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When George Washington was about to leave office, after giving near 50 years of service to his country, he addressed the nation through what has come to be known as his Farewell Address.  In that Address he warned us what to do and what not to do in order to preserve this new government which aimed at giving the “greatest amount of liberty to the greatest number of people.”  In warning us how this new Republic could be overthrown by those working inside it, he stated,

“But let there be no change by usurpation [one branch of government stealing power from another branch] …for…this…is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.”

(Washington, George. September 19, 1796, in his Farewell Address, published in the American Daily Advertiser, Philadelphia, September, 1796. James D. Richardson (U.S. Rep. from Tennessee), ed., A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents 1789-1897, 10 vols. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Gov. Printing Office, published by Authority of Congress, 1897, 1899; Washington, D.C.: Bureau of National Literature and Art, 1789-1902, 11 vols., 1907, 1910), Vol. 1, p. 213-224, Sept. 17, 1796. Tim LaHaye, Faith of Our Fd. Fathers (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, 987), p. 91.)

And yet, for over 80 years, the branches of the Presidency and the Supreme Court have been stealing the power which our Founders gave to the Congress, or reserved to the people and the states.  And Mr. Obama has been the worst one to steal these powers.  As Bill Federer, in his new book (which I highly recommend) From Change to Chains, states, “…Obama concentrated power at an unprecedented rate, taking control of banks, car companies, and life-and-death health care decisions of every citizen…”

Why is it so dangerous to concentrate power into just one branch like the Presidency or the Supreme Court?  Since God made man, as He said, “In Our image, after Our likeness, to have dominion [or, “to rule”]…” (Genesis 1:26), He intended us to have the liberty to look like Him, live like Him, and rule like Him.  The Garden of Eden provided just such an atmosphere.  Adam was free to do anything within the limits of God’s commands.  This is the very definition of liberty:  “Freedom within boundaries.”  Thus, Adam’s atmosphere of liberty was the best environment for him to become all that God had created him to be.  God came into this atmosphere of liberty “in the cool of the day” (Genesis 3:8) in order to teach Adam what he was created for and how he could be that.  So God loves liberty in a society because it is the atmosphere in which His will is most easily accomplished.  This is part of what the Bible is teaching us when it says,

“…where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” (2 Corinthians 3:17)

After man sinned, God gave us external civil government to keep down the sin principle in a society so the children in that society could still be taught the truth (See Genesis 9:5-6; Romans 13:1; 1 Peter 2: 14) and thus learn how to become, through Jesus Christ, what God had created them to be.  So satan is always motivating selfish men to take away the liberty of others, since satan’s goal is to keep us from coming to the truth.

America’s Founders understood this warfare and warned us of it.  President William Henry Harrison warned us in his inaugural address in 1841,

“The danger to all well-established free governments arises from the unwillingness of the people to believe in [the] existence of designing men…”

In other words, men who work in government but are trying to overthrow it!  Then he stated, as if looking into our present situation in America,

“It is in periods like this that it behooves the people to be most watchful of those to whom they have entrusted power.”

(Harrison, William Henry. March 4, 1841, Thursday, in his Inaugural Address. Benjamin Franklin Morris, The Christian Life and Character of the Civil Institutions of the United States (Philadelphia: George W. Childs, 1864), p. 605. )

So the greatest threat to liberty in a nation is when the people of that nation refuse to believe that there are those within their government who are a threat to their liberty!

Think about it; because if you don’t, someone else will do your thinking for you—and for your children!  And you won’t like what that brings to you.  I’m Don Pinson this has been Think About It.