“Seek the Lord while He may be found, call you upon Him while He is near.”

— Isaiah 55:6

“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” These familiar words open Charles Dickens’ great novel, A Tale of Two Cities, which was set in Paris in 1789, just at the beginning of the French Revolution. It was a time of great turmoil in that country. As we consider where our nation is spiritually, I think Dickens’ description is apt.

America was unquestionably founded as a Christian nation, as the Supreme Court once admitted, “This is a religious people. This is a Christian nation.” Well, that’s the way it started. The people in New England, when they got together in the early days of this country, signed the New England Confederation, in which they said, “We all came into these parts of America for one and the same end and aim.” Do you remember what that was? They said that one single aim was “to advance the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

I am sure that many people would be just shocked to hear that, and yet that is where we started. Unfortunately, because we have failed to share the Gospel consistently and frequently, there have been a growing number of people who have not known Christ, who know nothing about His kingdom, have never entered in, and wouldn’t even know how. Consequently, the number of unbelievers in this country has grown tremendously, while the percentage of believers has declined.

Let us pray for revival!

Lord of history, we have seen how You have guided nations as well as individuals. We pray for our nation, which started so well. Bring us back to Yourself and give us the gift of repentance…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH,
EMPIRES RISE AND FALL.

“Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.”

— James 1:22

We need to be a part of the solution to the problems of this world. James tells us to not just listen, but put into practice what we hear. It is not enough to come to church and sit there for an hour on Sunday morning. We have to hide the Word of God in our hearts and find out what He would have us to be and then begin to influence our world for Christ.

We need to have more Christians in government, in journalism, in the media, in the law, in the courts in order to begin to reverse the tide that has been moving across the country, the tide of atheism and immorality. But it is only going to begin when Christians realize that God has called them to serve Him in every sphere of life—then we can change this nation back for the glory of God.

This is a tremendous challenge to each one of us to be what God would have us to be, to spend time in His Word each day and time in prayer seeking what he would have us to do and then to overcome our fears and go out and serve Christ in the world. It is time to get off the bench; to get out of the bleachers; to get out of the pew; to get into the game and to begin to work for Jesus Christ.

O Lord, we see the need so clearly, but we feel so helpless to do anything about it. Help us to go in Your strength and work for Your kingdom wherever You have put us and to see Your hand in the situation…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
INFLUENCE THE WORLD FOR HIM.

“He sat down and called the twelve. And He said to them, ‘If anyone desires to be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.’”

— Mark 9:35

When we consider how our fiscal policies in this country are borrowing from the future at such alarming rates, it should not surprise us if our children’s children rise up to curse us. We are saddling them with an unpayable debt.

Somebody said well, “It is because of our own greed that we have become ungovernable.” We cannot balance the budget of this nation now. Why? Because politicians are scared that they will be voted out of office if they do not pander to the greed of the people. Now, this is not a popular thing to say. But, my friends, somebody has to say it.

This country is going to be destroyed by the twin evils of public greed and a false philanthropy on the part of politicians who are simply buying their reelection by taking money from one group and giving it to another.

The government is instituted for the purpose of administering justice. If you want to know what the government is supposed to do, read the 13th chapter of Romans where God explains what the purpose of government is. And that purpose is justice, not philanthropy. There is a great need for philanthropy and for benevolence but it should come from the private sector where it produces positive results and not from the government sector where it produces chaos and will inevitably bring this nation to destruction. Pray that God would raise up more statesmen who serve the people  instead of politicians who serve themselves.

Lord of the nations, we pray for godly leaders. We pray for public servants, who run for office to serve the people and promote justice and protection. We repent of our national greed and ask for Your help to turn our nation around…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, THOSE WHO
GOVERN US CAN BE PUBLIC SERVANTS.

“He becomes poor who deals with a slack hand, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.”

— Proverbs 10:4

In 1850, two years after a socialist revolution hit Paris, Frédéric Bastiat wrote an excellent book, entitled The Law. He said, “The law perverted! The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law became the weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!” Fortunately, the revolution was overthrown. But, of course, those lessons went by the wayside in the 20th century with the rise of many communist states, all of which were violent.

Bastiat said the purpose of the law is single and simple. The purpose of the law, the purpose of government is justice. It is to protect the life, the liberty, and the property of the citizens of that nation. God has given to every person the right to protect his life, his liberty, and his property. And the law is simply the collective enforcement of that right.

