Irrevocable

Part 2/2 (see part one of this two-part series)

Transcribed and edited from a recorded sermon by Dan Fisher on December 13, 2020.

For those who are here for the first time, today’s sermon is going to be a little different than what you are used to. I will be teaching the second part of a two-part series. I hope this message will inspire you, educate you and encourage you to be patriots for God.

Today’s scripture text I’ve chosen is in Second Corinthians 6:17a. It says, “Wherefore, come out from among them and be separate, saith the Lord.”

Only Israel and God entered into this covenant with the nation of Israel at Mount Sinai.

America was not birthed that way. However, America is exceptional and different than any other country in world history. If you go back and look at the roots of our pilgrim forefathers, you would learn that it was tremendous faith in God that caused them to come here. Their trust in God’s design created the Mayflower Compact and the form of Government that we have enjoyed for over 200 years in the United States of America.

America and the Declaration of Independence were built on a biblical worldview. Now I will read the Declaration of Independence to you:

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.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them 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.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by 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; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

It might sound odd to most of you to hear the words of our Declaration of Independence during a church service. Someone once said that man’s feet on the moon is the greatest accomplishment in human history. Actually, it is not. God’s feet on planet earth is the greatest accomplishment in human history, and we celebrate this every December.

We know the greatest freedom is that of the soul and that of the mind. However, we also realize that freedom from physical restraint and control is paramount to expressing our faith and living our lives in a way that we believe would honor God. Therefore, I cannot think of a better time to focus on what I’m going to be sharing with you today.

On November the 17^th of 1863, then-President Abraham Lincoln was asked to deliver a few appropriate remarks at the dedication of a national cemetery in a place called Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Lincoln had his moments both good and bad. Some of you may be huge fans of Abraham Lincoln, and others of you may not think that highly of him. At the speaker’s podium, he gave the Gettysburg Address. This is known by many to be the greatest speech ever delivered by an American president. Yet, it was probably one of the shortest. He said that those “…we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

I fear that we’re living in a time where Lincoln’s greatest fear could be realized. We have an incredible heritage. It is a tremendous blessing we have received from God to be a chosen people who have been allowed to live in relative freedom and liberty. This liberty can easily be taken for granted, while there are many who do not have the freedoms we have today.

I think most of us have forgotten the price that was paid for our freedom. We celebrate this on the Fourth of July, but you might not understand that those men were terrified at that moment. The weight that fell upon them was massive, very possibly one of the heaviest moments that men were ever called upon to endure. Thank God they did!

Can I hear an Amen?

I began last week talking to you about the subject of “Irreconcilable.” Today, I want to talk to you about the subject of “Irrevocable.” It brings me no pleasure to tell you that I believe that America is irreconcilably divided today. Recent events that are happening all around us only serve to emphasize that fact. We talked last week that for something to be irreconcilable, it must be an idea, a fact or a statement representing findings, or points of view that are so different from each other that they cannot be made compatible.

We saw that the Bible does not teach that Christians are not commanded to seek peace at any cost. In fact, Paul says to the Roman Christians, “If it is possible, live at peace with all men,” but he clearly implies it is not always possible. Jesus, the Great Prince of Peace who came to bring peace between sinners and God, said that he did not come to bring peace between individuals necessarily. Don’t get me wrong that would be God’s desire, but in a fallen world, it is practically impossible. He said, “No, the truth is that the message that I preach will make enemies for you, even out of your own family.” When we cannot reconcile with someone, Jesus tells us, for instance, in Matthew 10, verses 13 and 14, that we are to shake off the dust of our feet.

In Romans 16, verses 17 and 18, Paul says, “Note those who cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them.” The great overarching principle is restated in Second Corinthians chapter six verse 17, where the Lord says, “Come out from among them and be separate,” says the Lord, “and do not touch the unclean thing.” There are times when things are irreconcilable.

Last week we heard examples showing just how divergent and polarized we are. There are those who don’t want free speech, while others do. There are those who don’t want religious expression, while others do. There are those who don’t want our history, while others do. There are those who don’t want individual liberty, while others do. This list could go on forever. This was just to show you how opposite we are from one another.

During a CNN interview, reporter Chris Cuomo and Judge Roy Moore discussed where our rights come from. Judge Moore states “that because our rights contained in the Bill of Rights do not come from the Constitution, they come from God.” Then Cuomo pipes in and argues that “times change, definitions change…. Our rights do not come from God, Your Honor, and you know that. They come from man… That’s your faith, that’s my faith, but that’s not our country.”

That’s how divided we are. Our Declaration of Independence, Our National birth certificate says that we receive our unalienable rights from God. Maybe Chris Cuomo needs to read that declaration again. Although it wouldn’t do him any good because he rejects it.

In a very short period of time, Cuomo rejects the whole concept that rights come from God to man. He believes that rights come from Government to man. This is how irreconcilable we are. Depending on what side of that debate you stand on, everything changes. If our rights come from God, men cannot do anything to alter them, and they are truly unalienable, but if our rights come from other men, i.e., governments of men, well then what the government grants in one generation can change in the next. What one government grants and bequeaths to people in one era, it may take away in the next.

Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, freedom to defend yourself by gun ownership, well, those are all relative to the era in which you live according to people like Chris Cuomo, or they are eternal truths that our framers were smart enough to understand and articulate in our national birth certificate.

The real question is, which side of the issue will be on? They don’t want the declaration, we do. They believe rights come from Government, we don’t. How do you reconcile this? Well, the point is you do not.

Then what do we do? Well, this is where the word irrevocable enters our discussion. What is something if it’s irrevocable? Well, it is not able to be changed, reversed, or recovered, it is final. Now, not everything in life is irrevocable.

As much as we don’t like to admit it, God intends for marriage to be one man, one woman for life because of man’s sinfulness. God allows marriages to be dissolved under very limited circumstances. Infidelity, the primary one. Of course God’s will is that the couple reconciles and fixes their relationship, but a marriage can be revoked. Women who are in physical danger should be counseled to take their children and get out of that House. So marriage at some point is not irrevocable.

Partnerships, although they have signed contracts and signed agreements, they are not irrevocable. Some partnerships and businesses fail, resulting in attorneys having to legally break or dissolve that partnership. Therefore, not all partnerships are irrevocable.

A pastor’s relationship with his congregation is not irrevocable. Paul talks about how elders who sins should be rebuked publicly. The New Testament talks about how a pastor can disqualify himself and have to be removed. So not everything in life is irrevocable.

Oh, some things are, thank the Lord for that. Things like salvation. If you’re in Christ, Paul says, “Nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus. That is an irrevocable relationship.”

If you do not have that relationship today, at the end of the service, you’ll be given the opportunity to meet the Lord and enter into that irrevocable relationship for all eternity.

Our rights, I believe, are irrevocable. This is why they are called unalienable. We cannot be alienated from our rights, making them unalienable, irrevocable rights. Rights like the right to freely associate with who we choose and not associate with who we choose not to are our irrevocable rights.

No one, including Government, has the right to force you into associations that violate your faith. Yet the Equality Act, which has been passed by the House, is awaiting for the moment when the Democrats control the Senate. Then they will march that bill over to the Senate which will ultimately pass it. Should this happen, your religious beliefs and your faith can be violated by the legislative fiat. Now, even though they claim that they can do that, in the end, they cannot. This is the very moment in which we live that requires us to talk about these things. Political agreements, compacts, even constitutions are revocable.

We don’t like to think about this, but with last week’s introduction to this message, there are times when we’re just irreconcilably divided and there’s nothing we can do other than to separate. Separate, to revoke the original agreement, the original compact, the original contract, the original constitution. We celebrate people in history who have done this. Once a year, Americans celebrate the separatists. Most people think that the pilgrims were Puritans. They were anything but Puritan. They were separatists, and they disobeyed the King of England to separate themselves from the English church at significant risk.

