Steven,

Much of the justification for the Revolutionary War was from the
Hugenots.  From my understanding of history of that time, they relied
much on their understanding on such cases.

Remember, we were a colony, we were not totally dependent and did have
our own structure and government of sorts while still independent.



------------------------------------
Wallers Baptist Church
Pastor
derick@...
PO Box 95
Partlow VA 22534
tel: 540-582-5703
mobile: 540-894-1772
www.thedickensfamily.org
------------------------------------


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Steven G. Rockhill [mailto:revrock@...] 
> Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 2:55 PM
> To: pastorsforum@...
> Subject: Re: [PastorsForum] The Revolution
> 
> 
> Thanks Jimbo,
>    I was beginning to think that no one out there was interested in 
> history. But then again things have been so quiet maybe no 
> one else is 
> out there.  Anyway, this is an interesting article.  It is kind of an 
> interesting topic (at least I think so) as we try to even today sift 
> through what it means to be a "Christian Citizen" (title of 
> my message 
> this week).  I am certainly thankful to be living in the US 
> of A but it 
> does sadden me that the Scriptures can be so easily twisted 
> and abused 
> to further whatever fleshly cause one desires (even if it is 
> seemingly 
> noble).  Like the guy booting the democrats out from his church - the 
> relation between faith and politics/government can be so 
> easily clouded.
>     Unfortunately, Christians all to often seem to get swept up in 
> political fervor and lose sight of the Gospel, which is about 
> transformation one soul at a time, not rebellion.  We must 
> remember the 
> words of the Psalmist when he sings "Do not put your trust in 
> princes, 
> Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help. His spirit departs, he 
> returns to the earth; in that very day his plans perish.  Happy is he 
> who has the God of Jacob for his help Whose hope is in the Lord his 
> God."  Psalm 146:3-5
> 
> Peace,
> Steve
> 
> 
> 
> J & M wrote:
> > This should help you Steve.
> > Non-revolutionary
> > Jimbo 
> > 
> http://www.christianitytoday.com/holidays/fourthofjuly/features/50h010
> > .html
> > How Preachers Incited Revolution
> > Angry colonists were rallied to declare independence and 
> take up arms 
> > because of what they heard from the pulpit.
> > By Harry S. Stout
> > 
> >      No turning back.
> >      At the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775) Americans 
> suffered 
> > 441
> > casualties and the British 1,150. Though a strategic 
> victory for the 
> > British, English nerve was shaken, the colonists were 
> emboldened, and 
> > any hope for peaceful reconciliation was lost.
> > 
> > It's 1775. The year 1787, with its novel constitution and 
> separation 
> > of
> > church and state is a long 12 years away. At the moment, 
> you and your 
> > friends are just a bunch of outlaws.
> > 
> > You've heard the debates in Parliament over taxation and 
> > representation;
> > you've seen British troops enforce royal supremacy at the 
> point of a 
> > bayonet. Your king, George III, and Parliament have issued 
> a declaration 
> > asserting their sovereignty in "all cases whatsoever" in 
> the colonies. 
> > You are, at least in New England, a people under siege with British 
> > troops quartered in Boston. You've dumped tea into Boston's 
> harbor in a 
> > fit of rage and had your port closed.
> > 
> > Who will you turn to now for direction? There are no presidents or
> > vice-presidents, no supreme court justices or public 
> defenders to call 
> > on. There are a handful of young, radical lawyers, like the Adams 
> > cousins, John and Samuel, but they're largely concentrated 
> in cities, 
> > while you and most of your friends live in the country. In many 
> > colonies, including Massachusetts, there are not even 
> elected governors 
> > or councilors-they have all been appointed by the British 
> crown and are 
> > answerable to it.
> > 
> > Where you turn is where you have habitually turned for over 
> a century:
> > to the prophets of your society, your ministers.
> > 
> > The American Revolutionary era is known as the "Golden Age of 
> > Oratory."
> > What school child has not heard or read Patrick Henry's 
> immortal words, 
> > "Give me liberty or give me death"? Who has not seen 
> reenactments or 
> > heard summaries of Ben Franklin's heroic appearance before 
> a hostile 
> > British Parliament?
> > 
> > Yet often lost in this celebration of patriotic oratory is the key 
> > role
> > preaching played in the Revolutionary movement.
> > 
> > TV, INTERNET AND MORE
> > A few broad statistics can help us appreciate more fully the unique
> > power the sermon wielded in Revolutionary America.