Now, since it is unrighteous and criminal for me to take some innocent person’s life, since it is wrong for me to enslave another person, since it is wrong for me to unlawfully, unrighteously take their property, it is equally wrong for the government, collectively, to do the same. And that is what Bastiat calls “legalized plunder.”

Tragically, in our day we are seeing much “legalized plunder” through government welfare schemes. Charity is great—when it is voluntary. “Charity” by government coercion ceases to be charity. It creates poverty, not riches.

O Lord, so often when we humans do things our way, we mess up so badly. Help us as Your people to be generous and helpful to others without condoning and voting for unlawful gain. Raise up Christian statesmen to govern us…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH AND HIS PRINCIPLES,
GOOD GOVERNMENT CAN BE RESTORED.

“Let us break their chains and throw off their shackles.”

— Psalm 2:3, NIV

In Psalm 2, the world says of the Lord and of His anointed (i.e., His Christ): “We don’t want to be bound by God’s rules.” So the conflict is set.

There is a growing opposition that is taking place within our own government towards Christianity. Many people do not realize that secular humanism is a religion, which is now doing everything in its power to completely destroy Christian influence in any part of the public order of our nation.

Many decades ago, no one ever heard of secular humanism. A few decades ago it began to make its voice heard. Then it began to become the dominate voice to be heard in the media, in government bureaucracy, in the schools; and now it has taken over almost every one of these spheres completely. Its agenda now is to completely silence the Christian voice in every phase of public life in this country.

After removing all vestiges of it from the public domain, the final solution to the “Christian problem” is then to remove every vestige of Christianity altogether from this nation, both in the public and in the private spheres as well.

Part of the reason this has happened is because for too long we Christians have retreated into our “holy huddles” and have not influenced the world. But Jesus taught us we are to be in the world but not of the world. When we pray “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as is it is heaven,” we are certainly asking for His presence to be felt in greater ways. Why must Christian influence be squeezed out of the arena that for the most part Christians created in the first place?

O Lord, we see the destruction and silencing of Your church and we ask that You will once again turn our society back to You. We have seen You do it before and we ask humbly for another outpouring of Your Spirit in a national revival…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN HAVE
A NEW SPIRITUAL AWAKENING.

“But many of those who heard the word believed, and the number of the men grew to about five thousand.”

— Acts 4:4

Someone asked me, “Pastor, do you think there is any hope for our country? For our world? Things look so bleak that we can’t see any hope at all. Do you have any word of encouragement?” “Well, I said, I certainly do. I am greatly encouraged. In fact, I am more encouraged today than I have been for many years about what the Lord is doing in our world.”

What is God doing among us? Well, more than most people think. You know, it took one thousand years for the church to grow to the place where it has added fifty million professing Christians to its rolls. But we did that in the last five years when fifty million people were added to the rolls of the church of Christ worldwide. Meanwhile, the church’s growth around the world is exploding.

For my own curiosity, I graphed the growth rate of the church down through all twenty centuries to see what has happened. At first, it looked as if the line was almost parallel with the bottom line of the graph, it grew so slowly. The growth of the church for the first five hundred years could hardly be detected in the midst of the population of the world.

But by the 19th and 20th centuries, the rate began to go straight up. So I am very optimistic about what God is doing in the church. God is bringing His will to pass, and we have the privilege to take part in that venture.

Lord of the harvest, bring more workers into the field. Thank You for the growth of Your church around the world. Thank You for this harvesting of the earth. Help us to be willing workers…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, THE
HARVEST IS BEING BROUGHT IN.

“…without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”

— Hebrews 9:22

Right after sin entered into the world, a dichotomy began—a divergent stream of two different thoughts that ever typify the religions of men. One: God’s way—the other: man’s. Feeling the shame and guilt of their sin, do you remember what Adam and Eve did as the prototypes of all other lost human beings? They covered themselves with fig leaves. That is a symbolic presentation of all of the religions of the world—they invented fig leaf theology.

