Providential Interpretation of History

There is taught by individuals who hold a Biblical worldview, that there are varieties of it. But, it is on the whole, they say, a "prism" by which you analyze an individual's perspective of life. This prism constitutes various facets, e.g., theological, philosophical, educational, political, etc. This requires that a student be educated in all, or many, of the possible facets of the prism before he can properly make an analysis of a thing. This has the appearance of tedium and dependence on the "knowing" ones or intellectual elites. If an analysis is a taking apart of something into its basic elements, it occurs a Biblical worldview approach is a manner of "taking apart" someone's view or perspective. For what? to expose "wrong"? from what standpoint? the Bible’s? How individuals judge by the Word varies, does it not?

I propose to advance the Providential interpretation of History, which is: One God working, ruling and overruling, in all of the affairs of men and nations to bring liberty to the individual. This interpretation allows for liberty of conscience, without judging an individual as being "right" or "wrong" about matters pertaining only to the individual. Providential history is inclusive of all men and nations; all things working for good, without seeing individuals through the prism of "them" and "us" all of the time. Providential history believes truth cannot be overturned; it is faith in the absolute power of God in all of the concerns of men and nations.

Providential history is taught through Universal History. Here, we are applying eternal, absolute principles to all men and nations. The nation is a divine institution, Gen. 10:32, and the third sphere of government after the home and the church. Universal history is guided by Revelation and a just view of God: Creator, The Most High and Divine Providence. Universal History makes the observation that individual liberty and self government are solely the effects of Christ and Christianity and that individual self government is the only positive alternative to despotism, which ruled mankind in the absence of Christianity.

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Part 4: of a 4-part series

Graduates, were you not born for this time, that you might contribute to the bringing of individual self-government to the foreground of the current history of the world; that you might represent Christ and his form of government to the nations; that they might seek after Christ and find His form of freedom: individual liberty; that the world might acknowledge what power Christ is in the life of the individual American Christian; that nations might want, instead of our military and monetary aid, want our Christ who is the foundation of our liberty and self-government?

Today we are more concerned about which brand of socialism is better than another’s rather than being concerned for the quality of individual self-government which shall displace socialism in the future and coming generations. The cure for the American people’s growing tendency toward socialism is not in their electing political conservatives into public office. But rather, the cure and antidote are to be found within the American Christian, who first repents for his own socialism, for his not trusting Christ and His principles of self and civil government, who repents for his denying the power of Christ within his own life and living, and then to clean his own household of such unbelief.

History testifies that while individual self-government -- while Christ -- is in the earth, no socialism shall prevail and the claim of the inevitable victory of socialism is a pretentious impossibility. For, ". . . of the increase of his government," of the government of God’s Son, "there shall be no end." Christianity is power, not force; not of might in numbers but rather of internal strength, the strength of individual character and conscience.

Modern America has been separated from its own history for seemingly far too long. The controversies and challenges presently issuing from within the local and national spheres of civil government are the direct consequences of the American people’s ignorance -- willful or innocent -- of the principles which established this nation and which promote the greatest liberty for the individual and the greatest individual capacity for self-government that the world has ever known.

The generations immediately following after George Washington’s began to let go of their responsibility to maintain the liberty and independence for which their forefathers paid so dearly; those generations were found unworthy of their inheritance. Washington’s generation was uniquely prepared by Providence to establish the world’s first Christian republic, but we are learning that to maintain this republic, generations greater than Washington’s must arise. We rely upon the ruling and overruling work of Divine Providence to preserve you and make you worthy of your inheritance and fit you for the stewardship of our nation.

In the years just ahead of you, life’s experiences will deepen and widen that foundation so well laid by your parents. Build your lives well on this foundation. Your education is your enterprise. In faith complete what has been so faithfully begun by your parents. Your challenge is not to be neglectful and irresponsible of your Christian liberty as some of your fathers were; but, in the name of Christ’s liberty, your challenge is to put on the mantel and authority of Christian character and conscience that all the world within your sphere of influence may witness the power of individual self-government, of the power of Christ in the life of the individual, which is for His name’s sake.

You also, will be held accountable for the quality of civil government you leave behind; starting within your spheres of influence you will answer for how secure you have made your inheritance of individual liberty for your posterity. Is it unreasonable for you to think your generation ought to do better than the last? Your parents gave you more liberty than they ever experienced in their lives at your age. Rather than trusting in society, they trusted God for their earthly needs and for your education. Are you to do any less? Will you promise God to do anything less?

