1 00:00:04,750 --> 00:00:09,710 Greetings. This is Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church 2 00:00:09,710 --> 00:00:14,730 with a moment of truth where we challenge you to think through an important issue of life and 3 00:00:14,730 --> 00:00:23,829 faith. Today, what are principles 13 and 14 of the Constitution in our book, The 5,000-Year Leap? 4 00:00:24,089 --> 00:00:28,769 Now, if you've been tracking with us over the last few weeks, you know what I mean by these 5 00:00:28,769 --> 00:00:35,509 terms. The book, The 5,000-Year Leap, is a work that does the best job that I have seen of summarizing 6 00:00:35,509 --> 00:00:41,890 the thought and worldview of our founding fathers. How can we possibly distill the main points of our 7 00:00:41,890 --> 00:00:48,710 Constitution and why men like Washington, Jefferson, and Madison made it in the first place, this 8 00:00:48,710 --> 00:00:54,350 Constitution? If you're looking for such a work, well, The 5,000-Year Leap is it. What this book 9 00:00:54,350 --> 00:01:00,450 does is boil down all the eloquence and vast body of speeches and books, all of which are worth reading 10 00:01:00,450 --> 00:01:07,530 in themselves, into 28 principles and how we need to hear those principles today. Humanity has 11 00:01:07,530 --> 00:01:13,709 experimented with government for over 5,000 years, and thus the title of The 5,000-Year Leap, and come 12 00:01:13,709 --> 00:01:20,170 up with all kinds of horrible, disastrous forms of government, a monarchy, where a single king is 13 00:01:20,170 --> 00:01:27,469 judge, jury, and executioner, and which is so susceptible to tyranny, or a democracy, where the 14 00:01:27,469 --> 00:01:36,230 mob rules in all of its irrational passion, and is equally susceptible to tyranny, or a socialist state, 15 00:01:36,670 --> 00:01:40,950 where a kind of bait-and-switch is performed on the people who are promised that all power and property 16 00:01:40,950 --> 00:01:48,409 is held in common, but which in reality is manipulated by a few men, often called the dictatorship of the 17 00:01:48,409 --> 00:01:55,849 proletariat by philosophers like Karl Marx. Well, it's no surprise, here, as well, the socialist state, 18 00:01:56,409 --> 00:02:02,329 as we're seeing in our own day, is just as susceptible to tyranny as others. Well, after studying very 19 00:02:02,329 --> 00:02:08,110 closely all these forms of government, our founding fathers distilled the best from history into what 20 00:02:08,110 --> 00:02:14,969 we now know as the American Constitution. Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, oh, they were all close 21 00:02:14,969 --> 00:02:20,849 students of the history of governments, and they found that a constitutional republic was the best 22 00:02:20,849 --> 00:02:28,250 form of government to match human nature and its weaknesses with Christian renewal and its strengths. 23 00:02:28,729 --> 00:02:34,969 Well, with this in mind, what are the 13th and 14th principles of the 28 principles of the American 24 00:02:34,969 --> 00:02:42,969 Constitution? The 13th principle is a constitution should be structured to permanently protect the 25 00:02:42,969 --> 00:02:51,069 people from the human frailties of their rulers. Very important to understand. A constitution should 26 00:02:51,069 --> 00:02:58,310 be structured to permanently protect the people from the human frailties of their rulers. How utterly 27 00:02:58,310 --> 00:03:05,449 critical this principle is to our own age. Nowhere is the gap between the sober, realistic worldview of our 28 00:03:05,449 --> 00:03:12,729 founding fathers in starker contrast with the soft, naive, saccharine worldview of our progressive 29 00:03:12,729 --> 00:03:18,509 age. In our own day and age, who will admit that there are any human frailties against which citizens 30 00:03:18,509 --> 00:03:24,849 need protection? Of course, unless it's Donald Trump, right? In which case you need an exorcist. 