Skip to content ReVersed - Chapter 10 - America's Founding: Biblical or Secular? Jun 10 · 9 min ...more
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Dr. Jim Garlow is a lifelong pastor who most recently served in San Diego, California, and now leads Well Versed, a ministry dedicated to bringing biblical
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True Meaning of Separation of Church and State 0:10 Well, we welcome you to chapter 10 of the book reversed. As I've told you before in the other videos, the 1st book was well versed. It lays out the biblical foundations to 30 political topics. And we're0:22 today talking about Reversed, subtitle, from Culturally Woke to Biblically Awake. They're looking at now at chapter 10 and remember there's a coloring book that goes with that. Every0:34 page of the coloring book, for example, here's page 26 of the coloring book. That goes with chapter 26 of the book reversed. This is for obviously children. So you can train your children in these same very0:46 important principles. What is chapter 10? It's the issue of America's founding. Is it biblical or secular? That's a hotly debated issue. Let me ask you a question.0:58 The phrase separation in church and state, is that in the constitution or the declaration of independence? You're a smart audience. You know the answer. It's not in either 1. I've had1:10 many conversations with people who say, oh, I know it's in 1 or the other. Well, no. It's actually not. Where does the phrase separation of church and state come from? It comes from a letter written1:21 January the 1st, 18 o 2 by then president Thomas Jefferson, written to the Danbury Baptists in Connecticut. They were concerned1:34 that the government would intrude into the church life. And he says, no, the church cannot be intruded into by the government, because there is a and he called it a wall of1:45 separation. That's the phrase he used, the wall of separation. And that meant very simply this, the church can go into the public square, into government, religion goes in government,1:58 but the government cannot come in and control the life in the church. That's what it meant. Until it got flipped on its head in a couple of supreme court2:09 cases in 19 47 and 19 48. They were the famous Everson Everson case and the McCollum case. Now remember up to that time, the2:21 church and state issue always meant the government could not intrude into the life of the church. Jefferson, who actually came up with this phrase, was completely comfortable with2:33 the church life or religious issues in the life of government. In fact, so much so, that he attended weekly worship services in the US capitol building. They2:45 they occurred from 1800 to 18 69. In our US capitol building, the the rotunda, the main rotunda was not yet built. That was the center section. There was the senate side and the house2:56 side. So on the House side is the Statuary Hall. That's where the House of Representatives originally met. And that's where the services were held, 1800 to 18 69. Thomas3:08 Jefferson, as president, would get on his horse and ride up Pennsylvania Avenue with a Bible tucked under his arm and attend those Christian worship services. The worship was provided by the Marine3:20 Corps Band, mind you. And they would go to worship services there and have the preaching of the word of God from various pastors from a number of different denominations during that time frame.3:32 Jefferson didn't think there was anything wrong with church services being held in the US Capitol building itself, and he attended them. I had the privilege of co founding3:44 services in in 20 17, weekly worship services for a while in, on Wednesday nights in statuary hall. Well, not in statuary hall, but right below3:56 statuary hall, what's called h c 5 in the capitol building. We called we actually called it the Jefferson Gathering in honor of of Thomas Jefferson. So, separation of church and stateBiblical Foundations of the Founders 4:07 was always understood to mean the government cannot intrude in the church, but by all means is religion, religious constructs welcome in the life of the government. Until 19 47,4:20 19 48, and things began to be switched on their head and they changed the definition. Now among our founding fathers by the way, how many founding fathers are there? Well, there's somewhere between4:31 150 to 200. If you take into account those who signed the Declaration of Independence, those who signed the constitution, and others who were writing it during that same time frame, but roughly 150 to 200 people4:43 who qualify as being labeled founding fathers. Of those, what source do they quote most often? The answer is the Bible. What does4:55 the Bible teach about government? There's 4 forms of government. There's personal government, there's self restraint. There's family government, the order of the of the family. There's5:07 church life or congregational life. And then last of all, there's civil government. Civil governance is addressed as much as the others are. When we look and think about the Bible, I5:19 don't want you to think about it just as your personal private life, or how your family is supposed to order, or how you're supposed to live out your personal life. I want you to understand that it is filled, the Bible5:30 is filled with explanation for community life and for national life as well. Now, let's come to this issue of Christian nation. What does it mean to be a Christian nation? We are not5:41 suggesting that everyone has to be a Christian. We're not even suggesting that everybody who founded our nation was a perfect Christian. I'm not saying that at all. We're saying that there are fundamental5:53 values of every culture or every nation, and that the founding values of the United States were Judeo Christian values. Judeo6:05 Jewish Hebrew Scriptures, Christian New Testament. The founding principles of our country were distinctly Judeo Christian at their very core.6:17 That's why they referred to the Scriptures so many times in their writings. Again, let me repeat. The most quoted book for all of our founding fathers was the Bible itself. We don't imply that a6:29 Christian nation a nation is not saved. People are saved. But but meaning to be a Christian nation is that it's founded on certain principles, biblical principles and biblical6:41 values. It does not mean that everyone has to be a Christian. Of the 56 signers of the declaration of independence, Every single 1 of them, almost all of them,6:52 were were followers of Jesus Christ. And 1 half of them were actually trained in divinity or had religious degrees. In fact, 35 out7:04 of our 47 presidents have called for times of praying, of fasting, of supplication before the before the Lord. Our nation7:16 was clearly founded on Judeo Christian values. That's why all the older monuments before this rise of modern secularism and revisionistic history that tried to wipe out our7:28 history, why all of them are loaded with scriptural passages, why even our our the assembly where our our legislators meet, the House of Representatives. What is it7:40 designed? It's designed distinctly honoring even the figure of Moses and the 10 Commandments. Why? Because America was established on the values of the Judeo Christian Bible7:52 itself. That's trying to help us move from being culturally woke to biblically awake.7:59 Let us pray for our nation. Lord, we are aware of our own shortcomings. We confess that we have not always lived in accordance to your will andEvidence of Judeo-Christian Heritage 8:11 ask for your forgiveness. We repent before you. We make teshuva to return to you, Lord, and ask for national revival and a sense of renewed faith and8:23 hope in the citizens of our nation. May your kingdom come and may your will be done for our country. Father, we thank you for your holy word. And as we have8:35 sinned against you in so many ways, we cry out for your great mercy for this nation. Spare us from your judgment and that we so rightly deserve and bring8:46 about your presence, your salvation, your empowerment upon our people to live in righteousness for you. In Jesus' name, amen.8:59 We hope you enjoyed the video. Thank you so much for watching. Hey, don't forget to check out this discussion questions that are attached. Have a fun time studying and we will see you in the next chapter.In this video 0:00 True Meaning of Separation of Church and State4:00 Biblical Foundations of the Founders8:00 Evidence of Judeo-Christian Heritage
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