Greetings. This is Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church with a moment of truth where we challenge you to think through an important issue of life and faith. And today, the United States of America, I would submit to you, requires repentance and reformation before God if the United States will ever experience restoration to greatness. Peace and prosperity. Nowadays, we are indeed experiencing a fall from greatness, warfare, and poverty.

And that's only going to increase if we remain on the same trajectory that we are on now. And it's not just a matter of mere politics of getting the right guy into office and the wrong guy out of office. Most of us have been conditioned to think along these lines that if we elect the right politicians and implement the right policies, well, then we will have the right peace and prosperity. Oh, but that is not the way that God works, dear listener. And he is sovereign over all of our affairs.

God demands righteousness, justice, and mercy from his people. God demands repentance and reform from us, that is the United States, as a precondition to restoration for this nation or any nation. God says in Ezekiel chapter 18, I will judge you every one according to his ways, declares the Lord God. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin. Now this, of course, begins.

Every one, he says. That means every individual of every particular nation, every individual in America needs to turn and look inwardly towards repentance and reformation before the whole mass of our population then experiences restoration and peace and prosperity. When our individual hearts are right and our individual behavior begins to conform to righteousness and justice, then we begin to see a change in our national circumstances. The prophet says in 1 Chronicles, then you will prosper if you are careful to observe the statutes and the rules that the Lord commanded Moses for Israel. Be strong and courageous.

Fear not, do not be dismayed. Ah, that holds just as true for every nation. Righteousness exalts a nation, as the Proverbs say. But we in the United States have been conditioned to decouple the engine of spiritual faith from the rest of the train and then expect that train to chug along down the track of greatness. Oh, we have been bludgeoned so often with a club of separation of church and state, for example, that we're senseless of what God requires of nations.

Proverbs 14, 34, as I referenced a moment ago. Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. God and the nations as well reproach us for our sin, fellow American. For the moment, we exalt ourselves because we think we're on the right path, perhaps. We were at least a little while ago.

We had elected some of the right politicians, like there's a few Tea Party candidates. And we also then elected a go-getter president, right? President Trump. And in the past, we implemented some of the right policies, like a tax bill, a humming economy, a few miles of wall, an America first foreign policy, right? And we thought that we were on our way to making America great again, as that candidate was famous for saying, right?

But we missed the most crucial element. And I think this is why we are on a free fall yet today. That is, we neglected the faith of America, which is the true greatness of America. President Trump, listen, and all other candidates running for office, listen to what an early friend of America said about the source of our greatness. French writer Alexis de Tocqueville, after visiting America in 1831, he said, and I quote him extensively, he said, I sought for the greatness of the United States in her commodious harbors, her ample rivers, her fertile fields, and boundless forests, and it was not there.

I sought for it in her rich mines, her vast world commerce, her public school system, and in her institutions of higher learning, and it was not there. I looked for it in her Democratic Congress and her matchless constitution, and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness, did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

Unquote. Let me quote those last sentences again for you. America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great. Oh, what say you, America?

Can we any longer say America is good? Perhaps this is why America is also no longer great. For example, while we can't rejoice and give thanks to God for the reversal of the blood-soaked Roe v. Wade decision recently by the Supreme Court, we must not rest on our laurels. It is only a beginning. Inertia is the momentum developed by an object in motion, and the energy required to stop that object must equal or exceed the energy required to put it into motion.

America, the abortion industry has developed incredible inertia over the last 50 years. Babies are still being sacrificed on the figurative altar to Molech every day. And the change on the legal front has not necessarily resulted in a consequent change in a consequent change in the moral front, that is, the sense of right and wrong on this issue in the hearts and minds of our people. We must continue to pray for and persuade fathers and mothers to have their children, no matter how difficult the circumstances for raising them might be.

And then we, the community, must come along to help them with those difficult circumstances and provide a community of support for them. As a country, we have become still callous and desensitized to the slaughter among us. As a baby is aborted every 30 seconds in America, still slice and dice, scalded in saline solution, or live killed by the doctor in so-called late-term abortions. America cannot be great when she continues to shed such a river of innocent blood.

And as I've detailed in the past, the United States is the chief consumer of child trafficking, for example, where thousands of girls and boys are bought and sold like commodities, primarily for the sexual lusts of American men. America cannot be great when she buys and sells her children as a commodity instead of buying and selling commodities in order to raise her children in the fear and nurture of the Lord.

Also, the United States has become a virtual crack whore of a country over the last few decades, selling herself for the marijuana and cocaine and heroin and fentanyl and methamphetamine, which flows wider than the Rio Grande across our southern border, enriching politicians and street gangs and the clandestine agencies of the deep state. And that doesn't even include the so-called legal drugs like opioids that are doled out by prescription. Oh, and Uncle Sam cannot be great, dear listener, when Uncle Sam has a hypodermic needle, excuse me.

Uncle Sam cannot be great when he has a hypodermic needle sticking out of his arms, stoned out of his constitutional gourd. America, do you not know? Can you not see? Know what God hates in a people. He says this in Proverbs chapter six.

