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Even though the Constitution protects against a state religion, it nevertheless projects a Christian nation.  The God about which Jefferson referenced in the Declaration was the God of Christianity, who is the true God.  The founders wrote a Constitution for a Christian nation.  The Constitution envisions a Christian nation.

The Constitution limits the power of government based on the truth that rights come from God.  Government does not give the rights that the Constitution protects.  God does.  This puts the true God, the God of Christianity, above the government of the United States.  It also places the people of the United States under God, like the pledge reads:  “one nation under God.”

The people or government of the United States cannot replace God with something else and succeed.  The framework still stands and hinders a significant decline, but by replacing God the nation then essentially opposes itself.  True believers will tell the truth about this, so not stay silent.

God blesses only nations whose God He is (Psalm 33:12).  That is axiomatic.  But I’m writing something here even more than that.  The United States started as a Christian nation under the one and true God.  To cease from that would make the United States a different nation than how and what it began.  It would eliminate Americanism, the true nature of the nation according to its founding.

Declaration of Independence

Laws of Nature and Nature’s God

The United States declared its existence on the following self-evident truths.  First,

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

This nation began with the dissolution of political bands to England.  It declared that the laws of nature and nature’s God entitled it.  This God is not some arbitrary God.  In the context of the history of England and the United States, this was the Christian God.

All Men Are Created Equal and Endowed by their Creator with Certain Unalienable Rights

Second,

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

This nation declared that England did not give their rights.  It was endowed with those rights by their Creator, who is the Christian God.  The United States could rightly abolish the former colonial government and institute a new government on the rights the Christian God gave.  The Christian God possessed higher authority than England and the new nation under Whom it stood.  He gave them these unalienable rights and the right of independence.

Gettysburg Address

Dedicated to the Proposition That All Men Are Created Equal

Unless the nation made a new declaration, the United States continues a Christian nation.  The founding principle of the Declaration of Independence faced a challenge during the Civil War.  Abraham Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863 and he attached that time to its founding with his words in that speech.  First,

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

To start, he didn’t use the name, “God,” like Jefferson did and the Founders signed their John Hancocks.  But he agreed that “our fathers” were “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” referring to the Declaration of Independence again.  By saying, “created,” he alluded to the Creator, the same Christian God of 1776.

Nation Dedicated to a Proposition

If I were to choose a key word in Lincoln’s address, I would pick, “dedicate.”  His speech had three paragraphs and he used the word “dedicate” as crucial in all three.  This connected the following two paragraphs to the first.  The founders dedicated themselves to the proposition that God created men equal, so God gave men their rights by His creation.  Even if the United States did not live out that proposition, they remained dedicated to living out that proposition.  Second,

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

Civil Laws and Rights

A civil action is a legal dispute based upon laws.  Old Testament Israel functioned according to civil laws.   Civil rights essentially means the rights God gave according to His laws, having created mankind.  The term comes from the Latin, jus civis, “right of the citizen.”  The North and the South fought over a disagreement about the rights of citizens.

Lincoln said the Civil War was a test to see if a nation, dedicated to the proposition that God created men equal and gave them their rights, could endure.  A Christian nation cannot endure if it rejects the Christian God.  I believe this nation is in another struggle right now of the same nature as 1863.  Lincoln uses “dedicate” twice.  Was the nation dedicated to the proposition that it received its rights from the Christian God?  Lincoln expressed that the nation could live because of those who gave their lives, a very nice turn of phrase.  He came to dedicate a portion of the former battlefield as their final resting place.

Paragraph Three of the Address

Abraham Lincoln memorialized the cemetery at Gettysburg, the most crucial battle and turning point in the Civil War, according to the nation’s dedication to the Christian God. Third (this is one paragraph in the speech, but I’m dividing it into two),

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Hallow or Sacred

In general, people today don’t use “dedicate,” “consecrate,” and “hallow.”  “Hallow” is a form of “holiness.”  Almost nothing is sacred anymore.  No one wants hallowed ground.  They don’t want to acknowledge anything as holy.  More important are their own conveniences and privileges, living not for anything greater than themselves.

Lincoln would not use “consecrate” and “hallow” without reference to the Christian God.  The ground at Gettysburg was not hallow because of a Lincoln speech.  Hallow ground goes back to Exodus 3 and Moses’ encounter at the burning bush. The ground at Gettysburg was hallow because the reason that justified these men’s death.  A great proposition, dedicated to the Christian God, hallowed their deaths.  They didn’t die for self, for their own rights, but for rights vindicated by a biblical proposition.  These were true rights that proceed first from Genesis 1 and God’s mandate.

Christian Nation

Consider again that Lincoln says, “we can not dedicate” and “to be dedicated here to the unfinished work” and “to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us.”  What is the increased devotion the living were to take from the dead’s last full measure of devotion?  He implied the dead at Gettysburg would die in vain without dedication to the proposition of a nation under the Christian God.  The Christian God gave everyone their rights.

For a government to protect the rights of the people and be a government for the people, it must submit to the highest authority:  the Christian God.  This nation as a whole loses its dedication when it denies that God.  It rejects its purpose for existence.  No principle holds it together.  How does it do that?  Many, many ways that every Christian at least should understand.

I hope I’m expressing a legitimate idea or concept of Christian nationalism, based upon natural laws ordained by God, scripture, and history.  Christians should not apologize for these laws, scripture, and history.  It is the truth about the United States.  May the one and true God, the Christian God, be praised!

More to Come