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Is there any link between America and the Bible? Was this nation founded on Biblical principles, or was it just “coincidence” that it came into being and grew to be the greatest nation in world history? Though people without knowledge of, or respect for, the Bible would have us believe it was just “luck”, the historical record reveals just the opposite.

In speaking to a 4th of July celebration in Newbury, Connecticut in 1837, John Quincy Adams revealed our Biblical foundations. Being one of our Founders and our sixth President, he was very familiar with the thinking of the Founders. He knew what they had done, and where their ideas had come from. He identified our roots when he stated:

“Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Saviour of the World, your most joyous…festival returns on this day:

“Is it not, that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the Progress of the Gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity…”

(Adams, John Quincy. July 4, 1837, in his work entitled, An Oration Delivered before the Inhabitants of the Town of Newburyport at their Request on the Sixty-First Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence (Newburyport: Charles Whipple, 1837), pp. 5-6. | Marshall Foster and Mary-Elaine Swanson, The American Covenant – The Untold Story (Roseburg, OR: Foundation for Christian Self-Government, 1981 | Thousand Oaks, CA: The Mayflower Institute, 1983, 1992), pp. 18-19.)

Adams stated that the “…birthday of the nation…forms a leading event in the Progress of the Gospel dispensation…” What did he mean by that? Our Founders believed that God, the father of Jesus Christ, was marching through history sharing the good news of what Christ did at the Cross to restore mankind to His original purpose for man. They believed that God had steadily moved the Gospel in a westwardly direction in order to preach the Cross of Christ from the east to the west. From the Apostle Paul turning westward into Greece in Acts 16, the Gospel was to go around the globe moving steadily from the east to the west.

America was “a leading event” in this progress because it was the first nation ever formed for the specific reason of co-operating with God in His plan to get the Gospel to the whole earth. This, our Founders believed, was the uniqueness of America. They developed her institutions of education, economy, and government, to teach, fund, and protect the right to share the message of Christ.

Adams identified further the purpose of our government when he stated, “…the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission…” The phrase, “social compact” was an idea familiar to most all Americans in that day. It simply meant that a group of people had agreed to live under “one system of government and one system of law”. He is saying this agreement among Americans about the government they would live under, was organized on the “foundation of the Redeemer’s mission”. In other words, Christ’s coming to restore man to God’s original purpose was to be protected by a government whose spirit and structure agreed with the “mission of Christ”. Our original government in America was formed to protect the right to take the Gospel to the next generation. Contrary to the current interpretation of the Separation of Church and State, getting the message of Christ to our children and ultimately the whole world is the very reason our government was formed. While government force was never to be used to try to make someone believe in Christ, government force was to be used to make certain those who wanted to share the message of Christ had the right to do it. This is what makes America unique among all the nations of history!

The Bible says, “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord…” (Psalm 33:12)

Did you know your American liberty exists to get the Gospel to your children and neighbors? Are you using your liberty for that?

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.