8/25/15

From Mark Copeland... "GIVE ME THE BIBLE" Why I Love The Bible

                          "GIVE ME THE BIBLE"

                          Why I Love The Bible

INTRODUCTION

1. In this series ("Give Me The Bible"), thus far we have explored...
   a. The Problem Of Biblical Illiteracy
   b. Why I Read The Bible
   c. Why I Believe The Bible

2. But I don't just read and believe the Bible, I love the Bible...!
   a. It is my favorite book
   b. It is my constant companion when I travel
   c. I read it daily, with the goal of reading through it at least once
      each year

[Like the Psalmist, I love the Word of God (cf. Ps 119:97-104)  Why?
First of all, because...]

I. THE BIBLE GAVE ME NEW LIFE

   A. THE THEME OF THE BIBLE...
      1. Is God's plan for the redemption of man from sin
      2. Beginning with promises made in Genesis - Gen 3:15; 12:1-3;
         22:18
      3. Fulfilled with the coming of Jesus Christ - Ac 3:25-26; Ga 3:16

   B. THE GIFT OF THE BIBLE...
      1. It tells us how we can be reconciled to God - Ro 5:8-11
      2. It reveals the gospel whereby we can be saved - Ro 1:16; 1Co 15:1-4
      3. A gospel with both commands and promises - Mk 16:15-16; Ac2:38-39; 3:19; 22:16
      4. Through the Word of God, I was given a new life in Christ - 1Pe2:22-23; 2Co 5:17
         a. Freedom from the guilt of sin by the blood of Christ- Ep 1:7
         b. Freedom from the power of sin by the Holy Spirit - Ro 8:11-14
         c. The opportunity to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus
            Christ - 2Pe 3:18
      5. As Jesus promised, I was given the opportunity for an abundant
         life! - Jn 10:10

[I became a Christian early in life (at 13 years of age).  For more than
45 years, I have sought to live as the Bible directs.  I therefore love
the Bible because of the benefits I receive as...]

II. THE BIBLE GUIDES ME THROUGH LIFE

   A. DURING MY YOUTH...
      1. I was inspired by young role models in the Bible
         a. Joseph, who resisted temptation - Gen 39:9
         b. Daniel, who purposed in his heart to do what was right - Dan1:8
         c. Shadrach, Meshach, Abed-nego, with faith in the face of fire
            - Dan 3:16-18
         d. Timothy, who served as an example despite his youth  - 1Ti4:12
      2. I was given wise counsel from:
         a. Proverbs - encapsulating the wisdom of Solomon - Pr 1:1-4
         b. Ecclesiastes - the meaning of life and how to live it - Ec11:9-10; 12:1
         c. Jesus - regarding the proper priorities in life - Mt 6:33;16:26
         d. The apostles - showing me how to live for Christ - 1Co 11:1;2Pe 1:5-11
      3. With the Bible as my guide...
         a. I avoided many of the pitfalls that plague youth
            (immorality, materialism)
         b. I made good choices involving life (friends, marriage,
            family, work)
      4. And whenever I stumbled, the Bible...
         a. Offered me grace and forgiveness in Jesus Christ - 1Jn 1:9;
            2:1-2
         b. Gave me encouragement to get back up, to press on - Php3:12-14

   B. INTO MY OLD AGE...
      1. I am inspired by aged role models in the Bible
         a. Moses, who at 80 accepted a new calling - Exo 7:7; cf. Psa90:10
         b. Joshua, who starting at 80 led Israel for 30 years - Josh 24:29
         c. Caleb, who said "Give me this mountain!" at age 85 - Josh14:6-12
         d. Daniel, who continued to serve God and man into his 90s
            - Dan 6:1-3,10
         e. Anna, who though 84 continued to serve God with prayers and
            fasting - Lk 2:36-38
         f. Paul the aged apostle, who continued to write letters and
            travel - Phm 1:9,21-22
      2. I continue to receive wise counsel from:
         a. Proverbs - always increasing in understanding - Pr 1:5-6
         b. Ecclesiastes - always reminding me what is important - Ec2:24-26; 9:9
         c. Jesus - always keeping my priorities straight - Lk 10:40-42;12:22-40
         d. The apostles - guiding my life as a disciple of Christ - Php4:4-9
      3. With the Bible as my guide...
         a. I can face the future with confidence - 2Co 4:16-18
         b. I can look forward to what the Lord will provide - 2Ti 4:6-8
      4. And as this life comes to an end, the Bible...
         a. Offers me the hope of the resurrection - 1Co 15:50-58
         b. Promises a heavenly city, a new heavens and earth - He13:14; 2Pe 3:13-14; Re 21:1-7

