What Is Independence Worth to You?

If one were to come here today from another country and watch our mainstream news, the only news they would be informed of in serious tones is the storm making its way along the East coast, and… it’s about to wreak havoc on 4th of July celebrations. People may be evacuated from North Carolina’s outer banks as Arthur bears down on them and people everywhere have to cancel BBQ plans.

While I don’t make light of the first major storm of the hurricane season, I have gone through a few hurricanes myself to know how devastating they can be but what gets me the most is not just the fact that the storm is the big news story, but the fact that this happens to coincide with Independence Day and it seems most people only worry that this storm will screw up their plans.

I don’t mean to make light of that either, I know the 4^th has always been a favorite holiday for millions, but I have to wonder- how many Americans understand just what Independence Day should be about, and do they realize the perilous place our nation is in right now?

The fireworks are fun to watch, but am I the only one who can’t help but think about what the day represents and the Revolution that changed the world? The fifty six men who pledged everything to sign the Declaration of Independence from a tyrannical Monarchy, and the struggle to become a new nation. All the wars fought since, men and women giving much to win freedom for others and keeping this nation a beacon of freedom is what America has always been, and there is so much good in this nation. I beg people to open their eyes and see it.

 

Yet we have these days, a cumulation of decades of progressivism which is destroying this country before our eyes. Daily things are happening not just here, but around the world which are pulling our nation apart and I just can’t help but want to cry on this Independence Day at what we’ve allowed to happen. Many people are still blind and would call me a liar and a fool for thinking that the current administration and much of our government are trying to destroy this country. I guess they were asleep when Obama proclaimed “We are five days away from transforming America”, and still snoring when he said he would have more flexibility after the elections.

Daniel Webster, who came decades after the Declaration of Independence once said, “There is no nation on earth powerful enough to accomplish our overthrow. Our destruction, should it come at all will be from another quarter; from the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence. I must confess that I do apprehend some danger. I fear that they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants and fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be made the dupes of designing men and become the instruments of their own undoing.”

For far too long Americans have trusted the government; the same people have been elected over and over again, so much so that those same who were sent as public servants have come to treat what should be service as a privileged career in which they are entitled to.  In return they have given enough ‘free stuff’ to those who vote for them time and time again, and have placated them into complacency.  It’s a vicious cycle based on greed, one for the vote to maintain privilege and power, and one for what the government can do for them instead of what they can offer the country.
 

 

Too many good people have offered themselves and paid a high cost for this country, and it saddens me that too many don’t care enough to fight to maintain freedom here while those who paid were fighting somewhere else. No one seems to fight for them, and too many don’t care about fighting for what’s good in this country.  And there is and always has been plenty of good in this country.

For far too long there have been those working to ‘transform’ America, believing this nation has been too arrogant, too powerful and ought to be knocked down a few notches. We have a government filled with people with these beliefs, as well as the media and public schools and places of higher learning.  It’s no wonder we are in the crisis we are in. These people have grown up with every good thing and privilege provided by this country’s exceptionalism, have taken full advantage of all the things that made her great, yet trash it and desire her destruction.

I never thought I’d see this beacon of strength, exceptionalism, pride and freedom be destroyed from within. As I think about Independence Day this year, I think about those men who pledged their lives, fortunes and sacred honor, and can’t help but not feel like celebrating- knowing that they warned us, but no one listened. I think of how they would react could they be alive this day 238 years later and it makes me angry that they would be right in their disgust and indignation at what we’ve allowed to enslave us.

 

When I was growing up, I saw the pride of Americans, and like so many, I mistook it for arrogance. Once I moved here and lived the American experience for a while, I began to understand the pride and display it myself often enough. After all, what other nation has defended others like the United States? Even as other Allies joined World War II a few years before America’s involvement, it wasn’t until America became involved that the evil was driven back and subdued. What other nation has given so much in food, aid, education, refuge, freedom, and care?  America was always willing to send her best either to the battlefield or the mission field and have changed lives for the better around the world ever since.  This is the America I fell in love with. The people who have defended her and those who still do are the people I love and appreciate the most, as well as those who while might be at a loss of what to do to save their country, they are not willing to just sit and watch it collapse either. 

Are we enough to save her though? Well, God is the only One who can save her- but are there enough hearts in this country that are turned to Him? I can’t answer that for sure, but right at this moment, it doesn’t seem so. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. America was blessed once because the majority of people knew and believed in Him and His only begotten Son.  I pray they will know again, and believe.  Fifty six men signed what could have been their death warrant had the war been lost, but they believed in God’s provisions and providence and the United States of America was born.

 

How many are willing to pledge what those men did over 200 years ago?  Let me ask you in another way- what does this nation mean to you, and what would you give to keep your freedom?

This Independence Day I don’t feel like celebrating for the last hope of freedom that I see slipping away. Not when so much that is precious has given it to us. The thing I celebrate today is the fact that it’s my best friend’s birthday, and while I don’t get to celebrate it with him, he is in my heart, along with all of his brothers who are still fighting evil and trying to keep it from our shores and to me, they are worth fighting for. Freedom he and millions of others have fought for is worth fighting for.

What is it that is worth enough for you to fight for?

C. E. 2014