31 00:03:25,509 --> 00:03:32,150 When it was actually Nancy Pelosi who invited an exorcist to her own home to exorcise the demons there. Oh, 32 00:03:32,150 --> 00:03:39,150 in any case, our founding fathers saw human nature as fundamentally fallen and corrupt, 33 00:03:39,150 --> 00:03:45,349 needing renewal and regeneration, if ever things were going to improve for mankind. 34 00:03:45,530 --> 00:03:52,090 Modern psychology and spirituality and evolutionary theory refused to see the truth of human nature, 35 00:03:52,490 --> 00:03:58,310 convincing itself that human nature is basically good. They hearken back to men like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 36 00:03:58,310 --> 00:04:03,849 who argued that, and I quote him, man is naturally good. I believe that I have demonstrated it, 37 00:04:03,849 --> 00:04:08,490 unquote. While this demonstration is really nothing more than an observation on his part that man 38 00:04:08,490 --> 00:04:14,729 occasionally behaves well in order to get something he wants from a fellow man, and thus a man may punish 39 00:04:14,729 --> 00:04:21,790 a thief because he does not want to be stolen from himself. A man may give to a needy soul in hopes that 40 00:04:21,790 --> 00:04:28,870 he may get something when he is in need himself. Well, he expresses this, Rousseau does, as, and I quote, 41 00:04:28,870 --> 00:04:35,230 an exercise of virtue by which a man commits himself to practice while learning to understand it, 42 00:04:35,290 --> 00:04:41,110 unquote. But this is really nothing more than the old discredited theory of enlightened self-interest 43 00:04:41,110 --> 00:04:46,709 in which men supposedly treat other men well in order to be treated well by others themselves. 44 00:04:47,329 --> 00:04:53,230 This is at the heart of evolutionary ethics, so-called, whereby evolutionists try to account 45 00:04:53,230 --> 00:05:01,769 for morality in humans on the basis of species survival, on the basis of species survival alone. 46 00:05:02,129 --> 00:05:08,990 Richard Dawkins, prime example, a notorious British scientist who is as militant and atheist and 47 00:05:08,990 --> 00:05:14,350 evolutionist as you'll find. Well, he tries to do exactly this in his book, The Selfish Gene, 48 00:05:14,769 --> 00:05:19,089 The Selfish Gene. In this book, he asserts that men practice the golden rule, 49 00:05:19,089 --> 00:05:24,389 do unto others as you would have them do unto you, only because it is conducive to survival, 50 00:05:24,610 --> 00:05:28,750 because your chances of survival increase if others can be convinced of this thing too. 51 00:05:29,350 --> 00:05:34,949 He also tries to make evolution account for the rise of the family, because if one protects his 52 00:05:34,949 --> 00:05:41,269 own relatives, then his own gene pool is increased and like traits to his own are propagated, right? 53 00:05:41,709 --> 00:05:47,529 Well, outside of this, for him, human nature has no reason for morality. He's not inherently weak or 54 00:05:47,529 --> 00:05:52,350 sinful or fallen from a previous righteous state. According to evolutionists, modern progressives 55 00:05:52,350 --> 00:05:59,430 refuse to acknowledge any human frailties or faults whatsoever. But besides, being a series of very 56 00:05:59,430 --> 00:06:06,449 weak arguments for powerful and biblical forces, evolution has utterly failed to account for the rise 57 00:06:06,449 --> 00:06:14,430 of Christianity and self-sacrifice for not only one's own immediate survival, but also for others 58 00:06:14,430 --> 00:06:21,269 outside of one's own immediate gene pool. This is precisely what the Bible means when it talks about, 59 00:06:21,790 --> 00:06:28,050 for God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, 60 00:06:28,310 --> 00:06:34,970 but have eternal life. That's, of course, John 3, 16. Jesus stands as heaven's greatest argument 61 00:06:34,970 --> 00:06:41,509 against evolution and its theory of morality, because Christ transcends all of the convenient, 62 00:06:41,509 --> 00:06:50,750 handy categories of survival of the fittest theorists. Christ has sacrificed and given of himself for far 63 00:06:50,750 --> 00:06:58,430 more than self-interest or his own immediate gene pool, right? The Apostle John says, Christ is the 64 00:06:58,430 --> 00:07:05,589 propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. The reason 65 00:07:05,589 --> 00:07:11,230 this sacrifice and death was required, which is all too often forgotten, is because of man's sinful 66 00:07:11,230 --> 00:07:18,350 fallen condition. The Bible paints man as a corrupt, fallen sinner. The Apostle Paul says, 67 00:07:18,589 --> 00:07:25,189 none is righteous, no, not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together 68 00:07:25,189 --> 00:07:32,050 they have begun worthless. No one does good, not even one, unquote. Not a single human being can escape 69 00:07:32,050 --> 00:07:39,089 this condition. This is what theologians mean when they talk about original sin. Original sin is that 70 00:07:39,089 --> 00:07:47,149 state of man whereby he inherits a flawed nature just by the mere reason of his being born. Original sin. 71 00:07:47,449 --> 00:07:55,370 Man cannot help but be a sinner. It is as natural as breathing. He's so from his very birth. David the 72 00:07:55,370 --> 00:08:01,430 psalmist says, behold, I was birthed in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me. Dear listener, 73 00:08:01,790 --> 00:08:07,589 do not be deceived about this. The Bible presents mankind as fatally flawed. Though he may do things 74 00:08:07,589 --> 00:08:12,970 that appear good once in a while, from a human perspective, we constantly pat ourselves on the 75 00:08:12,970 --> 00:08:18,370 back, congratulating ourselves that we've done this or that. That's perfect and good and righteous 76 00:08:18,370 --> 00:08:25,269 before God. But know this, though men do things that appear good to one another, they are corrupt 77 00:08:25,269 --> 00:08:31,750 and full of sin from God's perspective. Solomon said in the Proverbs, there's a way that seems right 78 00:08:31,750 --> 00:08:39,850 to a man, but its end is a way of death. From God's perspective in heaven, man's righteousness on earth 79 00:08:39,850 --> 00:08:46,450 is nothing but sin. Isaiah puts it this way, we have all become like one who is unclean, and all our 80 00:08:46,450 --> 00:08:53,149 righteous deeds are like filthy rags." This natural state of man is precisely why words like salvation 81 00:08:53,149 --> 00:08:58,750 and redemption are used to describe what must happen to man before he is actually good and righteous and 82 00:08:58,750 --> 00:09:04,809 true. It is the very reason for the name of the Savior. You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save 83 00:09:04,809 --> 00:09:12,110 his people from their sins. So, dear listener, know this. Although modern progressive America refuses to 84 00:09:12,110 --> 00:09:18,309 acknowledge the flawed state of human nature, our founding fathers knew it only too well. And because 85 00:09:18,309 --> 00:09:23,570 of this flawed nature, man had to be watched and controlled, especially those who were in government 86 00:09:23,570 --> 00:09:30,769 over us and had power over us. If all that we have said about human nature is true of our fellow man 87 00:09:30,769 --> 00:09:37,970 in society in general, how much more so is it true of our fellow man in government? Our founding fathers 88 00:09:37,970 --> 00:09:44,870 felt that nowhere is man less to be trusted with his natural instincts than in governing his fellow man. 89 00:09:45,509 --> 00:09:50,429 How do you think George Washington felt about government power and its potential for harm? 90 00:09:50,429 --> 00:09:57,250 Oh, there were those who wanted to make him king, giving him unlimited powers, beginning the perpetual 91 00:09:57,250 --> 00:10:05,009 cycle of monarchy and tyranny all over again, only on this new continent. Heaven forbid, thank God that 92 00:10:05,009 --> 00:10:11,309 Washington had the foresight and character to refuse a king's crown. In fact, he said, and I quote 93 00:10:11,309 --> 00:10:19,309 Washington, government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous 94 00:10:19,309 --> 00:10:28,009 servant and a fearful master, unquote. Yet there are those in our own nation who would make of a charming, 95 00:10:28,210 --> 00:10:34,230 charismatic president a king. Though he may not yet bear the title of king, what is the difference 96 00:10:34,230 --> 00:10:40,110 if a single man commands the economy can fire and hire corporation presidents in the private sector 97 00:10:40,110 --> 00:10:46,289 and Congress does his back and call? It frightens me as a student of history at just how ignorant so 98 00:10:46,289 --> 00:10:51,330 many Americans are of the divine science of government, as our founding fathers called it, 99 00:10:51,529 --> 00:10:59,389 made so by our public school system. Like millions of Pollyannas, our students are ready to follow the 100 00:10:59,389 --> 00:11:05,629 first charming government magistrate into the dark wood of tyranny. Times are hard and we look for 101 00:11:05,629 --> 00:11:11,549 saviors and problem solvers. The temptation to exchange our hard won and rare liberties for so-called 102 00:11:11,549 --> 00:11:18,070 solutions to our problems like housing or medical care or jobs in a time of crisis, it's that temptation 103 00:11:18,070 --> 00:11:24,370 is so strong. But we must not be fooled by such appearances, dear reader, dear leader, dear listener, 104 00:11:24,370 --> 00:11:31,490 though ever so benign, as Madison puts it, for it is a truth which the experience of all ages has 105 00:11:31,490 --> 00:11:38,269 attested that the people are commonly most in danger when the means of injuring their rights are in the 106 00:11:38,269 --> 00:11:46,570 possession of those toward whom they entertain the least suspicion. Unquote. Naive Pollyannas we are. 107 00:11:47,269 --> 00:11:52,289 Dear listener, though millions of fellow citizens around us are naive and ecstatic about a political 108 00:11:52,289 --> 00:11:59,169 messiah. Stay cool. Keep your wits about you. Although things like liberty and rights sound 109 00:11:59,169 --> 00:12:04,950 abstract and ethereal, when you are short of the concrete realities of life like food, shelter, and a 110 00:12:04,950 --> 00:12:13,090 job, do not fall to the temptations of trading them in for those things. No. The very reality that makes 111 00:12:13,090 --> 00:12:17,889 fallen man tyrants is that once they have your liberties and rights, there's no incentive to 112 00:12:17,889 --> 00:12:23,309 provide you with what you lacked before that is food, shelter, and a job. Our founding fathers 113 00:12:23,309 --> 00:12:30,590 constructed the constitution to protect us from the human frailties of our rulers. Man is not basically 114 00:12:30,590 --> 00:12:37,649 good. Untouched by the regenerating power of God, man is fallen and wicked and susceptible to the 115 00:12:37,649 --> 00:12:45,070 vagaries of his fallen nature. The temptations of power over the other man is irresistible. It's 116 00:12:45,070 --> 00:12:51,049 godlike. It is fatal to a free people. Understanding man's true nature, our founding fathers built into 117 00:12:51,049 --> 00:12:58,129 the constitution guards and safeties for our rights. The concept of separation of powers, for example, or 118 00:12:58,129 --> 00:13:05,590 checks and balances, both of which and more will be studied in detail in the future, are premised on the 119 00:13:05,590 --> 00:13:12,230 fact that man's fallen nature is constantly unrelentingly tempted to power and tyranny over 120 00:13:12,230 --> 00:13:18,009 his fellow man. This would not be true if men were basically good. Do not let your politicians and 121 00:13:18,009 --> 00:13:26,429 social scientists soothe you with the lie that our natures are fundamentally neutral, as an animal in 122 00:13:26,429 --> 00:13:33,789 nature would be, or fundamentally good, as religious flatterers try to paint humanity in order to win you 123 00:13:33,789 --> 00:13:40,769 over. When I go to a doctor for a checkup, I expect an honest diagnosis of my health. If he flatters me by 124 00:13:40,769 --> 00:13:45,710 telling me I'm such in fine shape for a man my age and that I have a clean bill of health, when in 125 00:13:45,710 --> 00:13:52,049 reality I have a cancerous tumor beginning to grow in my chest, well that doctor is a liar. I may go 126 00:13:52,049 --> 00:13:56,649 skipping out of his office that day, feeling good about myself, delighted in my new doctor, but I will 127 00:13:56,649 --> 00:14:03,450 soon be sick and dying, wishing the first diagnosis had been true and honest. But by then, it's too late to 128 00:14:03,450 --> 00:14:09,570 do anything, right? So it is. We have many in our culture giving us a false diagnosis of human nature, 129 00:14:09,570 --> 00:14:14,549 that your leaders can be trusted with immense power, and that they have your best interest at heart, 130 00:14:14,610 --> 00:14:21,769 and that politicians, right, like Joe Biden, are basically good people who only want to exercise 131 00:14:21,769 --> 00:14:29,330 power for the public interest. Oh, this is a lie, a false diagnosis of human nature. Give me rather the 132 00:14:29,330 --> 00:14:34,429 good doctor of the Bible, the great physician himself, Jesus Christ, who gives me the first, 133 00:14:34,830 --> 00:14:40,529 the right diagnosis, and then the right prescription. Our founding fathers understood this from the 134 00:14:40,529 --> 00:14:46,090 Bible as well, and applied it to the realities of the political world around them, and thus they put 135 00:14:46,090 --> 00:14:53,230 no confidence or trust in man in his unregenerate natural state. In fact, Thomas Jefferson says this 136 00:14:53,230 --> 00:14:59,309 about the heart of man, it would be a dangerous delusion or a confidence in the men of our choice 137 00:14:59,309 --> 00:15:05,230 to silence our fears for the safety of our rights. That confidence is everywhere the parent of despotism. 138 00:15:05,789 --> 00:15:12,090 Free government is founded in jealousy and not in confidence. It is jealousy and not confidence, 139 00:15:12,090 --> 00:15:19,289 which prescribes limited constitutions to bind down those whom we are obliged to trust with power, 140 00:15:19,289 --> 00:15:25,649 that our Constitution has accordingly fixed the limits to which, and no farther, our confidence may 141 00:15:25,649 --> 00:15:32,549 go. In questions of power, then, let no more be said of confidence in man, but bind him down from 142 00:15:32,549 --> 00:15:40,149 mischief by the chains of the Constitution, unquote. Jefferson understood human nature. Only when you have 143 00:15:40,149 --> 00:15:45,690 a correct diagnosis can you prescribe the correct cure, and our founding fathers correctly diagnosed 144 00:15:45,690 --> 00:15:52,909 human nature as fallen and corrupt. It's called total depravity. And thus, they were able to prescribe 145 00:15:52,909 --> 00:15:59,710 the right political cure, a limited Constitution. Only the chains of the Constitution could tie down the 146 00:15:59,710 --> 00:16:06,450 dreaded beast of tyranny. It's unfortunate and dangerous that many Pollyanna people in our country are 147 00:16:06,450 --> 00:16:13,570 naively untying those chains today, believing the lie coming from the beast's mouth that the men of our 148 00:16:13,570 --> 00:16:20,149 choice are basically good, and putting confidence in those men that they only have our best interest at 149 00:16:20,149 --> 00:16:28,389 heart and only want to serve the public interest. Oh, we persist in this on this course. Oh, make no 150 00:16:28,389 --> 00:16:34,789 mistake about this. Man's nature is fallen and corrupt, not basically good. And our founding fathers 151 00:16:34,789 --> 00:16:39,929 developed our 13th principle in light of that truth. That is, a Constitution should be structured 152 00:16:39,929 --> 00:16:46,470 to protect the people from the human frailties of their rulers. Well, the 14th principle is bound up 153 00:16:46,470 --> 00:16:53,129 very closely with the 13th, and that is, life and liberty are secure only as long as the right to 154 00:16:53,129 --> 00:17:01,090 property is secure. The 14th principle of the Constitution, found then in the 5,000-year leap, is 155 00:17:01,090 --> 00:17:08,910 life and liberty are secure only as long as the right to property is secure. Unbeknownst to most Americans 156 00:17:08,910 --> 00:17:14,750 and most American Christians today, this is also a biblical principle. Some Christian sects and 157 00:17:14,750 --> 00:17:20,470 denominations and individuals had developed a faulty, pietistic view of property and possessions. 