> > 
> > Over the span of the colonial era, American ministers delivered
> > approximately 8 million sermons, each lasting one to one-and-a-half 
> > hours. The average 70-year-old colonial churchgoer would 
> have listened 
> > to some 7,000 sermons in his or her lifetime, totaling 
> nearly 10,000 
> > hours of concentrated listening. This is the number of 
> classroom hours 
> > it would take to receive ten separate undergraduate degrees 
> in a modern 
> > university, without ever repeating the same course!
> > 
> > The pulpits were Congregational and Baptist in New England;
> > Presbyterian, Lutheran, and German Reformed in Pennsylvania and New 
> > Jersey; and Anglican and Methodist in the South. But no matter the 
> > denomination, colonial congregations heard sermons more 
> than any other 
> > form of oratory. The colonial sermon was prophet, newspaper, video, 
> > Internet, community college, and social therapist all 
> wrapped in one. 
> > Such was the range of its influence on all aspects of life 
> that even 
> > contemporary television and personal computers pale in comparison.
> > 
> > Eighteenth-century America was a deeply religious culture that lived
> > self-consciously "under the cope of heaven." In Sunday worship, and 
> > weekday (or "occasional") sermons, ministers drew the 
> populace into a 
> > rhetorical world that was more compelling and immediate than the 
> > physical settlements surrounding them. Sermons taught not 
> only the way 
> > to personal salvation in Christ but also the way to temporal and 
> > national prosperity for God's chosen people.
> > 
> > Events were perceived not from the mundane, human vantage point but 
> > from
> > God's. The vast majority of colonists were Reformed or 
> Calvinist, to 
> > whom things were not as they might appear at ground level: 
> all events, 
> > no matter how mundane or seemingly random, were parts of a larger 
> > pattern of meaning, part of God's providential design. The 
> outlines of 
> > this pattern were contained in Scripture and interpreted by 
> discerning 
> > pastors. Colonial congregations saw themselves as the "New Israel," 
> > endowed with a sacred mission that destined them as lead 
> actors in the 
> > last triumphant chapter in redemption history.
> > 
> > Thus colonial audiences learned to perceive themselves not 
> as a ragtag
> > settlement of religious exiles and eccentrics but as God's special 
> > people, planted in the American wilderness to bring light 
> to the Old 
> > World left behind. Europeans might ignore or revile them as 
> "fanatics," 
> > but through the sermon, they knew better. Better to absorb 
> the barbs of 
> > English ridicule than to forget their glorious commission.
> > 
> > For over a century, colonial congregations had turned to England for
> > protection and culture. Despite religious differences 
> separating many 
> > colonists from the Church of England, they shared a common 
> identity as 
> > Englishmen, an identity that stood firm against all foes. 
> But almost 
> > overnight, these loyalties were challenged by a series of British 
> > imperial laws. Beginning with the Stamp Act of 1765 and 
> running through 
> > the "Boston Massacre" of 1770, the Tea Act of 1773, and 
> finally, martial 
> > law in Massachusetts, patriotic Americans perceived a 
> British plot to 
> > deprive them of their fundamental English rights and their 
> God-ordained 
> > liberties.
> > 
> > In the twentieth-century, taxation and representation are political 
> > and
> > constitutional issues, having nothing to do with religion. But to 
> > eighteenth-century ears, attuned to lifetimes of preaching, 
> the issues 
> > were inevitably religious as well, so colonists naturally turned to 
> > their ministers to learn God's will about these troubling matters.
> > 
> > TYRANNY IS "IDOLATRY"
> > When understood in its own times, the American Revolution was first 
> > and
> > foremost a religious event. This is especially true in New England, 
> > where the first blood was shed.
> > 
> > By 1775 the ranks of Harvard- and Yale-educated clergymen swelled to
> > over600 ministers, distributed throughout every town and 
> village in New 
> > England. Clergymen surveyed the events swirling around 
> them; by 1775 
> > liberals and evangelicals, Congregationalists and 
> Presbyterians, men and 
> > women-all saw in British actions grounds for armed resistance.
> > 
> > In fact, not only was it right for colonists to resist British
> > "tyranny," it would actually be sinful not to pick up guns.
> > 
> > How did they come to this conclusion? They fastened on two 
> arguments.
> > 
> > First, they focused on Parliament's 1766 Declaratory Act, 
> which stated
> > that Parliament had sovereignty over the colonies "in all cases 
> > whatsoever." For clergymen this phrase took on the air of 
> blasphemy. 
> > These were fighting words not only because they violated 
> principles of 
> > representative government but even more because they 
> violated the logic 
> > of sola Scriptura ("Scripture alone") and God's exclusive claim to 
> > sovereignty "in all cases whatsoever."
