Greetings. This is Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Idaho Falls, Idaho, with a moment of truth where we challenge you to think through an important issue of life and faith. And today, since we are approaching the 4th of July, many of you will hear this after the 4th of July, but in remembrance and in celebration of our liberties and our freedoms, I want to challenge you to think through the issue of the Christian background of the American Constitution, in particular, the colonial period.

Colonial America embodied so much of what the ideals of the American Constitution and Declaration of Independence aspired to keep and preserve and encourage and nurture. And so I want to look closely at that period of our history, colonial America. There has been a historical blackout in the media and especially in our schools, which normally would take us through the changes of American constitutional background, which is very much Christian. But instead, we have had an historical blackout, a condition I hope to ameliorate, at least to some extent here today and in future broadcasts too.

Just a reminder, I am Pastor David Bass, and I minister at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and we meet for holy worship on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. Our location is 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard, and we have just an excellent website that you can check out, describes us a little bit, and we have articles there. We have some sermons catalogued, and then we also have, that is newgenevaopc.org, newgenevaopc.org, one word, of course. And then we have a second website, omnispotestas.org, O-M-N-I-S-P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S.org.

And that has catalogued many of our radio messages, recent as well as going back almost three years, and you can access those and be apprised of what we do here on this radio spot. That's omnispotestas, O-M-N-I-S-P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S.org. That is Latin for all authority, because Christ said, all authority has been given to me and done this to proclaim the gospel and see the gospel then overwhelm the world, even as it has been doing over these millennia. In any case, what I'd like to treat today is the Christian background of the American Constitution during the colonial period.

Now, prior to the convening of the Constitutional Convention in 1787, our founding fathers studied and absorbed the constitutions of the respective colonies of the new nation. This was part of their homework. These 13 colonies had each been founded upon unique individual charters and principles. Massachusetts and Connecticut were their Puritan and Yankee ingenuity. Maryland, established by the Calvars as a haven for Roman Catholics.

Pennsylvania, chartered to William Penn, a Quaker who wished to see the Christian religion flourish in openness and toleration. Rhode Island, of course, which became a haven for heretic and outcast alike. In short, while each was founded upon unique individual charters and principles, they all had this one thing in common. They expressly, overtly acknowledged the Christian religion and the Christian God of the Bible as the source and goal of their respective colonies, principles, and structure. This is part of the historical blackout that public schools perform upon the memories of their young charters.

For example, the first charter of Virginia puts it this way. We, greatly commending and graciously accepting of their desires for the furtherance of so noble a work, which may, by the providence of Almighty God, hereafter tend to the glory of His divine majesty in propagating the Christian religion to such people as yet live in darkness and miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God. This was the impulse for the first charter of Virginia and the Constitution of Connecticut as well, held forth several articles which would be controversial in today's political climate, especially in Connecticut.

For example, they said, In part, that the scriptures hold forth a perfect rule for the direction and government of all men in all duties which they are to perform to God and men, as well as in families and commonwealth, as in matters of the church. The scriptures, yes. And this point as well, this article from the Constitution of Connecticut, and it reads, That is, in matters which concerning the gathering and ordering of a church.

So likewise, in all public offices which concern civil order, as the choice of magistrates and officers making and repealing laws, dividing allotments of inheritance, and all things of like nature, they would all be governed by those rules which the scriptures held forth in them. Unquote. How important the Bible was to our early forefathers. And I would just say it must be questioned whether the courts of modern Connecticut itself would put up with what colonial Connecticut incorporated into the orders of the general court of the commonwealth of Connecticut.

And it reads, it says, That God's word should be the only rule for ordering the matters of government in this commonwealth. Unquote. Would any court, federal or state, order such a thing today? No, of course not. Instead of genuine humility and gratitude before Almighty God for having given such a rich resource for self-governance and republican principles as found in the Bible in the centuries of Christian tradition, modern socialist courts are filled with shame and arrogance towards the Bible and our rich heritage in Christianity.

There is no conscious effort to expunge as swiftly as possible. I'm sorry, there is a conscious effort to expunge as swiftly as possible all references to and reliance upon that text and tradition. That is the tradition and text of the Bible. So, dear listener, do not be distracted from the real issue in this struggle. The Ten Commandments will begin to reappear in our courthouses when the law of God is written upon the hearts of the men and women who serve there.

