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God had kept North America unsettled until rather late in history.

To be sure, earlier on, there were travelers from Asia who did arrive on the west coast, and who eventually did spread across the continent.  Yet, even after thousands of years, these aborigines were still few in number, and the continent remained, in effect, a wilderness.

Travelers then came from the opposite direction, that is, from the east, from Norway via Iceland and Greenland and settled on the east coast of Vinland hundreds of years before Columbus came.  Nevertheless, as the settlements in Iceland and Greenland perished, so nothing permanent ever became of any Norse settlement that had been founded in North America.

What was God’s purpose in keeping North America unsettled?

It was what his providence always has been in regards to man:  it was in view of man’s afterlife.  That is, the Lord of heaven and earth wants all those born in time to recognize their sins, to be sorry for them, and to receive from him his promised gift of salvation, obtaining it by an act of faith.  After that the Lord will take home to him all those who have believed his promise.  In this case, God kept North America unsettled in order to provide a home, a nursery, if you will, for those followers of his recent Reformation in Europe. That is, he had reserved a promised land in which his gospel could grow and spread, indeed, to become one more westward stepping stone from where the gospel could proceed full circle around the globe before the end.

It was in the spirit of such reverent acknowledgment of this soul-saving providence of God that Columbus named the first land in the Western Hemisphere “San Salvador,” that is in English, “holy Savior” and did not give it an irreverent and flippant name such as “Devil’s Lake” (North Dakota).

In fact, not only was it a precursor of things to come in North America that the Norse in Iceland had a republic in 925 A.D., but, more importantly, that fifty years before this, when the Norse first landed, they found orthodox Christians in Iceland, Irishmen, who had remained aloof from the great falling away (2nd Thessalonians 2:3) in the rest of the Western Christian church.  Later in time North America would indeed become a home for orthodox Christianity, predominantly for the German and Scandinavian Lutheran immigrants.

After the handful of explorers of the 1500’s and 1600’s, settlers started to come to North America with the intent to establish a permanent home.  Just the same, of these initial settlements some were disastrous failures; others barely survived.  Of those that did survive, even these amounted to little more than tiny outposts which clung to the shores of the Atlantic.  Hence it appeared that nothing much would ever become of these homesteads.  At this time, 130 years after Columbus, immigrants came in only as a trickle as compared to the waves of immigrants from northern Europe and Scandinavia in the latter third of the 1800’s which poured into this country in the hundreds of thousands.  Thus America was settled in the beginning in various places sparingly, in fact, in human estimate, randomly and haphazardly, with no unified intent or purpose with a view toward any future consolidation.

Yet, unknown to these settlers, God had a different plan in mind.  In his providence he kept his sheltering arms over the infant years of our land, and supported it with his hand as it labored to take its first steps.

A painting of George Washington based on an engraving made by John C. McRae which, in turn, was based on an original painting by Henry Brueckner.

An eyewitness account of this unfolded blessing is given by none other than George Washington in the year 1783, who articulated it in these words:  “The citizens of America, the sole lords and proprietors of a vast tract of continent, are now acknowledged to be possessed of absolute freedom and independency.  Here Heaven has crowned all its other blessings by giving a fairer opportunity for political happiness than any other nation has ever been favored with.  The rights of mankind are better understood and more clearly defined than at any former period.  The collected wisdom acquired through a long succession of years is laid open for our use in the establishment of our forms of government.  The free cultivation of letters, the unbounded extension of commerce, the progressive refinement of manners, the growing liberality of sentiment, and, above all, the pure and benign light of revelation, have had a meliorating influence on mankind.  At this auspicious period, the United States came into existence as a nation” (George Bancroft, History of the United States of America [New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1888], VI, page 84).

