[Faith-talk] Daily Thought for Tuesday, July 2, 2013

[Paul]

Hello and good day to all of you out there in cyberspace.  I hope and pray that, by God's matchless grace and His providential care, that your day is going well or went well.

With apologies to others in other nations who don't celebrate their national days or whatever you call them, the next few days and perhaps even beyond will showcase the country where I live and, despite our obvious corrupt government system here, that God still has His hand on us.  Actually He has His hand on every other nation, whether its citizens realize that or not.

Dianne Rine Dunbar, someone whose name is not familiar to me, wrote an article several years ago in a publication called "Pulpit Helps" entitled "America's Beauty," rendered as follows:

Many people go through life thinking that everything happens by chance.  But life is made up of personal choices.  We do have more control over our lives than most people realize.  But our world is fast becoming a "madhouse." Patients are writing prescriptions, students want to run the schools, children are trying to manage the home, and church members, not the Holy Spirit, to direct the churches.

Here, in America, the land of the free and home of the brave, we have the freedom of religion, speech, the press, and right of petition.  We have these rights because our forefathers came to this land to escape religious persecution and to worship God in the way He intended.

Many years ago a French philosopher visited America.  He wanted to find the secret of our greatness.  He traveled from town to town, talking with people, examining our schools, our national government, and centers of business without finding the reason for our strength.  Not till he visited the churches of America and witnessed the pulpits of this land "aflame with righteousness" did he find the secret of our greatness.  Returning to France, Alexis de Toqueville summarized his finding with this word of warning:  "America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great."

The test of a nation is the growth of its people intellectually and spiritually.  Money and prosperity are of very little account.  Money will not save us! Only a spiritual revival which changes the desires of our people will save our nation and preserve its greatness.

Second Chronicles 7:14 says "If My people, which are called by My name shall 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 will heal their land."

If you choose to put your trust in education, you will get what education can give you.  If you choose to put your trust in money, you will get what money can give you.  If you choose to put your trust in government, you will get what government can give you.  But if you put your trust in God, you will have everything!

Colossians 1:26-27 says that God has kept a secret for centuries but now He is pleased to reveal it to everyone on earth who love Him and lives for Him.  The secret is this:  Christ in your hearts is your only hope of glory.

In this new life that Christ gives, one's nationality or race or education or social position is unimportant.  Whether a person has Christ is what matters and He is equally available to all.

America's true beauty does not lie in her government, wealth, power, wisdom or society but in the hearts and minds and lives of her citizens who know Christ and fear God.

Thanks, Dianne, for your article today.  I hope and pray that others were inspired by what you wrote.  (Actually she probably won't read that last sentence, but I'd like to imagine that she did).

And now until tomorrow when, Lord willing another Daily Thought message will be presented, may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, in these last days in which we live.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul