A phone call on Tax Day eve
I received a phone call last night from a national polling organization. The lady on the other end of the line wanted to know my opinion on the presidential candidates and whether the country was going in the right direction or the wrong one. Of course, she got an earful. She asked an open-ended question about what were the four areas I believed were the most critical for our country. There are so many, it made me think. But to my list–1) the economy and jobs; 2) Constitutional rights, 3) declining morals, and 4) accountability. While I know there are many, many more because we are a nation in great distress, those are the four that fit my pistol. We should be reminded on this day, April 15, of our nation’s woes.
What made America great is how Americans once loved God and His precepts. The foundation among the people was so very strong. Certainly, facing great odds to settle a wilderness and survive it took great faith among the early Americans. To fight tyranny against the largest, most powerful military in the world took great faith. To fight brother against brother in our bloodiest internal battle and end the institution of slavery took great faith. To fight the most powerful evil axis in the world, which was slaughtering Jews by the millions and threatened our very freedom, took great faith. But then something changed. Those who wanted to abolish family, property, religion and morals, and use government to do it, came a calling.
The very thing that our Founding Fathers feared the most–that the government would become out of control and exploit the citizenry with another form of tyranny–has occurred. Right now, it’s a soft tyranny. A control where we have some freedoms, and are not incited to fight against them because they are somewhat bearable. Little by little, the government is taking over the job base, which taxes those who create jobs, so government can control them. Constitutional rights are eroding, especially the linchpin of all rights–religious freedom and free speech as anarchists and communists are using free speech to extinguish the free speech of others. Religious freedom is being used to deny religious freedom to others.
The declining morals in this nation are part and parcel to its gradual setting of the sun over the skies of freedom. People are just doing what is right in their own eyes. The “Church” is at best distracted. Neither the “Church” nor the citizenry is able to hold accountability to one another or to leadership. We are being taxed a third of the year to pay for all this. That phone call last night made me think. I hope it makes you think as well. Galatians 5:1 says, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” Praise God for His mercy and gift of freedom. True liberty is of Christ and in Christ. As we gaze upon Tax Day, let us remember the liberty of Christ AND the tyranny before us. One cannot be defeated without the fierce application of the other.