In fact, Bancroft himself remarked about our country:  “Our national organization… was essentially imbued with the spirit of the Reformation which rose up in Germany with Luther” (“Church News,”The Lutheran Witness, Vol. 5, No. 6 [7 August, 1886], page 45

Thus “Woodrow Wilson expressed a great historical fact when he said:  “’However humiliating it may be to them or to us, America did not come out of New England’….The Swedes on the Delaware [River] had more to do with the genuine molding of American history than had the Pilgrim Fathers of New England.  With these early colonists, liberty of conscience was a historical fact, and not a mockery or a myth, as with the Pilgrim Fathers of New England.  They laid the foundation for the success of William Penn’s ‘Holy Experiment’ before this great man was born.  At a later day the migration from Pennsylvania into the valleys of the Ohio and Mississippi and to the West spread the Delaware and Pennsylvania influence throughout these regions.  Well for all of us that ‘America did not come out of New England’.  Well for all of us that American did not take on the stamp of the bigotry and intolerance of the witch-hanging and Quaker-hanging Pilgrim Fathers.  Let us be truly thankful that there were ‘other rocks’ than Plymouth Rock” (C. Hale Sipe quoted by Theodore Engelder, “What We Do Not Owe the Pilgrim Fathers,” Theological Monthly, Volume VIII, Number 5 [Saint Louis:  Concordia, May, 1928], page 152).

To be sure, the very men on the spot in the year 1760 and later testified that one could unite “fire and water” sooner than unite the thirteen colonies (W. E. H. Lecky, The American Revolution, editor James A. Woodburn [New York:  D. Appleton and Company, 1908], page 12 footnote).  Yet God brought the colonies together as one nation.

As it is the will of God, according to his Ten Commandments, that men should live peacefully, and accomplish their goals and projects in like manner, for example, as when Canada became an independent nation in the 1800’s in a peaceful manner, so America could have done the same.  Nevertheless, men refused to have it so, and plunged the land into desperate war in 1775.  Just the same, God was neither frustrated nor defeated.  In spite of the fact that things looked so hopeless for the American cause that in 1780 Alexander Hamilton admitted that if the colonies could not get still another loan from France “we must make terms with the Great Britain” (Lecky, page 424 footnote), the Lord listened to the cries of his believers to deliver them, kept his biblical pledge to do so, and, by his marvelous might raised up the American nation out of the ashes of war.

Therefore, realize that in his fathomless plan of mercy, the true and triune God of heaven had kept this continent as a trackless wilderness so that he could provide a home for his followers of the Reformation, which had restored the biblical gospel, to be guided by him from inception to form a Christian nation, and to be blessed by him with a golden age of gospel believers, who could and should be a soul-saving beacon to the rest of the world!

Yet our people soon fell away from a love of God’s truth, and, after a period of his patience and grace, had refused to hear his warning calls to repent and to return to the Lord.  Keeping his threat to destroy any nation that would reject his gospel, our land is now subject to his unrelenting anger.  We deserve it.  We have no excuse to offer.

Nevertheless, trust in the Lord’s promise:  “The Lord is with you while you are with him” (2nd Chronicles 15:2)! Humble yourself, admit your guilt, confess our country’s sins, ask the Lord for his forgiveness of them, and plead, “Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name; and deliver us and purge away our sins, for your name’s sake” (Psalm 79:9)!

Prayer/Hymn

Lord, while for all mankind we pray,
Of ev’ry clime and coast,
Oh, hear us for our native land,
The land we love the most.

Oh, guard our shores from ev’ry foe,
With peace our borders bless,
With prosp’rous time our cities crown,
Our fields with plenteousness.

Unite us in the sacred love
Of knowledge, truth and Thee;
And let our hills and valleys shout
The songs of liberty.

Here may religion, pure and mild,
Smile on our Sabbath hours;
And piety and virtue bless
The home of us and ours.

Lord of the nations, thus to Thee
Our country we commend:
Be Thou her Refuge and her Trust,
Her everlasting Friend!

                               John Reynell Wreford (1800-1881).

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Prepare yourself spiritually!  Repent of your sins!

“The Lord comes… to convict all who are ungodly” (Jude 14, 15).  “You are convicted by the law as transgressors” (James 2:9).  “Repent!” (Mark 1:15.)  “I will declare mine iniquity; I will be in anguish over my sin” (Psalm 38:18).

Have saving faith in the gospel!
“I am poor and sorrowful; let your salvation, O God, set me up on high!” (Psalm 69:29.)  “Do not be furious, O Lord!” (Isaiah 64:9.)  “The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit” (Psalm 34:18).  “All sins will be forgiven the sons of men” (Mark 3:28).  “God in Christ also forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32).

Humble yourself!  Do not have pride!

“Lord, you have heard the desire of the humble” (Psalm 10:17).  “Thus says the High and Lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:  ‘I dwell in the high and holy place with him who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble’” (Isaiah 57:15).  “Be clothed with humility, for ‘God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble’.  Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God” (1st Peter 5:5-6).  “If my people who are called by my name would humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2nd Chronicles 7:14).

Possess a fear of God, not flippancy!
“As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear him.  As the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward those who fear him” (Psalm 103:13, 11).  “Fear God!” (Revelation 14:7.)

Bring forth fruits of repentance!
“To him who orders his conduct aright, I will show the salvation of God” (Psalm 50:23).

Confess to God the sins of our country!  Make a list of them!

Plead with Heaven for their forgiveness!
In doing this you will obey God’s command that he wants you to do this (Psalm 10:17; 1st Timothy 2:1; “that they may receive forgiveness of sins,” Acts 26:18).  You will act as a wall between his anger and our country (Ezekiel 22:30).  As a result, our country will be spared from the punishment of war, and will have a longer period of grace.

Pray for the peace of the land (Jeremiah 29:7)!

Walk in the Lord’s ways!
“If we would sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer will remain a sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26).  “He who does the will of God abides forever” (1st John 2:17).  “Understand what the will of the Lord is!” (Ephesians 5:17.)

Befriend, encourage, and support others:
Do this to neighbors and to those who would be running for political office, being the “salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13).  “To him who orders his conduct aright I will show the salvation of God” (Psalm 50:23).  “If you would abide in my word, you will be my disciples indeed” (John 8:31).

Help our citizens to repent of their sins, and to believe the true gospel:
“To open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins”! (Acts 26:18.)

Pray that God would raise up future heroes for the Christian faith, who would be good helpers to their fellow Americans, and who would do their duty in the future, terrible conflict, and have their self-sacrificing efforts blessed by God!

Set a good example for them now when they are children, so that they could be encouraged to do the same when they become adults!

Draw up a list of passages in which Scripture teaches about countries:  How God will bless them when they believe, and how he will punish when they would not, and of how we are to obey as citizens so that you would be able to answer those who might refer to this subject, and so that you may teach those who do not know!

Draw up a list of law and gospel passages – the law to make you repent – and the gospel to keep your faith alive!  Read it!  Assemble passages of God’s protection promises in which he pledges to feed, to clothe, and to protect you from danger!

Accumulate a library of sound, Lutheran doctrinal books and devotional books so that these may be your teachers!  The best books will be the older ones published in America by Concordia Publishing House from 1889 – 1940, or even recently published ones that have been translated from older German or Latin Lutheran books.  If some of the doctrinal books would prove to be hard to understand, get a teacher to explain them!

Then “be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might!” (Ephesians 6:10.)

Prepare, and be vigilant!

“As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man:  They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.  Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot:  They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and sulfur from heaven and destroyed them all.  Even so it will be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed” (Luke 17:26-30).

Prepare, and be vigilant!  You are living at a dangerous time in America.  One of the great dangers that is seldom thought of, much less acted upon, at this time, is the lazy notion that the way you are living religiously would be fine as it is; that there would be no reason to improve it.  Indeed, it would make no sense or difference to make a radical change for the purpose of preparation since there would be nothing for which you would need to prepare.  Every tomorrow turns out to be the same as the day before.  Humanly speaking, there is nothing in sight that could and should motivate you to stop the way in which you are living morally, and to begin to prepare for disaster as if it were to strike tomorrow.  Yet, in spite of this mistaken reasoning, or better:  on account of this mistaken reasoning, the text urges preparedness.

