Forgotten God“We have been the 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 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.” Who said it? Abraham Lincoln, in his Proclamation of a day of National Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer, 1863. If these words seemed fitting in that day, how much more do they describe the debauched state of our present, beloved America. Please don’t get me wrong; I believe that our country is the greatest in all the earth. The freedoms that we enjoy because of the sacrifices of countless men and women who loved liberty more than life, are dear to my heart. We are indeed “God blessed,” ...but perhaps not forever. If we turn our backs on the God who made us free, should we be surprised when He, true to His Word, turns our blessing to chastening? The book that contains the principles upon which our nation was founded, also contains the solution to our present dilemma. Many years ago, God told His chosen people, Israel, “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. (2Chronicles 7:14).” |