Yes, the Ten Commandments will begin to reappear in our courthouses when the law of God is written on the hearts of the men and women who serve there. So, don't despair because of a few symbols. Granite monuments, pledges, and mottos are being challenged, aren't they? These are all faith symbols, however, which every culture fashions to express the source and foundation upon which rests the law which governs them. And the more pagan and degenerate our land becomes, the more pagan and degenerate will become our symbols.

Our culture is in the process of cleansing the land of her Christian symbols precisely because she has already substantially cleansed her soul of her Christian principles. First comes the reality in the soul, and the symbol follows. The symbols are seen as a threat and embarrassment because they no longer represent what we are in our national soul.

To the majority of those who rule us today, the cross, the creche, the scriptures, they are all a shame and a threat to a secular culture because they are a visible reminder of the biblical Christian values and principles that they have abandoned in a mad pursuit of an ugly, death-dealing secularism. But it was not so with our founding fathers. In the colonial period, we see the substantial effects of the first great awakening upon the 13 colonies. For example, as the gospel swept through the young nation during that first great awakening, late 18th century, she experienced the truth that in Christ all men are brothers.

As Peter Marshall puts it in his book, The Light and the Glory, highborn or commoner, great merchant or poor farmer, magistrate or soldier, all were equal at the foot of the cross. Eternal heaven was open to all who accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior, and it mattered not what their station in life was or how wealthy they were or who their parents were, unquote. Well, this message of the gospel, this great egalitarian message, found its way into the fabric of the church's makeup, too. It was adopted and practiced there. And once again, as Peter Marshall puts it, it was only natural that it would extend into civil government as well.

Here, then, was the seed of democracy, which would extend into civil government as well. Here, then, was the seed of democracy, which would be embedded and embodied in the Constitution of the United States, of the political understanding that all men were equally entitled to vote, and that, in the sight of God, a farmer was as good as King George, for God was no respecter of persons. His laws applied equally to all men, unquote. From the book by Manuel N. Marshall, The Light and the Glory. So, here, we begin to see a profound distinction beginning to emerge on the distant shores of the American continent.

Despite the long tradition of English rights, there was still an entrenched class system of royalty nobles, commoner. That was centuries old. And although the commoner had his rights, he knew his place and station, and only rarely did he have opportunity to improve that station. In America, however, due to the power of Christianity, this is important to understand, in America, due to the power of Christianity and leveling the playing field for all men, that same commoner had every chance to succeed as the noble, only limited by his skills, intelligence, and energy.

Additionally, his vote in the meeting house counted every bit as much as the highborn or the Richmonds. He could stand in that same meeting house, and as long as he did it decently and in order, he could voice his opinion, express himself freely on any subject at hand. Thus, not only did a great ocean and time and distance separate England from her child, but increasingly, so did that child's institutions and colonial constitutions.

Every colonial considers himself a good English subject, but slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, that colony, that colonial became conscious of the fact that he was far more independent of England than England had ever suspected she was of him. This intuitive, implicit liberty was strengthened in the first generation born in the colonies, most of whom had never known anything but Republican democracy in its purest town-meeting form. The American colonists knew several liberties of which his continental counterpart was unaware. For example, the colonial had complete freedom of movement in America. He could pick up and go whenever he wanted.

There was no class system, which chained, if you will, the lower class and upper classes, for that matter, to their traditional squaredom, to their traditional system of land holdings, and the class of serfs in comparison to the class of nobles, which chained the serf especially to his master and to his particular square plot of land. In America, there was complete freedom of movement. You could pick up and move west if you wanted to find new circumstances. There was also, in colonial America, freedom of expression that was unheard of and unseen.

In England, a man could express his opinion, whatever it was, on whatever occasion he found to be necessary, most notably at the town hall, where local issues were decided by locals. There was also, in America, amongst the colonials, direct representation in colonial legislatures. Yes, one vote, one man, right? One man, one vote. And you could elect a representative to your colonial legislatures.

Those were organized, established, and set up in a variety of ways. But one thing they all shared in common was that every man had direct representation in these colonial legislatures as they voted. There was also, in colonial America, in contrast to England, a freedom of religion with no established religion. This was unknown in England, of course. Many Christians and sects had been persecuted.