Now, each one of you, go and walk with Him independently dependent upon Him alone rejoicing. Govern and measure your lives by His Word. Live by the power of Christ in you. God who made you has prepared a place for you in this world. Look not on your shortcomings, inadequacies, and failings, but know only that God cannot fail in His good and wise purposes. Then some day, further down the road of your life, you shall look back over your shoulder to see that His goodness and mercy have followed you all the days of your life.

Graduates, please accept my sincere congratulations to you and your families and best wishes for a blessed future.

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Part 3: of a 4-part series

Graduates, your home education is God’s idea. It is one positive evidence of God’s favor upon our nation. All the problems which a nation has originate in the nation’s families and homes. If these problems are to be addressed and resolved, they must first be addressed and resolved within the Christian’s home. To correct what is wrong in America, we must begin with what is wrong with the thinking and government in the Christian homes in America that have caused them to be unable to produce the proper leadership for each of the spheres of civil government: city, county, state, and nation. American Christians have not been cultivating and growing individual self-government in their homes and churches for a long while.

I ask you: As generations before you, have you been socialized, predisposed to trust in associations, fellowships, organizations, corporations, and all of society rather than in God for all of your earthly needs, so as to exchange your birthright of liberty for the world’s mess of pottage? Or, will you believe in God’s principles of economics and individual enterprise taught us by Paul in his letter to the Christians in Thessalonica:
. . . that ye study to be quiet, to do your own business, and to work with your own hands. . .That ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing. (4:11, 12)

We do not, however, separate what God is doing in the wilderness of home education from what God is doing in America. Home education is blessing America. From the demand of independency and the enjoyment of liberty which are naturally inherent to home education, generations are arising which are not as disposed to socialization as their fathers and mothers were; old patterns of life and living which have supported the increasing of socialism in this nation are being set aside and new patterns of individual enterprise and independency from the State are being set for generations to come.

Thus, we ask ourselves: Could Providence not be preparing generations to live unto Him, those future American generations who would seek to please Him, having the mind of Christ concerning history, government, and education? Could God, perhaps, be weaning our nation from a belief in the all-powerful state unto faith in the absolute, eternal, and unchanging power of God? Could it be that home education in America represents the beginning of the end of socialism in America? The positive hope is real because we know from personal experience of the power of Christ in the life of the individual, of his home, of his church, of his business, and of his local community.

To be continued…

Part 2: of a 4-part series

When a Christian denies the divine origin and purpose for civil government, he naturally relinquishes his responsibility for the quality of civil government that may be established over him and tacitly consents to any potential loss of his God-given life, liberty, and property. How should God hold this Christian guiltless of negligence and disobedience with regard to the maintenance of good civil government when he is not maintaining good self-government within his own sphere of influence? when he is not trusting God for the government of himself and for everything which pertains to him? but, he is instead relying upon men for his direction, regulation, control, and restraint?

Today, we suffer for our being irresponsible for the quality of civil government, or the government of our nation, as generations past have walked away from and abandoned the responsibility for the quality of civil government within their local spheres of influence, beginning within their own homes, their churches and, then, within their local communities. They have demanded secularists somehow to maintain divine institutions and have expected men blind to God to see and to lead us with respect to our homes, our churches, and civil governments. Can any one of us defy the law of gravity and not crash and burn? Can generations let go of Biblical principles of the home, church, and civil government and not suffer miserable spiritual and material consequences? Can a people secularize the home, the church, and the civil government for long and not eventually feel the tightening bands of socialism about their lives, liberties, and livelihoods?

Self-government is no more than simple obedience to God’s principles for all of life and living: for marriage and the security of the home; for the care of the business of the church; and for the fulfillment of the purpose of civil government to protect every man’s life, liberty, and livelihood. In proportion to a nation’s ignoring and letting go of these principles, does that nation corrupt itself with unbelief and disobedience, thus to begin on a course of self destruction.

Are we now not undergoing the painful consequences owed to the corruption of our self-government? True to the ways of Providence, corruption has its own pain that leads to a correction, that leads men to ponder the causes for their discomforts and national troubles and to think upon what the cure might be for them, what other course might be taken in order to reverse the path they have taken toward self destruction. This painful process of correction leads us today to examine within, beginning with our own views of civil government, of the government of our homes, our churches and communities, and of our nation. As America was conceived by individual reformation, America shall also be restored to her foundation of self-government by individual repentance and the revival of individual self-government.

Individuals are cured of socialism when they come finally to the end of socialism within themselves, when they have had their fill of the leeks and onions of today’s Egypt, of the socialization and standardization of socialism, never to return to them again, never to separate the history of America from the History of Christ, and not forsaking, but standing firmly, assured in the individual liberty with which Christ has set them free, in the greatest liberty for the individual seen in the history of the world.

To be continued…