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America Reads the Bible!

Just as Ezra read the Word aloud to the people of Israel (Nehemiah 8:1–3), awakening revival and repentance, inspiring them to rebuild the temple, and working with Nehemiah to mobilize the people to rebuild Jerusalem’s walls, America Reads the Bible is a sacred opportunity to call our nation back to its spiritual foundations. Through a public, continuous reading of the entire Bible in our nation’s capital by our national leaders from all spheres of influence, we believe God can spark revival in individual hearts and inspire Americans to carry the Word forward in their lives and communities into the next 250 years of our national story.

April 18-25, 2026 in Washington, D.C.

Join a historic, week-long, continuous Bible-reading — reigniting America’s spiritual foundation as we celebrate 250 years of freedom!

Discipleship Resources from WallBuilders

  1. Worth Riding a Hundred Miles to Hear – Psalm 35
  2. The Ten Commandments: The Basis for a Free and Civilized Society – Deuteronomy 5
  3. The Revelatory Source for the Constitutional Separation of Powers – Jeremiah 17:9
  4. Calling the Nation to Prayer and Fasting – Ezra 8
  5. The Heart of a Grateful Nation – II Chronicles 5-7
  6. His Desire to Answer Prayer – Matthew 6
  7. Meditating on God’s Word – Psalm 4:4
  8. What Good Can I Do This Day? – Acts 10:38
  9. The Duty of Nations – Psalm 9:17
  10. Righteousness Exalts a Nation – Proverbs 14:34
  11. Stepping Stones – I Chronicles 17:11-12
  12. The Rock Upon Which Our Republic Rests – II Kings 23

Devotional articles taken from from The Founders’ Bible available from WallBuilders.

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The Ten Commandments: The Basis for a Free and Civilized Society

Thoughts on Deuteronomy 5

It is difficult to argue that any single work has had a greater or more far-reaching impact through four centuries of American life, law, and culture than the Ten Commandments. As such, the fact that their public display would become a matter of current debate or prohibition is almost unthinkable. And yet it is.

The Ten Commandments are the embodiment of the Moral Law (one of the four types of law in the Bible) and formed the foundation for general morals in America as encompassed in the Common Law. Their repetition here in Deuteronomy 5 provides an opportunity to demonstrate that they were also the impetus for specific American statutory laws.

The original delivery of the commandments in Exodus was to the children of Israel immediately after God had delivered them from Egypt and established them as an independent nation. Now they are being repeated to the younger generation, some forty years later, as they are preparing to finally enter the Promised Land. After suffering the delay and the pain of watching their parents perish in the wilderness because of their continual disobedience and refusal to enter (Numbers 14:29), Moses is renewing the covenant with them. The Ten Commandments are not mere dictates of obligation; they are lifegiving promises that if adhered to would bring blessing and prosperity. God promised that it would go well with them, and they would prolong their days in the land that they were about to possess.

Such promise was not lost upon our Founding Fathers who openly endorsed the application of the Ten Commandments to civil law in America. statesman John Quincy Adams declared:

The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application—laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws.1

Founder and educator Noah Webster agreed:

Where will you find any code of laws among civilized men in which the commands and prohibitions are not founded on Christian principles? I need not specify the prohibition of murder, robbery, theft, trespass.2

These laws are essential to the existence of men in society, and yet some critics today object to displaying the Commandments on such spurious grounds that there are too many versions—that the Lutherans have a version, as do the Jewish, Catholic, and Orthodox faiths; and that the Protestants have several different versions.3 They thus argue that with so many different versions, public displays of any of them will always invoke a “deep theological dispute” and therefore should be avoided.4 But this claim is ridiculous.

What distinguishes the various “versions” are primarily the different ways in which they are numbered. In the original Hebrew text, the Ten Commandments appear in paragraph form, with no numbers or verses; but as they were translated into subsequent texts, various faiths and branches of Christianity chose to number them differently. For example, the first command in the Jewish version is usually the prologue in most Protestant versions; but both contain the same content. The different numberings are merely superficial manmade contrivances for ease of identification, but all versions cover the same subject matter.

Yet no matter how the commandments are numbered, each finds direct application in American laws. A few examples (chosen from dozens of similar ones) are presented below.

1. Have No Other Gods.

This command was directly incorporated into the first written code of laws enacted in America: those of the Virginia Colony in 1610.5 The subsequent Massachusetts legal code of 1641 and that of Connecticut in 1642 similarly declared:

If any man after legal conviction shall have or worship any other god but the Lord God, he shall be put to death. Deut. 13.6, 10, Deut. 17.2, 6, Ex. 22.20.6

2. Have No Idols.

Typical of the civil laws on this command was a 1680 New Hampshire law declaring:

Idolatry. It is enacted by ye Assembly and ye authority thereof, yet if any person having had the knowledge of the true God openly and manifestly have or worship any other god but the Lord God, he shall be put to death. Ex. 22.20, Deut. 13.6 and 10.7

Note: reading such early statutes and the ones that follow can give the impression that the death penalty was freely applied to almost any crime in America, but such was definitely not the case. This fact becomes apparent when comparing American laws with European laws from the same period. As noted by early American historian Daniel Dorchester:

When the Mayflower left England [in 1620], thirty-one offenses were punishable with death in the mother country. By the middle of that century, the black list had enlarged to 223, of which 176 were without the benefit of the clergy [there were no exceptions]. How far in advance the New England colonies were is evident from the fact that not a single colony code recognized more than fifteen capital crimes.8

That might still strike us as severe, but when understood in context, realize that having a copy of the Scriptures for themselves, in their own language, to study and learn what God was like as revealed in His Word was a relatively new development. Prior to this it was rare and sometimes even illegal for an individual to possess a Bible. The populace could then be kept ignorant and easily controlled by those in power who regularly committed horrible atrocities in God’s Name. Given that, it is quite remarkable just how quickly these early forefathers began to learn for themselves that God was not like those who had misrepresented Him for their own aims. (For a more complete discussion of this subject, please see the commentary for Psalm 119:11 in The Founders’ Bible.)

3. Honor God’s Name.

Civil laws based on this commandment were divided into two categories: (1) laws prohibiting swearing and profanity, and (2) laws prohibiting blasphemy. Noah Webster confirmed that both were derived from this commandment:

When in obedience to the Third Commandment of the Decalogue you would avoid profane swearing, you are to remember that this alone is not a full compliance with the prohibition which comprehends all irreverent words or actions and whatever tends to cast contempt on the Supreme Being or on His Word and ordinances [i.e., blasphemy].9

Numerous statutory laws were enacted as a result of the Third Command.10

4. Honor the Sabbath Day.

From the beginning, every American colony enacted civil laws to honor the Sabbath.11 That legal recognition continued over subsequent centuries. For example, during the American Revolution, Commander-in-Chief George Washington issued numerous military orders directing that his troops observe the Sabbath:

The Commander in Chief directs that Divine service be performed every Sunday at 11 o’clock. . . . It is expected that officers of all ranks will by their attendance set an example to their men.12

Following the Revolution, the states continued to honor the Sabbath. For example, Vermont enacted a ten-part Sabbath law in 1787;13 Massachusetts enacted an eleven-part law in 1791;14 Virginia enacted an extensive eight-part law (written by Thomas Jefferson) in 1792;15 New Jersey enacted a twenty-one-part law in 1798;16 New Hampshire enacted a fourteen-part law in 1799;17 Maine enacted a thirteen-part law in 1821;18 and other states did the same.19

When the U.S. Constitution was written in 1787, it, too, honored the traditional Christian Sabbath. Article I, Section 7, ¶ 2, stipulates that the president has ten days to sign a law, “Sundays excepted.” This “Sundays Excepted” clause had previously appeared in the state constitutions, and so the historical understanding of this clause at both the state and federal levels was summarized by numerous courts, including the 1912 Supreme Court of Missouri:

It is provided that if the Governor does not return a bill within 10 days (Sundays excepted). . . . Can any impartial mind deny that it contains a recognition of the Lord’s Day as a day exempted by law from all worldly pursuits? The framers of the Constitution, then, recognized Sunday as a day to be observed, acting themselves under a law which exacted a compulsive observance of it. . . . Sunday was recognized as a day of rest.20

Other courts were equally candid about Sabbath laws and their relation to the Ten Commandments. For example, in 1950, the Supreme Court of Mississippi affirmed:

The Sunday laws have a Divine origin. . . . After the six days of creation, the Creator Himself rested on the seventh. Genesis, Chapter 2, verses 2 and 3. Thus, the Sabbath was instituted as a day of rest. The original example was later confirmed as a commandment when the law was handed down from Mt. Sinai: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” [Exodus 20:8].21

In 1967, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania similarly declared:

“Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy; six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt not do any work” [Deuteronomy 5:12-14]. This Divine pronouncement became part of the Common Law inherited by the thirteen American colonies and by the sovereign states of the American union.22

The modern U.S. Supreme Court asserts that even to this day, states have the right to enact laws honoring the Sabbath.23

5. Honor Your Parents.

A 1642 Connecticut law specifically cited the Decalogue as the basis for its civil laws related to honoring parents:

If any child or children above sixteen years old and of sufficient understanding shall curse or smite their normal father or mother, he or they shall be put to death unless it can be sufficiently testified that the parents have been very unChristianly negligent in the education of such children, or so provoke them by extreme and cruel correction that they have been forced thereunto to preserve themselves from death [or] maiming. Ex. 21:17, Lev. 20, Ex. 20:15.24

Three centuries later, a 1934 Louisiana appeals court affirmed the continuing influence of the Fifth Command on civil laws:

“Honor thy father and thy mother” is as much a command of the municipal law as it is a part of the Decalogue, regarded as holy by every Christian people. “A child,” says the code, “whatever be his age, owes honor and respect to his father and mother.”25

6. Do not murder.

A 1641 Massachusetts law declared:

Ex. 21.12, Numb. 35.13, 14, 30, 31. If any person commit any willful murder, which is manslaughter committed upon premeditated malice, hatred, or cruelty not in a man’s necessary and just defense, nor by mere casualty against his will, he shall be put to death. Ex. 21.14. If any person shall slay another through guile, either by poisoning or other such devilish practice, he shall be put to death.26

Similar provisions derived from the prohibition in the Ten Commandments can be found in the laws of the early colonies and subsequently of the independent states—laws spanning the centuries. Consequently, courts have been very candid in acknowledging the Decalogue as the origin of American civil murder laws, such as when a 1932 Kentucky appeals court asserted:

Following the promulgation of Moses at Mt. Sinai has required of each and every one of its citizens that “Thou shalt not murder” [Exodus 20:13]. If that law is violated, the one guilty of it has no right to demand more than a fair trial, and if, as a result thereof, the severest punishment for the crime is visited upon him, he has no one to blame but himself.27

7. Do not commit adultery.

Directly citing the Decalogue, a 1641 Massachusetts law declared:

If any person committeth adultery with a married or espoused wife, the adulterer and adulteress shall surely be put to death. Ex. 20.14.28

For three centuries, colonies and states based their adultery policies on the Decalogue. For example, a 1787 Vermont law stated:

Whereas the violation of the marriage covenant is contrary to the command of God [Exodus 20:14] and destructive to the peace of families: be it therefore enacted by the general assembly of the State of Vermont that if any man be found in bed with another man’s wife, or woman with another’s husband, . . . &c.29

In 1898, the highest criminal court in Texas declared:

“Thou shalt not commit adultery” is our law as well as the law of the Bible.30

And in 1955, the Washington Supreme Court likewise ruled:

Adultery, whether promiscuous or not, violates one of the Ten Commandments and the statutes of this state.31

8. Do Not Steal.

Early colonial laws are easily cited for evidence of the Decalogue’s influence on this prohibition, but consider more recent declarations, such as from the 1951 Louisiana Supreme Court, which recognized:

In the Ten Commandments, the basic law of all Christian countries, is found the admonition “Thou shalt not steal.”32

In 1940, the Supreme Court of California had similarly declared:

“Thou shalt not steal” applies with equal force and propriety to the industrialist of a complex civilization as to the simple herdsman of ancient Israel.33

And in 1914, a federal court ruled that the Constitution’s “takings clause” prohibiting government seizure of private property was an embodiment of the Decalogue’s Eighth Command against theft, including government theft.34

9. Do not perjure yourself.

A 1642 Connecticut law declared:

If any man rise up by false witness, wittingly and of purpose to take away any man’s life, he shall be put to death. Deut. 19:16, 18, 19.35

For over three centuries, civil laws against perjury were openly acknowledged to be derived from the Decalogue, as when the 1924 Oregon Supreme Court declared:

No official is above the law. “Thou shalt not bear false witness” is a command of the Decalogue, and that forbidden act is denounced by statute as a felony.36

10. Do not covet.

The Tenth Command actually forms the basis for many of the prohibitions given in the other commandments. That is, a violation of this commandment frequently precedes a violation of the others, particularly the command against stealing. As William Penn, the framer of the original laws of Pennsylvania, acknowledged:

He that covets can no more be a moral man than he that steals since he does so in his mind. Nor can he be one that robs his neighbor of his credit, or that craftily undermines him of his trade or office.37

Founding Father John Adams also granted the importance of this commandment:

The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If “Thou shalt not covet” and “Thou shalt not steal” were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.38

Many courts have acceded the numerous other categories of laws to which this provision of the Decalogue directly applies.

For example, in 1895, the California Supreme Court cited this prohibition as the basis of civil laws against defamation.39 In 1904, the Court of Appeals in West Virginia cited it as the basis of laws preventing election fraud.40 In 1951, the Oregon Supreme Court cited this part of the Decalogue as the basis of civil laws against modern forms of cattle rustling.41 And in 1958, a Florida appeals court cited it as the basis of laws targeting white-collar crime. 42 There are numerous other examples establishing that this commandment of the Decalogue had a substantial influence on many other civil laws.

Conclusion

There are hundreds more examples irrefutably demonstrating the substantial influence of the Ten Commandments on American civil law. So clear and compelling is the historical evidence that it has been consistently acknowledged by courts across America, such as when the 1917 Supreme Court of North Carolina affirmed:

Our laws are founded upon the Decalogue, not that every case can be exactly decided according to what is there enjoined, but we can never safely depart from this short but great declaration of moral principles without founding the law upon the sand instead of upon the eternal rock of justice and equity.43

In 1950, the Florida Supreme Court similarly pointed out:

A people unschooled about the sovereignty of God, the Ten Commandments, and the ethics of Jesus could never have evolved the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution. There is not one solitary fundamental principle of our democratic policy that did not stem directly from the basic moral concepts as embodied in the Decalogue and the ethics of Jesus.44

In short, the Ten Commandments not only formed the basis of the Moral Law in America but were also a direct influence on its civil statutory laws. The effect of the commandments produced a truly civilized society, for as a matter of civil policy it matters not one whit if my neighbor is an atheist or opponent of Christianity, but if he will nevertheless govern his behavior by the basic values found in the Ten Commandments—that is, if he will refrain from killing me, stealing my property, or taking my wife—he will make a good citizen, regardless of whether or not he holds any specific religious beliefs. As John Adams affirmed, even if the Ten Commandments “were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.”45