Dr. Paul Jehle is an ardent student of history. In addition to being a pastor, he also serves as the Executive Director of the Plymouth Rock Foundation. This is an organization dedicated to the remembrance of the Pilgrims and the Christian heritage that was forged in the wake of their influential devotion to God and the Bible. He documented some of the risks that were taken for that little band of separatists. Imagine what faith it took for them to break away. They initially went to Holland to finally cross the Atlantic Ocean, during the worst possible time of the year. For 66 days, they were tossed back and forth in that little ship that we know as the Mayflower, only to be blown off course and land in an area that they had not planned on. It was so desolate when they first landed. We believe this to be the reason William Bradford’s wife committed suicide, by jumping off the side of the ship and drowning. Yet,  we celebrate these people because they were willing to sever a longstanding tie because differences had become irreconcilable.

This is where we are today and although it is not my desire on Sunday mornings to turn messages into history lessons, where else can we deal with the subject? To quote from Abraham Lincoln again, early in his political career, he was told that he could not talk about the abolition of slavery in political circles because that brought religion into politics. He said, “But then on the other hand, I’m told that I cannot talk about the abolition of slavery in religious circles because that’s bringing politics into religion.” We asked, “Where pray tell can we talk about this subject?”

I believe we have a spiritual responsibility to take the word of God and shine it on our lives from day-to-day and to use God’s word to help us to interpret not only what’s going on around us, but what we must do. This is what the separatist that we call the pilgrims did. This is what the framers a little over a century later did.

Were they all born again Christians? Probably not. Let’s not over Christianize them, but that era was an era of profound respect for the Bible and the principles enshrined therein. Even those who did not claim a personal relationship to Christ had a pretty strong respect for the Bible, the God of the Bible, and the principles of liberty they found in the scriptures. They looked elsewhere of course. It was not just their belief in scripture, but there are some things that we need to remember that they believed.

Now you may argue, “Well, they just said what they said when they said it because it was convenient for that time.” Well, that may be so, but I cannot know the motives of individuals. All I can do is look at what people do, what they say, and what they write and judge them accordingly. It’s what Jesus called judging a tree by its fruit. I cannot know the heart of anyone in my era, and I certainly cannot know the heart of anyone living in the 1770s. But listen to what James Madison, who was the primary author of the US Constitution, wrote in Federalist 39: “…the proposed Government cannot be deemed a national one; since its jurisdiction extends to certain enumerated objects only, and leaves to the several states, a residuary and inviolable sovereignty over all other objects.”

In other words, what the author of the US Constitution is saying is that the Federal Government is not a national government controlling everything; at that time there were only 13 states, but only had authority where it had been given specific power.

Is that the way it works today? In Federalist 14, Madison says “…the general, he’s speaking there of the Federal Government, is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws. Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects…”

What are called the enumerated powers? Article one section eight of the US Constitution, depending on how you count them, there are some 18. That’s it. Now, I want you to think with me for just a moment. Do you think that the framing generation of the 1770s would have fought an 8-year war against the most powerful military in the world, against the largest empire that existed at that time… Do you think they would have fought that 8-year war, sacrificed in goods, personal belongings, blood, sweat, tears and many of them with their lives, just so they could win and design the same kind of Government they had just fought to get out from under? Does that make any kind of sense at all?

No, now to illustrate this to you, by the time John Adams is president, the Alien and Sedition Acts had been passed without going into heavy detail. Basically, what the Alien and Sedition Act said is, you cannot criticize the Federal Government. If you criticize the Federal Government, you can be arrested, you can be fined, you can be thrown in jail. They actually executed those powers and did just that, even imprisoning a congressman.

Well, James Madison, the author of the US Constitution and Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence led out in a response to what they believed was a very unconstitutional situation—that if it was not addressed, all of our liberties could be violated and ultimately, the Federal Government could do just about whatever it wanted to.