CONCLUSION

1. Yes, I love the Bible, because it...
   a. Introduced me to God and His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ
   b. Taught me the way of salvation through an obedient faith In Jesus
   c. Guides me to experience abundant life now, and receive eternal
      life hereafter - Ps 119:105

2. And so I concur with sentiments expressed by two great men...

   "I believe that the one chief reason that I have been kept in happy
   useful service is that I have been a lover of Holy Scripture.  It has
   been my habit to read the Bible through four times a year; in a
   prayerful spirit, to apply it to my heart, and practice what I find
   there.  I have been for sixty-nine years a happy man; happy, happy,
   happy." - George Muller, who established orphanages in England

   "I am profitably engaged in reading the Bible. Take all of this Book
   that you can by reason and the balance by faith, and you will live
   and die a better man. It is the best Book which God has given to
   man." - Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of the United States

Many people love the Bible.  Don't you?  I hope I have encouraged you to
truly love the Word of God...

Executable Outlines, Copyright © Mark A. Copeland, 2011

Noah's Ark—Not A "Rough" Draught by Kyle Butt, M.A.



https://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=13&article=563

Noah's Ark—Not A "Rough" Draught

by  Kyle Butt, M.A.

When reading through the exciting story the Flood, it often is very easy to miss the importance of certain verses. For instances, Genesis 7:19-20 states: “And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high mountains that were under the whole heaven were covered. Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.” At first glance, it might just look like these verses are telling us that water covered every high mountain. But to those who are familiar with shipbuilding, this verse means much more than that.
As workmen construct a ship, designers must take into account its draught, which is the measurement of how far into the water the ship will sink when it is fully loaded. Were you to confer with shipbuilding guides, you would discover that the draught for large barge-type vessels generally is approximately one-half of their height. Since the ark was 30 cubits high, it would sink 15 cubits into the water. It therefore would need 15 cubits of water above the highest mountains in order for its bottom not to scrape against those mountaintops. Interestingly, God not only designed the perfect vessel for the trip, but also sent the correct amount of water to prevent that vessel from smashing into the top of a submerged mountain peak.
When the Holy Spirit inspired the Bible, He did not include information “just to take up space.” Each verse in the Bible is important for one reason or another. Let us all work hard to discover those reasons.

God's Just Destruction of the Canaanites by Eric Lyons, M.Min.


https://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=12&article=4660

God's Just Destruction of the Canaanites

by  Eric Lyons, M.Min.