Endnotes

1 John Quincy Adams, Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son, on the Bible and Its Teachings (Auburn: James M. Alden, 1850), 61, 70-71.
2 Noah Webster, “Reply to a Letter of David McClure on the Subject of the Proper Course of Study in the Girard College, Philadelphia,” October 25, 1836, A Collection of Papers on Political, Literary and Moral Subjects (New York: Webster & Clark, 1843), 291-292.
3 Glassroth v. Moore, 333 F.3d 1282, 1285 (2003), cert. denied, 540 U.S. 1000; Professor Paul Finkelman, “The Ten Commandments on the Courthouse Lawn and Elsewhere,” Fordham Law Review (2005), 73:1477-1520.
4 Van Orden v. Perry, 545 U.S. 677, n16 (2005) (Stevens, J., dissenting).
5 “Articles, Laws, and Orders, Divine, Politic and Martial for the Colony of Virginia,” 1610-1611, For the Colony in Virginea Britannia Lawes Divine, Morall and Martiall, etc., Compiled by William Strachey, ed., David H. Flaherty (Charlottesville: The University Press of Virginia, 1969), 10. 
6 “Massachusetts Body Of Liberties,” 1641, Documents of the Constitution of England and America, from Magna Charta to the Federal Constitution of 1789, ed. Francis Bowen (Cambridge: John Bartlett, 1854), 71.
7 “General Laws and Liberties of New Hampshire, Cappitall Laws, Idollitry, Section 1” 1680, Documents and Records related to the Province of New-Hampshire, ed., Nathaniel Bouton (Concord: George E. Jenks, State Printer, 1867), 383. 
8 Daniel Dorchester, Christianity in the United States from the First Settlement Down to the Present Time (New York: Phillips & Hunt, 1895), 122.
9 Noah Webster, Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education (New Haven: Howe & Spalding, 1823), 8.
10 See, for example, “Articles, Laws, and Orders, Divine, Politic and Martial for the Colony of Virginia,” 1610-1611, For the Colony in Virginea Britannia Lawes Divine, Flaherty (1969), 10-11; The Code of 1650 (Hartford: Silas Andrus, 1825), 30; and many others.
11 “Articles, Laws, and Orders, Divine, Politic and Martial for the Colony of Virginia,” 1610-1611, For the Colony in Virginea Britannia Lawes Divine, Flaherty (1969), 11; “General Laws and Liberties of New Hampshire,” 1680, 383; Charles J. Hoadly, Records of the Colony or Jurisdiction of New Haven, From May, 1653, to the Union, Together With the New Haven Code of 1656 (Hartford: Chase, Lockwood and Company, 1858), 605; “An Act to Restrain People from Labor on the First Day of the Week,” passed October 4, 1705, Laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: John Bioren, 1810), I:25-26; “Title 160: Sunday,” 1741, Alphabetical Digest of the Public Statute Law of South Carolina (Charleston: John Hoff, 1814), 2:272-275; “Vice and Immorality, Section IV,” A Manual of The Laws of North Carolina (Raleigh: J. Gales and W. Boylan, 1808), 2:229; “An Act for the Due Observation of the Sabbath, or Lord’s Day,” The Public Statute Laws of the State of Connecticut (Hartford: Hudson and Goodwin, 1808), I:577-578; etc.
12 George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, ed. John C. Fitzpatrick (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1934), 11:342-343; General Orders, Cambridge, August 5, 1775, 3:402-403; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Morristown, April 12, 1777, 7:407; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Morristown, May 17, 1777, 8:77, General Orders, Head-Quarters, Morristown, May 24, 1777, 8:114; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Middle Brook, May 31, 1777, 8:153; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Middle Brook, June 28, 1777, 8:308; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Pennybacker’s Mills, September 27, 1777, 9:275; General Orders, Head-Quarters, Perkiomy, October 7, 1777, 9:329; etc.
13 “An Act for the Due Observation of the Sabbath,” passed March 9, 1787, Statutes of the State of Vermont (Bennington: Anthony Haswell, 1791), 155-157.
14 “Of the Observance of the Lord’s Day and the Prevention and Punishment of Immorality,” The Revised Statutes of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (Boston: Dutton & Wentworth, 1836), 385-386.
15 “An Act for the Effectual Suppression of Vice, and Punishing the Disturbers of Religious Worship, and Sabbath Breakers,” passed December 26, 1792, The Revised Code of the Laws of Virginia (Richmond: Thomas Ritchie, 1819), I:554-556. See also ThomasJefferson, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Julian P. Boyd (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950), II:322.
16 “An Act for Suppressing Vice and Immorality,” passed March 16, 1798, Laws of the State of New Jersey (New Brunswick: Abraham Blauvelt, 1800), 329-333. 
17 “An Act for the Better Observation of the Lord’s Day, and for Repealing All the Laws Heretofore Made for that Purpose,” passed December 24, 1799, Constitution and Laws of the State of New Hampshire (Dover: Samuel Bragg, 1805), 290-293.
18 “An Act Providing for the Due Observation of the Lord’s Day,” Laws of the State of Maine (Hallowell: Calvin Spaulding, 1822), 67-71.
19 See, for example, James Coffield Mitchell, The Tennessee Justices’ Manual (Nashville: J. C. Mitchell and C. C. Norvell, 1834), 427-428; George C. Edwards, A Treatise on the Powers and Duties of Justices of the Peace and Town Officers, in the State of New York (Ithaca: Mack, Andrus, and Woodruff, 1836), 386-387; etc.
20 State v. Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co., 143 S.W. 785, 803 (Mo. 1912).
21 Paramount-Richards Theatres v. City of Hattiesburg, 49 So.2d 574, 577 (Miss. 1950).
22 Bertera’s Hopewell Foodland, Inc. v. Masters, 236 A.2d 197, 200-201 (Pa. 1967).
23 McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961).
24 “Capital Laws of Connecticut,” 1642, The Blue Laws of New Haven Colony, Usually Called Blue Laws of Connecticut (Hartford: Case, Tiffany & Co., 1838), 103.
25 Ruiz v. Clancy, 157 So. 737, 738 (La. Ct. App. 1934), citing Caldwell v. Henmen, 5 Rob. 20.
26 “Massachusetts Body Of Liberties,” 1641, Documents of the Constitution of England and America, from Magna Charta to the Federal Constitution of 1789, ed. Francis Bowen (Cambridge: John Bartlett, 1854), 72.
27 Young v. Commonwealth, 245 Ky. 570, 53 S.W.2d 963 (Ky. Ct. App. 1932).
28 “Massachusetts Body Of Liberties,” 1641, Documents of the Constitution, ed. Bowen (1854), 72.
29 “An Act Against Adultery, Polygamy, and Fornication,” passed March 8, 1787, Statutes of the State of Vermont (Bennington: Anthony Haswell, 1791), 16-17.
30 Hardin v. State, 39 Tex.Crim. 426 (1898).
31 Schreifels v. Schreifels, 287 P.2d 1001, 1005 (Wash. 1955).
32 Succession of Onorato, 51 So.2d 804, 810 (La. 1951).
33 Hollywood Motion Picture Equipment Co. v. Furer, 105 P.2d 299, 301 (Cal. 1940).
34 Pennsylvania Co. v. United States, 214 F. 445, 455 (W.D.Pa. 1914).
35 “Capital Laws of Connecticut,” 1642, The Blue Laws of New Haven Colony, Usually Called Blue Laws of Connecticut (Hartford: Case, Tiffany & Co., 1838), 103.
36 Watts v. Gerking, 228 P. 135, 141 (Or. 1924).
37 William Penn, Fruits of Solitude, In Reflections and Maxims Relating To The Conduct of Human Life (London: James Phillips, 1790), 132.
38 John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America (Philadelphia: William Young, 1797), 3:217.
39 Weinstock, Lubin & Co. v. Marks, 42 P. 142, 145 (Cal. 1895).
40 Doll v. Bender, 47 S.E. 293, 300-01 (W.Va. 1904) (Dent, J. concurring).
41 Swift & Co. v. Peterson, 233 P.2d 216, 231 (Or. 1951).
42 Chisman v. Moylan, 105 So.2d 186, 189 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1958).
43 Commissioners of Johnston County v. Lacy, 93 S.E. 482, 487 (N.C. 1917).
45 John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America (Philadelphia: William Young, 1797), 3:217.

The Revelatory Source for the Constitutional Separation of Powers

Thoughts on Jeremiah 17:9 

The separation of powers and reciprocal checks and balances incorporated throughout the Constitution is still heralded as one of the most important features of American government, enabling it not only to survive but to thrive for over two centuries. History is filled with oposite examples showing that when government power was centralized in one body or leader, that government always became abusive and resulting in national ruin. The Founding Fathers not only had these examples of history to guide them, but they had the wisdom found in the Bible.

The love of power, and our propensity to abuse it, finds its root in the human heart. Jeremiah 17:9 declares: “The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can understand it?” This wellknown verse encapsulated what Calvinistic ministers and theologians termed the “depravity of man” (that the natural heart of man easily embraced moral and civil degradation). It was a frequent topic for sermons in the Founding Era. The Founding Fathers understood the significance of this verse and openly cited it, as when John Adams reminded Americans:

Let me conclude by advising all men to look into their own hearts, which they will find to be “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked” [Jeremiah 17:9].1

Those ignorant of the Bible often believe in the innate goodness of man—that man will naturally do what is right. However, experience regularly confirms the opposite: without a heart regenerated by the power of God, man will routinely do what is wrong. Adams specifically rejected any notion of the innate goodness of man, especially when it came to government:

To expect self-denial from men when they have a majority in their favor, and consequently power to gratify themselves, is to disbelieve all history and universal experience – it is to disbelieve revelation and the Word of God, which informs us “the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked” [Jeremiah 17:9]. . . . There is no man so blind as not to see that to talk of founding a government upon a supposition that nations and great bodies of men left to themselves will practice a course of self-denial is either to babble like a newborn infant or to deceive like an unprincipled impostor.2

And even those who had experienced a regenerated heart through the power of God in Christ nevertheless knew enough about the truth of this verse and human nature to not even fully trust themselves to be above corruption. As John Quincy Adams confessed:

I believe myself sincere; but the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked [Jeremiah 17:9]. I do not believe the total depravity of man, but I am deeply conscious of the frailty of my own nature.3

Understanding this principle from Jeremiah 17—a principle that was accepted by all sides of the theological spectrum—the Founders knew that government would be much safer if all power did not repose in the same authority. Making practical application of this Biblical truth, they divided and checked power between branches so that if one branch behaved wickedly, the other two might still check and stop it. As George Washington explained:

A just estimate of that love of power and proneness to abuse it which predominates in the human heart is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power by dividing and distributing it into different depositories . . . has been evinced [demonstrated] by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes.4

James Madison agreed:

What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed, and in the next place oblige it to control itself.5

This remarkable feature of American government—the separation of powers and reciprocal checks and balances—can be attributed to the Founders’ understanding of Jeremiah 17:9.

Endnotes

1 John Adams, “On Private Revenge III,” published in the Boston Gazette, September 5, 1763, The Works of John Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1851), 3:443.

2 John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America (London: John Stockdale, 1794), 3:289, “Letter VI. The Right Constitution of a Commonwealth, examined.”

3 John Quincy Adams, diary entry of November 16, 1842, Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co, 1876), XI:270.

4 George Washington, Address of George Washington, President of the United States, and Late Commander in Chief of the American Army, to the People of the United States, Preparatory to His Declination (Baltimore: Christopher Jackson, 1796), 13.

5 Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, & James Madison, The Federalist on the New Constitution; Written in 1788 (Philadelphia: Benjamin Warner, 1818), 281, Federalist #51 likely by James Madison.

What Good Can I Do This Day?