Because if you can’t criticize it, then doesn’t it have soul authority? Where’s freedom of speech? Where’s freedom of assembly? Where’s the freedom to petition your Government, to redress grievances? Well, it’s non-existent if you can’t criticize the Federal Government and can be thrown in jail if you do. Rightly so, the two authors of our founding documents were very concerned. Listen to what Madison writes in his Virginia Resolution 1798, “That this Assembly (the Virginia Assembly) most solemnly declares a warm attachment to the union of the states…it is their duty to watch over and oppose every infraction of those principles which constitute the only basis of that union…”

You must understand what he’s saying here. He says that the only basis that holds the union together is the ability of the states to hold the Federal Government in check. He says, without that power, the union breaks apart “…because a faithful observance of them can alone secure its existence.”

What is its existence? The union and the public happiness. He says, “…in case of a deliberate, palatable, and dangerous exercise of other powers…”

What do you mean by other powers? Well, powers that the Federal Government just bequeaths to itself, not listed in the US Constitution. Madison goes on to say “…not granted by the said compact (that’s the constitution), the states who are parties thereto have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil,…”

Thomas Jefferson, in the Kentucky Resolution, written that very same year said, “…that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.”

Consider Obamacare. According to the author of the Declaration of Independence, our national birth certificate, Obamacare is unauthoritative and void.

In a letter to George Washington on February the 15th, 1791, Jefferson said this, “To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specifically drawn around the powers of Congress (that would be by the constitution) is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.”

Think about how the mask mandates have caused this country, such division.  It relates to what we just heard. It is not about not wanting to wear a mask, because that is your freedom of choice to decide whether or not you feel safer by wearing a mask. It’s not about the mask in and of itself. It’s the authority that governors and mayors have bequeathed upon themselves to force people to wear a mask. Because by the same power, they could force you to wear a football helmet, or to wear a pair of rubber flippers, or to put on a suit of armor, or to wear a hazmat suit, or to stay in your house, shut your business and close down your church.

That’s why this is so important. If we believe that the preaching of the gospel is the most important thing we can do in life, then surely we would believe that the second most important thing is to defend the right to do the most important thing.

I stand before you to defend the right of conscience and of speech, and yet my friends, we are right on the verge of having those stripped from us. That’s why this is so important. It’s not just a bunch of political gobbledygook. This is life and death.

History shows that tyrants always use the same steps to enslave their subjects. There was nothing new about this in 1776. They had seen all of this before, and there’s nothing new about it today. People are no more evil today than they were in the 1400s. Man has fallen. Man has this insatiable desire because of his fallenness to control his fellow citizens. Without great restraint, some can rise to a position of power to do just that.

We have no idea how long we will be on this planet. This is for our children, grandchildren and even great-grandchildren. We have a responsibility to secure their future. Do I want to end my life in a prison? No, but I am willing to pledge my life and my fortune and my sacred honor to keep them free.

And I am willing…

Alexander Hamilton was one of the framers and a big government guy. I think he would be appalled to see what big government looks like today. He said, “If the Federal Government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers,” by the way, it has, “…the people whose creature it is…” Notice, the Government is a creation of the people. Now, this harkens back to what Lincoln said in Gettysburg, in 1863, government of, by, and for… Hamilton continues “…the people must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done to the Constitution as the exigency,” that means the circumstances, the urgent need, “…may suggest and prudence justify.”

I’m here to tell you that’s where we are today.

Great injury has already been done to our liberties. What can we do? Well, first, we all have to establish if we have reached an irreconcilable spot. I personally believe we have. There are certain things that are revocable, but unalienable rights are not among them.

Constitutions are revocable. Compacts are revocable. But, eternal truths are irrevocable.

And it’s upon those that we stand and we can do no other. So here’s the thing, Chris Cuomo said, “Our rights don’t come from God, they come from government.” If that was true, it means the government can take them away.

How many liberties are you willing to give up? How many of us are willing to go down with the ship? There is at least half of this country who want to remake the American Republic into something else and I promise you, that’s something else, you’re not going to like.