That's why many of the colonies were established and why many Englishmen fled England to the colonies was to establish and express their own religious freedom. And there was no established religion either, no tax-supported state and colonial religion, except for Virginia, which, of course, did this for the longest time. The Church of England was established in Virginia, but all the other colonies had, indeed, a freedom of religion unknown, unseen in England. There was also a trial by jury that you had, a jury of your peers.

This was part of the great leveling, part of the great egalitarian strain in America, was that come to trial, in an issue of justice, you had a right to a trial by jury, not a judge, like Judge Jeffries, for example, notorious in the greatest sizes when he persecuted many commoners in England at that time. No, in America, trial by jury, and that jury was composed of peers, that is, farmers and locals and merchants and so forth, that you saw every day, and you were judged by them.

So, all of these things, and more, really, we can say, were enjoyed by colonials here in the colonies in America, and this became part of the warp and woof of America. This became what was expected of America, and when England began to transgress those rights, oh, the fury, yes. Imagine, then, all of these things being the given in America. Imagine the colonist consternation when British policy began to shift towards laying an increasing burden on this prosperous offspring of Mother England. Oh, boy.

A man could make his own way, he could make his own wealth, and suddenly Britain started to intervene and to curb these liberties. Began to happen. Began to happen in the mid-18th century, when the tyrant King George III asserted his authority over what he saw as a cow ready for the milking. That is the American colonies, excuse me. And so, the outrage of the Townsend Acts of 1767, for example, which imposed duties on glass and tea and paper and so on, this passed without the consent or vote of a single colonist.

Oh, they weren't used to this. And so, the outrage of the Stamp Act, as well, of 1765. It required a stamp of the British Crown on every legal document produced in America, despite the fact that the British Crown had little or nothing to do with the day-to-day life of the colonists, this local legislature, and who, in turn, had no representative across the wide sea to speak for him in Parliament, where all of these tyrannies were being manufactured.

And so, the outrage of the rough and arrogant British troopers regularly quartered in colonial homes, this too, they were given to taking whatever they wanted, whether colonial horse or silver or maiden. And so, the outrage of redress for these and other monstrous grievances were routinely ignored and scoffed at by the ministers and judges of the Crown. Justice became as much an orphan as many of the children of the colonies whose fathers were in jail, impressed into the British Navy, far at sea maybe, or who were just in their graves because of peremptory sentences passed down by judges accountable only to the King.

Dear listener, what were the colonists to do? Was not a Christian to be obedient to proper authority? This rang from many of the Tory pulpits of the day. They read Romans chapter 13, verses 1 and 2, just like we have many Tory preachers all across America, too, who say there's nothing for it but to submit and to obey. Paul says this in Romans 13, Let every person be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.

Therefore, he who resists the authorities, resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment, unquote. So, all of these points we give a hearty amen to with the Apostle Paul because, indeed, legitimate government is to be obeyed. And if this were the only scripture that spoke to proper rule and authority, well, then we would be consigned to bear tyranny no matter what our circumstances and opportunities. It would be fallen, sinful man who would dictate government. Which is the case often, anyway.

It's becoming increasingly so in America. And, under these circumstances, the Christian would never be able to speak to issues like justice and mercy, the proper limits of power, and the duties and qualities of both prince and subject. Instead, our founding fathers were completely familiar with the body of material, the scope, the scope, the wide range of material that bore upon these and other topics developed over centuries of thought and practice.

Yes, unlike the unthinking Christian pastors and congregations today who just shake their heads and say, all authority is given by God, all authority is given by God, we've got to obey and submit. No, our founding fathers were intimately familiar not only with their Bibles, but also other deeply Christian men and philosophers who had bent their talents to reflecting on these subjects. They called the study of government the divine science because, indeed, it was something close to the heart of God. And men like Montesquieu, Samuel Rutherford, Algernon Sidney, and, of course, Mr. John Locke, philosopher of the revolution.

These men developed the idea that not only was there explicit obedience expected of the subject, but also an implied contract that Locke called the social contract. And he said this social contract existed between the commoner, the man who is under the magistrate, and those who exercise rule. This social contract existed, and it was scripturally drawn out because king and legislature and judge must follow the commandments of the scriptures, one of which stated, he that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God, as 2 Samuel 23, 3 says.

This was one of the guiding scriptures then of our founding fathers and those who developed a Christian philosophy of government. He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. Those two things. Mighty important for the magistrate. If we had magistrates today who followed those two rules, that is fearing God and being just to their core.

