| America
in the Cross-hairs Al Qaeda is the Diseased Trigger-finger, But the Aim is God’s 
Autumn, 2001–Wasn’t this the third time I received the same premonition as I passed the Pentagon again? “My wrath is kindled against this nation. Have I not granted them high freedom and prosperity?—but see, how they turn from me to embrace iniquity! Behold, this symbol of their might. [Pentagon] They shall suffer judgement here as I withdraw my arm of mercy from their vileness and unbelief.” I told my family about this foreboding later when we passed the Pentagon on our way to perform chamber music. “Yes!” said my daughter, “Look how someone could crash a plane into it!” Still, we could scarcely envision the sick and bloody barbarity that was to fulfill my revelation. Days later, as the terrible events of 9/111 unfolded, I recalled the sobering prophecy I had received. Praying fervently to understand the tragic meaning of it all, I experienced one of the sacred entitlements to which Christians are privileged—crucial passages of scripture were emphatically “brought to my remembrance”2 with profound and poignant relevance to the atrocity that had occurred. First, as to the what of 9/11: “Behold, the judgments of God will overtake the wicked;3 and it is by the wicked that the wicked are punished.”4 Yes, Al Qaeda is the diseased trigger-finger, but the aim is God’s, for, according to divine decree, “[The nation that] sins against the greater light shall receive the greater condemnation.”5 America knows too much. She cannot “get away
with” the ungodliness of
other nations. She has been schooled and sustained from the beginning
in the righteousness of
“that Almighty Being, who rules over the
universe.”6 It has been proclaimed with learning, love, and
life’s-blood, from the days of John Winthrope to Jonathan Edwards to
Joseph Smith to James Keller’s Christophers,
and preached with power
and spirit from Billy Sunday to Billy Graham. “What more can he say
than to you he hath said?” asks a familiar hymn. Are we not without
excuse? “He that repents not, from him shall be taken even the light
which he has received; for my Spirit shall not always strive with man,
saith the Lord of Hosts.”7 But his anger, though fierce,8 is
not vicious, for he has
said: “As many as I love, I rebuke
and chasten: be
zealous therefore, and repent.”9 Second, as to why
9/11: “He hath sworn in his
wrath that whoso should
possess this land [the Americas] should serve him, the true and only
God, or they should be swept off when they are ripened in
iniquity…Behold, this is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall
possess it shall be free from bondage, and from all other nations under
heaven, if they will but serve the God of the land, who is Jesus
Christ…”10 Indeed, it was upon this very bedrock11
of faith in the actual God,
that the brilliant, brave, devout Founders of this
country laid
its foundation—and they warned us unequivocally
not to forget that
fact: 1. “No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible
Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than those of the United
States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an
independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of
Providential agency.” (President George Washington) 2. “The
general principles upon which the Fathers achieved independence were
the general principals of Christianity.” (President John Adams)
3. “Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have
removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people
that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be
violated but with His wrath?” (President Thomas Jefferson) 4. “We’ve
staked the whole future of American civilization not on the power of
government…[but] upon the capacity of each and all of us…to govern
ourselves according to the commandments of God. The future and success
of America is not in this Constitution, but in the laws of God upon
which this Constitution is founded.” (President James Madison)
5. “It
cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation
was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions,
but on the gospel of Jesus Christ! For this very reason peoples of
other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of
worship here.” (Patrick Henry) The astounding prescience of these words lives
on still, as people, the
world over, struggle to come to America, risking, at times, their very
lives! In stark contrast
elsewhere, spiritual darkness builds brutal
barriers of concrete, terror, and conspiracy to hold its own people
captive! And though many have perished—at the Berlin Wall, Phnom Penh,
Tiananmen Square, and the voting precincts of Iraq—thousands more
continue to fight their way toward freedom. What drives them?
What
spirit impels their quest? It is the divine gift of conscience, that
“true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world”12—the
sense of right and wrong. This, our highest faculty—referred to
by George Washington as “that spark of celestial fire”—thrives by exercise, as our other
powers. Thus, “he that receiveth light, and
continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth
brighter and brighter until the perfect day.”13 Truly, an
informed,
sensitive conscience towers above all other human potential—intellect,
sentiment, personality, talent. By following its guidance
prayerfully,
honestly, wisely, diligently, courageously, humbly, virtuously,
lovingly, patiently one progresses inevitably toward actual
acquaintance and kinship with him who is “the Light of the world;”14
whereupon, the growing light within one’s self is strengthened by
confluence with an even greater Light from above, the Holy Spirit, ever
unfolding truth and guiding the lives of its adherents. This “advanced
telecommunications medium”—to put transcendent truth in today’s
terms—is what makes Christianity unique among all religions. Whether
marked by an involuntary swallow of conviction or the actual occurrence
of impossible events, or some other means, the Spirit’s witness is binding, and of record, and wholly reliable—unlike our mortal sight
(that illusionists deceive by profession), or reason (that sophists
beguile by craft), or sentiment (reliable more for its caprice and
maintaining high divorce rates). True Christianity is true per se.
