Would you do me the kindness of allowing me to make a self assertion, and then hear me out before you condemn me? The assertion is this: I am narrow-minded. Some would use different words, such as bigoted, prejudiced, exclusive, hateful, among others. But if you would, please hear me out before you make a judgment. After you have listened, then feel free to judge me as you wish.

There is an unquestionable, obvious divide in our country. This divide has been identified in several different ways: racial, political, ideological, philosophical, religious, etc. I would agree that you can certainly identify each of these divides in our contemporary culture.

However, I would suggest that none of these is the real reason for the division which is so clearly seen in our beloved country. I would suggest that each of these is caused by an underlying divide which, in essence, is the root of every divide listed above, as well as any other you might name. The divide to which I refer is a spiritual divide.

I believe that the contemporary generation has a very limited knowledge of this spiritual divide. The reason for that, for the most part, is that the younger generation has very little knowledge of the historical foundation upon which this great nation was established. It only takes a cursory reading of documents written by our founders that they envisioned this nation as one which would be guided by Christian principles. This is not to suggest that every person involved in the formation of the United States were committed Christians, because they were not. And, there has never been a time when every citizen of this nation was a professing believer in Jesus Christ. But, this nation was founded upon Christian principles, and the founders made clear that this nation would only succeed and survive as long as those principles were embraced and practiced.

The reason I stated in the preceding paragraph that the younger generation has no knowledge of the Christian influence on our founders is because of historical revisionism. Christianity has, for the most part, been removed from American history courses taught in American classrooms. As a matter of fact, in many history books, the influence of Christianity is put into a very negative light. It is presented as an overly oppressive influence that has had a negative impact on the development of our nation.

When Christian influence is removed from the public arena, it opens our culture up to all sort of belief and behavior which runs contrary to Biblical truth. We are now witnessing a cultural revolution because we no longer have the moorings of a strong Biblical foundation. Thus, we see the erosion of the family through the dissolution of the long recognized and accepted Biblical view of that entity. We are seeing the proliferation of alternate lifestyles because we have rejected the clear teachings of Scripture. We see over a million women march on our capitol, crying out for a woman’s right to do with her body what she wants, without any intervention of our government. I would suggest that we take government out of the equation, and get back to what the Bible says about the sanctity of human life. I believe and respect the right of women to make a personal choice, but the choice is not the end a pregnancy, the choice is to get pregnant. Once that choice has been made, then the only right choice is to give birth to that child, who is a gift from God.

I am not so naïve as to believe that we could ever go back to those days. We are, after all, the great melting pot of the world, and thus we have embraced every conceivable religion and philosophy of every people group which now calls the United States home. However, I would suggest that we could go back if we as a nation would once again embrace the beliefs of our founders, and recognize that we were founded and created to be that bastion of religious freedom which offers a place of refuge for anyone and everyone from anywhere and everywhere, but with the underlying premise that when they come to make this country their home, they understand that they can practice whatever religion or non-religion of their choice, but not to expect that we throw our Christian foundation out for the sake of embracing their beliefs and practices.

My heart yearns for the day when we would once again be recognized as a Christian nation, guided by Biblical principles, while allowing the freedom for everyone to practice their choice of religious belief as long as they followed the principles and practices of a nation whose Lord is the God of the Christian faith.

Now, am I bigoted, narrow-minded, exclusivistic? No more so than the hundreds of thousands who marched on the capitol last Saturday. We see things from diametrically opposite ends of the spectrum. How do we go about resolving the many issues that now face our nation? My suggestion is that we not look to our politicians, but to God, and allow His word to give the guidance we need to be the nation that honors Him.