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Explore the birth of the Kingdom of God in America, as the Pilgrims and Puritans embarked on a revival and reformation journey to form a nation that declared liberty from the Kingdom. Discover the role of the church in society, the American Revolution, and the challenges faced along the way.
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HOW THE CHURCH… Birthed the Kingdom of God in Establishing America
What if God…. Birthed a revival among His people and coupled that with reformation of society? Sent these individuals and churches into a wilderness to form a civilization? Allowed them to experiment, make mistakes, but eventually form a nation? Brought forth a nation that consciously declared that the Kingdom of God produced its liberty and other nations can now follow its example?
He did… it’s the United States The Pilgrims and Puritans were in revival with a reformation (Kingdom) worldview They believed they were sent into a wilderness to build a Kingdom civilization They wrestled with the relationship between church, state and the private sectors, making mistakes that hindered liberty and choice Eventually the United States was brought forth that declared that the liberty it had came from the Kingdom of God…
18th Century - Colonial Pastor / ChurchThe“Black Robed Regiment” • Sermon was the main communication media (Sunday, Election, Artillery, Weekly – 15,000 hrs) • By age 18, equal to three college educations! • Great Awakening (1706-1750) – 1/5 converted (90%) • Believers embraced a Biblical World View • God is Sovereign; government by consent (limited) • Rights are God-given (justice – equality) • Religious liberty unalienable (jurisdiction) • Charity is most effective as private (localism) • Economic liberty in the marketplace (self-rule) • Defensive war is just (service-based power)
The American Revolution1760-1790 “Rights as Men, Christians and Subjects” – Sam Adams (The Creator-Redeemer Distinction)
Father of the American Revolution - August 1, 1776 We have explored the temple of royalty, and found that the idol we have bowed down to, has eyes which see not, and ears that hear not our prayers, and a heart like that of nether millstone. We have this day restored the Sovereign, to whom alone men ought to be obedient. He reigns in Heaven, and with a propitious eye beholds his subjects assuming that freedom of thought, and dignity of self-direction which He bestowed on them. From the rising to the setting sun, may His kingdom come. Samuel Adams
A Dark Time; 1776-1777 • Though America had declared Independence… • New York City was taken by the British… • Invasion of Canada failed… • Though we won Trenton and Princeton… • We were driven out of New Jersey • Washington lost Brandywine (200 dead, 500 wounded; 400 captured) • Paoli Massacre in Pennsylvania (300 dead; 100 captured) • British forced Congress out of Philadelphia, fled to York… • John Adams: “the prospect is chilling, on every side; gloomy, dark, melancholy, and dispiriting”
Sam Adams to 20 members of Congress in York, Pennsylvania, September of 1777 Gentleman, your spirits appear oppressed with the weight of the public calamities. Your sadness of countenance reveals your disquietude. A patriot may grieve at the distress of his country. But he will never despair of the commonwealth…. Our affairs, it is said, are desperate! If this be our language, they are indeed. If we wear long faces, long faces will become fashionable. The eyes of the people are upon us. The tone of their feelings is regulated by ours. If we despond, public confidence is destroyed (bridge of trust),the people will no longer yield their support to a hopeless contest, and American liberty is no more.
But we are not driven to such narrow straits. Though fortune has been unpropitious, our condition is not desperate. Our burdens, though grievous, can be borne. Our losses, though great, can be retrieved. Through the darkness which shrouds our prospects the ark of safety is visible. Despondency becomes not the dignity of our cause, nor the character of those who are its supporters. Let us awaken then, and evince a different spirit - a spirit that shall inspire the people with confidence in themselves and in us - a spirit that will encourage them to persevere in this glorious struggle, until their rights and liberties shall be established on a rock.
We have proclaimed to the world our determination 'to die freemen, rather than to live slaves.' We have appealed to Heaven for the justice of our cause, and in Heaven have we placed our trust. Numerous have been the manifestations of God's providence in sustaining us. In the gloomy period of adversity, we have had 'our cloud by day and pillar of fire by night.' We have been reduced to distress, and the arm of Omnipotence has raised us up. Let us still rely in humble confidence on Him who is mighty to save. Good tidings will soon arrive. We shall never be abandoned by Heaven while we act worthy of its aid and protection.
Good Tidings did Come…. Trumbull commissioned – 1821 hung in Capitol
“A signal stroke of Providence” - Washington General Schuyler General Stark General Gates General Burgoyne Colonel Morgan
Day of Thanksgiving Proclaimed;December 18, 1777 FORASMUCH as it is the indispensable Duty of all Men to adore the superintending Providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with Gratitude their Obligation to him for Benefits received, and to implore such farther Blessings as they stand in Need of: And it having pleased him in his abundant Mercy, not only to continue to us the innumerable Bounties of his common Providence; but also to smile upon us in the Prosecution of a just and necessary War, for the Defense and Establishment of our unalienable Rights and Liberties; particularly in that he hath been pleased, in so great a Measure, to prosper the Means used for the Support of our Troops, and to crown our Arms with most signal success…
Day of Thanksgiving Proclaimed… …That at one Time and with one Voice, the good People may express the grateful Feelings of their Hearts, and consecrate themselves to the Service of their Divine Benefactor; and that, together with their sincere Acknowledgments and Offerings, they may join the penitent Confession of their manifold Sins, whereby they had forfeited every Favor; and their humble and earnest Supplication that it may please GOD through the Merits of JESUS CHRIST, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of Remembrance…
Day of Thanksgiving Proclaimed… ...under the Providence of Almighty GOD, to secure for these United States, the greatest of all human Blessings, INDEPENDENCE and PEACE: That it may please him, to prosper the Trade and Manufactures of the People, and the Labor of the Husbandman, that our Land may yield its Increase: To take Schools and Seminaries of Education, so necessary for cultivating the Principles of true Liberty, Virtue and Piety, under his nurturing Hand; and to prosper the Means of Religion, for the promotion and enlargement of that Kingdom, which consisteth “in Righteousness, Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost."