Like the Appalachian Trail, it is real
whether you’ve been there or
not, whether you believe it or not, whether you like it or not. And its
reality is unaffected by one’s personal bias, or the opposing
prejudices, traditions, (even threats) of others, or the antipathy of
those who care not whether it be true, but dread it for the rebuke they
guiltily infer upon their own corrupt lifestyles. This nurturing dispensation of light and truth
into the mind and
heart15 (the seat of one’s character), combined with the
ongoing
factual ingress of divine intelligence from Holy Scripture (the actual,
inspired, Judeo-Christian scriptures—not man-made or purported tomes,
which, though well-intentioned, will not empower) together produce
changes and improvements in one’s attitudes, abilities, conduct and
associations so unprecedented and meritorious that only the term
“regeneration” can describe it. Naturally, these significant
improvements in an individual’s life, when combined with those of other
like individuals, become societal improvements,
whereby, the nation
itself, ascending through ever larger communities (families,
towns,
states, regions) emerges stronger than it could otherwise be—morally,
politically, economically, militarily—all because it is spiritually stronger. This results
in a highly advanced civil and
ethical
disposition within the populace, described by Lord Moulton as
“obedience to the unenforceable,”
whereby the citizenry voluntarily
conduct their lives with honor, decency, and sacrifice beyond that
which government could compel by force. Thus, the warranty of
Christ—“If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; and
ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free”16—is
literally fulfilled, as the people gain freedom, first individually,
from the inward tyranny of evil and error, then nationally, from the
outward tyranny of hostile and corrupt nations. This is the reason that
only Christian forces (at the Battle of Tours/Poitiers, for example)
were able to repel the fanatical hordes bent on taking over the world
by bloody onslaught of terror and rapine, incited by ideologues whose
ideas were to inflame more
than inform, urging envy
above achievement,
hatred above happiness, death above discernment, blinded to the fact
that murderers are monsters not martyrs, that pillagers are predators
not prophets, that truth teaches, “Do what is right for everyone’s
life,” not “Do what I want or
everyone dies,” that forced religion
is false religion—skulking
in dismal caves of loathing, jealousy, and
rage, thinking the answer to all life’s problems is kill–kill–kill. And again, only the Allied (Christian) nations
were able to vanquish
the brutal juggernaut of Axis Powers that created such unspeakable
horrors as the Nazi death camps, the Nanjing Massacre, and Yakuza
Sex-Slavery. Faced with the danger of opposing so enormous an evil,
President Franklin Roosevelt, in 1941, wrote an open letter “as
Commander-in-Chief” addressed “to all who serve in the Armed Forces of
the United States” commending “the reading of the Bible” as a “fountain
of strength,” and that “men of many faiths and backgrounds have found
in the Sacred Book words of wisdom, counsel, and inspiration.” Later
that year, a day after the Pearl
Harbor attack, Roosevelt appealed to
the entire nation to turn to the Bible. [Now, of course, not
everyone
in a Christian nation is Christian,
and not all those who claim to be
Christian are really so. And true, the Soviet Union, which later became
an “ally” (after we aided its resistance to Nazi invaders), was atually
persecuting its Christians. (And this
abuse of Christians, to which
leftist mentality seems addicted like cheap rum, has trickled-down to
our day as “political correctness.”) Nevertheless, the Soviets
still
benefitted spiritually from
a centuries-old reservoir of moral
conscientiousness that Christianity historically engenders. Indeed, the
truth of the old saying, “If you would
civilize a man, begin with his
grandmother,” was shown during pivotal Cold War events, when
Khrushchev
decided to end the Cuban missile crisis (virtually ending his own
career), sensing he would be answerable for the loss of innumerable
lives; and Brezhnev, later, during nuclear arms reduction talks,
evinced the same abiding moral sway of earlier Christian influences,
conceding that “God will never forgive us if we fail”—thus halting the
terrible specter of World War III in its tracks. And yes, Germany
and Italy had a tradition of Christianity, but their fascist dictators
showed how brutally determined they were to crush the Christian
resistance—as the tragic deaths of Bohnhoffer, Jaegerstaetter, Edith
Stein, and others attest.] Hence, the “big picture” is clear and inescapable—that nothing has
lifted and benefitted human welfare as true Christianity has done.
Yes,
there have been flaws and faults in individuals and institutions,
especially the worst—where un-Christian deeds have been cloaked by
perpetrators under the guise
of religion (most notoriously in the Dark
Ages, where Christ’s religion was
displaced by cruel and depraved religiosity).
But,
struggling through the cleansing gauntlet of
reformation and counter-reformation to its enlightenment, expansion,
and humanitarian eras, the contributions of genuine Christian
civilization to the welfare of mankind are almost beyond reckoning—in
law, government, diplomacy, science, economics, invention, medicine,
mathematics, psychology, social sciences, literature, philosophy, art,
music, architecture, education, business, communication,
transportation, humanitarian organizations, etc. Yet, over-arching,
undergirding, endowing all
of these, is the incalculable achievement of
human freedom! Reflecting on all the above helps us understand
why Jefferson said,
“the reason that Christianity is the best friend of Government is
because Christianity is the only religion that changes the heart.”
