Sermon Tone Analysis

Happy Memorial Day

The day that we remember those who have given the most so that we can experience the most of life

If your family is one of those families who have sacrificed by losing a loved one in a war or some other way in the armed services.

We are very sorry, but also thankful for what your loved one gave for our freedom

If you have been or are in the armed forces - thank you for your service.

As American’s we are very thankful for the lives that have been laid down and the sacrifices made so that we can live the dream.

God Bless America Again!

Though I didn’t do it last year, I’ve been taking the three holidays of summer and speaking a series that I call, “The Spirit of America.”

A series that focuses on God’s Spirit in America.

A series that looks at the past of our country, and the now and the future and how God has been and will be involved in all.

A series that looks at our problems of faith and patriotism and from the Word of God show you what God has to say.

I want to get back to that this year.

I want to speak a message entitled, “Silence is Madness,” and in this and I think all three for the summer will look at the principle of Separation of Church and State.

Turn with me over to Psalms

The nations raging against the leadership and authority of God.

We know that this speaks of the history of the nation of Israel, but we also can see that this is prophetic about a time in the future.

I believe that time that we are living in now is one of them

Think about the picture here.

The Madness of Our World

all the nations of the world, knowingly aligning together against God.

But then think of the headlines that we’ve had for a lot of years now.

Each story getting more insolent and rebellious against God.

It would seem that the stage is set for this to happen today!

Here are some that I’ve found over the last 10-15 years:

A state employee in Minnesota was barred from parking his car in the state parking lot because he had a religious sticker on his bumper.

A kindergarten student in Saratoga Springs, New York, was forbidden to say a prayer over her lunch and was scolded by a teacher for doing so.

A military honor guardsman was removed from his position for saying “God bless you and this family, and God bless the United States of America” while presenting a folded flag to a family during a military funeral - a statement the family requested be made at the funeral.

Senior citizens meeting at a community senior center in Balch Springs, Texas, were prohibited from praying over their own meals.

A library employee in Russellville, Kentucky, was barred from wearing her necklace because it had a small cross on it.

College students serving as residential assistants in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, were prohibited from holding Bible studies in their own private dorm rooms.

A third grader in Orono, Maine, who wore a T-Shirt containing the words Jesus Christ was required to turn the shirt inside out so the words could not be seen.

A School official in Saint Louis, Missouri, caught an elementary student praying over his lunch; he lifted the student from his seat, reprimanded him in front of the other students, and took him to the principal, who ordered him to stop praying.

In Memphis, Tennessee, a library offered shelves for displaying community advertisements and announcements.

When a local church placed a notification of its upcoming Christmas program and a small nativitiy scene on the shelf, the library required the removal of Joseph, Mary, Jesus and the wise men from the scene leaving only the farm animals.

As I spoke about these things in the last 20 years, I’ve watched as some of the people who heard these messages, took on the demeanor of Pastor Ken is a little out there, this could never happen in America.

I spoke of persecution, and so many people (Christians) refuse to see that it is happening.

Yet:

In Orange County, California, a pastor was arrested for quietly playing Christian music at his picnic table in a public park

Two Gideons were arrested in Florida for standing on a sidewalk and giving Bibles to those who wanted them

Four Christian evangelists at a public festival near Detroit were arrested for answering questions they had been asked about their own Christian faith.

A Christian father was arrested in Lexington, Massachusetts, for objecting to the public school teaching his kindergarten son about homosexuality and gay marriage.

A sixty-seven year old man in Georgia was arrested for passing out Christian tracts on a public street

In Philadelphia eleven Christians were arrested for holding up signs with Bible verses during a gay pride parade down the city’s streets

In Wichita, Kansas, a pastor was arrested for standing on a public sidewalk and giving out Gospel tracts and the Gospel of John

In Hemet, California, a Christian pastor was arrested for reading a Bible out loud on a public sidewalk.

and in Sacremento, California, a christian youth pastor was arrested after he struck up a casual conversation about faith with fellow shoppers at a mall.

And I didn’t even touch on the smear tactics of the left to the appointment of the last conservative Judge to the Supreme Court, Judge Brett Kavanaugh

Or the many Christian business men and women who have been taken to court over cakes and clothing and other things that deal with gay marriage and other things that are against their faith.

Why is it just the Christians?

I just saw that in the local schools, this new muslim congresswoman is going to be having special days where the kids are taught certain ways of the muslim faith including their prayers in the public school classrooms.

I’m not against the muslims, we live in a country that believes in freedom of religion.

It’s why our founding fathers came here.

But let me try to teach my students how to pray to Jesus and see what happens.

The Madness Continues

This conflict is not new.

but it is heating up.

We have never experienced anything like this in America

We’ve read about in our history books, we’ve seen it in our world news

But we’ve not lived it here before.

And we have to be careful about the way that we respond to it.

These two Sides - God and Satan have been at it from the beginning.

And we know that God wins in the end.

But what about now in America?

The answer to which side will succeed is found in the people

In God’s people

What many of us don’t realize is that these things have always been in our country, but they didn’t effect us, because there was a different heart in God’s people.

I’m not asking you to rise up and stand against a new attack.

I’m asking you to rise up and stand.

I’m asking you to stop being wishy washy

I’m asking you to fight for what you believe in.

To stand up for your faith, and to do it before the chance to stand up for it is completely gone.

These secular anti-God forces cannot and will not prevail if God’s people take their place.

Where we are losing our country to these thoughts from hell, are in those places where we who love God become:

apathetic, lethargic and uninvolved

If this continues to happen, we will continue to read these types of news articles and see these things continue to occur in our country day after day.

Mathew 13:25

The people of God are asleep, and the enemy is taking advantage of our lack of vigilance.

It’s not that we don’t have the support.

You see that’s one of his tricks.

We think that we are outnumbered.

But I want you to know today that it is a very small percentage who are getting these things done and they are being successful, because we are not engaged.

It only took one woman to get prayer out of our public schools, because everybody thought that she could never do it.

And guess what, we have been paying for that in our country ever since.

Look at the news of our schools now.

Polling repeatedly confirms that public approval for religious expressions such as prayer at school events, or political gatherings and other things such as displaying the Ten Commandments or other religious documents, preservation of the national motto and “under God” in the pledge, teaching creation in our public schools is consistently at 70% or above.

That’s huge folks.

We aren’t being defeated, we just aren’t making noise.

That’s less than 30 percent that are getting these things done.

How?

We aren’t involved.

We are silent majority.

We saw this in the history of our nation.

Thomas Paine was very vocal and hostile toward Christianity.

He sent those views and critiques to Benjamin Franklin and listen to Franklins response:

I will not enter into any discussion of your principles, though you seem to desire it.

At present I shall only give you my opinion that…the consequence of printing this piece will be a great deal of odium (hate) drawn upon yourself, mischief to you, and no benefit to others. he that spits into the wind, spits in his own face.

But were you to succeed, do you imagine any good would be done by it?

…Think how great a portion of mankind…have need of the motives of religion to restrain them from vice - to support their virtue…I would advise you, therefore, not to attempt unchaining the tiger, but to burn this piece before it is seen by any other person

Pain was not to be moved, so he went ahead and published the book, “The AGe of Reason.

And was condemned by his peers.