Although Donald Trump wears hats that don’t fit his head right (they look like he’s baking cookies), we really like his slogan: Make America Great Again.
The only problem is that Mr. Trump isn’t giving us all the answers to make America great. He’s missing a critical piece in his message. As a matter of fact, he’s missing the most important part.
In his famous book, “Democracy in America,” Alexis DeTocqueville said, “America is great because she is good. When America ceases to be good she will cease to be great.”
Our greatness as a nation is directly tied to our goodness – moral goodness. This was the context of DeTocqueville’s quote.
He said that he “sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers – and it was not there … in her fertile fields and boundless forests – and it was not there … in her rich mines and her vast world commerce – and it was not there … in her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution – and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.”
Our churches were once “ablaze with righteousness,” teaching people the difference between good and evil, right and wrong. This provided the foundational standard of morality whereby our country could be great.
Yet in today’s post-modern America, where good is evil and evil is good, this kind of teaching is all but a distant memory at the national level. Religion and morality are faux pas and political correctness is our only moral absolute. And, as a result, we have a nation dropping in the “world greatness” meter by the second.
Trump is courageously highlighting this drop, and for that we thank him.
But if he wants America to be great again, he must first get to the root of our decline –we’ve rejected God and His standards. In today’s America, if it feels good by all means we do it – because there are no more moral absolutes …
… until it’s your spouse on Ashley Madison or your daughter sitting in a Planned Parenthood killing center. Then things change a bit!
It’s time we come clean and turn back to Jesus as a nation. It’s time we reject post-modernism and its devastating consequences on our society. It’s time we start being good (as God defines it) so that we can make America great again!
With the recent exposure of both Planned Parenthood and Ashley Madison, we realize just how bad we’ve truly become as a nation. There’s no way we can be great when junk like this embedded into the fabric of this country.
There’s a verse in the Bible that says, “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but instead expose them” (Ephesians 6:10). We bet DeTocqueville heard this verse a time or two in the early American church.
What’s interesting is that our sins are now being exposed today as if God has pulled back the curtain to give us a glimpse of how desperately evil we’ve become – to see what’s truly behind the veil of our “good Christian” nation.
In plain view, we’re watching Planned Parenthood rip babies apart, limb from limb, and Ashley Madison rip marriages apart. God is allowing us to see how rampant these sins have become and their devastating consequences.
He is also showing us that post-modern thinking is a joke – everyone knows there’s a moral standard deep in the soul. As we see what child sacrifice (Planned Parenthood) and sexual perversion (Ashley Madison) really look like up close and personal it causes us to recoil in disgust.
Our nation is in trouble. We all know it. And the only way to “Make America Great Again” is not by electing promising politicians (though that plays a small part), but the way home is to turn back to Jesus and repent – that His goodness might once again flow through our land like a refreshing stream.
“Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” (Ephesians 3:19).
Do you want to make America great again? Or how about make your marriage great again?
The answer is found in Jesus. Return to Him and confess your sins that His restoration might begin. Every one of us is a sinner, so let’s admit it and get things out in the open with Jesus and those closest to us so that we can be healed and restored.
If your church isn’t preaching this message, leave and find a new one. We don’t have time for games anymore – the show is over. It’s time for a sweeping revival in this land.
So, let’s make America great again by returning to the “goodness” that made our nation great in the first place – true biblical morality found only at the feet of Jesus.