In the 1930s and 40s, the Nazi regime committed state-sponsored genocide of so-called “inferior races.” Of the approximately nine million Jews who lived in Europe at the beginning of the 1930s, some six million of them were exterminated. The Nazis murdered approximately one million Jewish children, two million Jewish women, and three million Jewish men. The Jews were starved, gassed, and experimented on like animals. In addition, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime slaughtered another three million Poles, Soviets, gypsies, and people with disabilities (see “Holocaust,” 2011 for more information). Most sane people, including Christians and many atheists (e.g., Antony Flew, Wallace Matson), have interpreted the Nazis’ actions for what they were—cruel, callous, and nefarious.
Some 3,400 years before the Holocaust, the God of the Bible commanded the Israelites to “destroy all the inhabitants of the land” of Canaan (Joshua 9:24). They were to conquer, kill, and cast out the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites (Exodus 23:23; Deuteronomy 7:1-2; Joshua 3:10). After crossing the Jordan River, we learn in the book of Joshua that the Israelites “utterly destroyed all that was in the city [of Jericho], both man and woman, young and old, ox and sheep and donkey, with the edge of the sword…. [T]hey burned the city and all that was in it with fire” (Joshua 6:21,24). They also “utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai” (Joshua 8:26), killing 12,000 men and women, and hanging their king (8:25,29). In Makkedah and Libnah, the Israelites “let none remain” (Joshua 10:28,30). They struck Lachish “and all the people who were in it with the edge of the sword” (10:32). The Israelites then conquered Gezer, Eglon, Hebron, Debir, and Hazor (10:33-39; 11:1-1). “So all the cities of those kings, and all their kings, Joshua took and struck with the edge of the sword. He utterly destroyed them, as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded” (Joshua 11:12).
God had the Israelites kill countless thousands, perhaps millions, of people throughout the land of Canaan. It was genocide in the sense that it was a planned, systematic, limited extermination of a number of nation states from a relatively small area in the Middle East (cf. “Genocide,” 2000; cf. also “Genocide,” 2012). But, it was not a war against a particular race (from the Greek genos) or ethnic group. Nor were the Israelites commanded to pursue and kill the Canaanite nations if they fled from Israel’s Promised Land. The Israelites were to drive out and dispossess the nations of their land (killing all who resisted the dispossession), but they were not instructed to annihilate a particular race or ethnic group from the face of the Earth.
Still, many find God’s commands to conquer and destroy the Canaanite nation states problematic. How could a loving God instruct one group of people to kill and conquer another group? America’s most well-known critic of Christianity in the late 1700s and early 1800s, Thomas Paine (one of only a handful of America’s Founding Fathers who did not claim to be a Christian), called the God of the Old Testament “the Mars of the Jews, the fighting God of Israel,” Who was “boisterous, contemptible, and vulgar” (Paine, 1807). Two centuries later, Richard Dawkins (arguably the most famous atheist in the world today), published his book The God Delusion, which soon became a New York Times bestseller. One of the most oft-quoted phrases from this work comes from page 31, where Dawkins called God, a “racist, infanticidal, genocidal…capriciously malevolent bully” (2006). According to one search engine, this quote (in part or in whole) is found on-line approximately one million times. The fact is, critics of the God of the Bible are fond of repeating the allegation that, because of His instruction to the Israelites to kill millions of people in their conquest of Canaan, the God of the Bible has (allegedly) shown Himself to be an unruly, shameful, offensive, genocidal, “evil monster” (Dawkins, p. 248; cf. Hitchens, 2007, p. 107).

Was God’s Campaign Against Canaan Immoral?

How could a supremely good (Mark 10:18), all-loving (1 John 4:8), perfectly holy God (Leviticus 11:44-45) order the Israelites to slay with swords myriads of human beings, letting “none remain” in Canaan? Is not such a planned, systematic extermination of nations equivalent to the murderous actions of the Nazis in the 1930s and 40s, as atheists and other critics of Christianity would have us believe? In truth, God’s actions in Israel’s conquest of Canaan were in perfect harmony with His supremely loving, merciful, righteous, just, and holy nature.

Punishing Evildoers is Not Unloving

Similar to how merciful parents, principals, policemen, and judges can justly administer punishment to rule-breakers and evildoers, so too can the all-knowing, all-loving Creator of the Universe. Loving parents and principals have administered corporal punishment appropriately to children for years (cf. Proverbs 13:24). Merciful policemen, who are constantly saving the lives of the innocent, have the authority (both from God and the government—Romans 13:1-4) to kill a wicked person who is murdering others. Just judges have the authority to sentence a depraved child rapist to death. Loving-kindness and corporal or capital punishment are not antithetical. Prior to conquering Canaan, God commanded the Israelites, saying,
You shall not hate your brother in your heart…. You shall not take vengeance nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself…. And if a stranger dwells with you in your land, you shall not mistreat him. The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself (Leviticus 19:17-18,33-34; cf. Romans 13:9).
The faithful Jew was expected, as are Christians, to “not resist an evil person” (Matthew 5:39) but rather “go the extra mile” (Matthew 5:41) and “turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39). “Love,” after all, “is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10; cf. Matthew 22:36-40). Interestingly, however, the Israelite was commanded to punish (even kill) lawbreakers. Just five chapters after commanding the individual Israelite to “not take vengeance,” but “love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), God twice said that murderers would receive the death penalty (Leviticus 24:21,17).

