OK! Everybody Up! Rise and Shine! Good Morning! Up! Up! Up! Do you know a veteran? Do you know an Active military person? Do you know someone in the military Reserves? Better keep your eyes and arms open today so you’re ready to reach out and shake the hand of, or physically wrap your arms around someone who serves to keep America free.
If you live in America you are one of millions who experienced a vital freedom on Saturday or Sunday. I don’t often do this but today, I hope you enjoy this post linked from Giana Consulting, an executive leadership firm. https://consultgiana.com/thankful-for-a-freedom-we-should-never-take-for-granted/
It takes courage to preserve religious freedom otherwise God wouldn’t have pointed that out in Joshua 1:7, 8 ““Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
In America we have very little exposure to the truth that people just like us live in persecution because they have lost their freedom to worship God. Their chosen faith in God is totally against the law, and any teachings about Jesus are banned. We understand the need to have our military protect our country from terrorists, threat of wars, and keep our borders from invasion. We understand little about the freedoms we take for granted – because they are ingrained in our culture and way of life.
I despise the knowledge that people like me suffer for their beliefs in God because they live in a country where their religious freedoms have been brutally cut away from their basic rights. These persecuted people live out 1Peter 4:19 every moment of their existence. “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.” They are doing good and they will be rewarded in their eternal home that lasts forever. I have to believe they live with the effects of Matthew 5:12 in their hearts. “Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”
I thank God for our military and the freedoms we have to read the Bible, worship publically, and assemble together to learn about God. I pray that God continues to protect my beloved America and never allows the freedom of worship to be taken from us. Creation, and therefore the Creator, comes under heated debate so often now. We, who believe in the creation story, must support and honor that truth that God created the universe and all that is in it. We need to be persistently thankful for the defense we still have in this statement: “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men were created equal, they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness!”
Because of Grace we Press On