Thoughts on Acts 10:38

Founding Father John Quincy Adams gave his life to his faith, his family, and his country. He lived to be eighty years old and actively worked more than sixty of those years for the benefit of others. His service included diplomatic missions to five nations, serving as a state senator, US senator, secretary of state, and US president. And while every other president before and after him permanently retired from public life after leaving office, John Quincy Adams did not. On retirement, he was elected to the US House of Representatives, where he would spend nine terms. He eventually died in the US Capitol. Although he declared “I had not the slightest desire to be elected to Congress,”1 he still served because his neighbors desired his leadership and elected him for that purpose. Adams believed that it was his Christian duty to serve when called upon rather than indulging a personal wish to retire to a quiet unencumbered life.

In Congress, he took up the fight to end slavery at a time when the overwhelming majority in Congress did not want to even discuss the subject. He undertook a relentless personal crusade to secure the Declaration of Independence’s promise of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” for all individuals, regardless of race. But by choosing that path, he walked a difficult road. As he lamented, “The best actions of my life make me nothing but enemies.”2 Yet he did not quit, for he believed that “his service belonged to the nation.”3

He was consistently on the front lines in any quest to improve the lives of citizens and combat injustice. When he was seventy-four and had been fighting brutal congressional battles for over a decade, he wrote:

I deem it the duty of every Christian man, when he betakes himself to his nightly pillow, in self-examination to say, “What good have I done this day? Ay! And what evil have I done that may be repaired or repented of?” Nor should he rise from that pillow the next morning till after the inquiry, “What good can I do, and to whom, this day?” I have made this my rule for many years, with superadded prayer to the Lord of all—the Giver of every good gift for light [James 1:17]—for discernment, for guidance, for self-control, for a grateful heart to feel and acknowledge all His blessings, for humble resignation to His will, and submission to His chastisements. . . .Jesus Christ went about doing good [Acts 10:38]; I would do the same.4

John Quincy Adams understood that God places each of us here not to pursue own pleasure, but so that we might glorify God through serving and helping others. May the Spirit of God anoint us as well to imitate Jesus and personally “go about doing good.”

Endnotes

1 John Quincy Adams, diary entry for September 18, 1830, Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1876), 8:240.

2Adams, diary entry for October 25, 1833, Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Adams (1876), 9:26.

3 Dictionary of American Biography, ed. Allen Johnson (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1928), 1:92.

4 Adams, diary entry for November 16, 1842, Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Adams (1876), 2:269-270.

 

Calling the Nation to Prayer and Fasting

Thoughts on Ezra 8

In Ezra 7, Babylonian King Artaxerxes commissioned the priest Ezra to gather Jewish captives, return to their ancient homeland, and set up a civil government. They were also to rebuild the holy temple in Jerusalem, which had lain in ruins for decades. In chapter 8, Ezra assembled the people. But before they set out on their dangerous trek:

Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from Him a safe journey for us, our little ones, and all our possessions. For I was ashamed to request from the king troops and horsemen to protect us from the enemy on the way, because we had said to the king, “The hand of our God is favorably disposed to all those who seek Him, but His power and His anger are against all those who forsake Him.” So we fasted and sought our God concerning this matter, and He listened to our entreaty (vv. 21–23).

He called for a time of fasting and prayer to beseech the Lord’s intervention and assistance. And as Ezra attested, God answered their prayers. They journeyed safely to Jerusalem and successfully restored both the temple and civil government in their homeland.

The practice of calling the nation to a time of corporate prayer and fasting is repeated frequently throughout the Scriptures. For example, when the Ammonites came against Israel, King Jehoshaphat “turned his attention to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. So Judah gathered together to seek help from the Lord” (II Chronicles 20:3–4). Esther called the people to a time of prayer and fasting before she begged the king to save the Jews from the death decree issued by wicked Haman (Esther 4:16). And when Jonah warned the people of Nineveh of God’s intended judgment on them, “the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them” (Jonah 3:5), and their destruction was averted.

This Biblical model was repeated hundreds of times in early America.1 In fact, on eight separate occasions during the American Revolution, the Continental Congress called the nation to a time of humiliation, fasting, and prayer.2 Founding Fathers who were state governors likewise called their own states to prayer and fasting. These included signers of the Declaration Matthew Thornton,3 Samuel Adams,4 John Hancock,5 Samuel Huntington,6 Caesar Rodney,7 and signers of the Constitution John Dickinson,8 John Langdon,9 John Gilman,10 William Livingston,11 and others. This pattern—repeated so often before, during, and after the American Revolution—continued under the Constitution by U.S. presidents.

The XYZ Affair

During Washington’s presidency, France and Great Britain were at war with each other. So Great Britain blockaded American ships coming to Europe for fear they might be aiding the French. In 1794, John Jay negotiated a treaty (aka: the Jay Treaty) with the British to ease the growing tensions. But when the Jay Treaty was ratified in 1796, the French (still at war with Great Britain) responded by seizing 300 American ships to prevent supplies from reaching the British.

The following year in an attempt to prevent war with France, President John Adams dispatched three diplomats to negotiate with French officials. But before they could meet, the French agents demanded as preconditions: (1) a formal apology from President Adams, (2) a $10-million low-interest loan to the French government, and (3) a $250,000 personal bribe to the French foreign minister, Charles Tallyrand. Of course, the Americans refused.

The French continued to seize American ships and threatened an invasion of the United States. Congress therefore authorized a military buildup and began preparations for war. Adams’ political opponents believed he was exaggerating the situation and demanded proof of his claims. For which he released a report including the official diplomatic correspondence, but with the French agents’ names redacted (they were identified only as W, X, Y, and Z).

On seeing the documents, Americans were outraged. A formal declaration of war against France was narrowly averted. But an unofficial naval war (now called the Quasi-War), was unavoidable. Before France eventually signed a treaty with America in 1800, and war with France loomed, President Adams called the nation to a time of prayer and fasting:

Seasons of difficulty and of danger . . . are a loud call to repentance and reformation; and as the United States of America are at present placed in a hazardous and afflictive situation by the unfriendly disposition, conduct, and demands of a foreign power, evinced [proved] by repeated refusals to receive our messengers of reconciliation and peace, by depredations [attacks] on our commerce, and the infliction of injuries on very many of our fellow citizens while engaged in their lawful business on the seas. . . . I have therefore thought it fit to recommend . . . a day of solemn humiliation, fasting, and prayer.12

War of 1812

Nearly three decades after the American Revolution, the British had not kept many of the promises made at the end of the war. In fact, British encroachments on American ships and property were increasing. The result was the War of 1812, sometimes called the Second American Revolution. President James Madison regularly called the nation to prayer and fasting throughout the war, explaining on one of those occasions:

I do therefore recommend [a day of prayer and fasting] . . . for the devout purposes of . . . acknowledging the transgressions which might justly provoke the manifestations of His Divine displeasure; of seeking His merciful forgiveness and His assistance in the great duties of repentance and amendment; and especially of offering fervent supplications that in the present season of calamity and war, He would take the American people under His peculiar care and protection—that He would guide their public councils, animate their patriotism, and bestow His blessing on their arms . . . and, finally, that turning the hearts of our enemies from the violence and injustice which sway their councils against us, He would hasten a restoration of the blessings of peace.13

Civil War

In late 1860, it appeared that a national conflict was imminent. President James Buchanan called the nation to a time of prayer and fasting, reminding the country:

In this the hour of our calamity and peril, to Whom shall we resort for relief but to the God of our fathers? His omnipotent arm only can save us from the awful effects of our own crimes and follies—our own ingratitude and guilt towards our Heavenly Father. Let us, then, with deep contrition and penitent sorrow, unite in humbling ourselves before the Most High, in confessing our individual and national sins. . . . Let our fervent prayers ascend to His Throne that He would not desert us in this hour of extreme peril, but remember us as He did our fathers in the darkest days of the Revolution and preserve our Constitution and our Union, the work of their hands, for ages yet to come. . . .Let me invoke every individual, in whatever sphere of like he may be placed, to feel a personal responsibility to God and his country for keeping this day holy.14

And while in the midst of that bloody Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln called the nation to a day of humiliation, fasting, and prayer, explaining in most profound terms:

It is the duty of nations as well as of men to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon, and to recognize the sublime truths announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord. And insomuch as we know that by His Divine law, nations, like individuals, are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war which now desolates the land may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people? We have been recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God—we have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined in deceitfulness of our hearts that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace—too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness. . . . All this being done in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins and restoration of our now divided and suffering country to its former happy condition of unity and peace.15

Times of corporate humiliation and prayer were called in times of national danger and also in times of national tragedy. For example, in 1841 when President William Henry Harrison died, President John Tyler called the country to a time of special prayer:

When a Christian people feel themselves to be overtaken by a great public calamity, it becomes them to humble themselves under the dispensation of Divine Providence, to recognize His righteous government over the children of men, to acknowledge His goodness in time past as well as their own unworthiness, and to supplicate His merciful protection for the future.16

President Andrew Johnson held a similar day of humiliation, mourning, and prayer following the death of Abraham Lincoln.17 As did President Chester Arthur on the death of President James Garfield.18

Modern Examples

The US observed several days of national prayer during both World War I19 and World War II.20 And presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump both issued prayer proclamations in response to natural disasters or epidemics.21

America has long followed the Biblical precedent of observing times of corporate prayer and fasting. But this is a spiritual discipline that every Christian would do well to personally develop (Matthew 9:15). After all, Jesus noted that some situations in our lives change only through prayer and fasting (Matthew 17:21). And it allows us to spend time in concentrated prayer in our relationship with the Lord.