What preparedness?  Physical preparedness – food, water, and batteries?

Actually, the preparedness which is needed is a moral one, in which Christians must get more serious about repentance and faith, and do it urgently with great earnest.  The temptation of the hour is to think that the current effort at repentance and faith is sufficient, no more is needed, especially in comparison to other church members who seem to be lax and worldly.  Yet listen to the text!  Properly speaking, it is a warning to get yourself prepared for Judgment Day through repentance and faith, and not to let your guard down by the eternal sameness of everyday living.

Just the same, on top of this marked effort to be vigilant against a faith-wrecking preoccupation with worldly matters before Judgment Day is the preparedness for a calamity brought upon this country by God similar to the ones in the text.  In those two instances the monotony of daily life went on normally and regularly, though morally things had actually declined little by little, barely perceptible day by day, until the awful stench of the end product which ascended to the nose of God became unbearable.  Then, one day, unexpectedly and unannounced, though it had been warned about in advance, punishment came so fast and furious that no one could prepare for it, delay it, or out run it.  Only those faithful souls who took God’s warning to heart; who took the effort to be vigilant; who shook themselves out of the lethargy of sin, though there appeared to be nothing on the horizon to be vigilant about; though vigilance seemed to be a waste of time, were prepared spiritually, ignoring the cries of “Fanatic!” from their families and friends, having put off every sin that would drain faith’s strength, and having reinforced their faith by regular reading of the gospel promises.  Then, come what may, whatever calamity God would send in his wisdom, they were ready, and having done all, they could stand (Ephesians 6:13), strengthened by the might which God had supplied them through their law and gospel efforts at vigilance and preparedness.

Therefore, be prepared for the coming firestorm on America which will precede Judgment Day!  Do not let your morals slide, or let your faith decline because of worldliness, reasoning that the level where you are at morally is a lot better than most!  Heaven does not gauge by the standard set by sinful men.  By God’s gauge the righteous scarcely will be saved (1st Peter 4:18).

Be vigilant!  Remember Noah and Lot!

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The American people themselves will be to blame.  All of us would be; for all of us would fall into three groups:
Either (1) those citizens who would reject the Almighty’s call to repent of their sins and to believe his saving gospel pledge; (2) those who would retain a Christian church membership but actually would have “fallen away” (2nd Thessalonians 2:3) from a genuine repentance and gospel faith; that is, they would have backslidden (Jeremiah 3:12) and would have forsaken the Lord (Jeremiah 2:13), and thus actually would belong in the first group; and (3) those who genuinely have a biblical repentance and gospel faith, yet who have failed to act as salt (Matthew 5:13), that is, who have failed to do enough to prevent this land from backsliding from the gospel, and to keep God from punishing this country.
In regards to this third group, the Holy Spirit has warned, “The time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God” (1st Peter 4:7).  In other words, above all others God holds his believing children responsible when he would “punish the world for its sins, and the wicked for their iniquity” (Isaiah 13:11), for they should know better.  They have “the mind of Christ” (1st Corinthians 2:16) and biblical knowledge which the unbelievers do not have.  Hence, obeying the command of God (Ezekiel 22:30-31) and following the example of Ezra’s prayer (Ezra 9:6, 10, 13, & 15), of Daniel’s prayer (Daniel 9:3-27), and the spirit of Abraham’s prayer (Genesis 18:22-32), believers must (1) humble themselves, (2) confess the sins of our citizens, (3) plead with God that these sins may be forgiven, (4) pray for the peace of the land (Jeremiah 29:7), that is, ask for a stay of execution from its deserved divine punishment, and thus “make up the hedge and stand in the gap” like a firewall between God’s anger and a land of wicked citizens, so that he “could not destroy it” (Ezekiel 22:30).
Just the same, how many Christians and congregations have failed to do this very thing?  For example, some seek the good things of this world first of all, and not the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33).   Others try to serve both God and personal possessions (Matthew 6:24).  Instead of being a salt (Matthew 5:13), some church members rather join the unbelievers in the sins of the flesh.  “The sharp line, which God’s Word draws between the world and the children of God, is in many matters almost completely erased.  That is also the reason why the world does not hate us any more.  We have become friends with it.  We are ashamed to confess Christ to the world.  The world loves its own and notices that we have moved closer to it and have become more like it.  It notices that a child of the world is often more dear and more highly regarded than a brother in the faith, and that we would rather give up a brother than a friendly child of the world.  The world indeed sees how similar we are to it.” ¹
So who would be to blame for the worsening conditions in America?  The sincere Christian must blame himself, repent of his negligence, ask for forgiveness, be assured of forgiveness, and then, act as salt and a firewall.
Do so!

