Get your own Free Home PageNow I could have said "The Christian Roots of the Delcaration of Independence." But I think you will agree that "foundations" has a more solid ring to it.
And I could have said "The Biblical Foundations ... " And for that matter I could have said "The Evangelical Foundations ... " And I could have even said "The Fundamentalist Foundations ... "
Indeed, all of these good words can be applied to the foundations of the Declaration of Independence. If the Christians of 1776 were suddenly to appear in America in 1994 I am sure they would be characterized by all of these -- Bible believers, evanelicals, and fundamentalists.
And so it was with most of the writers and signers of the Declaration of Independence. They were men of God and men of the Bible.
So let's change our title for our "King's Business" message this morning to, "The Christian, Biblical, Evangelical, Fundamentalist Foundations of the Declaration of Independence."
Such a thing could never happen in a million years. And it didn't happen in 1776. Most of the men who wrote and signed the Declaration of Independence were men of God, men of the Bible, men steeped in the Christian history of Europe and England, men who unashamedly confessed their faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
And it my purpose this morning to prove that fact of history to you.
Here is my outline:
1. The Christian Influence of Absolute Truth and Absolute Law on the Declaration of Independence.
2. The Christian Influence of John Locke on the Declaration of Independence.
3. The Christian Influence of John Witherspoon on the Declaration of Independence.
4. The Christian Influence of the Adams family of Boston on the Declaration of Independence.
5. The Christian Influence of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson on the Declaration of Independence.
6. The Christian Influence seen in the actual text of the Declaration of Independence.
God's truth and God's law are inseparable. And it is only through surrender to His truth and His law that sinful man can be liberated.
Jesus said, "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." And, "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." (John 8:32 and 36)
God's eternal law is not the path to salvation and liberation, but it points the way by convincing us that we are sinners and need to be saved. And apart from the law of God mankind cannot govern himself in justice, peace, and prosperity.
The source of absolute truth and absolute law are our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Tyrants lie and are lawless. They produce societies of evil, misery, slavery, and death. They have no regard for the eternal truths of God or for his immutable, unchangeable law.
Our Founding Fathers knew all these things, and their Declaration of Independence set it forth clearly.
Their absolutist concept of truth and law are reflected in such words as "becomes necessary," "entitle," "requires," "causes which impel," "self-evident," "unalienable Rights," "the Right of the People," "Abuses," "Usurpations," "Right," and "Duty."
Such concepts of human behavior can be traced only to the Bible, where other men of God declared, "We ought to obey God rather than men." (Acts 5:29)
He believed in revealed truth, in the authority of scripture, and in the necessity of God's will in human affairs.
His concepts found their way almost verbatim into the Declaration:
- Government is a trust, forefeited by a ruler who fails to secure the public good. The ruler's authority is conditional rather than absolute.
- Citizens have the right to expect political power to be used to preserve his property.
- The people are ultimately sovereign, and always have the right to withdraw their support and overthrow the government if it fails to fulfill its trust.
Locke believe that a Christian was a man who accepted Christ as God's Messiah, and that he would live in accordance with Christ's teaching.
But it is important to remember that these fundamental concepts of truth, law, and liberty were not unique to Locke. His Puritan upbringing and education were the outcome of 200 years of the experiences of the French Huguenots, the German Lutherans, the Dutch Dissenters, the English Puritans, and the Scottish Presbyterians in their pursuit of Bible-based political liberty.
All of these converged upon America in the 1700s, through John Locke, giving us our marvelous Declaration of Independence.
Witherspoon was a Scottish Presbyterian minister, born in 1723, assuming the presidency of Princeton in 1768, only 8 years before the Declaration, which he signed representing New Jersey.
From his arrival in the colonies he was enthusiastic about America. He influenced many of his students in the absolutes of Christian truth, law, and liberty. Among his students were one president, nine cabinet officers, 21 senators, 39 congressmen, 3 justices of the Supreme Court, 12 state governors, and 9 signers of the Declaration. Perhaps the most illustrious of all Witherspoon's students was James Madison, fourth president of the United States.
John Witherspoon was a strong advocate of the Biblical doctrine of covenants between God and man. He believed that the contracts, compacts, covenants, and constitutions that were being established throughout the colonies, including the Declaration of Independence, were agreements between God and man for the glory of God and the welfare of man.
So great was his influence in the Continental Congress where the Declaration of Independence was promulgated that the British blamed the revolution on the Presbyterians:
"I fix all the blame of these extraordinary proceedings upon the Presbyterians. They have been the chief and principal instruments in all these flaming measures. They always do and ever will act against government from restless turbulent spirit which has always distinguished them everywhere."
And when word of the signing of the Declaration reached England, Horace Walpole said in Parliament, "Cousin America has run off with a Presbyterian parson," an unmistakeable reference to the Rev. John Witherspoon.
Thank God for this mighty man of God who came to America from Scotland to teach our early patriots and Founding Fathers the Biblical, Christian principles of truth, law, and liberty!
What, specifically, did he teach them? In a word, that when rulers become lawless, then citizens have the right and responsibility to oppose them, revolt, and throw off their tyranny.
Years later John Adams, second president of the United States would say, "John Witherspoon is as high a son of liberty as any man in America."