Do we just stand by and say, “Well, we’re locked in, there’s nothing we can do about it”?

Did the 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th Amendments lock us in so that we can’t do anything about it?

Do you honestly believe that the framers who wrote the original documents would have stood by and done nothing? And yet, we practically have. I’m doing what I realize is greatly misunderstood in our time and not popular with many, but it seems like it is time for a political separation.

Let’s call it a political divorce, just like the divorce or political separation that Thomas Jefferson called for in the Declaration of Independence. He tells us in that document, what we are to do. He says, “Governments are created to secure our rights, those unalienable rights, that these governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Do you consent to what the Federal Government is doing today?

No. Whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, what ends? Our unalienable rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; which involve the ability to acquire property. Yet, elected officials like AOC and her constituents are claiming that government has the right to take what you’ve earned and redistribute it to those who won’t work.

By the way, the separatists that we call the pilgrims experimented with that. Remember how that worked out for them? They nearly starved to death, until William Bradford said, “No, we’re going to be capitalists. I’m going to give you a piece of land, it’s yours. You farm it, you eat. You don’t farm it, you don’t eat.”

Paul said the same thing in the New Testament, “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.”

The Declaration of Independence states, “that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it…”

Notice the right of the people. Not the rebellion of the people. The right of the people to do what? To alter, to abolish it and later on as I read earlier, to throw it off. Now by the way, those are three DEFCON levels.

To alter is DEFCON 3, that means that our Government’s gotten off course, and we just have to do some course corrections.

To abolish it is DEFCON 2, which means the Government has gotten so far off track that it cannot be fixed, and we have to redo it. So we abolish what we have and we create a new one.

DEFCON 1 is when we’ve blown through those two warnings and waited so long that now our Government has become a tyranny. That is when we have to throw it off.

Where are we today? I believe we’re at DEFCON 2, but we’re quickly racing to DEFCON 1.

If we do not figure out a way to peacefully separate and simply say to those who don’t want our history— who don’t want freedom of speech, who don’t want freedom of religion, who do not want the right to own private property, or to be able to own a firearm for self-defense—to go do that peacefully with our blessings. At the same time, they need to allow us who do believe in those things, to pursue those with their blessings. If we do not figure out a way to peacefully separate, we risk being overrun by tyranny. And many of us will be at risk of finishing our days on this earth in jail.

This is why this is so important. No one wants to go to war. I also don’t want a Federal Government that can tell me when I can preach and when I can’t, and when we can open our church and when we can’t, and to use emergency powers to enact all of these unconstitutional measures, to tell me that I have to embrace what the Bible calls sinful perversion, that I have to perform same-sex weddings, or I’m violating their civil rights. I will not do this.

Never. Not because I have any hatred toward those people. I believe what they do is wrong, but I will not condone what they do, nor can you, and be true to God’s word.

What does Jefferson say we must do? He said we must institute new Government. You understand these are not my words, none of them. These are the words in our national birth certificate. He said we must institute new Government, it’s time for that. The Declaration of Independence states, “…laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them (meaning those who have been aggrieved), shall seem most likely to affect their Safety and Happiness.

Following Thomas Jefferson’s own advice, this is what we are to do. Now, we’re a small congregation. On a good Sunday, we have some 400 people here. I’m not a powerful individual. My message does not go very far. Of course, we have an internet presence, social media where our message goes a little further than just to those who attend. But we’re not a large church. All I can do is tell you what I believe to be true, and then to be true to you, to be as transparent as I can possibly be to you. This is all I can do.

I would imagine that those men that were sitting in Independence Hall in July of 1776 felt rather small themselves. Sometimes large things have small beginnings. Now, as I begin to close this message, I want you to know, that generation did not relish what was about to happen.

