Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set – Prov. 22:28.

The 4th of July for America and even for the rest of the world is more than a birthday but a ‘reminder of what/Whom it was established.’ [1] July 4 recalls the history of a colonial population that was oppressed by the mother country and the fortitude displayed by those who took a stand against this maltreatment. It is said that America exports its culture to the rest of the world hence, whatever happens in America happens in most nations, especially the removal of the moral and spiritual landmarks set by the founding fathers. July 4 calls us to stop legislating abominations and to repent. Abomination is not liberation or freedom but a curse.

The American Founding Fathers, the fifty-six men who signed the Declaration of Independence, pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honour. They put their lives on the line ‘nine died of wounds and hardship during the war. Five were captured and imprisoned, and in each case subjected to torture.’ According to Benjamin Franklin at the American Constitutional Convention in July 1797, ‘all of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a superintending Providence in our favor….’

In the beginning, America, in its pains, griefs, trials, temptations, weak and heavy-laden, cumbered with a load of care, found an excellent Refuge and Friend in Jesus. July 4 reminds us that America was founded on Christian heritage and ancient’s landmarks. These ancient landmarks started with the Bible, the Mayflower Compact, and the Declaration of Dependence upon God and independence from England. Mayflower Compact was based and undertaken in God’s name to advance God’s kingdom. [2] It was not about pluralism. It is a spiritual and moral crime to remove prayer from schools bearing in mind that the Mayflower Compact was part of the formative event in American history and the first step to the American Constitution. These ancient’s landmarks guided America through dark times and returned America to the light of truth and justice. In the beginning, Americans’ right as a citizen was first given by God and not by the government.

July 4 invites us to reflect on the question Benjamin Franklin asked his fellow Americans 226 years ago: ‘Have we now forgotten this powerful Friend? Or do we imagine we no longer need His assistance? In the words of Franklin, without God, Americans can ‘succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel; we shall be divided by our little partial local interest; our projects will be confounded; and we shall become a reproach and a byword down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter, from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing government by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war, or conquest.’ Do we need another prophet to believe in Franklin’s prophecy? Today, wars are raging in individual human souls, the family, churches, the classroom, and the government. Nations are divided. Truth abandoned. Family values and marriage are under attack. American founding fathers sought to guide against the evil desires, legislations, and enticement of government, always seeking to replace or play God in the life of the people and churches. George Washington aptly explained that it is impossible to govern without the Bible. The truth is that the only assurance of safety and foundation of morality is found in Bible-based Christianity. 

The U.S. Supreme Court’s (1844) unanimous ruling for the Bible to be read and taught divine revelation in response to the case of Vidal v. Girard’s Executors, 43 U. S. (HOW.2) 126, 127, 132 was against the Girard’s Last Will and Testament to establish an orphanage and school, with the stipulation that no religious influence be allowed. According to the law, “The plan of education proposed is anti-Christian, and therefore repugnant to the law. … The purest principles of morality are to be taught. Where are they found? Whoever searches for them must go to the source from which a Christian man derives his faith—the Bible. … There is an obligation to teach what the Bible alone can teach, viz. a pure system of morality … Both in the Old and New Testaments [religious instruction’s] importance is recognized. In the Old, it is said, “Thou shalt diligently teach them to thy children,” and in the New, “Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not. No fault can be found with Girard for wishing a marble college to bear his name forever, but it is not valuable unless it has a fragrance of Christianity about it.’ July 4 warns us against invaluable wishes that are shaping American cultures and being exported to different parts of the world. [3]

Girard’s idea and love of a marble college for pupils without a fragrance of Christianity amounts to spiritual crime to remove ancient landmarks, thereby raising pupils for the devil. Love and freedom without a fragrance of Christianity amount to the yoke of pride and immorality. Girard’s hope of a marble college amounts to the hopelessness that calls for repentance—a call from selfish and fleshly ambitions to humble service to God. 

The morality of America was rooted in Christianity and not pluralism. In 1980, in Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. 39 ‘the Supreme Court ruled that a Kentucky law that required the posting of the Ten Commandments on the wall of every public school classroom in the state violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment because the purpose of the display was essentially religious.’ [4] Society is suffering from public and spiritual disorders today because of the removal of ancient landmarks. Rewriting history and distorting by removing the ancient landmark promotes and teaches rights to be wrong and wrongs to be right.

The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that it is through the Bible, especially the New Testament, read and taught as a divine revelation in the college that its general precepts expounded, its evidence, and glorious principles of morality are explained and inculcated. Only through the Bible can ‘the purest principles of morality be learned so clearly or so perfectly as from the New Testament? Where is benevolence, the love of truth, sobriety, and industry, so powerfully and irresistibly inculcated as in the sacred volume? [5] There is no vacuum in life. When God is removed from our schools, Satan will take over. If any ancient landmark is removed, even in the church, someone will pay for it. Today there is a crime and a decline of the highest order. Someone, and even many, is paying for it today.

Sin and disobedience to God’s Word beset humans on all sides—secret sins in our daily lives. The pride and failure to recognize, repent of and turn from sin results in our divisions, bondages, decline, and wars under oppression by the work of Satan. Sin may take captive of a person, home, church, and nation; hence, many today see abominations as pride, liberation, and freedom, just as the Gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing. July 4th calls for repentance from the spiritual crime of removing ancient landmarks that our founding fathers placed in place in our nations and church, or we are ready to face God’s judgment. 

July 4, inspired by American independence, offers another opportunity for Americans, the church, and the world, in general, to be set free and receive spiritual independence just as God grants us independence over our spiritual and political oppressors. We are powerless to save ourselves. July 4 calls us to restore our fathers’ ancient landmarks and faith to receive our spiritual and moral independence from the oppressive force of sin, pride, and disobedience that is the purpose of destroying the church and the world. It is time to repent and stop wearying God of empty debates, words, and civic religion that legislate and preach abominations.

Happy renewing Spiritual Independence Day to Americans.

  [1] http://dejiokegbile.com/america-arise-and-bless-god/

[2] https://christianheritagefellowship.com/the-mayflower-compact/

[3] http://dejiokegbile.com/making-america-great-again-love-in-human-heart/

[4] https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/696/stone-v-graham#:~:text=the%20Associated%20Press)-,In%20Stone%20v.,the%20display%20was%20essentially%20religious.

[5] https://humblesmith.wordpress.com/2010/07/03/god-the-supreme-court-1844/