Samuel Adams, born in 1722, was 13 years older than his cousin, President John Adams. He has been called "the father of The American War for Independence."
His house was known as a house of prayer. He was the organizer of the Boston Tea Party, and led his countrymen in many other causes for liberty. He said that they must "rely not on the arm of flesh but on the arm of that all-powerful God who is able to unite this country as brothers in common cause." He was concerned that his compatriots "reason out their political convictions from the standpoint of their Christian rights."
Believe it or not, Samuel Adams actually said, "The rights of the colonists may be best understood by reading and carefully studying the institutes of the great Law Giver and Head of the Christian Church, which are to be found clearly written and promulgated in the New Testament."
On the day that he signed the Declaration of Independence he said, "We have this day restored the Sovereign to whom all men ought to be obedient. He reigns in Heaven, and from the rising to the setting of the sun, let His kingdom come."
And after it was all over, and the United States of America had become a reality, Samuel Adams wrote, "A general dissolution [destruction] of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue, they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader."
John Adams was born in 1735, and died on July 4th, 1826, on the same day that Thomas Jefferson died, in the Jubilee year of the Declaration of Independence.
He was one of four signers who was assigned to the task in assisting Thomas Jefferson in the drafting of the document, and it is said that when he saw Jefferson's first draft without any mention of God, he insisted that God be made a Party to this momentous event, and then assisted him in the proper wording.
Think of it!
God in His great wisdom placed a man of God -- one of the Adamses of Boston -- at Jefferson's side to ensure that the Christian faith would be a vital part of the foundations of America!
The day before the Declaration was signed by the first signers, -- July 3, 1776 -- Adams wrote his wife Abigail, "... this great anniversary ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty."
Also attributed to John Adams as he witnessed the establishment of the United States of America are these prophetic hopes and warnings:
"The destiny of America is to carry the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all men, everywhere."
"It is religion and morality alone, which can establish the principles upon which Freedom can securely stand ... the only foundations of a free Constitution is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our people ... they will not obtain a lasting liberty."
And, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
John Quincy Adams, son of John and Abigail Adams, though only nine years old when his father and his relative Samuel Adams signed the Declaration of Independence, he continued the strict application of Christian fundamentalist beliefs to the life of the new nation that his father and his cousin had helped establish. These two quotations from the writings of John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the United States, simply serve as additional insights and proofs of the fervent Christian influences of the Adamses of Boston to be found in the Declaration of Independence. If this is what the presidential son believed, certainly is what the presidential father believed also.
"Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon Earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity?"
"The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond, the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity. From the day of the Declaration ... they [the American people] were bound by the laws of God, which they all, and by the laws of the Gospel, which they nearly all, acknowledged as the rules of their conduct."
The Adamses of Boston, dear friends, are the kinds of Christian fundamentalists who were prime movers in the promulgation of our Declaration of Independence.
Jefferson wrote, "God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are a gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that His justice cannot sleep forever." And, "Almighty God hath created the mind free ... the plan of the holy Author of our religion." ("... the holy Author of our religion" is a clear reference to our Lord Jesus Christ.)
When rancor and division were threatening the Continental Congress, Franklin rose and said, "I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth -- that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that 'except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.' ... I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service."
So much for the cavils of those who accuse Franklin and Jefferson of being irreligious and unchristian.
1. "... the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitles them ..." The writers of the Declaration said that the drastic action that they were taking was made necessary by Christian, biblical law, which was also known as "Natural Law."
2. "... they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights ..." The writers of the Declaration maintained that the rights of the colonists came from God, and that they could not be taken away ("unalienable").
3. "... appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world ..." The writers of the Declaration pictured themselves as going to court, basing their case on biblical law, with the God of the Bible as their Judge.
4. "... with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor." The writers of the Declaration declared to King George and to the world that they were trusting in the Christian God of the Bible for protection in their monumental endeavor.
It was all very logical, legal, and truthful: They were lawful human beings. Relying on Divine law, they believed their rights to do so were given to them by God. They appealed to God to judge their intentions to be right, and they relied on God to protect them in their very dangerous effort.
Let no one be misled or deceived, my friends. The God that the writers of our Declaration of Independence recognized was not a Hindu god, nor a Buddhist god, nor an Islamic god, nor a Judaistic god. They were demonstrating their faith in the God of the Bible, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the God of eternal, immutable law, the Creator of the universe and of life on earth.
(To those who say that the Constitution of the United States makes no reference to Christianity or to the Christian's God, Dr. Brabner-Smith invites us to note these words from the Constitution's next to last sentence:
"... the seventeenth day of September, in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven and of the independence of the United States of America the twelfth."
Add it up. Here there are five direct references to the Christians' God. One, of course, in the words, "... in the Year of our Lord ..." and the four in the Declaration of Independence signified by the second date, "... of the Independence of the United States of America the twelfth." The independence of the 13 states began on the day of the publication of the Declaration, twelve years earlier.)
On the occasion of this 218th anniversary of the Christian-influenced Declaration of Independence, I have to be grateful for the Christian liberty that gives even those who despise that liberty the right to seek to destroy it. But I just get a little tired of those who can't join with me in praying from the bottom of my heart, "God, thank you for the writers and signers of the Declaration of Independence who recognized You in their work, and God, bless America."
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