This coming Saturday, we will celebrate the 239th birthday of the United States. It is far more than just the anniversary of an event in time. The opening words and the closing words of the Declaration of Independence have a powerful message for us today.

“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”

There is a recognition that this new nation was on equal standing among the powers of the earth with any other nation on the earth. The basis of that equal standing was not something that other nations gave to them, but something to which God held the title and God gave to them. Continue reading →

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