The Wickedness of the Inhabitants of Canaan

The Canaanite nations were punished because of their extreme wickedness. God did not cast out the Canaanites for being a particular race or ethnic group. God did not send the Israelites into the land of Canaan to destroy a number of righteous nations. On the contrary, the Canaanite nations were horribly depraved. They practiced “abominable customs” (Leviticus 18:30) and did “detestable things” (Deuteronomy 18:9, NASB). They practiced idolatry, witchcraft, soothsaying, and sorcery. They attempted to cast spells upon people and call up the dead (Deuteronomy 18:10-11).
Their “cultic practice was barbarous and thoroughly licentious” (Unger, 1954, p. 175). Their “deities…had no moral character whatever,” which “must have brought out the worst traits in their devotees and entailed many of the most demoralizing practices of the time,” including sensuous nudity, orgiastic nature-worship, snake worship, and even child sacrifice (Unger, 1954, p. 175; cf. Albright, 1940, p. 214). As Moses wrote, the inhabitants of Canaan would “burn even their sons and daughters in the fire to their gods” (Deuteronomy 12:30). The Canaanite nations were anything but “innocent.” In truth, “[t]hese Canaanite cults were utterly immoral, decadent, and corrupt, dangerously contaminating and thoroughly justifying the divine command to destroy their devotees” (Unger, 1988). They were so nefarious that God said they defiled the land and the land could stomach them no longer—“the land vomited out its inhabitants” (Leviticus 18:25). [NOTE: Israel was an imperfect nation (as all nations are), but God still used them to punish the Canaanites. God warned Israel before ever entering Canaan, however, that if they forsook His law, they, too, would be severely punished (Deuteronomy 28:15ff). In fact, similar to how God used the Israelites to bring judgment upon the inhabitants of Canaan in the time of Joshua, He used the pagan nations of Babylon and Assyria to judge and conquer Israel hundreds of years later.]

The Longsuffering of God

Unlike the foolish, impulsive, quick-tempered reactions of many men (Proverbs 14:29), the Lord is “slow to anger and great in mercy” (Psalm 145:8). He is “longsuffering…, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). Immediately following a reminder to the Christians in Rome that the Old Testament was “written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope,” the apostle Paul referred to God as “the God of patience” (Romans 15:4-5). Throughout the Old Testament, the Bible writers portrayed God as longsuffering.
Though in Noah’s day, “the wickedness of man was great in the earth” and “every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Genesis 6:5), “the Divine longsuffering waited” (1 Peter 3:20). (It seems as though God delayed flooding the Earth for 120 years as His Spirit’s message of righteousness was preached to a wicked world—Genesis 6:3; 2 Peter 2:5.) In the days of Abraham, God ultimately decided to spare the iniquitous city of Sodom, not if 50 righteous people were found living therein, but only 10 righteous individuals.
And what about prior to God’s destruction of the Canaanite nations? Did God quickly decide to cast them out of the land? Did He respond to the peoples’ wickedness like an impulsive, reckless mad-man? Or was He, as the Bible repeatedly states and exemplifies, longsuffering? Indeed, God waited. He waited more than four centuries to bring judgment upon the inhabitants of Canaan. Although the Amorites were already a sinful people in Abraham’s day, God delayed in giving the descendants of the patriarch the Promised Land. He would wait until the Israelites had been in Egypt for hundreds of years, because at the time that God spoke with Abraham “the iniquity of the Amorites” was “not yet complete” (Genesis 15:16). [NOTE: “The Amorites were so numerous and powerful a tribe in Canaan that they are sometimes named for the whole of the ancient inhabitants, as they are here” (Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown, 1997).] In Abraham’s day, the inhabitants of Canaan were not so degenerate that God would bring judgment upon them. However, by the time of Joshua (more than 400 years later), the Canaanites’ iniquity was full, and God used the army of Israel to destroy them.
Yes, God is longsuffering, but His longsuffering is not an “eternal” suffering. His patience with impenitent sinners eventually ends. It ended for a wicked world in the days of Noah. It ended for Sodom and Gomorrah in the days of Abraham. And it eventually ended for the inhabitants of Canaan, whom God justly destroyed.