Samuel Cooper of Brattles Church (1725-1783) Pastored Brattles Street Church Boston 1747-1783 Pastored John Hancock, Sam Adams, John Adams, James Bowdoin and Joseph Warren Highly influenced Benjamin Franklin and Phyllis Wheatley Helped to establish the French alliance in the War Wrote the address published with proposed Massachusetts Constitution of 1780…
The Declaration of Independence July 4, 1776
Thomas Jefferson to Henry Lee – May 8, 1825 “…this was the object of the Declaration of Independence. Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of… it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion. All its authority rests then on the harmonizing sentiments of the day…”
John Adams to Timothy Pickering on the Declaration - 1822 “…as you justly observe, there is not an idea in it but what had been hackneyed in Congress for two years before. The substance of it is contained in the declaration of rights and the violation of those rights, in the Journals of Congress, in 1774. Indeed, the essence of it is contained in a pamphlet, voted and printed by the town of Boston, before the first Congress met.”
Calvin Coolidge– July 5, 1926 “The great apostle of this movement (toward independence) was the Rev. John Wise …His works were reprinted in 1772 and have been declared to have been nothing less than a textbook of liberty for our Revolutionary fathers… No one can examine this record and escape the conclusion that in the great outline of its principles the Declaration was the result of the religious teachings of the preceding period…”
John Wise of Ipswich – 1689 (1652-1725) Pastored 2nd Chebcco Church in Ipswich 1683-1725 Stated from the pulpit “no taxes shall be levied on the subjects without consent” in 1687 Inspired Cotton Mather to write a Declaration of Independence Vindication of the Churches of New England in 1717 (self-rule) Sam Adams re-printed the Vindication in 1772; inspiring the Declaration of 1776
A Vindication of the Government of New England Churches - 1717 Henry Martin Dexter said of Wise’s work… “he did not himself see, nor did his generation comprehend, either the exact bearing, or the entire force, of the principles which he enunciated. It was in his intent to …bring the churches back to the Cambridge Platform as their fundamental law; but in so doing he generated a momentum…”
The Law of Liberty(self-rule / localism) • Law of Nature – creation law; the law of God “self-evident” in nature (imperfect due to man’s sin nature) – common grace • The Law of God – the precepts of liberty written in the Bible (perfect) • Wise – “an original liberty stampt upon his rational nature… the light of nature and revelation” • Declaration – “the laws of nature and of nature’s God”
Government protects Rights(limits) • God-given rights of life, liberty, property to be protected (not provided) by Government • Only God-given rights are inalienable • Wise – “the end of all good government is to cultivate… happiness of all mankind… in all his rights, his Life, Liberty, Estate… • Declaration – “endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights… that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men”
Delegated Authority(jurisdiction) • Only God has ultimate Sovereign authority • The people, under God, give permission for civil government’s jurisdiction… • The people delegate authority through the constitution (covenant) before God (oath) • Wise – “the first human subject and original of civil power is the people…” • Declaration – “deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
Individuality(Justice-Equality) • Individuals created “in the image of God” • Individuals are equal before the law • Equal rights, not equal things or capacity • Individuals make the welfare of groups… • Wise – “Every man… equal to every man… no servitude or subjection can be conceived without inequality” • Declaration – “all men are created equal”
Lemuel Haynes(1753-1833)First African American Ordained • Converted /discipled in Great Awakening as a slave until 1774 • Joined Minutemen in 1775; garrisoned Ticonderoga in 1776 • Wrote a ballad on the Battle of Lexington in 1776 (justice): • For liberty each Freeman strives, as it’s a gift of God; • And for it, willingly yield their lives, and seal it with their blood. • Twice happy they who thus resign, into the peaceful grave, • Much better those in death consign, than a surviving slave. • First Black ordained in 1783 – all white church in Connecticut • Leading Calvinist minister in Vermont (1783-1814) • Opposed Expatriation of Slaves in 1817 (Colonization Society) • Opposed Unitarianism – Universal Salvation sermon…
One Race – all mankind equal • Abraham Lincoln on Dred Scott – June 26, 1857 • Blacks were included in the meaning of “equality” • By 1857, theirconditionhadbeen “ameliorated” • Supreme Court decisions aren’t “the law of the land” “…the opinion of the Supreme court… ought not to control the coordinate authorities of this Government. The Congress, the executive and the court, must each for itself be guided by its own opinion of the Constitution. Each public officer, who takes an oath to support the Constitution, swears that he will support it as he understands it, and not as it is understood by others.”
Whites and Free Blacks were initially protected as equals…. • State Constitutions of Delaware (1776); Maryland (1776); Pennsylvania (1776); New York (1777); Massachusetts (1780), and New Hampshire (1784); all protected racial voting • In a number of States, free blacks and whites both ratified the Constitution (1787-1788) • Blacks held office prior to the Civil War • Congressional and State laws “ameliorated” the equality of blacks from 1820 to 1860…