 

Endnotes

1 See Deloss Love, The Fast and Thanksgiving Days of New England (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1895), 464–514.

2 See the Journals of the American Congress from 1774 to 1788 (Washington: Way and Gideon, 1823) for June 12, 1775; March 16, 1776; December 11, 1776; March 7, 1778; March 20, 1779; March 11, 1780; March 20, 1781; and March 19, 1782.

3 Matthew Thornton, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer,” June 22, 1775, Evans #14275.

4 Samuel Adams, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” April 2, 1795, Broadside in the WallBuilders Collection; Samuel Adams, “A Proclamation for a Day of Solemn Fasting and Prayer,” May 4, 1797, Independent Chronicle (March 30, 1797).

5 John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting and Prayer,” Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser, March 26, 1789, 1; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer,” April 25, 1782, Evans #17593; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Public Fasting and Prayer,” May 15, 1783, Evans #18024; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer,” April 17, 1788, Evans #21236; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting and Prayer,” March 31, 1797, Evans #23549; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” March 29, 1792, Evans #24519; John Hancock, “A Proclamation for a Day of Public Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer,” April 11, 1793, Broadside in the WallBuilders Collection.

6 Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” April 17, 1788, Evans #21761; Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” Pennsylvania Packet or General Advertiser, March 4, 1780, 3; Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” March 31, 1791, Evans #23284; Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” April 12, 1792, Evans #24218; Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer,” April 17, 1793, Dunlap’s Daily American Advertiser, March 30, 1793, 3; Samuel Huntington, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” April 22, 1789, Evans #21018; Samuel Huntington, “Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” March 28, 1789, from Broadside in the WallBuilders Collection.

7 Caesar Rodney, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” May 6, 1779, Evans #43623.

8 John Dickinson, “A Proclamation for a Day of Public Prayer,” November 19, 1781, Evans #17134.

9 John Langdon, “A Proclamation for a Day of Public Fasting and Prayer,” April 6, 1786, Evans #19824.

10 John Taylor Gilman, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer,” April 19, 1804, Broadside in the WallBuilders Collection.

11 William Livingston, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting and Humiliation,” January 17, 1777, The Papers of William Livingston, ed. Carl E. Prince (New Jersey Historical Commission, 1979), I:200.

12 John Adams, “A Proclamation for a Day of Solemn Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer,” May 9, 1798, Russell’s Commercial Gazette (April 4, 1798); John Adams, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer,” March 6, 1799, The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1854), 9:572.

13 James Madison, ”A Proclamation for a Day of Public Prayer,” Connecticut Mirror (July 20, 1812), 3; James Madison, “A Proclamation for a Day of Public Prayer,” July 23, 1813, Independent Chronicle (July 29, 1813), 3–4; James Madison, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer,” January 12, 1815, The Yankee (November 25, 1814), 2.

14 James Buchanan, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer,” January 4, 1861, from a Broadside in the WallBuilders Collection.

15 Abraham Lincoln, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer,” April 30, 1863, The Liberator (April 24, 1863), 3. See also, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer,” August 12, 1861, in the WallBuilders Collection; “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting and Prayer,” July 17, 1864, Burlington Daily Hawk-Eye (July 14, 1864), 3.

16 John Tyler, “A Proclamation for a Day of Fasting and Prayer,” April 13, 1841, A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, ed. James D. Richardson (U.S. Bureau of National Literature and Art, 1910), 4:33.

17 Andrew Johnson, “The President’s Proclamation of a Day of Humiliation and Mourning,” May 25, 1865, The New York Herald (April 25, 1865), 8.

18 Chester A. Arthur, “A Proclamation for a Day of Humiliation and Mourning,” September 26, 1881, from a handwritten draft in the WallBuilders Collection.

19 Woodrow Wilson, Proclamation 1445—Decoration Day, May 11, 1918.

20 Franklin D. Roosevelt, Proclamation 2418—Day of Prayer, August 7, 1940; Proclamation 2531—Day of Prayer, December 22, 1941; Proclamation 2602—Day of Prayer, December 3, 1943; Harry S. Truman, Proclamation 2651—Victory in Europe: Day of Prayer, May 8, 1945; and Proclamation 2660—Victory in the East: Day of Prayer, August 16, 1945.

21 George W Bush, Proclamation 7462—National Day of Prayer and Remembrance for the Victims of the Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001, September 13, 2001; Proclamation 7925— National Day of Prayer and Remembrance for Victims of Hurricane Katrina, September 8, 2005, voluntary, and separate from regular National Day of Prayer from May of that year; Donald J Trump, Proclamation 9634— National Day of Prayer for Victims of Hurricane Harvey and for Our National Recover Efforts, September 1, 2017; Proclamation 9997-— National Day of Prayer for All Americans Affected by the Coronavirus Pandemic and for Our National Response, March 14, 2020.

Righteousness Exalts a Nation

Thoughts on Proverbs 14:34

America’s Founding Fathers were not only concerned for their own generation but also for posterity—about future generations. In fact, when they wrote the U.S. Constitution, they candidly acknowledged that they had done so to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” The Rev. Mathias Burnet eflecting this ideal in an Election Sermon preached to the Connecticut legislature:

To God and posterity you are accountable [for your rights and your rulers]. . . . Let not your children have reason to curse you for giving up those rights and prostrating those institutions which your fathers deliv­ered to you. 1

He reminded citizens that they would answer to God for whether or not they had preserved the rights entrusted to them. And they would answer to posterity.

Patrick Henry held identical sentiments. When he passed away in 1799, his executers opened and read his personal legal documents and his will. Included was an original copy of the 1765 Stamp Act Resolutions (early precursors to the American Revolution). These were originally passed by the Virginia Legislature, of which he had been a member. On the back of those resolutions Henry penned a handwritten message, knowing it would be read at his death. He recounted the early colonial resistance to British policy that eventually resulted in the American Revolution, and then concluded with this warning:

Whether this [the American Revolution] will prove a blessing or a curse will depend upon the use our people make of the blessings which a gracious God hath bestowed on us. If they are wise, they will be great and happy. If they are of a contrary character, they will be miserable. Righteousness alone can exalt them as a nation [Proverbs 14:34]. Reader!—whoever thou art, remember this!—and in thy sphere practice virtue thyself and encourage it in others. P. Henry 2

Whether or not America will prosper into the future depends on its righteousness today. But how is national righteousness measured? Dozens of Bible passages (like Deuteronomy 28, 1 Kings 18, 1 Chronicles 21) affirm that national righteousness is defined by national policies and their allignment with God’s standards. As Samuel Adams advised, only God-honoring policies can exalt a nation:

[Divine] revelation assures us that “Righteousness exalteth a nation” [Proverbs 14:34]. Communities are dealt with in this world by the wise and just Ruler of the Universe. He rewards or punishes them according to their general character. 3

Civic Righteousness and Civil Rights

Across the pages of American history both political and religious leaders have regularly cited this verse. For example, Frederick Douglass, who was a preacher and famous political leader long before and after the Civil War, told citizens:

I have one great political idea. . . . That idea is an old one. It is widely and generally assented to; nevertheless, it is very generally trampled upon and disregarded. The best expression of it, I have found in the Bible. It is in substance, “Righteousness exalteth a nation; sin is a reproach to any people” [Proverbs 14:34]. Sir, this constitutes my politics – the negative and positive of my politics, and the whole of my politics. . . . I feel it my duty to do all in my power to infuse this idea into the public mind, that it may speedily be recognized and practiced upon by our people. 4

Douglass believed that every political concern should be guided by issues of righteousness. But too often today, political concerns (and votes) are instead guided by issues of economics—what is good for the economy, my job, my pocketbook, etc. When Jesus’ disciples focused on such worries—food, clothing, finances, and homes—He reminded them to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,” and all of their physical needs would be provided (Matthew 6:33). Strikingly, when a nation pursues economics over righteousness, it generally loses both. Notice how frequently secular nations find themselves facing burgeoning and unsolvable economic problems. The only way to preserve economic prosperity is by pursuing righteousness in public policy.

The Rev. Francis Grimke understood this. He was born to a slave mother in 1850 in South Carolina, and served as a valet in the Confederate army until Emancipation. After the war, he attended Lincoln University, Howard University, and Princeton Theological Seminary, and became a minister in Washington, D.C. He had lived through the Civil War as a boy, and as a young man survived the barbarity of the Ku Klux Klan during Reconstruction. Then in the early 1900s, he watched the second revival of the Klan as it marched openly in parades in Washington, D.C. Even members of Congress participated.