Thus, it is an understatement to
say that America needs Christianity
more than Christianity needs America. And this is why “gripe
factions”—the Madalyn Murrays, Barry Lynns, Michael Newdows, especially
ACLU, in their presumptuous efforts to de-Christianize the very country
whose religious ethic safeguards them— should be seen, in their true
light, as “kicking jackasses”
trying to knock down the village
water-tower—being too ill-tempered to walk around it, obtuse to the
disaster they would bring upon themselves and everyone else. It appears
we
now
have more to fear from ACLU (and their ilk) than Al Qaeda, for the
latter can only fell towers we may rebuild as we hunt rabid jackals
down; but the former seek to destroy the very “tower of strength,” even
that “Mighty Fortress”17 from which our Country has received
protection
beyond our perception,18 and without which we shall become
virtually
defenseless. And, should our children survive the deadly days our evil
may evoke, they may be privileged no more to read, in the tongue of
Shakespeare and Frost, from those sacred Testaments their fathers read:
“Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty,”19 but
may be
forced to read, in the tongue of whore-hugging tyrants, from a
red-bound book of platitudes: “Political power grows out of the barrel
of a gun.” But jackass “wisdom”
always fails, being blind at heart. No,
it is tyranny that grows out of the barrel of a gun—and dies at the
barrel of some other gun. Yes, it is even as Christ said—those
who live by the sword, die by the sword. But he also enjoins, as does history
itself, that at certain critical junctures when tides of evil swell,
then “he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.”20
Thus, free men must live with the
sword—knowing when to take it up, and
when to put it down—or freedom will die by the sword of tyranny. What
an eternal difference
between two small words: with and
by, for their
underlying concepts are infinitely determining,
yet divergent as Heaven
and Hell, for through them, freedom—and nations live or perish! Finally, a sad and most alarming matter: I have
received another
warning! It has come in wake of the incredible moral imbecility of
termagant “judges” [Who appointed
them??] in Massachusetts and New York
City, who, as self-annointed legislators, are blatantly trying to
pervert the sacred institution of marriage. (This is not the only, but
one of the most dangerous of
our country’s growing venalities.) I
attempted to warn Federal authorities, based on my stark experience of
9/11, but was disregarded, rather deviously, by representatives of the
FBI, when I stated that the warning came from God. Therefore, I address
you, my fellow citizens, gravely, in the name of God: Because of
the apostasy of this people from Him whose power and blessing
established this American nation and has preserved it unto this day of
growing abominations, you shall, for your rivers of filthiness, receive
rivers of death, above and below, even in the still-grieving cities of
lucre and law. Please consider the warning of a prophet to his
people,
who were faltering in their righteousness and reverence, even as
America today: “…heavy destruction awaiteth this people, and it surely
cometh unto this people, and nothing
can save this people save it be
repentance and faith on the Lord Jesus Christ…”21 His
words
went
unheeded, and his people were decimated.
I urge you, regardless of your
religious persuasion, to ask of God, in the name of Christ, worthily,
and in sincere faith, if this warning is not true. Thus, God will
confirm it to you by the power of his Spirit; wherefore, it shall be
incumbent to join in the rescue of the land, with the brave, prayerful,
and savvy exertions of the good people who are standing true, whose
current champion, President Bush, though worthy, must nevermore tempt
the very devil with "bring-it-on" brashness, nor speak of “the
mighty
United States” without trembling under the Almighty hand that made it
so—and, excepting our deep and permanent repentance, shall make it not so! Remember, that God, who is just, has warned: “I
the Lord cannot look
upon sin with the least degree of allowance.”22 But he is
also
merciful: “For behold, the Lord hath said: I will not succor my people
in the day of their transgression; but I will hedge up their ways that
they prosper not; and their doings shall be as a stumbling block before
them. And again he saith: If my people shall sow filthiness they shall
reap the east wind, which bringeth immediate destruction. And now,
behold, the promise of the Lord is fulfilled, and ye are smitten and
afflicted. But if ye will turn to the Lord with full purpose of heart,
and put your trust in him, and serve him with all diligence of mind, if
ye do this, he will, according to his own will and pleasure, deliver
you.”23 In the throb of momentary success, let us
remember that mortal
life is a school, not a sauna, as Ben Franklin’s “Poor
Richard” reminds
us—the wise take pains and receive pleasure, while fools take pleasure
and receive pain. If we are “wise in the days of our probation,”24
we
will seek to “endure to the end,” not to “endlessly indulge,” that
fulness of joy will be our eternal heritage at the coming,
inexorable day of Judgement. Thus, it
is our
faith and our conduct that secure for us a priceless relationship with
the genius and goodness of God, and with life, and our own, and others’
lasting happiness and well-being. God bless you, and our beloved country, and all people of good will.
1. I received no specific intimation about the
9/11 disasters of New
York and Pennsylvania, perhaps because it was difficult enough to reach
my attention even close-by (D.C. area), especially through the
imbroglio of one's normal preoccupations, responsibilities, and typical
human "denseness." |