Himself. Relentless attacks on the life and moral cornerstones of any nation/people is the tactic as old as the serpent in the Garden. The same ancient enemy and ceaseles hater of human life is at work wearing a different face. (Dare I say mask?) We who should know better have been as silent as the proverbial church mouse skittering under the pews.

Today, choose life as you celebrate the Fourth. Choose to honor God’s gift of life and be thankful for the privilege, yes, the divine privilege of living free instead of in bondage. God is the only hope, the only “living God” who can guide us “through the night, with His light from above.” Thank you Kate Smith, for the exuberant reminder.

Happy Birthday, America!