What About the Innocent Children?

The children of Canaan were not guilty of their parents’ sins (cf. Ezekiel 18:20); they were sinless, innocent, precious human beings (cf. Matthew 18:3-5; see Butt, 2003). So how could God justly take the lives of children, any children, “who have no knowledge of good and evil” (Deuteronomy 1:39)? The fact is, as Dave Miller properly noted, “Including the children in the destruction of such populations actually spared them from a worse condition—that of being reared to be as wicked as their parents and thus face eternal punishment. All persons who die in childhood, according to the Bible, are ushered to Paradise and will ultimately reside in Heaven. Children who have parents who are evil must naturally suffer innocently while on Earth (e.g., Numbers 14:33)” (Miller, 2009). God, the Giver of life (Acts 17:25; Ecclesiastes 12:7), and only God has the right to take the life of His creation whenever He chooses (for the righteous purposes that He has). At times in history, God took the life of men out of righteous judgment. At other times (as in the case of children), it was taken for merciful reasons. [NOTE: For a superb, extensive discussion on the relationship between (1) the goodness of God, (2) the contradictory, hideousness of atheism, and (3) God bringing about the death of various infants throughout history, see Kyle Butt’s article “Is God Immoral for Killing Innocent Children?” (2009).]

CONCLUSION

Though the enemies of the God of the Bible are frequently heard criticizing Israel’s conquest of Canaan, the fact is, such a conquest was in complete harmony with God’s perfectly loving, holy, and righteous nature. After patiently waiting for hundreds of years, God eventually used the Israelites to bring judgment upon myriads of wicked Canaanites. Simultaneously, He spared their children a fate much worse than physical death—the horror of growing up in a reprehensible culture and becoming like their hedonistic parents—and immediately ushered them into a pain-free, marvelous place called Paradise (Luke 16:19-31; 23:43).

REFERENCES

Albright, William F. (1940), From the Stone Age to Christianity (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins).
Butt, Kyle (2003), “Do Babies Go to Hell When They Die?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=13&article=1201.
Butt, Kyle (2009), “Is God Immoral for Killing Innocent Children?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/article/260.
Dawkins, Richard (2006), The God Delusion (New York: Houghton Mifflin).
“Genocide” (2000), The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin), fourth edition.
“Genocide” (2012), Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/genocide.
Hitchens, Christopher (2007), God is Not Great (New York: Twelve).
“Holocaust” (2011), Encyclopedia.com, http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Holocaust.aspx#1.
Jamieson, Robert, et al. (1997), Jamieson, Fausset, Brown Bible Commentary (Electronic Database: Biblesoft).
Miller, Dave (2009), “Did God Order the Killing of Babies?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=13&article=2810.
Paine, Thomas (1807), “Essay on Dream,” http://www.sacred-texts.com/aor/paine/dream.htm.
Unger, Merrill F. (1954), Archaeology and the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan).
Unger, Merrill F. (1988), “Canaan,” The New Unger’s Bible Dictionary (Electronic Database: Biblesoft).

Congressman Broun and Creation by Jeff Miller, Ph.D.


https://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=3538

Congressman Broun and Creation

by  Jeff Miller, Ph.D.