158 00:17:22,230 --> 00:17:28,470 Pietism was a movement of the 16th and 17th centuries that reacted against the materialism of 159 00:17:28,470 --> 00:17:35,250 the age by retreating into a false spirituality that saw all things material as evil and all things 160 00:17:35,250 --> 00:17:43,029 invisible and spiritual as good. This and thus, property and inheritance and wealth were by 161 00:17:43,029 --> 00:17:51,509 definition evil, and those of property must be somehow evil and wicked, right? Attractive quality 162 00:17:51,509 --> 00:17:58,170 clothing, bad. Sackcloth and rough wool underwear, good. A safe, warm, large home, bad. A cold, rickety 163 00:17:58,170 --> 00:18:04,950 room in a monastery, good. A large estate with land and inheritance, bad. Homelessness and wandering the 164 00:18:04,950 --> 00:18:12,170 countryside, good. Well, the ideal was that a man behaved with Christian piety, that he looked 165 00:18:12,170 --> 00:18:19,009 exclusively inward to his soul and meditated on the things of the Spirit with very little action in the 166 00:18:19,009 --> 00:18:26,109 real material world. And much of this kind of attitude lingers in the life of the church today, like a bad 167 00:18:26,109 --> 00:18:32,890 hangover. Oh, the pietistic view of the world is not the biblical view of the world. The biblical view 168 00:18:32,890 --> 00:18:39,289 is that we do not neglect the inward world of the Spirit, but that the inward world of the Spirit is 169 00:18:39,289 --> 00:18:45,589 brought to bear in the real world, in the real world of other people, and the material of the 170 00:18:45,589 --> 00:18:51,750 objective world, too. The subjective reality of the life in Christ is always made real in the objective 171 00:18:51,750 --> 00:18:59,549 life of Christ's creation. It is in that creation that we are commanded to take dominion and fill it with 172 00:18:59,549 --> 00:19:06,990 a regenerate humanity. Be fruitful and multiply, the Bible says. Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the 173 00:19:06,990 --> 00:19:13,049 earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over it. The taking dominion of the earth by necessity and 174 00:19:13,049 --> 00:19:20,809 definition means acquiring property as land is taken and cultivated, and the rich produce of the land 175 00:19:20,809 --> 00:19:27,509 brings prosperity. By being fruitful and multiplying, family is created, and property shared with it, 176 00:19:27,509 --> 00:19:34,109 and an inheritance passed down through generations. And so the Bible always looks at property as 177 00:19:34,109 --> 00:19:41,069 familial. This is utterly crucial to understanding the nature of property. Property is familiar. I'm sorry, 178 00:19:41,190 --> 00:19:48,009 is familial. Pardon me. Property is familial, and why life and liberty are secure, only as long as the 179 00:19:48,009 --> 00:19:53,750 right to property is secure. We see this principle inculcated again and again throughout Scripture. 180 00:19:53,750 --> 00:19:58,789 Father Abraham was wealthy, though without landed possessions, with the exception of the land he bought 181 00:19:58,789 --> 00:20:05,269 at Machpelah to bury his wife Sarah. Even then, the nation surrounding Canaan respected this purchased 182 00:20:05,269 --> 00:20:10,450 land throughout the generations, right down to the days when Israel came into possession of the land. 183 00:20:11,089 --> 00:20:18,529 Property rights were respected, and only when they are can man be said to be truly free. Israel herself 184 00:20:18,529 --> 00:20:26,329 divided up the promised land by familial tribes. The 12 tribes