And a just core, a just character, a just practice based on biblical principles too, that is also assumed. We would have a different kind of government indeed today, wouldn't we? If we had men and women who followed these two rules from 2 Samuel 23, he that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. So this is a given. And it was widely acknowledged that the ruler who violated this contract, this social contract, then as John Locke puts it, the ruler who violated this contract forfeited his right to the obedience and loyalty of his subjects.

It was not a low bar, but a very high bar. When we come to resisting then magistrates, it had to be that the ruler who violates this social contract of being unjust and no longer fearing God, indeed, if this was the man, then he forfeited his right to the obedience and loyalty of his subjects. Even good King James I, who was really no friend to democracy, he put it this way, a king ceases to be a king and degenerates into a tyrant as soon as he leaves off to rule according to his laws.

Yes, lawless kings, lawless magistrates do not deserve obedience and loyalty because a magistrate ceases to be a magistrate and degenerates to a tyrant when he leaves off ruling according to law. Yes, and we find that in our government today, do we not? We have a government of men rather than laws. We see that whether it's the bushes or the Clintons or those in the FBI and the CIA who indeed are tyrannizing over us in the deep state, they rule according to men, not according to law.

Now, for the colonists, if only King George III had listened to his predecessor, that is James I, but instead, George III added, as Thomas Jefferson articulated in the Declaration of Independence, George III added a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evincing a design to reduce them, that is the colonists, under absolute despotism. It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government and to provide new guards for their future security, unquote. So these are the conditions that must be balanced then, must be balanced then, along with Romans chapter 13.

Jefferson did not pen the Declaration in an intellectual and biblical vacuum. No, he did not. His readers knew precisely whence his thought. Resistance to tyrants as a well-established doctrine in civil philosophy. Yes, Samuel Rutherford, for example, in his book, Lex Rex, he says, he who resisteth the man who is the king, commanding that which is against God, killing the innocent, resisteth no ordinance of God, but an ordinance of Satan.

For a man commanding unjustly and ruling tyrannically hath in that no power from God. Yes, you obey Satan rather than God when you obey a tyrant who kills the innocent and who is godless. Now, King George III amply fit this description and Jefferson made this clear in his Bill of Particulars in the Declaration. The catalog of wrongs is daunting and takes up the large bulk of the Declaration, doesn't it, even though the opening paragraphs are usually quoted and not much else.

Well, Jefferson does this because the candid world to which he addressed the Declaration would have expected a biblical and philosophical rationale for the serious matter of rebellion. If it could be demonstrated that George III was not ruling over men justly, ruling in the fear of God, then America's case was made. Besides providing posterity with a set of inspirational prose, the Declaration of Independence thus accomplished its goal of making the argument for separation from the mother country. So, Jefferson could look to God for justification of America's cause.

As he puts it, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions do in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies solemnly publish and declare that these united colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states. Unquote.

And so, we discover that in everything from the colonial charters and constitutions to the Declaration of Independence penned on the eve of the revolution, the Christian religion and the Bible suffused the thought and souls of the men who made them to divorce God from our institutions today expunge the memory of him and his book is only to pull out from underneath our collective feet the very foundation that causes us to stand as a country. In fact, we hope to demonstrate in our next lecture that this is the close connection between biblical principles and preceding charters with the Constitution.

To say God is nowhere mentioned in the text of the Constitution that the basis for government is really only a canard. The Constitution itself is intimately connected with the atmosphere in which it was created and it wasn't made in a vacuum. No, it was made in a context and that context was that of the Christian religion and the Bible. This has been Pastor David Bass and I minister at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Now, we meet for holy worship.

I encourage you to join us. Come out of the woodwork, out of the shadows as they say, those of you that have been listening for a while. Come and visit us. We meet for holy worship on Sunday at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard and you can call us for more information at area code 208-528-7948 and you can check out our websites too. We have two of them.

Our church website, newgenevaopc.org. One word, newgenevaopc.org. There you'll find much information on our church, many articles and many records of sermons that we have preached at New Geneva in the past and you can also check out our second website which is omnispotestas.org O-M-N-I-S dash P-O-T-E-S T-A-S dot org and there you'll find a catalog of these radio messages and you can peruse those at your leisure. Once again, this has been Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Idaho Falls, Idaho and you can call me for more information at 208-523-0196. That's area code 208-523-0196.