Grimke personally witnessed America’s literal split, and now the resurgence of the Klan. While he believed he nation would remain united, he delivered a sermon in 1909, warning what America’s future would be should we ever foresake righteousness:

The Stars and Stripes—the old flag—will float . . . over all these states. . . . If the time ever comes when we shall go to pieces, it will . . . [be] from inward corruption—from the disregard of right principles . . . from losing sight of the fact that “Righteousness exalteth a nation, but that sin is a reproach to any people” [Proverbs 14:34]. . . . The secession of the southern states in 1860 was a small matter with the secession of the Union itself from the great principles enunciated in the Declaration of Independence, in the Golden Rule, in the Ten Commandments, in the Sermon on the Mount. Unless we hold, and hold firmly to these great fundamental principles of righteousness . . . our Union . . . will be “only a covenant with death and an agreement with hell” [Isaiah 28:18]. If it continues to exist, it will be a curse and not a blessing. 5

Blessings for Posterity

When selecting public officials, Christians must not be concerned about their pocketbooks or their jobs. The foremost concern should be whether that official will advance policies upholding Biblical standards of righteousness. Biblical rights and wrongs on moral issues must always take precedence over economic, environmental, healthcare, energy, or any other issues. Whether and in what condition America will continue to exist in the future completely depends on if citizens will embrace and apply Proverbs 14:34 in both their private and their civic lives.

Endnotes

1 Matthias Burnet, An Election Sermon, Preached at Hartford, on the Day of the Anniversary Election, May 12, 1803 (Hartford: Hudson and Goodwin, 1803), 27.

2 Patrick Henry, Patrick Henry: Life, Correspondence and Speeches, ed. William Wirt Henry (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1891), 1:81-82, from a handwritten endorsement on the back of the paper containing the resolutions of the Virginia Assembly in 1765 concerning the Stamp Act.

3 Samuel Adams to John Scollay, April 30, 1776, The Writings of Samuel Adams, ed. Harry Alonzo Cushing (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1907), 3:286.

4 Frederick Douglass, speech delivered at Ithaca, New York, October 14, 1852, The Frederick Douglass Papers, ed. John Blassingame (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982), 2:397.

5 Rev. Francis J. Grimke, from “Equality of Right for All Citizens, Black and White, Alike,” March 7, 1909, Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence, ed. Alice Moore Dunbar (Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1970), 348-349.

Meditating on God’s Word

Thoughts on Psalm 4:4

The Bible places great emphasis on the meditation of God and His Word. In fact, the Bible makes clear that you cannot grow spiritually without meditating on His Word.

Perhaps the best way to describe the importance of meditation is to liken it to the process of digestion. While it is important to consume the food (or to use a spiritual analogy based on Matthew 6:11 and 4:4, to consume the Word of God), if what we consume is not broken down and digested so that it can be absorbed by the body, it renders no nutritional benefit. In fact, there are medical maladies whereby individuals can actually consume large amounts of food but die of starvation because the body does not break down and digest the food. So too, with the intake of God’s Word.

First Timothy 4:15 commands “meditate on these things; give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all” (NKJV). Notice the sequence: if you (1) mediate on these things, (2) your growth and maturity will become evident to everyone. Similarly, Joshua 1:8 commands us to (1) meditate in His Word day and night, then (2) your way will be prosperous and you will have good success. Other verses that emphasize the importance of meditation include Psalm 63:6, Psalm 119:15, 99.

In both the spiritual and the physical realms, it is not how fast or how much you consume that is important, but how much you digest. And digestion takes time. You have to go over and over the same content similar to a cow chewing its cud. After cows have eaten, they lie still and ruminate—chew on what they ingested to allow full digestion and extract all the nutrition.

When you read God’s word (which should be done daily), be sure to meditate on what you just read. Take time to ask yourself questions such as: who (To whom was this passage written?), what (What was the theme of this passage?), when and where (What were the circumstances and events that surrounded this message?), why (Why was the message in this passage given?), and how (How will I apply what is in this passage to my own life? What changes must I make in my own speaking, thinking, or behavior?). This meditation will move our spiritual lives beyond merely taking the “milk” of God’s Word and on to consuming its “solid food” (Hebrews 5:12-14).

John Quincy Adams was one of many Founding Fathers who had consumed much of God’s Word. As he acknowledged:

My custom is to read four or five chapters every morning immediately after rising from my bed. It employs about an hour of my time and seems to me the most suitable manner of beginning the day.1

In addition to his regular daily readings, every Sunday he usually covered additional chapters, frequently studying and comparing translations of the Bible in several different languages (of which he could speak seven). One Sunday in 1826, while serving as president of the United States, he recorded:

Heard Mr. [Robert] Little [pastor of a church Adams attended] from Psalm 119:133: “Order my steps in Thy Word, and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.” A desultory [spontaneous] and impressive moral discourse [sermon], setting forth by various illustrations the different modes by which iniquity [sin] may obtain dominion over us. Among his quotations from Scripture was that of the first seven verses of the fifth chapter of Isaiah (the song of the vineyard that brought forth wild grapes). In this instance, as in numberless others, I was struck with the careless inattention of my own mind when reading the Bible. I had read the chapter of Isaiah, containing this parable I dare say fifty times, and it was altogether familiar to my memory; but I had never perceived a fiftieth part of its beauty and sublimity. The closing verse of the parable, especially which points the moral of the allegory, speaks with irresistible energy: “For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His pleasant plant, and He looked for judgment, but behold oppression – for righteousness, but behold a cry” [Isaiah 5:7].2

Significantly, Adams was fifty-eight when he made this diary entry, and it had been his practice from his youth to read through the entire Bible every year.3 So despite having already read this passage from Isaiah “I dare say fifty times,” he still saw something brand new in it. As he confessed, “I was struck with the careless inattention of my own mind when reading the Bible,” and it is for this reason that meditation receives such an emphasis in the Bible. We must read God’s Word every day; but we must also take time to digest what we read—to “meditate within your own heart…and be still” (Psalm 4:4).

Endnotes

1 John Quincy Adams, Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son on the Bible and Its Teachings (New York: Derby, Miller, & Co., 1848), 11-12.

2 John Quincy Adams, diary entry for November 5, 1826, Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1874), 7:168-169.

3 Adams, Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son (1848), 10-11.

The Duty of Nations

Thoughts on Psalm 9:17

Proverbs 3:5–6 reminds us that in all our ways (public as well as private) we are to acknowledge Him. And while it is wisdom for individuals, it is also true of nations. In response to the idolatry of others or their failure to acknowledge God, Psalm 79:6 and Jeremiah 10:25 call for God’s wrath upon all nations that do not call upon His name; and the warranty of 1 Samuel 2:30 that “Those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me will be lightly esteemed” was delivered to civil leaders, not religious ones.

The psalmist said, “The wicked return to Sheol, even all the nations who forget God” (Psalm 9:17). Whenever we stop acknowledging Him, whether as an individual or a nation, we then begin to forget Him, and at that point we are in trouble. Understanding this truth, President George Washington emphatically declared:

It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.1

Notice the four duties that Washington said pertained to nations:

  1. Acknowledge God
  2. Obey His will
  3. Be grateful for His aid
  4. Implore His protection and favor

President John Adams concurred and similarly declared:

The safety and prosperity of nations ultimately and essentially depend on the protection and the blessing of Almighty God, and the national acknowledgment of this truth is . . . an indispensable duty which the people owe to Him.2

President Thomas Jefferson agreed, and in his First Inaugural Address reminded the nation that the first thing “necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people” was “acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence.”3

The conviction that America should publicly acknowledge God was frequently expressed by our national leaders. In fact, President Abraham Lincoln not only did so but even warned the nation in his day that it was beginning to forget God:

It is the duty of nations as well . . . and to recognize the sublime truth announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord [Psalm 33:12]. . . . But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined in the deceitfulness of our hearts that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace—too proud to pray to the God that made us.4

For this reason, President Lincoln called the nation to a time of public humiliation, fasting, and prayer so that it would once again remember God.

Remembering and honoring God at the national level begins with simple acknowledgment of God. Therefore modern conflicts over things such as the National Motto, the inclusion of “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, public displays of the Ten Commandments or nativity scenes, and prayer at athletic events, school meetings, or political gatherings are not small or trivial matters. The presence of such public acknowledgments is not coercive, but rather simple, encouraging reminders with a long history of precedent underscoring the value and wisdom of honoring God. The Founding Fathers would never have supported any public policy that would prohibit such expressions and thus invite us as a nation to forget God.

Endnotes

1 George Washington, “A Proclamation” printed in The Providence Gazette and Country Journal (October 17, 1789), 1. See also George Washington, “Proclamation for a National Thanksgiving,” Writings of George Washington, ed. Jared Sparks (Boston: American Stationers Company, 1837), XII:119.

2 John Adams, “Proclamation for a National Thanksgiving,” March 23, 1798, The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1851), IX:169.

3 Thomas Jefferson, “First Inaugural Address,” March 4, 1801, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Barbara B. Oberg (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006), 33:150.

4 Abraham Lincoln, “A Proclamation” printed in The Liberator (April 24, 1863), 3. See also Abraham Lincoln, , “A Proclamation Appointing a National Fast-Day,” The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Arthur Brooks Lapsley (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1923), 6:270–271.