Read the following piece from the devotional book by F. E. Pasche, Daily Bread (Saint Louis:  Concordia, 1926), page 292-293!

“Beware of the Cares of This Life!

Having food and raiment, let us be therewith content. 1 Tim.6:8.

The unbelieving children of this world have their minds fixed on nothing but the things of this world.  Their sole desire is to enjoy this life, to have a good time, to eat, drink, and be merry, and to obtain wealth, to acquire an abundance of earthly possessions.  These are the things which occupy their minds day and night.  And how restless are they in the chase after riches!  How do they scheme in order that they may obtain this world’s goods and enjoy them!  How often are they led by their craving for wealth and pleasure to deviate from the path of honesty, to resort to unlawful means, to trickery and fraud, to burden their consciences, and to make themselves miserable!  They are ensnared in the cares of this life.  And where does this earthly-mindedness lead to?  The apostle says:  “Whose end is destruction.”  Eternal damnation is the goal for which they are making.
Oh, beware, then, of the cares of this life!  Provide for your immortal soul!  Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness!  Christians must not be earthly-minded; their hearts and hopes are to be fixed above.  Heart and mind should ever become more loosed, disengaged, from the things of this world, and our longing for the world to come should continually increase and grow.  It is true that we must to a certain extent occupy our minds also with earthly things, inasmuch as we must live and provide for our own temporal welfare and that of others; but our true home is in heaven.  There are things of much higher importance than the things of this present life – the things that are above, the things that can make us truly happy.  Earthly things cannot make us truly happy.  True happiness surely cannot dwell in the hearts of those who have no higher aim than to receive their good things in their lifetime and occupy their minds with nothing but earthly things.  Truly happy are they who are in the world, but not of the world.  Happy are the faithful Christians who are heavenly-minded.

Prayer.

Almighty God, teach us that our labor is in vain except Thou bless it in order that we may ask Thee for Thy gifts.  Preserve us from fears springing from lack of trust in Thee and from worldly anxieties, that we may labor for our necessities in this life, like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, without care.  Let us be diligent in the work of our calling, and yet not form covetousness or the desire to gain wealth, but from obedience to Thee, that we may so pass through things temporal that we shall not lose the things eternal.  Amen.

¹ C. F. W. Walther, Old Standard Gospels, translator Donald E. Heck (Fort Wayne:  Concordia Theological Seminary Press, 1984), page 396.

    45-What-is-wrong-with-America

Simply stated, it will be this:  Americans have rejected God’s gospel promise of salvation in Jesus Christ.

Thus the trouble with America will not be –

• An opposition to new politics.
• An unwillingness to accept the different morals of others.
• A resistance to a cultural cleansing.

Rather what you are seeing going on today is the result of the rejection of God’s gospel and of that good change which it makes in the soul, namely, all sorts of lawlessness, selfishness, and the promotion of evil.