> > 
> >> From the first colonial settlements, Americans-especially 
> New England
> > 
> > Americans-were accustomed to constraining all power and granting
> > absolute authority to no mere human being.
> > 
> > For Reformed colonists, these ideas were tied up with their 
> historic,
> > covenant theology. At stake was the preservation of their 
> identity as a 
> > covenant people. Not only did Parliament's claims represent 
> tyranny, 
> > they also represented idolatry. For colonists to honor those claims 
> > would be tantamount to forsaking God and abdicating their national 
> > covenant pledge to "have no other gods" before them.
> > 
> > In a classic sermon on the subject of resistance entitled A 
> Discourse
> > Concerning Unlimited Submission, Boston's Jonathan Mayhew, 
> a liberal(he 
> > favored Unitarianism), took as his text Romans 13:1-6, in 
> which Paul 
> > enjoins Christians to "be subject unto the higher powers." 
> The day he 
> > picked for this sermon was portentous-it came on the 
> anniversary of the 
> > execution of Charles I, when Anglican ministers routinely 
> abhorred the 
> > Puritan revolution, and Puritans routinely kept silent. 
> Mayhew would not 
> > keep silent.
> > 
> > For centuries, rulers had used this text to discourage 
> resistance and
> > riot. But circumstances had changed, and in the chilling climate of 
> > impending Anglo-American conflict, Mayhew asked if there 
> were any limits 
> > to this law? He concluded that the law is binding only insofar as 
> > government honors its "moral and religious" obligations. 
> When government 
> > fails to honor that obligation, or contract, then the duty 
> of submission 
> > is likewise nullified. Submission, in other words, is not unlimited.
> > 
> > Rulers, he said, "have no authority from God to do mischief. . It is
> > blasphemy to call tyrants and oppressors God's ministers." Far from 
> > being sinful, resistance to corrupt ministers and 
> tyrannical rulers is a 
> > divine imperative. The greater sin lies in passively 
> sacrificing the 
> > covenant for tyranny, that is, in failing to resist.
> > 
> > Who determines whether government is "moral and religious"? In the
> > Revolutionary era, the answer was simple: the individual. 
> There were no 
> > established institutions that would support violent 
> revolution. Ultimate 
> > justification resided in the will of a people acting 
> self-consciously as 
> > united individuals joined in a common cause. Where a government was 
> > found to be deficient in moral and spiritual terms, the individual 
> > conscience was freed to resist.
> > 
> > AMERICA: A NEW HEAVEN
> > Clergy in the Revolutionary era reminded people not only what they 
> > were
> > fighting against, namely tyranny and idolatry, but also 
> what they were 
> > fighting for: a new heaven and a new earth.
> > 
> > Many early American settlers arrived believing they were 
> part of the 
> > New
> > Israel, that they would be instruments for Christ's 
> triumphant return to 
> > earth. Interpretations varied on whether the last days 
> would be marked 
> > by progressive revelations and triumphs (the 
> "postmillennial" view), or 
> > whether they would be marked by sudden judgments and 
> calamities (the 
> > "pre millennial" view), or some combination thereof. But 
> all agreed the 
> > present was portentous, and American colonists were going to play a 
> > direct role in the great things looming.
> > 
> > Wars, first with France and later with England, accelerated these
> > millennial speculations. In fighting against England and 
> George III, 
> > people felt they were at once fighting against the Antichrist in a 
> > climactic battle between good and evil, tyranny and freedom.
> > 
> > Freedom and liberty (like individual) were both political and 
> > religious
> > terms. They helped not only preserve fundamental human 
> rights but also 
> > sustain loyalty to Christ and to sola Scriptura. So closely 
> intertwined 
> > were the political and religious connotations, it was virtually 
> > impossible for colonists to separate them.
> > 
> > In his 1776 sermon on The Church's Flight into the 
> Wilderness, Samuel
> > Sherwood examined the prophecies in the Book of Revelation 
> and concluded 
> > that American Christians were the "church in the 
> wilderness," nurtured 
> > in a faraway hiding place and raised to battle and defeat 
> Antichrist. He 
> > argued that the powers of Antichrist were "not confined to the 
> > boundaries of the Roman empire, nor strictly to the 
> territory of the 
> > pope's usurped authority." Rather, they extended to all enemies of 
> > Christ's church and people. He concluded that England's monarchy 
> > "appears to have many of the features and much of the temper and 
> > character of the image of the beast."