Worth Riding a Hundred Miles to Hear

Thoughts on Psalm 35

By September 1774, the tensions between America and Great Britain had been escalating for a decade and were reaching a boiling point. But despite those differences, Americans were largely still loyal to Great Britain. The colonies were vigorously pursuing reconciliation. The British, however, rejected those overtures and even responded with military force, such as turning their guns on Americans in the 1770 Boston Massacre. British governors in America also disbanded legislative assemblies (such as Governors Dunsmore and Boutetout in Virginia and Governor James Wright in Georgia), attempting to impose hardfisted tyrannical rule.

The colonies decided that the time had come to act together rather than individually. In May 1774, Virginia called for a Continental Congress,1 as did New York2 and others. They hoped that by speaking with a unified voice, Britain would no longer ignor their grievances and they could reach an understanding. Specifically, they were seeking a repeal of the Intolerable or Coercive Acts, including those disbanding colonial juries, replacing elected American officials with unelected ones appointed by the British Crown, and requiring British troops to be boarded in private American homes

On September 5, 1774, forty-five delegates gathered in Philadelphia in what became known as the First Continental Congress. While each delegate was a significant figure in his own colony, most were unknown to the others. Incidentally, many went on to become nationally recognized leaders, eventually signing the Declaration or Constitution, leading the military, or even becoming US Presidents.

As the delegates met one another and contemplated their course of action, John Adams reported their very first proposal after organizing themselves:

When the Congress first met, Mr. [Thomas] Cushing [of Massachusetts] made a motion that it should be opened with prayer.3

This apparently harmless suggestion met unexpected stiff resistance:

It was opposed by Mr. [John] Jay of New York and Mr. [John] Rutledge of South Carolina because we were so divided in religious sentiments—some Episcopalians, some Quakers, some Anabaptists, some Presbyterians, and some Congregationalists—that we could not join in the same act of worship.4

Strikingly, both of the opponents (Jay and Rutledge) were devoted Christians. In fact, John Jay (who became an author of the Federalist Papers and the original Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court) was a founder and president of the American Bible Society and even wrote lengthy evangelical treatises on the Scriptures. These pious individuals opposed an opening prayer because the various delegates came from many different Christian denominations.

Today, it seems strange that a denominational difference might prevent one Christian from praying with another, but not then. Most of the colonies had official state-established denominations (such as the Anglicans in Virginia, South Carolina, Maryland, North Carolina, and New York; and the Congregationalists in Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts). The governmentally preferred denomination would sometimes persecute and even kill those from other denominations who preached or conducted their own religious services without official authorization from the state church.5 But God had been at work in the colonies, preparing to overcome these abuses by helping Christians focus on the major Biblical teachings on which they all agreed rather than the non-essential denominational doctrines that separated them.

The groundwork for this change came through the national revival known as the Great Awakening (1730-1770) and was especially facilitated through the influence of English evangelist George Whitefield. Whitefield made seven missionary journeys to America, preaching across the country for thirty-four years on horseback, delivering 18,000 sermons.6 It is estimated that eighty percent of all Americans heard him preach,7 and his “Father Abraham” sermon was one of his more famous ones.

John Adams heard that sermon and recounted its message to Thomas Jefferson. In that sermon, Whitefield pretended to be at the gates of Heaven talking to Abraham:

He [Whitefield] began: “Father Abraham,” with his hands and eyes gracefully directed to the heavens (as I have more than once seen him): “Father Abraham, whom have you there with you? Have you Catholics?” “No.” “Have you Protestants?” “No.” “Have you Churchmen?” [Anglicans].“No.” “Have you Dissenters?” [Congregationalists]. “No.” “Have you Presbyterians?” “No.” “Quakers?” “No.” “Anabaptists?” [Baptists, Amish, Mennonites]. “No.” “Whom have you there? Are you alone?” “No.” “My brethren, you have the answer to all these questions in the words of my next text: “He who feareth God and worketh righteousness, shall be accepted of Him’’ [Acts 10:35].8 God help us all to forget having names and to become Christians in deed and in truth.9

Samuel Adams had taken the message of Whitefield’s popular “Father Abraham” sermon and gave it practical application in that first gathering of Congress. After hearing Jay and Rutledge oppose the motion for prayer, he “arose and said he was no bigot, and could hear a prayer from a gentleman of piety and virtue, who was at the same time a friend to his country.”10 Adams then acknowledged that because he was from Boston, he “was a stranger in Philadelphia, but had heard that [the Rev.] Mr. [Jacob] Duché (pronounced Dushay) deserved that character, and therefore he moved that Mr. Duché, an Episcopalian clergyman, might be desired to read prayers to the Congress tomorrow morning.”11

It is significant that Samuel Adams—an ardent Congregationalist (a Puritan)—personally suggested having an Episcopalian clergyman from the Church of England (a denomination greatly disliked by Congregationalists) deliver the original opening prayer in Congress. By this suggestion, Adams was implementing the Acts 10:35 message so long preached by Whitefield.

Interestingly, seventy years later in arguments before the US Supreme Court, the great Daniel Webster recalled this example to the Justices, reminding them:

At the meeting of the first Congress, there was a doubt in the minds of many about the propriety of opening the session with prayer; and the reason assigned was, as here, the great diversity of opinion and religious belief. Until at last Mr. Samuel Adams, with his gray hairs hanging about his shoulders and with an impressive venerableness now seldom to be met with . . . rose in that assembly, and with the air of a perfect Puritan said it did not become men professing to be Christian men who had come together for solemn deliberation in the hour of their extremity to say that there was so wide a difference in their religious belief that they could not, as one man, bow the knee in prayer to the Almighty, Whose advice and assistance they hoped to obtain. . . . And depend upon it, that where there is a spirit of Christianity, there is a spirit which rises above form, above ceremonies, independent of sect or creed, and the controversies of clashing doctrines.12

Adams’ Whitefield-like rebuke penetrated the hearts of the other delegates:

[Cushing’s] motion was seconded, and passed in the affirmative. Mr. [Peyton] Randolph [of Virginia], our President, waited on Mr. Duché. . . Accordingly, next morning he appeared with his clerk and in his pontificals.13

In the culture of that day, prayer was not nearly so casual as it is today; it was very formal. As Benjamin Franklin once noted, clergy “officiated” in prayer.14 And recall that when Samuel Adams moved for Jacob Duché to “read prayers in the established form,” Duché agreed to do so, arriving “with his clerk and in his pontificals”—that is, he entered the assembly with an entourage and in his special ceremonial robes. Prayers over public bodies at that time involved an orthodox ceremonial formality that deliberately conveyed a majestic reverence for Almighty God.

But Duché did much more than just “officiate” by “reading” prayers from the Book of Common Prayer. Surprising everyone present, he launched into an unforeseen but passionate and spontaneous prayer. According to John Adams:

Mr. Duché, unexpectedly to everybody, struck out into an extemporary prayer which filled the bosom of every man present.15

What was the effect?

I must confess I never heard a better prayer or one so well pronounced. . . .with such fervor, such ardor, such earnestness and pathos, and in language so elegant and sublime. . . .It has had an excellent effect upon everybody here.16

Several delegates commented on Duché’s remarkable prayer, including Samuel Adams,17 Joseph Reed,18 and Samuel Ward;19 and Silas Deane reported that Duché’s prayer. . .

was worth riding one hundred mile to hear. He. . .prayed without book about ten minutes so pertinently, with such fervency, purity, and sublimity of style and sentiment, and with such an apparent sensibility of the scenes and business before us, that even Quakers shed tears.20

By the way, Deane’s comment that it was a prayer “worth riding one hundred mile to hear” is significant. In that day, riding one hundred miles meant three days in the saddle. Deane admitted that he would have willingly spent three days on horseback just to reach that gathering and hear that prayer. And the prayer delivered by this Anglican minister was so powerful that it even caused even the stern Quakers (the group most frequently persecuted by Duché’s Anglican denomination) to “shed tears” as they listened to it.

While the exact wording of that first prayer is not known, an indication of the type of prayers prayed by Duché can be ascertained in the Second Continental Congress. Shortly after the Declaration of Independence was approved, Duché was appointed congressional chaplain21 and delivered this stirring prayer:

O Lord our heavenly Father, high and mighty King of kings and Lord of lords. . .over all the kingdoms, empires, and governments, look down in mercy, we beseech Thee, on these American States who have fled to Thee from the rod of the oppressor and thrown themselves on Thy gracious protection, desiring to be henceforth dependent only on Thee; to Thee have they appealed for the righteousness of their cause; to Thee do they now look up for that countenance and support which Thou alone canst give; take them, therefore, Heavenly Father, under Thy nurturing care; give them wisdom in council, and valor in the field; defeat the malicious designs of our cruel adversaries; convince them of the unrighteousness of their cause. . . .All this we ask in the name and through the merits of Jesus Christ, Thy Son and our Savior, Amen!22

A year later, it did not appear as if his prayer would be answered. The Americans had lost battle after battle, and British troops had invaded and seized his hometown of Philadelphia. In the midst of this gloomy outlook, Duché wrote George Washington, predicting defeat for the Americans and urging him to retract the Declaration of Independence. Washington refused, and Congress declared Duché a traitor, whereupon he fled to Great Britain. But late in life, after receiving permission from President Washington, Duché returned to America where he spent his remaining years.