U.S. House Representative Paul Broun, a Georgia Republican, was attacked earlier this month for his strong stand for the biblical model of Creation as opposed to evolution. LiveScience.com painted Congressman Broun as ignorant of the scientific facts, which according to them, prove that the Universe could not be as young as Broun says it is (i.e., “about 9,000 years old,” Pappas, 2012).
According to geochemist Richard Carlson of the Carnegie Institution, the Earth and the rest of the solar system began to solidify between 4.567 and 4.568 billion years ago. What scientific evidence do Broun’s accusers point to in order to prove him wrong? According to LiveScience.com, “This age range is calculated using isotopes, or variants of chemical elements. For the purposes of dating the solar system, researchers use lead and uranium isotopes” (Pappas). The single piece of evidence used to convict Broun of error and substantiate an old Universe is isotope dating.
The problem with this “evidence” is that evolutionary dating methods, such as lead and uranium dating, are riddled with several false assumptions which cannot be conclusively substantiated. Three prominent examples are (1) no daughter element (e.g., lead) existed in the specimen at the beginning of its decay; (2) the specimen being examined constitutes a closed system; and (3) the nuclear decay rate of the elements being measured (e.g., uranium and lead) have remained constant throughout history. All three of these assumptions (and others) are unsustainable and rather presumptuous. In fact, they have been shown to be wrong in many cases, as we have often pointed out over the years at Apologetics Press. Ironically, the geologists intimately familiar with such dating techniques admit that “violations” of the assumptions “are not uncommon” (McDougall and Harrison, 1999, p. 11).
In reality, due to the nature of catastrophic events throughout history—events which violate the uniformitarian principles upon which evolution and its old-Universe contention hinge—the age of the Universe cannot be determined, except through divine revelation. Science simply cannot give a conclusive answer to the question regarding the age of the Earth. It can only yield theories that are based on certain unprovable (and suspect) assumptions. The Creationist contention—that the Earth is relatively young and most of its geologic features are the product of catastrophic events—is perfectly in keeping with the evidence, and in fact, fits the evidence better (cf. DeYoung, 2005). Bottom line: Congressman Broun’s viewpoint is in keeping with the evidence and reason. Bravo, Congressman, for standing up for the Bible and true science.

REFERENCES

DeYoung, Don (2005), Thousands...Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).
McDougall, Ian and T. Mark Harrison (1999), Geochronology and Thermochronology by the 40Ar/39Ar Method (New York: Oxford University Press), second edition.
Pappas, Stephanie (2012), “Fact Check: What a 9,000-Year-Old Earth Really Looked Like,” LiveScience, http://www.livescience.com/23872-9000-year-old-earth-creationism.html.

Gambling, the Military, and Christian Ethics by Dave Miller, Ph.D.


https://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=7&article=2354

Gambling, the Military, and Christian Ethics

by  Dave Miller, Ph.D.

Aaron Walsh had a bright and promising future. A Warrant Officer in the U.S. Army and a decorated Apache helicopter pilot, he had a lovely wife and two young children. When he joined the Army, however, he developed an addiction to gambling due to the presence of slot machines on overseas military posts. (The Department of Defense uses slot machine revenues to fund military recreation programs). In 2005, he went AWOL, only to be found sitting in front of a video slot machine on a military post in Seoul, South Korea. Unable to break his addiction, young Walsh lost his family and his career in the Army, and spent time homeless on the streets of Las Vegas, Nevada. In 2006, he returned to Maine in hopes of reconnecting with his wife and children, but his gambling addiction only continued. Sadly, on September 26, 2006, at the age of 34, Walsh went to Baxter State Park and killed himself with a gunshot to the head (Griffin, 2007). “[T]he way of the transgressor is hard” (Proverbs 13:15, ASV).
American civilization has declined to such an extent that most citizens today would be surprised to learn that, from the very beginning of our nation until about 50 years ago, the majority of Americans viewed gambling as immoral. In fact, the Founding Fathers forthrightly addressed the issue of gambling. The Continental Congress passed a resolution on October 12, 1778, declaring their condemnation of gambling:
Whereas true religion and good morals are the only solid foundations of public liberty and happiness: Resolved, That it be, and it is hereby earnestly recommended to the several states, to take the most effectual measures for the encouragement thereof, and for the suppressing theatrical entertainments, horse racing, gaming, and such other diversions as are productive of idleness, dissipation, and a general depravity of principles and manners (Journals..., 1823, 3:85, emp. added).
The laws of Connecticut included a prohibition against gambling:
Gaming is an amusement, the propensity of which is deeply implanted in human nature. Mankind in the most unpolished state of barbarism and in the most refined periods of luxury and dissipation, are attached to this practice with an unaccountable ardor and fondness. To describe the pernicious consequences of it, the ruin and desolation of private families, and the promotion of idleness and dissipation, belong to a treatise on ethics (as quoted in Swift, 1796, 2:351).
In a letter to Martha Jefferson in 1787, Thomas Jefferson commented on the degrading influence of gambling:
In a world which furnishes so many employments which are useful, so many which are amusing, it is our own fault if we ever know what ennui is, or if we are ever driven to the miserable resources of gaming, which corrupts our dispositions, and teaches us a habit of hostility against all mankind (as quoted in Forman, 1900, p. 266).
In his proposal for a revision of the laws in his home state of Virginia, Jefferson offered the following “Bill to Prevent Gaming,” which restricted the holding of public office to non-gamblers:
Any person who shall bet or play for money, or other goods, or who shall bet on the hands or sides of those who play at any game in a tavern, racefield, or other place of public resort, shall be deemed an infamous gambler, and shall not be eligible to any office of trust or honor within this state (1950, 2:306).
Ironically, as Commander-in-Chief of all U.S. military forces, George Washington frequently addressed the deleterious effect of gambling on the soldiers of the Continental Army he commanded. In General Orders issued on February 26, 1776, Washington admonished:
All officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers are positively forbid [sic] playing at cards, and other games of chance. At this time of public distress, men may find enough to do in the service of their God, and their Country, without abandoning themselves to vice and immorality (1931, 4:347, emp. added).
Courtesy Library of Congress: www.loc.gov
The majority view of America and its Founders from day one has been that gambling in its various forms is a vice that is destructive of the moral fabric of society—a view they gleaned from the Bible (see Miller and Butt, 2003). With uncanny anticipation, George Washington declared to his troops on May 8, 1777: “As few vices are attended with more pernicious consequences, in civil life; so there are none more fatal in a military one, than that of Gaming; which often brings disgrace and ruin upon officers, and injury and punishment upon the Soldiery” (8:28, emp. added). The death of Aaron Walsh is a tragic testimony to the truth of Washington’s declaration. If the military’s morality protocol from the beginning of our nation was still in effect, Aaron Walsh likely still would be alive, and his family would still have a father and husband. Even more tragically, if the Continental Congress was correct in its claim that “true religion and good morals are the only solid foundations of public liberty and happiness,” then America is moving swiftly down a road that will result in “a general depravity of principles and manners” and the dissolution of “public liberty and happiness.”