Because Americans have refused to repent of their sins, they have engaged in all sorts of lawless behavior which has brought on misery, division, and a loss of civility.  Therefore, God has sent his punishments on top of this self-inflicted misery by way of floods, storms, droughts, disease, loss of income, and tyrannical government. This is why things have gone from good to bad in America.

In short, Americans have forsaken morality for immorality.  This occurred after the majority of Americans left the gospel faith for unbelief.

This change had been going on for some time at a slower rate.  In the 1960’s it gathered tremendous speed and momentum from pop music, from the pop culture urged in books, and from the entertainment media in general.  Even such a humbling divine punishment as the Vietnam War did not pause much less slow down America’s wild partying.  “How the mighty are fallen!” (2nd Samuel 1:25.)

Ask someone aged seventy to eighty years old how things used to be years ago as compared with now.  He will tell you that there was a great deal of difference in how people behaved.  Back then Americans commonly were more moral than they are now because society was made up of a significant number of Christians who would behave in a moral manner, not in a lawless manner.  For instance, after World War One, statistics showed that about forty percent of Americans belonged to a Christian church.  Their behavior was the common one in society and even influenced to a great extent the non-Christian segment to behave itself in public in a polite, kind, and responsible manner, not because that segment actually was convinced of Christian morality, but simply because it did not want to be seen as being out of step with the rest of society.  Aside from this there was also, to be sure, a tiny minority of incorrigible citizens – there always has been in every age – who kept crime alive.  Yet they were in the tiny minority, though the newspapers would devote their sensational headlines to them.  Consequently, their lawlessness behavior would be made to appear more widespread in proportion to what it actually was.

For example, in 1946, in Marshall County, Kansas, in the community of Bremen, there had been no arrest or court procedure for thirty years.  The community was made up almost entirely of the Lutheran faith and had two Lutheran schools which made a public school unnecessary.  Because of this, think of how much lower their tax and insurance rates must have been!  Around the same time the Chicago Tribune reported that Frankenmuth, Michigan had never had a crime of violence in the 102 years of its existence.  During the last twenty-five years its jail had been entirely empty.  Throughout the Great Depression of the 1930’s not one person was on the relief rolls.  Since its founding the town had been the first in the state to report all of its taxes paid in full, and has given more than the average in charitable drives.  What is the explanation?  Ninety-five percent of the people in Frankenmuth were Lutherans.  “Righteousness exalts a nation” (Proverbs 14:24).

Indeed, even in the 1950’s and the early 1960’s people in a Midwestern city could leave home in order to attend church without having to lock their back door.  They could buy jars of food safely at a grocery store that had no safety seals on them.  They could board an airliner without going through a metal detector, and would be given metal knives, forks, and spoons for their meals.  An uncountable number of similar examples could be given. This is how much peace and safety formerly existed in our society because of the widespread influence of the Christians.  Thus neither society nor government had to go either to great lengths or to great expense to protect people. The vast majority of people commonly did not engage in immoral activity because they had no will to do it.  In fact, it never occurred to them to do the evil things that since have been imagined and practiced in society today.

Again, on account of the prevalent immoral behavior today, government has had to take steps in order to protect itself and its citizens.  For instance, the public library in downtown Saint Paul has become a secure compound.  All of the side doors have been locked except for one entrance.  There are security cameras, and visitors have to pass through a shoplifting and/or metal detector.  None of this was in place years ago.  For “security reasons” the U.S. Postal Service has forbidden mail over thirteen ounces from being dropped into outdoor mail boxes.  People have to go through scanners and/or have to be hand searched at transportation terminals.  Any citizen, young or old, who sets foot in a governmental building, is now automatically considered to be a suspected terrorist until he has been screened and approved each time by a governmental agency.  You are now living in a police state.  It has been caused by waves of immoral Americans all across the country in the last few generations.