But returning to that first gathering, Congress did not just pray. According to John Adams, Duché also. . .

read the collect [Scriptures] for the seventh day of September, which was the thirty-fifth Psalm. You must remember this was the next morning after we heard the horrible rumor of the cannonade of Boston. I never saw a greater effect upon an audience. It seemed as if Heaven had ordained that Psalm to be read on that morning. . . .It has had an excellent effect upon everybody here. I must beg you to read that Psalm. . . .Read this letter and the 35th Psalm to [your friends]. Read it to your father [the Rev. William Smith, church pastor].23

Significantly, when the delegates gathered in Philadelphia, they heard a rumor that Boston was under attack. The Founders’ distress was palpable; they were still British citizens, and their own British army and navy was now besieging them. But Psalm 35 spoke directly to their growing fears.

Delegate Silas Deane noted that “the lessons [Scriptures] of the day, which were accidentally extremely applicable,”24 and John Adams agreed, affirming that the reading of Psalm 35 on that day was not only “most admirably adapted” but also that was “Providential.”25

Significantly, when the Book of Common Prayer was written in 1662 under King Charles II, Psalm 35 had been designated for reading on September 7 of each year (other passages also assigned for that day and studied in Congress that morning included Amos 9, Matthew 8, and Psalm 36). The fact that Psalm 35 had been assigned to that day well over a century earlier affirmed to the Founders that God knew what they would be facing at that time, thus confirming to them that He was watching over them—that, as one Founding Father expressed it, “the liberties of America are the object of Divine protection.”26

As you read Psalm 35, place yourself in the Founders’ circumstances, imagine their mindset on that day, and consider the fear that must have tried to grip their souls. Since this Psalm contains the prayers of an innocent and defenseless people attacked by a much stronger adversary, it is easy to understand why it so impacted the nation’s first Congress.

Endnotes

1 “An association, signed by 89 members of the late House of Bugesses,” May 27, 1774, Library of Congress, http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.rbc/rbpe.17801200.

2 “Letter from the New York Committee of Fifty-One to the Boston Committee of Correspondence; May 23, 1774,” The Avalon Project, http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/letter_ny_comm_1774.asp.

3John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams, During the Revolution, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1875), 37.

4 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

5 See, for example, James Madison to William Bradford, Jr., January 24, 1774, The Writings of James Madison (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1900), 21; James Underwood and William Burke, The Dawn of Religious Freedom in South Carolina (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2006), 167; Robert Semple, A History of the Rise and Progress of the Baptists in Virginia (Richmond: Robert Semple, 1810), 14, 29-30; A Companion to Thomas Jefferson, ed. Francis Cogliano, editor (Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, 2011), 78; Cyclopedia of Methodism, ed. Matthew Simpson (Philadelphia: Everts & Stewart, 1878), s.v. “Virginia.”

6 See, for example, John Gillies, Memoirs of Rev. George Whitefield (Middletown: Hunt & Noyes, 1838), 273; N. F. Bryant, The Household Monthly (Boston: N. F. Bryant, December 1859), III:3: 237, “Whitefield in America.”

7 See, for example, “George Whitefield: Did you Know,” April 1, 1993, Christian History; Dave Schleck, “CW to Recreate Visit of Famous Preacher,” December 15, 1995, Daily Press; Stephen Gorham, “The Divine Dramatist: George Whitefield and the Full Flowering of the Great Awakening,” February 26, 2012, American History, Suite 101.

8 John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, December 3, 1813, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Andrew A. Lipscomb (Washington, DC: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), XIV:19-20.

9 Stephen Mansfield, Forgotten Founding Father: The Heroic Legacy of George Whitefield (Nashville: Cumberland House, 2001), 86.

10 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

11 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

12 Daniel Webster, Mr. Webster’s Speech in Defence of the Christian Ministry, and In Favor of the Religious Instruction of the Young (Washington, D. C.: Gales and Seaton, 1844), 36-37.

13 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

14 The Works of Benjamin Franklin, ed. John Bigelow (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904), XI:378, “Motion for Prayers in the [Constitutional] Convention.”

15 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

16 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

17 Samuel Adams to Joseph Warren, September 9, 1774, Letters of Delegates to Congress, ed. Paul H. Smith (Washington, D. C.: Library of Congress, 1976), I:55.

18 John Adams diary entry of September 10, 1774 The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1850), II:377-378.

19 Samuel Ward’s diary entry of September 7, 1774, Letters of Delegates, ed. Smith (1976), I:45.

20 Silas Deane to Elizabeth Deane, September 7, 1774, The Silas Deane Papers (New York: New York Historical Society, 1887), I:20.

21 July 9, 1776, The Journals of the Continental Congress (Washington, D. C.: Government Printing Office, 1906), V:530.

22 James Thatcher, A Military Journal (Boston: Richardson and Lord, 1823), 145n.

23 John Adams to Abigail Adams, September 16, 1774, Familiar Letters, ed. Adams (1875), 37.

24 Silas Deane to Elizabeth Deane, September 7, 1774, Silas Deane Papers (1887), I:20.

25 John Adams diary entry of September 7, 1774, Works of John Adams, ed. Adams (1850), II:368.

26 George Washington, General Orders of September 26, 1780, The Writings of George Washington, ed. John C. Fitzpatrick (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 1937), XX:95.

The Sermon on the Mount Carl Bloch, 1890

His Desire to Answer Prayer

Thoughts on Matthew 6

Prayer has always been central to Biblical faith, highlighted in dozens of examples throughout the Scriptures, and was therefore also deeply embedded in American life. In fact, colonial, state, and federal governments issued over 1,400 official calls to prayer between 1620 and 1815.1 The Founding Fathers clearly were convinced of the efficacy of prayer.

John Jay, who was the original Chief Justice on the US Supreme Court, believed that the fact that God had told us to pray, and that He had even told us how to pray and what to pray for, were clear indications that He wanted to answer our prayers. As he explained:

Had it not been the purpose of God that His will should be done on earth as it is done in heaven, He would not have commanded us to pray for it. That command implies a prediction and a promise that in due season it shall be accomplished.2

Jay’s reference is to the Lord’s Prayer, when Jesus’ disciples had come to Him and asked Him to teach them to pray, to which He replied:

Pray, then, in this way: ‘Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. [For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.’] (Matthew 6:9-13)

This prayer, well known to the Founding Fathers, appeared in American public school textbooks for well over two centuries, and an elderly John Quincy Adams attested that it was one of the first things he had learned as a youngster:

My mother was the daughter of a Christian clergyman . . . In that same spring and summer of 1775 [when I was only seven], she taught me to repeat daily after the Lord’s Prayer before rising from bed, the Ode of Collins on the patriot warriors [a patriotic poem]. . . .Now—seventy-one years after they were thus taught me—I repeat them from memory.3

Early American statesman John Chandler Davis conversed with Adams about the Lord’s Prayer shortly before the latter’s death (Adams died in the U. S. Capitol in 1848), Davis recounted:

In 1847, I became well acquainted with him and frequently met with him and talked with him in the House of Representatives. I remember one morning in 1847 that I met him before the House was called to order. He was very feeble. It was not long before the subject of religion was introduced by Mr. Adams. Among other things I remember his saying, “There are two prayers I love to say: the first is The Lord’s Prayer, and because the Lord taught it; and the other is what seems to be a child’s prayer, “Now I lay me down to sleep,” etc., and I love to say this because it suits me. And,” he added, “I love this prayer so much that I have been repeating it every night for very many years past, and I say it yet – and I expect to say it my last night on earth if I am conscious. But,” said he, “I have added a few words to the prayer so as to express my trust in Christ, and also to acknowledge what I ask for I ask as a favor and not because I deserve it. This is it,” said he, and then he repeated it as he was in the habit of saying it: “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep; if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take – for Jesus’ sake. Amen.” This was in 1847. He died in 1848 while I was living in Washington, and I have no doubt but that the “child’s prayer that just suited” him was reverently repeated every night until he died.4

Jesus taught His disciples to pray the Lord’s Prayer, something many Founding Fathers faithfully embraced. The Lord’s Prayer serves as a time-tested helpful guide for our own prayers that comes with a clear indication of God’s desire to answer them. As John Jay affirmed, the Lord’s Prayer leads to answered prayer.

Endnotes

1 DeLoss Love, The Fast and Thanksgiving Days of New England (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1895), 464-514.

2 John Jay at the Annual Meeting, May 8, 1823, The Life of John Jay, with Selections of his Correspondence and Miscellaneous Papers, ed. William Jay (New York: J. & J. Harper, 1833), 1:503.

3 John Quincy Adams, The Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, ed. Charles Francis Adams (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1874), I:5-6.

4 J. C. Davis, , “Child-Likeness of the Old Man Eloquent,” The Churchman (1890), reprinted in The Sunday School Union (1890), XXXII:415.