There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him. Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood. Are you listening, abortionists? And then a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers, unquote. So, until America awakens and comes to a realistic understanding of her spiritual state, she will never right.

The ship of state, the spiritual state of a people, is upstream from her cultural state, and the cultural state is upstream from the political state of a people. So, yes, spirit dictates culture, and culture dictates politics. So, we must reform our spiritual state before we ever hope to reform our cultural state, and then, consequently, our political state. John puts it this way. He says, For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.

The Apostle John says this in Revelation chapter 3. Oh, back then, the king had no clothes. The church has no clothes. The people have no clothes. We think we are rich.

We think we've prospered, that we need nothing, not realizing that we, the United States of America, and her church, are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. And it is time for Americans to look at themselves the way God does, and then do something about it. That is, repent and reform before we are restored. Well, what does that look like, dear listener? What does that look like?

Well, first of all, repentance. Repentance means that there is a sight, sorrow, and sea change over our sin. Ha ha, repentance is, in brief, a knowledge and experience that there is a sight, sorrow, and sea change over sin. The hardest thing for an addict to do is admit his addiction. His entire ego is vested in lying to himself that he's okay, that he has it under control, that his abuse is not his master.

But once he admits that he is powerless over his drug of choice, he's on the road to recovery. He has a sight of his sin, in other words. That's the first step in any nation's road to repentance as well. As King Solomon put it in his high prayer at the opening of the temple, he said, Yet if they turn their heart in the land to which they have been carried captive and repent and plead with you in the land of their captors, saying, We have sinned and have acted perversely and wickedly. Oh, America must first acknowledge that she has sinned and acted perversely and wickedly.

Right now, we strut around the world as if we are God's gift to glory and glamour, not realizing, as John says, that we are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. Dear listener, there is no repentance until there is recall of transgression, the full realization that we have offended the Almighty. And when that happens, then another thing happens. As 2 Corinthians 7 says, The heart of a nation truly grieves over its offense to God. There is godly sorrow over sin.

Paul puts it this way, So, only when America sees her heart truly rent apart in sorrow from coast to coast will we know that we are moving towards true repentance. It has happened in the past in America, during the Great Awakening, for example, before the Revolution in 1776, and also, again, in the Second Great Awakening in the early 19th century. Our doctrinal standards define repentance like this.

It says, Repentance unto life is a saving grace, whereby a sinner, and that's what we're constituted of here in this nation, whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of his sin, in apprehension of the mercy of God in Christ, does with grief and hatred of his sin, turn from and unto God, with full purpose of, and endeavor after new obedience. Oh, dear listener, but it doesn't stop there. Not only is there a sight and sorrow over sin, but there's also a sea change over sin. That is, one begins to change his behavior to stop sinning.

We will know when America has truly repented, when the abortion clinics are shutting down, and children are placed in families with men and fathers, instead of trafficked for sex, to men and fathers. We will know America has truly repented, when the evil traitors of the deep state are unmasked, and justice, only justice, marches them down into Guantanamo Bay, instead of closing Guantanamo Bay. We will know that America has truly repented, when the hypodermic needle falls away from the arm of Uncle Sam, and becomes strong again to defend the nation, that arm. But once again, it doesn't stop there.

Secondly, the United States must bring about a reformation of her morals, and religious character, too. There must be repentance and reformation before there is restoration. It's not enough to repent, that is, have a sight, sorrow, and sea change, regarding sin per se. But we must also move on from there, and reform what has become so terribly blighted and decayed in our country, not just our neighborhoods and inner cities. John tells the church in Ephesus, for example, remember, therefore, from where you have fallen, repent and do the works you did at first, unquote.

This is the essence of reformation. America used to be a nation of goodness and righteousness. Once again, as de Tocqueville puts it, not until I went to the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness, did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good. Let me repeat that again for you.

America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great. Can you see that formula in action today? Oh, dear listener, we need somebody to come along prior to Donald Trump and say, make America good again, not make America great again, make America good again. We all need to be saying this and preaching it, shouting it from the rooftops.

Make America good again. To Tocqueville was so insightful. Our genius and power is directly proportional to our goodness. That is, it's bound to how righteous we are as a nation, the degree to which we practice godly biblical righteousness. As the prophet Micah puts it, and this is intended for the nation, he has told you, oh man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Oh, how does the USA stand in need of these things? Oh, how do they measure up along the lines of Micah? First of all, when the United States is serious about biblical reform, she will practice justice again. Presently, there is a two-tiered system of justice in America. One for the Democrat and Republican elite and one for the rest of us.

Oh, for example, Dinesh D'Souza, who has just put out 2,000 mules, that great film on the corruption of the election of 2020. But previously, Dinesh D'Souza went to prison for mistakenly handling $10,000 in campaign donations. He was an obvious political prisoner, having produced a film as well, critical of then-President Obama. He is subject to this while Hillary Clinton goes scot-free, betraying the United States as Secretary of State, grafting millions of dollars in the Clinton Foundation. Oh, fat cats like Hillary Clinton are too fat to fail.