descended from Abraham. Clans further divided 185 00:20:26,329 --> 00:20:33,230 these tribal lands right down to the individual families. So committed is God to seeing property as 186 00:20:33,230 --> 00:20:42,170 familial that even after generations had passed and land bought and sold many times, after 49 years of this 187 00:20:42,170 --> 00:20:49,490 process, there would be a year of jubilee in which all land would be reset to its original state of possession 188 00:20:49,490 --> 00:20:55,109 among the original families that owned it in the first place. Oh, borders would go back to their 189 00:20:55,109 --> 00:21:01,430 original lines. Families that may have lost property due to hard times or the conniving of their fellow 190 00:21:01,430 --> 00:21:07,789 Israelites being cheated, well, they would have the original family inheritance back again. God saw this 191 00:21:07,789 --> 00:21:13,430 as right and good and fair because property is right and good and fair, a foundational principle of 192 00:21:13,430 --> 00:21:19,910 creation. Property is meant to be developed and prospered in families. The year of jubilee was 193 00:21:19,910 --> 00:21:26,789 meant to be a time of true liberty because land previously held in bondage by non-families would be 194 00:21:26,789 --> 00:21:33,809 freed, returned to its original possessors. Goodbye, Black Rock, right? The year of jubilee was meant to be a time 195 00:21:33,809 --> 00:21:40,289 of true rejoicing. Thus, our word to be jubilant because God's original plan for subduing and 196 00:21:40,289 --> 00:21:46,490 possessing the land was respected and honored. Christians today little understand this commitment 197 00:21:46,490 --> 00:21:53,049 to property and its relation to the creation mandate and its foundation in families and thus its relation 198 00:21:53,049 --> 00:21:59,029 to true liberty and freedom. There's a direct line that can be drawn from the principle inherent in the 199 00:21:59,029 --> 00:22:05,210 year of jubilee to constitutional liberty because in the liberation of property to its original 200 00:22:05,210 --> 00:22:12,130 possessors, we have the right to property respected and honored by God himself. Oh, he made provision for 201 00:22:12,130 --> 00:22:18,869 it in the constitution of Israel. Ever since then, God has insisted that man cherish and respect not only 202 00:22:18,869 --> 00:22:24,589 his own property but that of his neighbor. Oh, that's the whole purpose of the injunction, thou shalt not 203 00:22:24,589 --> 00:22:30,769 steal. Property and freedom are bound up with one another and the man who does not understand this 204 00:22:30,769 --> 00:22:36,849 does not understand either the Bible or liberty. Is it any surprise then that our founding fathers 205 00:22:36,849 --> 00:22:43,069 understood this principle to their toenails? It was one of John Locke's recurring themes in his 206 00:22:43,069 --> 00:22:50,529 essay concerning civil government. Excuse me. He wrote an essay concerning civil government and all of our 207 00:22:50,529 --> 00:22:55,670 founding fathers had well-worn copies of this in their libraries. The man who fulfills this principle of 208 00:22:55,670 --> 00:23:01,130 subduing and taking possession of a portion of creation that has exclusive rights to that which he gives 209 00:23:01,130 --> 00:23:08,190 his labor. It's his. He has earned it. And Locke puts it this way. Whatsoever a man removes out of the 210 00:23:08,190 --> 00:23:15,309 state of nature, he has mixed his labor with it and joined to it something that is his own and thereby 211 00:23:15,309 --> 00:23:23,269 makes it his property. Unquote. Very well put. What you work for is yours. It is your property and no one 212 00:23:23,269 --> 00:23:28,130 has the right to take it from you and give it to someone else. In fact, the very reason for the creation 213 00:23:28,130 --> 00:23:33,710 of government in the first place is to protect the property of the private individual and keep it in 214 00:23:33,710 --> 00:23:39,589 his family. Our founding fathers saw the constitution