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Sam Adams, the Father of the American Revolution, which secured our liberty in America, stated:

“The right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, the rights of the Colonists as Christians may best be understood by reading and carefully studying the institutions of The Great Law Giver and the Head of the Christian Church, which are…clearly written…in the New Testament.”

(Adams, Samuel. November 20, 1772, in his pamphlet entitled, The Rights of the Colonists, in section: “The Rights of the Colonist as Christians.” The Rights of the Colonists (Boston: Old South Leaflets), Volume VII, 1772 | John Eidsmoe, Christianity and the Constitution – The Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, A Mott Media Book, 1987; 6th printing, 1993), p. 254.)

Sam Adams believed that our liberty was rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  It was simply the extension of the internal liberty Christ brings into our spirit and soul when we submit to Him as our Master and Deliverer.

The prophecies surrounding Jesus’ birth reveal that He came to bring freedom from the penalty and power of sin, which had kept mankind in bondage since our rebellion against God in the Garden of Eden.  Take, for instance, the prophecy spoken by John the Baptist’ father, Zacharias.  He stated that the Savior would bring…

“…salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins…” (Luke 1:77)

The word “remission” here means “freedom”.  It’s taken from two Greek words which mean “to send forth, away from.”  Thus, we see the Savior, Jesus, would send our sins away from us.  This included the penalty for our sin, which, according to Romans 6:23, is death (or separation from God) both now and in eternity.  But this “remission”, this freedom, also includes the sending away of the power of sin over us, so that, as the Apostle Paul would say later,

“…it shall not have dominion over you…” (Romans 6:14)

Not that we can’t choose to sin once we’re born again, it’s just that that is not our normal course.  It is not our heart.  We want to obey God, and over the rest of our life we will generally do that.

This “remission” from sin was pictured in the Old Testament in Leviticus 16.  There God told the Priests of Israel to lay their hands on the head of a goat, confess the sins of the nation, then have the goat taken into the wilderness where no human lived, and turned loose there.  This pictured what the Savior would do to release us by His death and resurrection.  All who would receive Christ as Master would be freed from sin!!

America’s Founders believed that this internal freedom in Christ must be allowed to grow into external freedom, which was civil liberty.  They believed that all civil blessings flowed from the liberty the Spirit of Christ brought when He came into a human heart.  Blessings like internal peace, external provision, as well as external protection.  When men have peace, protection, and provision from God, they are free to think logically with God.  That produces the best education method man can know.  Freedom from sin also allows us to think equally in civil government, that “…all men are created equal…”  Freedom in Christ allows men to think creatively about economy and, thus, produces the greatest amount of prosperity for the greatest number of people.

All the blessings which made America the greatest nation in world history came from so many of our Founding generation knowing the “remission of…sins” which Jesus brought to mankind.  This is why Noah Webster, the Father of our original education method, would say:

“The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His apostles…This is genuine Christianity, and to this we owe our free Constitutions of Government.”

(Webster, Noah. 1832. History of the United States (New Haven: Durrie & Peck, 1832), pp. 273-274, 300, paragraph 578 | Verna M. Hall, The Christian History of the American Revolution (San Francisco: Foundation for American Christian Education, 1976), p. 255.)

Do you know the internal liberty of Christ because you’ve surrendered to Him?

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.