While the rest of us are too small to warrant being free. And then, along with the prophet Micah, when the United States is serious about biblical reform, she will love mercy again as well. Mercy in the Bible is that attribute of God which shows compassion, right? That attribute which shows compassion, genuine compassion towards the helpless and the forsaken, those who perhaps cannot help themselves, who may not otherwise even deserve our help and compassion. God has mercy on the sinner who cannot save himself.

We, in turn, show mercy to one another and to others who otherwise may not be able to help us. We will show compassion towards the unborn, the sojourner, the orphan, the sick, the hungry, and the poor among us. But this will be done by the church and not the state. Also, then, from Micah, once again, when the United States is serious about biblical reform, she will walk humbly with her God. Now, in the past, in the past, America has owned the God of the Bible as her own.

The Supreme Court in 1892 stated flatly, our civilization and institutions are emphatically Christian, unquote. And George Washington, as well, was insistent that the divine hand of providence was upon him and the entire course of the American Revolution, for example. So the task of reforming America along the lines of justice, mercy, and humble walking with our God, they are immense. But it must not be ignored. It must not be shirked.

The longer we delay repentance and reform, the deeper we sink into the morass and decay of our sin, and the more difficult it will be to bring reform. In order to make America great again, we must make America good again, as de Tocqueville would put it. There is an urgency to this. Not only does the task of reform become more difficult with every moment we neglect it, but we also tempt the patience of God in judgment, the longer we postpone repentance and reform. As Ezekiel puts it, he says, therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, everyone according to his ways, declares the Lord God.

Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin. Restoration, the kind so dearly sought by red-blooded Americans, is not gotten by circumventing repentance and reformation, by short-cutting directly to peace and prosperity through our own cleverness, and by selecting the right politicians and policies. Now, that will only lead to the futile hamster wheel that we are in right now, of a system we have, where we run and run and run and spin and spin and get exactly nowhere. America, follow the counsel given the church at Ephesus. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen, repent and do the works you did at first.

Repentance and reform begins in the heart, the mind, and the soul of the individual. That means you. And, if I'm honest, as I saw in the mirror this morning, it begins with me, too. I must repent as well. And I make my appeal to you, who may fall under the hearing of this message.

Whatever the destiny of America, and God is sovereign over it, your destiny can be one of salvation, dear listener. In the book of Acts, a jailer asks the disciples, well, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household. Oh, and this has been the same. This has been true for all of us ever since that day.

Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household. Whatever happens to America, you can know the personal salvation of eternal life in the Lord Jesus Christ and blessing no matter what else happens. And, indeed, if enough of us do turn like this in genuine faith and repentance to the Lord Jesus Christ, we will see the blessings, the untold blessings that America has experienced in the past begin to wash over her again in tremendous blessing and restoration. For those of you that do know him, return to him. Do the works that you did at first, as John says, to the church in Ephesus.

Return to him. Repent and return to the Lord Jesus Christ. And we will begin to see, slowly but surely, step by step, perhaps quickly, perhaps majestically, and swiftly, we will see a return to greatness. Who knows how the Lord will bless? But we must, indeed, return to him.

Those of you that know him, return to him. Those of you that do not know him, come to a living faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will secure your place in his presence for eternity with tremendous blessing. And in the meantime, no matter what else happens here on the earth, excuse me, no matter what else happens here on the earth in the interim, you will still know him and have the assurance, the peace and assurance that the early church experienced under tremendous persecution. You will still have the peace and assurance that won the early world, that won the early church under the persecution of Rome.

Because, indeed, this nation will experience and is, to some extent, already experiencing persecution for righteousness and will continue to do so until the entire land begins to change and to come to Christ and repent and own the Lord Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Dear listener, please pray for the repentance and reformation of America because we will only see America restored to greatness when she becomes good again. As de Tocqueville puts it so trenchantly, if America ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.

But, indeed, if we, indeed, repent and return to the Lord Jesus Christ and labor for the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ and seek to become good again, then we will become great again. So, instead of first making America great again and skipping that step, let us first tend to the business of making America great. No, making America good again. And then and only then will America be great again. So, pray for the repentance and reformation of America, dear listener, and your own personal life.

It begins with your own personal life and I am going to go home and look at my own life and see what I need to repent of, what I need to do to return to my Lord and Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He beckons to you. Dear listener, he loves you and bid you to himself and I bid you to him as well and you will find the peace and salvation and restoration that all men seek in the long run. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. This has been Pastor David Bass at New Geneva and New Geneva meets for Holy Worship on Sunday at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard.

We invite you to join us, cross our threshold, meet us, you will find a friendly reception and an opportunity to worship in spirit and in truth. So please, come and join us on Sunday morning at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard and you can call us for feedback or for more information at area code 208-523-0196. That's area code 208-523-0196. com 1 4th Street Chapter 1 2 1 Square 3 M곳 2 cape 2 3 4 4 3 4 5 6 6 6 7 6 7 8 6 7 9 7 8 11 8 9 9 10 9