Christian Patriotism, Part Two

I remember well when I first saw the image. It was nothing less than appalling. The White House, one of the iconic symbols of the United States, was illuminated in “rainbow” colors in celebration of a Supreme Court ruling which provided legal status to same-sex marriage. To think that the highest office in our land would commemorate such a ruling seemed almost beyond plausibility at the time. How could the leading official of the United States, a government founded upon the principles of the Bible, approve of and even applaud a lifestyle for which God’s Word vehemently condemns? Even worse, the various colors of the rainbow (which have come to symbolize the homosexual movement) are first given us in the book of Genesis as a symbol of God’s mercy following His great wrath. By the rainbow, God means to remind us of the horridness of our sin, and that only because of His great mercy are we not overwhelmed by the floodwaters of His wrath (Genesis 9:8-17). How reprehensible that those very colors are used by many to represent a sin for which God will most certainly judge our nation!

Yet, even more shocking than that image is the thought that it is from nearly six years ago! It seems that the haughtiness of our national sins was still rather tame in comparison to our current headlines. While many of our governing officials are leading down a dark path in which God’s Laws are being flaunted, they are simply a reflection of a majority in our culture who long ago shirked the gospel of Jesus Christ. As a whole, America is continuing a downward spiral into moral degeneracy which will eventually end in spiritual chaos and condemnation. Of course, this did not happen suddenly in just the last decade, nor is any particular public official solely to blame. It is not the atrocity of one sin that will incur God’s wrath, but rather the wholesale rejection of God’s rule over every part of individual lives.

While the spiritual decline of the nation rightfully disturbs many followers of Jesus Christ, it is not the lone time in history in which a nation has rejected God’s Law. The Old Testament records that God’s people Israel often repeated a pattern in which they would turn away from their God. As a result, God’s discipline would come upon them, decimating their nation by natural disasters and powerful enemies. Yet, God’s people were provided a great promise of restoration, dependent upon their repentance. “When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name 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” (2 Chronicles 7:13-14).

To be certain, America is not Israel. We cannot claim the same covenant promises of land for which they are given by God. Yet, God is no less faithful to His Word. If we (God’s people/the Church) would repent, then the blessing of restoration by God would ensue. To be sure, we must stand against a wicked culture by our voice and our vote. But even more earnestly, the church must repent. We must cry out to God for revival. The great wickedness in our culture is certainly the result of years of spiritual complacency among God’s people. We have compromised God’s truth and we have not lived lives worthy of the gospel call. We must turn back to God so that He might show His mercy again.

This same plea is given by Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn in a recent letter which he sent to President Biden, and then published for all to read. At the close of his letter, he makes the following plea to the Church.

As for America, the problem is not social, or economic, or cultural or political, the problem is ultimately spiritual, and so must be the answer. America has turned away from God, and its only hope is that it returns to God. Choose true greatness and lead in that return, or continue in this departure from God to destruction and judgment. As for those of you who love this nation and are burdened and fearful for its future, America’s only hope is revival. Return. Without it, the nation is lost, and revival only comes through repentance and return.

It’s time to pray as never before that return and revival would come, but it’s time not only to pray for revival, but to choose revival, to choose to live in revival now. And for that, we must each commit to return to God, to put away from our lives that which must be put away, and take up that which must be taken up, and walk in His ways and live in His spirit as we have never done before. “For the eyes of the Lord search to and fro throughout the entire earth, looking for the one whose heart is completely His, to show Himself mighty on their behalf” (Cf. 2 Chronicles 16:9). Let us be that people, and revival will come.

And if the darkness must come, whether by persecution, or disorder, or disintegration, or apostasy, do not fear, for God is still on the throne, and the darkness cannot overcome the light, but only magnify it. And if the darkness should grow darker, then it’s time for the lights of God to shine even brighter; for it is no longer the time of the candle in the day, it is now time for the candle in the night. We are now the candle in the night that shines against the darkness and lights up the night, the world, with its radiance. We pray that the civilization that was established and consecrated to be a city on a hill, America, would once again shine with a light that once illumined it; but whether or not it does, it is time that each of us shine with a light of His glory.

It is time to live unhindered, uncompromised, unbound, bold, and all out on fire and mighty in the power of the living God, for thus says the Lord, “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. Deep darkness shall cover the earth, but the glory of God shall rise upon you” (Cf. Isaiah 60:1-2). In the Name above every name that is named, the Name of Yeshua Hamashiach; Jesus the Messiah, the Way, the Truth, and the Life; the King above all kings, the Lord of all, the Hope of the ages, and the answer to every life; the Star of Jacob, the Prince of life, the glory of Israel, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah; the Name that will remain above all names when all is passed away, Yeshua, Jesus, the same yesterday, today and forever. Amen.

For the love of our country, but even more so, for the love of Christ, let us prove our Christian patriotism by returning to the Lord. Perhaps our nation has been given one more chance at the mercy of God. Regardless of this nation’s future, each of us will be held accountable before God for the manner in which we sought His revival.

Jason