REFERENCES

Forman, S.E. (1900), The Life and Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Indianapolis, IN: Bowen-Merrill).
Griffin, Drew (2007), “Bill Would Ban Military Slot Machines,” CNN News, [On-line], URL: http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/12/15/military.gambling/index.html.
Jefferson, Thomas (1950), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press).
Journals of the American Congress: From 1774 to 1788 (1823), (Washington, D.C.: Way and Gideon).
Miller, Dave and Kyle Butt (2003), “Christians, Gambling, and the Lottery,” [On-line], URL: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/2301.
Swift, Zephaniah (1796), A System of Laws of the State of Connecticut (Windham, CT: John Byrne).
Washington, George (1931), The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745-1799 (Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office).

From Gary... Beyond hate


America has been a great country since its beginning. However, things are changing- political correctness, socialism, and liberalism are distorting this great land, almost to the point of being unrecognisable. The picture says that hate needs to be removed and it is right in that statement. I think we need to go a bit farther than that; consider the following...

Matthew, Chapter 13 (WEB)
 10  The disciples came, and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” 

  11  He answered them, “To you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven, but it is not given to them.   12 For whoever has, to him will be given, and he will have abundance, but whoever doesn’t have, from him will be taken away even that which he has.   13  Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they don’t see, and hearing, they don’t hear, neither do they understand.   14  In them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says, 
‘By hearing you will hear, 
and will in no way understand; 
Seeing you will see, 
and will in no way perceive: 
  15  for this people’s heart has grown callous, 
their ears are dull of hearing, 
they have closed their eyes; 
or else perhaps they might perceive with their eyes, 
hear with their ears, 
understand with their heart, 
and should turn again; 
and I would heal them.’

Hate is evil; no one denies that. Go to the source of evil and you will find the heart that has rejected God. A heart that is dulled by sin, which in turn dulls the hearing, eyesight and reason. This sickness (verse 15) can only be cured by turning to God for healing. America will be great again, one person at a time, WHEN verse 15 is applied on a national level. Believe it, because it is true.