Are you a member of the “First Fig Leaf Church”? Here is how you can tell. I think I might give you a bit of a fashion show. The perennial favorite in this fashion parade is probably the choicest fig leaf on the whole tree called “I’ve done the best I can.” Ah, you see people dressed in it everywhere, parading up and down in the street hiding behind that leaf. Or there is also a three-piece fig leaf called “I’ve kept the Ten Commandments,” spoken by people who could not name more than three of them.

But in Eden, God looking upon Adam and Eve’s fig leaves, made coats of skins and clothed them. There was that early prototype of the other religion—God’s religion—by which an innocent victim had to die and shed its blood because we need to be clothed, as it were, in the skin of that victim. Jesus is the true Lamb of God whose shed blood forgives those who believe in Him.

God our provider, thank You for providing the Lamb for the sacrifice. Thank You, Jesus, You are the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH AND BY THE
BLOOD OF THE LAMB, WE ARE PURIFIED.

“I press toward the goal to the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”

— Philippians 3:14

The Greek word translated in this verse as “goal” (in the King James it is “mark”) is the word from which we get scope, as in telescope, microscope, or in the common phraseology of the day, to “scope out” something. It means “to look into.”

Now in a race track the course is marked out very clearly as to where we are to go, but in the course of life there are no chalk lines on either side of us, so therefore it is important that we scope out the goal. In this Christian race, we need not only to run fast, to stretch forward, to press on. The problem with many people is they are going the wrong way. Now they may be going very fast, they may be succeeding and making great advances, but they are just going in the wrong direction.

One husband driving with his wife on vacation came to a crossroads. His wife said they ought to turn left. He chose to turn right. Then he drove the next 50 miles figuring out how he could turn around and go the other way without his wife knowing it.

As Christians we need to make sure we have not lost sight of the real goal. We have a heavenly calling that should guide our lives. We are so bombarded with the material things of this life and the world in all of its secularism, we could totally lose sight of the fact that there is any high calling at all.

Father God, we ask You to help us to keep our focus on You and Your work. Help us not to be distracted by earthly things…

BY HIS STRENGTH, WE CAN
STAY FOCUSED FOR HIS SAKE.

“My little children, let us love not in word and speech, but in action and truth.”

— 1 John 3:18

Christianity presents an incredible picture of love, the love of God in Jesus Christ. Because its ideals are so lofty and soaring, because its sentiments are so noble and so high, there is a danger that we should love in platitudes, and in ideals, and in emotional sympathies. There is a danger that we should feel that we have paid up our debt to love if we have praised its beauty, if we have felt its charm, if we have experienced its sentiment, then we feel that we have loved.

But John says no, let us not love in word or merely in feeling or in thought or tongue, but love in deed and in truth. We need to love in the practical ways of helping other people who are in need. And he says, “By this we know that we are of the truth, and shall reassure our hearts before Him. For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart and knows everything” (1 John 3:19-20). And those two verses have to be read together.

What does that mean “if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart”? He is saying that if we have lived our life and, because of the love of Christ we have loved our brethren, and we have endeavored to lay down our life for them, then we know we love because He loved us. God assures us in our hearts that we are His because we truly love.

God You who are love, what a miracle it is that any of us are loving at all. It is only Your love in our hearts which makes it so. I thank You for all the love I have received from fellow Christians, especially those closest to me…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
SERVE EACH OTHER IN LOVE.

“By this we know the love of God: that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”

— 1 John 3:16

Love is personified in Jesus Christ. Rather than take, He gave…even to the point where He gave His very life that we might be saved. Christ sacrificed His own life out of love for us. And how then should we live, after accepting His love?

We should be ready to lay down our lives for those in Christ. This statement is quite revolutionary in its implications. Even though we might never be asked to actually die for another person, we are asked to daily die to ourselves.

It is important that we do so, knowing that anything that we do less than laying down our lives for our brethren is to fall short of fulfilling the obligation of that love.

This means we could share more than we do. We could give more than we do. We show our love in practical ways. Christ the Savior has shown us the way. If we are to lay down our lives for our brethren, then surely to help others who are poor and who are in necessitated conditions of one sort or another is little to ask. We should help them with the goods of this world. May God give us more grace to live unselfishly.

God of love, give me Your beautiful love in ever greater measure. Help me to live unselfishly, whether I’m giving up a nap or laying down my very life. All small and great acts of unselfish love for someone else come purely from You…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
BE UNSELFISH AND LOVING.