Repent, America, Repent; Pray, America, Pray

REPENTANCE AND PRAYER KEY TO NATIONAL AND PERSONAL SURVIVAL

by Bob Russell, ©2020

(May 2, 2020) — Most of the articles I write center on politics or the ramifications of political policies on We the People but this one is going to be different, based solely on faith in Almighty God and what is needed to turn things around in America.  I write mostly based on Divine inspiration but this one is entirely divinely inspired.  It came to me last night as I was between sleep episodes.  I had not slept at all Wednesday night and began dozing about 7:00 last night.  I turned the TV off at 8:30 and slept until 11 pm when I woke up and was awake until a little after 3:00 a.m.  This came to me as I tried to go back to sleep and I asked God to let me rest and to bring this back to me today.

There are some key parts of Scripture that tell us what is necessary to solve our nation’s problems, among them 2 Chronicles 7:14: “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear their prayers from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”  This is written in the Old Testament and originally for the Jews (Hebrews) but now applies to Christians, God’s people under the New Covenant established by Jesus Christ on the Cross.  Another is Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”  Probably the most important verse of all is John 14: 6, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”  In this last verse Jesus tells us that false religions won’t get us to Heaven; we get there only through accepting Him as Lord and Savior.

Many refuse to accept Jesus, a decision that will hurt them personally but not really hurt the nation as a whole.  What does hurt the nation is the wholesale worship of false gods such as wealth, power, allah, or secular humanism (where each person is his own god).  Abortion is a policy that hurts the nation because it allows the murder of unborn children of God; I say this not as a statement on politics but of morality.   Jeremiah 1:5 says, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you…”  That tells me a fetus is not merely “a blob of tissue” but a child formed by Almighty God, the Creator of the universe and all that is in it.  I understand that there are cases where an abortion is necessary to save a life, such as in a case where birth would likely cause the death of the mother without being able to save the baby, but those cases are very rare.  Nearly all abortions are because a pregnancy is either an embarrassment, an inconvenience, or both.

One huge problem facing America today is that society as a whole, including many who claim to be Christians, have turned their backs on God, choosing instead to be their own god.  There are many times in the Bible when the Hebrews turned away from God and were defeated in battle and taken into captivity as slaves, but when they turned back to God He forgave them and restored them.  I saw this after the moslem terrorist attack on 9-11-2001; the churches filled up as people saw the attack as what it was, God no longer protecting America because as a nation we turned our backs on Him, deciding His protection wasn’t needed by us.  The repentance didn’t last very long and it was back to ‘God isn’t welcome in the public forum’ and ‘Those who speak of Jesus need to be shunned and silenced.’  Ronald Reagan once said, “If we ever forget we are one nation under God we will be one nation gone under.”  I see that happening right now, especially with the Chicken Little reaction to a minor epidemic of a strong strain of flu, the coronavirus.

The media and other liberal, God-hating, America-hating people are blowing this way out of proportion and politicians are using the mass hysteria to trash the Constitution and destroy liberty.  Until and unless the nation returns to God things will get worse until America becomes just another Third-World dictatorship under a global government headed by satan, soros, and tyrannical liberal politicians who don’t care about We the People or morality, only personal wealth and power.  The answer, as the title of this article states and the Bible clearly states, is to repent and pray, asking God to forgive us and have mercy on us.  I pray every day for these things and have already repented of my past very sinful life.  I accepted Jesus about 20 years ago and have steadily made the necessary changes in my life to show Him I am serious about following His teachings.  I also pray daily that all people who profess to be Christians will do the same so we can stave off the destruction that is coming under current circumstances.

Again, I write this not as a political position but as a moral one.  This nation was founded on the principle that We the People could worship God or deny Him as we choose, but liberals, and their people appointed as judges, have decided that God cannot be worshiped openly and that any reference to Him, especially references to Jesus Christ, cannot be made publicly but must remain inside a church building or inside our homes.  How long will it be before the expression of Christian faith, even in our own homes, will be against the law?  When I was in school many years ago, we had a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance every morning to start our day.  Anyone not wishing to participate could go into the hall until it was over then return to the classroom, but along the way communist, God-hating, liberty-hating people went to court and judges with the same evil hearts banned any expression of faith or patriotism.

Look at the crime rates now compared to the 1950s when I was a child.  Students were allowed to take .22 rifles to school and many schools had firearm safety and marksmanship classes as a daily routine yet we NEVER had a mass murder occur or even an accidental discharge of a firearm.  Now mass murder in “gun-free zones” at schools are regular occurrences  The problem isn’t too lax gun laws but too lax moral values.  Teen pregnancies are also off the charts as compared to my high school days in the 1960s.  Back then a girl who was pregnant “went to live with grandma and grandpa” for a while, but now they get an abortion and are treated as heroes by leftists because they chose to have the abortion.  God WILL NOT honor such behavior and the nation, and We the People are seeing the results.   The only way to turn the nation around is for every Christian to turn himself around; no one else can do it for us.  Jesus will be with each of us but each person has to take the first step, accept His offer of salvation that is freely given.  Jesus died a horrible death so we wouldn’t have to, rose from the dead, and is seated at the right hand of the Father so we can spend eternity with them.  I hope many will join me in this quest to see God put in His rightful place in our society and the nation saved from destruction.

I submit this in the name of The Most Holy Trinity, in faith, with the responsibility given to me by Almighty God to honor His work and not let it die from neglect.