they were creating as an instrument to keep property 215 00:23:39,589 --> 00:23:44,730 from the government and protect it in the hands of the people. The very basis of government is to keep 216 00:23:44,730 --> 00:23:49,809 property from the government and protect it in the hands of the people. If the people needed to do 217 00:23:49,809 --> 00:23:54,150 it, they could loan or give a small part of their property to government for the betterment of the 218 00:23:54,150 --> 00:24:00,230 welfare of the people. Our nation has it turned around though. Today, they see all property as 219 00:24:00,230 --> 00:24:06,930 ultimately the government's and we only get to have it as they see fit. This is the whole point of a very 220 00:24:06,930 --> 00:24:14,650 important Supreme Court case recently decided in 2005. It involves the principle of eminent domain. 221 00:24:14,730 --> 00:24:21,009 eminent domain. That principle asserts that a government can seize a man's private property 222 00:24:21,009 --> 00:24:26,990 and pay the man fair market value if the government wishes to put that property to use for the greater 223 00:24:26,990 --> 00:24:32,650 good of the community. This is a pernicious doctrine. Highways are built this way, as well as airports and 224 00:24:32,650 --> 00:24:37,789 other large public ventures. But in the Supreme Court case, Kelo versus City of New London, 225 00:24:38,390 --> 00:24:44,349 the City of New London, Connecticut, seized private property merely because they could get 226 00:24:44,349 --> 00:24:51,549 larger tax revenue from the shopping plaza that would be built there. How trivial, how dangerous 227 00:24:51,549 --> 00:24:58,710 to private property rights. With this decision, no man's home or yard is safe from seizure by 228 00:24:58,710 --> 00:25:04,210 government. With our government now seizing and controlling interest and many private companies in 229 00:25:04,210 --> 00:25:09,789 exchange for bailout money, we are traveling ever swifter down the road of government tyranny over 230 00:25:09,789 --> 00:25:15,789 private property. Our founding fathers knew that, with man's fallen tendencies, government should 231 00:25:15,789 --> 00:25:20,710 be bound with the chains of the Constitution from owning property and should have as its prime 232 00:25:20,710 --> 00:25:26,930 directive the protection of a private citizen's property. James Madison puts it this way. He says, 233 00:25:26,990 --> 00:25:32,690 government is instituted to protect property of every sort. This being the very end of government, 234 00:25:32,690 --> 00:25:39,250 that alone is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, or the property of which a man has 235 00:25:39,250 --> 00:25:45,910 in his personal safety and personal liberty is violated by arbitrary seizures of one class of 236 00:25:45,910 --> 00:25:51,029 citizens for the service of the rest. Unquote. Oh, in other words, you don't take from the rich and give 237 00:25:51,029 --> 00:25:56,410 to the poor. You don't take one man's property out of a supposed ideal of social justice and redistribute 238 00:25:56,410 --> 00:26:02,769 it to the disadvantaged. That's not government's job. No. The moment the idea, as John Adams puts it, 239 00:26:02,769 --> 00:26:09,789 the moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not sacred as the laws of God and that 240 00:26:09,789 --> 00:26:15,289 there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. 241 00:26:15,730 --> 00:26:23,069 Property must be secured or liberty cannot exist. Unquote. John Adams. Property must be secured or 242 00:26:23,069 --> 00:26:29,910 liberty cannot exist. Oh, dear listener, you have heard the 13th and 14th principles of the 28 243 00:26:29,910 --> 00:26:36,569 principles of the Constitution. New Geneva meets for holy worship on Sunday at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street 244 00:26:36,569 --> 00:26:45,829 on the corner of 4th and Boulevard. And you can call us for further information at area code 208-523-0196. 245 00:26:46,309 --> 00:26:49,750 208-523-0196.