The LORD's Day, May 25,2008, Memorial Day Weekend in The USA

One Nation, Under God

Proverbs 14.34 Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.

Solomon wrote this. God inspired him to do so. Solomon was king over Israel. Israel had been a theocracy, a nation without a human king. This was God’s will for Israel. He desired to be the One Who would lead this nation and use them to bless the whole world. What God desired for them did not the match the people’s desire and He knew it. He knew when they got into the land He had promised them that they would look at the other nations and desire a king like them.

Deuteronomy 17.14 When you enter the land the LORD your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,... Then God went on to tell them His qualifications for the king

It is sad that the nation of Israel never really got to experience the fulness of what it would have been to be a theocracy. They wanted a king and except for David the ends of those kings were for the most part tragic.

Here we are on another Memorial Day Weekend. It is a time among many other things of remembrance. As a nation tomorrow we remember those who gave their lives so we could be free while on this earth. For the next few months we think about this- this weekend, Flag Day and the Fourth of July. I read recently that the founder of the Church of the Nazarene, while he was still a Methodist pastor, used to drape his pulpit with the American flag during our nation’s Civil War, in support of the union and the freedom of slaves. His congregation burned him an effigy.

Our nation is in the throws of great confusion today. We are in danger of electing a president not on what he believes but on how appealing he is. I could go on about our flaws. You know them. We need to pray for the Americans today. We are flirting with the things that brought other nations down.

The way for a nation to be exalted is given here.

1. Righteousness Exalts a Nation

America rose up from a concern about religious freedoms. The Pilgrims came seeking a place to worship as they wanted to without an attachment to the government. This conviction was basic to our constitution. There was to be no state religion. That is what separation of church and state means. It wasn’t to protect the nation. It was protect the church

God blessed America. Its development was ordered by God. America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.
Alexis de Tocqueville


America became high and lofty. God exalted her. We did not become the world’s lone super power by ourselves.

Let me give you the whole of what Tocqueville said:
I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers — and it was not there … in her fertile fields and boundless forests — and it was not there … in her rich mines and her vast world commerce — and it was not there … in her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution — and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

God blessed America. He set her on a high place. If you go to a National Cemetery and look at those white head stones you will not find one solider who died for his country in act of aggression. Quite the contrary, you will find men who died for someone else’s freedom- ours or some other nation under a tyrant who needed to be removed for the good of humanity. America has never begun a war that was not for the sake of human freedom in one form or another.

That is one reason people become Americans. They feel uplifted just being here “This is the America they told me about ”- Christian Sarmiento +

God has been faithful to our nation for generations. Righteousness exalts a nation.

Righteousness exalts a nation. This has to do with justice in our courts. It has to with a fair rule. Our courts were set up to give justice to all. We were lifted to a position of power not because of ourselves but because God honored the way we treated people. Our flaws have been there all along. We did bad things but our history shows they were corrected and the truth has come out.

Part of righteousness is humility and when mistakes in error were made reparations were made.

Righteousness exalts a nation. Our nation has a history of treating its most vulnerable citizens, the young, the old and the disabled with respect and honor. That is our heritage.

In many ways there are similarities to our history and Israel’s. For years the school children of America heard the Word of God read to them in school. In 1963 this was declared unconstitutional and it was banned along with prayer. Here we are 45 years later with mass shootings in our schools, we have metal detectors and security cameras in our public schools. Good teachers have retired early.

2. Sin is disgrace to any people- even Americans and Israelites

It is a shame that we lost so much We mourn the loss of our soldiers this Memorial Day, from the Revolutionary War until the last young man who died in Iraq.
But the other loss in America is our morality and our sense of right and wrong. We lost the respect and fear of God we once had.

Israel thought they had a special favored nation status. They thought they could go against God without paying a price. They thought Psalm 135.4 For the LORD has chosen Jacob to be his own, Israel to be his treasured possession meant they could do whatever they wanted. They were wrong.

This morning on this Memorial Day we need to listen to what God is saying to our country...

Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.

II Chronicles 7.14 If my people, who are called by my name, will 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. 15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place. 16 I have chosen and consecrated this temple so that my Name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there.

17 As for you, if you walk before me as David your father did, and do all I command, and observe my decrees and laws, 18 I will establish your royal throne, as I covenanted with David your father when I said, 'You shall never fail to have a man to rule over Israel.'

19 But if you turn away and forsake the decrees and commands I have given you and go off to serve other gods and worship them, 20 then I will uproot Israel from my land, which I have given them, and will reject this temple I have consecrated for my Name. I will make it a byword and an object of ridicule among all peoples. 21 And though this temple is now so imposing, all who pass by will be appalled and say, 'Why has the LORD done such a thing to this land and to this temple?' 22 People will answer, 'Because they have forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers, who brought them out of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them—that is why he brought all this disaster on them.'

We pray for a movement of God that would cause this nation to return to its roots. We cry out to God for mercy because it strikes fear in our hearts to think we might get what we deserve

We pause this morning and you are here this morning because you care about the LORD and you care about what happens here on earth, in our nation.

May the LORD draw us back. May Americans realize what they have today has come from God. He has blessed us. But as He warned Israel, there is danger in being blessed. The blessings can come before Him. If they do they are idols and other gods. Don’t let that happen to you. Keep your eyes upon Jesus. If it has happened Turn your eyes upon Jesus
L.S. Lawrence’s book excerpt.
(The essence of II Chronicles 7.14)