To be sure, the non-Christians in our Christian society years ago had  the presumption that the peace, safety, and prosperity found in America simply existed naturally; that these things normally would be around.  Indeed, they chaffed under Christian influences and complained about the bondage in which they saw themselves. Their desire was:  “Let us pursue our immoral behavior and gather as many followers as we can with our Siren song in order that we may pursue as much immoral behavior as we want since we will never have to pay the price.”  Never did these radical promoters, these so-called liberals, give it a thought that in their efforts to make others immoral, they would have to pay a terrible price:  that they would kill the peace, safety, freedom, and prosperity in America and remove God’s blessing.  For instance, around the year 1989 crime cost our country about 168 billion dollars a year (figured in 1989 dollars) in law enforcement measures alone, while the loss from crime itself cost another 345 billion dollars.

Not only will America have to suffer these self-inflicted evils as the price to pay for its immorality, but the punishment of God will be placed on top of this.  The Almighty threatens:  “I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity” (Isaiah 13:11).  “When the righteous turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, he will die because of it” (Ezekiel 33:18).  God will begin his punishment already in this life by inflicting loss of life from storms, floods, heart disease, and so-called accidents.  Then he will continue it into the next, starting with Judgment Day.  Be warned of these threats of the Almighty!  It is he who will back them up.

Why has there been this increase in immorality?  Again, it is due to the decline in the numbers of true Christians in the population.  Recognize this rule:  The more Christians that there would be, the less immorality there will be!  On the other hand, the more non-Christians there would be, the more immorality there will be.  The correlation is simple and definite.

Yet have there not been exceptions to this general rule?  Have there not been instances of Christians and clergy caught in adultery and other such immorality?  Yes, but also look at their creed!  If they would have preached and practiced true repentance and faith such immorality will be rare, indeed.  On the other hand, if sinful pride would be imbedded in their church creed, this actually will encourage rather than discourage immorality, for example, as the man-made mandate for celibacy among the Roman Catholic clergy actually promotes unchastity among them.

Therefore, in order for there to be more morality in society so that God’s punishment could be lifted, and so that there could be a return to peace, safety, freedom, and prosperity, there would need to be more members of society that would be truly Christian.  The only way in which this could be done would be to get more and more of society to repent and to have gospel faith.  To be sure, to power Christians to live a civil and a moral life on earth is an intended goal of the gospel, though not the primary one. The primary goal of the gospel is to get people to heaven.

In order to get citizens to repent and to believe, true law and gospel preaching in boldness must be done by all of the pulpits which use the name of Christ.  Pray and work so that this may happen!  God commands it.  “I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it” (Ezekiel 22:30). This is your duty.  Do it!

Indeed, “the sinfulness of our age is our opportunity.  God is not willing even now that any should perish, but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth, repent, and be saved.  God commands us to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth.”  We “cannot afford to miss our opportunity.  Our souls must be set on fire, and burn with love and zeal for the saving of the poor condemned world.”[1]

Be encouraged and motivated to do this by God’s own promise:  “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (2nd Chronicles 7:14)!

[1] H. W. Bartels, “The Deplorable Conditions of our Day,” Vesper Sermons, editor John H. C. Fritz (Saint Louis:  Concordia, 1919), page 166.

Prayer/Hymn

Almighty Lord, before Thy throne,

Thy mourning people bend:

‘Tis on Thy grace in Christ alone

Our failing hopes depend.

Dark judgments, from Thy heavy hand,

Thy dreadful pow’r display;

Yet mercy spares our guilty land,

And still we live to pray.

How changed, alas! are truths divine

For error, guilt and shame!

What impious numbers, bold in sin,

Disgrace the Christian name!

O turn us, turn us, mighty Lord!

Convert us by Thy grace;

Then shall our hearts obey Thy Word,

And see again Thy face!

Then, should oppressing foes invade,

We will not yield to fear,

Secure of all-sufficient aid,

When God in Christ is near.

Anne Steele

This form was taken from the original hymn of Miss Steele which began:  “See, gracious God, before Thy throne.”  She wrote this hymn for the public fast that was declared in England, 6 February, 1756, in regards to the French and Indian War.