"Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your families, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes" (Neh. 4:14, NIV).
Famous quotes not in the Bible:
"To cut off Law from its ethical sources is to strike a terrible blow at the rule of law." --Russell Kirk Kilpatrick
"The bottom line is that at a certain point there is not only the right but the duty, to disobey the State." --Francis Schaeffer "... [B]ut as for me, give me liberty or give me death! " (Patrick Henry, 1775). "I regret that I have but one life to give for my country." (Attributed to John Paul Jones).
Nehemiah was a great extrinsic and intrinsic motivator (he got results!) to get the people to work building the wall and to fight for the nation against any enemy. All soldiers eventually wonder what they are fighting for and if it's a worthy cause or in vain. Who wants to die for a lost cause? Regardless, veterans serve the country by virtue of obeying orders and submitting to authority, which they vowed to do.
In Alfred, Lord Tennyson's epic poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade," we see that it's not the job description of soldiers to second-guess their superiors, ("ours is not to reason why?"), but they must be willing to pay the ultimate sacrifice, of laying down one's life for one's friends (Jesus called this the greatest sacrifice and expression of love), the soldier must be willing to give their all ("ours is but to do and to die"). There would be utter chaos in battle if every soldier thought he had the moral authority to question orders (unless they are immoral or illegal). The chain of command has earned moral authority and it should be respected and shown all due respect. "The powers that be" are of God (cf. Rom. 13:1), even Jesus told Pilate his power was granted from above.
What inspires troops to die? It certainly isn't for a tax cut, political agenda, or factory job! They got inspired by Thomas Paine's Common Sense during the Revolutionary War about the ideals of constitutional democracy--our grand experiment. All veterans who fought for our nation ultimately believed in the rule of law, the bill of rights including free speech, freedom of religion and the freedom of the press, and equal justice under the law, that no one should be above the law, for the law is the king as Samuel Rutherford wrote in Lex Rex (the rule of law) under the Supreme Law of the land, the US Constitution, as we are a nation of laws, not of men. They swore allegiance to the US Constitution and all enemies domestic and foreign.
Do I need to remind Americans that both Democrats and Republicans have given their lives for our freedom? Freedom isn't free, it has been bought in blood sacrifices. We don't have a Republican Guard like Saddam Hussein did, or a Gestapo like Hitler, we have Americans of all political persuasions giving some and some gave all for our country. We all need to fight for something bigger than ourselves, that will outlast us, and show our Christian colors, not standing cowardly on the sidelines, but undauntedly engaged in everyday mundane realities and exigencies.
There is more that unites us than divides us and servicemen find this out in the military. "United we stand, divided we fall!" We need not wonder how brothers in arms unite in the time of need and learn that their buddy may be of a different political persuasion, but it doesn't matter in the foxhole! We need to have unity without uniformity and keep our nation "one nation under God." We don't have to agree on everything but can find commonality and common ground to come together in our common fight against all enemies of our constitutional democracy.
"To cut off Law from its ethical sources is to strike a terrible blow at the rule of law." --Russell Kirk Kilpatrick
"The bottom line is that at a certain point there is not only the right but the duty, to disobey the State." --Francis Schaeffer "... [B]ut as for me, give me liberty or give me death! " (Patrick Henry, 1775). "I regret that I have but one life to give for my country." (Attributed to John Paul Jones).
Nehemiah was a great extrinsic and intrinsic motivator (he got results!) to get the people to work building the wall and to fight for the nation against any enemy. All soldiers eventually wonder what they are fighting for and if it's a worthy cause or in vain. Who wants to die for a lost cause? Regardless, veterans serve the country by virtue of obeying orders and submitting to authority, which they vowed to do.
In Alfred, Lord Tennyson's epic poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade," we see that it's not the job description of soldiers to second-guess their superiors, ("ours is not to reason why?"), but they must be willing to pay the ultimate sacrifice, of laying down one's life for one's friends (Jesus called this the greatest sacrifice and expression of love), the soldier must be willing to give their all ("ours is but to do and to die"). There would be utter chaos in battle if every soldier thought he had the moral authority to question orders (unless they are immoral or illegal). The chain of command has earned moral authority and it should be respected and shown all due respect. "The powers that be" are of God (cf. Rom. 13:1), even Jesus told Pilate his power was granted from above.
What inspires troops to die? It certainly isn't for a tax cut, political agenda, or factory job! They got inspired by Thomas Paine's Common Sense during the Revolutionary War about the ideals of constitutional democracy--our grand experiment. All veterans who fought for our nation ultimately believed in the rule of law, the bill of rights including free speech, freedom of religion and the freedom of the press, and equal justice under the law, that no one should be above the law, for the law is the king as Samuel Rutherford wrote in Lex Rex (the rule of law) under the Supreme Law of the land, the US Constitution, as we are a nation of laws, not of men. They swore allegiance to the US Constitution and all enemies domestic and foreign.
Do I need to remind Americans that both Democrats and Republicans have given their lives for our freedom? Freedom isn't free, it has been bought in blood sacrifices. We don't have a Republican Guard like Saddam Hussein did, or a Gestapo like Hitler, we have Americans of all political persuasions giving some and some gave all for our country. We all need to fight for something bigger than ourselves, that will outlast us, and show our Christian colors, not standing cowardly on the sidelines, but undauntedly engaged in everyday mundane realities and exigencies.
There is more that unites us than divides us and servicemen find this out in the military. "United we stand, divided we fall!" We need not wonder how brothers in arms unite in the time of need and learn that their buddy may be of a different political persuasion, but it doesn't matter in the foxhole! We need to have unity without uniformity and keep our nation "one nation under God." We don't have to agree on everything but can find commonality and common ground to come together in our common fight against all enemies of our constitutional democracy.
".... But they refuse to stand up for the truth...." (cf. Jer. 9:3). Cowards don't have anything worth fighting much less dying for (they won't take a stand or be counted for Jesus), and we all need to reexamine our priorities and live on purpose, knowing that life and principle is something of value and worth it all. If you have nothing worth dying for, you haven't yet begun to live. To sum up: the primary purpose of government is to curtail evil and keep it at bay, and when obstruction of justice occurs, it's the greatest of evil: government overreach and interventionism. But God hates the perversion of justice (cf. Deut. 16:19). And Augustine said that an unjust law is no law at all!
CAVEATS: "You twist justice making it a bitter pill for oppressed. You treat the righteous like dirt .. How you hate honest judges. How you despise people who tell the truth." (cf. Amos 5:7,10). "Truth forever on the scaffold; wrong forever on the throne." (James Russell Lowell). Soli Deo Gloria!
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