Jonas Clark who was the pastor of the church in Lexington, Massachusetts. One year after the battle of Lexington, he preached a sermon about it, listen to what he said, “The connection of America with Britain might have been preserved inviolate to the end of time. And it may be added, that there is no just ground to suppose, that it would have ever entered the heart of Americans, to have desired a disillusion of so happy a connection with the Mother-Country, or to have sought independence of Britain, had they not been urged, and even forced upon such an expedient, by measures of oppression and violence, and the shedding of innocent blood.”

Abraham Keteltas, a preacher who preached all over the northeast in a 1777 election sermon, said, “…all our assemblies … have endeavored, by the most humble and earnest petitions to the throne, to prevent the fatal war, which now rages and desolates our land. …and it was not until every pacific measure failed, and our petitions were scornfully treated, and rejected, and a powerful fleet and army had actually invaded us and shed our blood; that we took up arms, in behalf of our lives and liberties.”

A preacher and soldier in the continental army, William Gordon preached a sermon on July the 4th 1777, the first year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration. He said, “This continent complained of real grievances, and humbly petitioned. …Instead of being heard and relieved, the yoke was increased by fresh acts of cruelty, and new burdens laid upon the continent. Our first grievances were spoken of as if not real; and as though we complained without cause, ….we were at once plunged into a defensive war, …Still we were desirous, if possible, of an accommodation. We, therefore, petitioned again, without rising in our requests, only enlarging them to take in new grievances. Instead of having them redressed, we were deemed and were to be treated as rebels.”

I could give you quote after quote. For sake of time, I want to get to the final quote that I have from a man by the name of John Witherspoon. He was a member of the continental congress that voted to separate from Great Britain. He signed the Declaration of Independence. He was also the president of what later became Princeton University. He was a Presbyterian preacher. Dr. John Krebs was a witness of the scene that I’m about to read to you. He said, “Every eye went to him,” meaning to Witherspoon, “with the quickness of thought and remained with the fixedness of the polar star. He cast on the assembly a look of inexpressible interest and unconquerable determination, while on his visage the hue of age,” at that time, Witherspoon was 64, “was lost in the flush of burning patriotism that fired his cheek.”

Now, what caused everyone to pay such close attention to John Witherspoon, he stood and he gave this speech?

Witherspoon continued, “There is a tide in the affairs of men, a nick of time. That noble instrument on your table,” (meaning the Declaration of Independence), “which ensures immortality to its author,” (that would be Thomas Jefferson) “should be subscribed this morning by every person of this house. He that will not respond to its accents and strain every nerve to carry into effect its provisions is unworthy the name of freeman. For my own part of property, I have some, of reputation more. That reputation is staked, that property is pledged on the issue of this contest; and although these gray hairs must descend into the sepulcher, I would infinitely rather they should descend thither by the hand of the executioner than desert at this crisis the sacred cause of my country.”

The delegation heard that speech, heeded Witherspoon’s advice, and voted to separate from Great Britain, and the rest is history. This is where we are today. It is time for political separation, peaceful separation. Our differences are irreconcilable and our rights are from God and they’re irrevocable. And we must demand, the people must demand, that our unalienable rights be protected at all costs.

Let’s not be in a position where we have to tell our younger generation that “I have done nothing, and for that, I am ashamed.” It is time for every liberty-loving American to stand and say no further.

No further.

Would you bow with me in prayer? Before I pray, let me say to you that if you do not have peace with God, Jesus came to give you that peace. He is the prince of peace, and he will set you free from your sins. If you want to come today and meet the one who died for you, come, we have counselors who will be here to pray with you.

Maybe you’re a Christian and you know that you have not been faithful to what God has called you to do, then come today. There is never a better time than right now to recommit your life to what God has called you to do and to be.

Now is the time to learn these principles and to stand for what we know is right. Maybe you ought to join this church. You know that pastors all over this state should be preaching on these topics, you know it. Then you should join this church and link arms with us, and help us.

Father, in Jesus’ name, we close this time that we’ve had together. As we have this short time of invitation, would you deal with us?

Lord, we pray it in Jesus’ name, amen.