> > 
> > In only slightly more secular terms, the greatest pamphlet of the
> > Revolutionary era invoked this millennial imagery. Thomas 
> Paine's Common 
> > Sense was the runaway bestseller of the American 
> Revolution. In time 
> > Paine would be unveiled as a wild-eyed deist, and worse, an 
> atheist. But 
> > you couldn't guess that from Common Sense. It read like a 
> sermon. Paine 
> > knew his audience well, and he knew what biblical allusions 
> would bring 
> > them to arms.
> > 
> > His sermonic pamphlet begins by berating George III as the "royal 
> > brute"
> > of England, noting that monarchy, like aristocracy, had its origins 
> > among ruffians who enforced their "superiority" at the 
> point of a sword. 
> > Then they masked this brute coercion with the trappings of refined 
> > culture and regal bearing. Nevertheless, "How impious is 
> the title of 
> > sacred majesty applied to a worm, who in the midst of his 
> splendor is 
> > crumbling into dust!" He then identifies the monarchy with 
> tyranny, and 
> > tyranny with idolatry and blasphemy. Paine traces in 
> elaborate detail 
> > Israel's "national delusion" in requesting a king as did 
> other nations, 
> > and God's subsequent displeasure at a "form of government which so 
> > impiously invades the prerogative of heaven."
> > 
> >> From scriptural precedent, Paine, the revivalist of revolt, 
> >> concludes,
> > 
> > "These portions of Scripture are direct and positive. They 
> admit of no
> > equivocal construction. That the Almighty hath here entered 
> his protest 
> > against monarchical government is true, or the Scripture is false."
> > 
> > Paine then went on to echo ministerial visions of a new millennial 
> > age.
> > With unmitigated confidence, Paine reiterated John Winthrop's 
> > 17th-century Puritan vision of America as a "city upon a hill." But 
> > unlike Winthrop, Paine's millennial city was modeled on republican 
> > principles (rather than hierarchical)and religious 
> toleration (rather 
> > than state-enforced conformity). With words certain to thrill, he 
> > likened the colonists to a young tree on which small 
> characters were 
> > carved, characters of liberty and freedom. In time this 
> tree would grow 
> > huge, and with it, the characters boldly would proclaim the 
> birth of a 
> > new adventure in freedom that would be seen throughout the world.
> > 
> > Many colonists were fearful that, if they failed, their 
> leaders would 
> > be
> > hung as traitors and the people enslaved in tyranny. But 
> Paine exulted, 
> > "We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation 
> > similar to the present hath not happened since the days of 
> Noah until 
> > now. The birthday of a new world is at hand, and a race of 
> men, perhaps 
> > as numerous as all Europe contains, are to receive their portion of 
> > freedom. . How trifling, how ridiculous do the little 
> paltry cavillings 
> > of a few weak or interested men appear when weighed against 
> the business 
> > of a world."
> > 
> > With rhetoric like this, Paine fused the liberal Mayhew's defense of
> > resistance with an evangelical-like appeal to passion. It is not 
> > surprising that liberals and evangelicals united in "the 
> business of a 
> > world."
> > 
> > VOICE OF HOPE AND COURAGE
> > No minister studied the rapidly unfolding events against scriptural
> > teachings more closely than did Concord's 32-year-old 
> minister, William 
> > Emerson(grandfather of Ralph Waldo Emerson). For a long 
> time, his world 
> > had been dominated by local concerns and salvation 
> preaching. But all of 
> > this changed in March and April 1775, when all the members of his 
> > congregation were propelled into what he termed "the 
> greatest events 
> > taking place in the present age."
> > 
> > By March, Emerson and other Concord patriots knew that 
> British spies 
> > had
> > infiltrated their town and informed General Thomas Gage of a hidden 
> > armory and munitions supplies stocked by the local "Sons of 
> Liberty" (a 
> > secret society of radicals). Many believed Gage was planning a 
> > preemptive strike on these supplies, and they feared for 
> their lives. At 
> > a muster of the Concord militia on March 13, Emerson 
> preached a sermon 
> > on 2 Chronicles 13:12: "And behold, God himself is with us for our 
> > captain. . O children of Israel, fight ye not against the 
> Lord God of 
> > your fathers, for ye shall not prosper" (KJV).
> > 
> > Never would he deliver a more momentous sermon. He had it within his
> > means to promote or discourage an almost certainly violent 
> call to arms. 
> > What was he to say? What was God's will for his American people?
> > 
> > With obvious agitation, Emerson began his sermon with the 
> somber note
> > that recent intelligence warned of "an approaching storm of war and 
> > bloodshed." Many in attendance would soon be called upon for "real 
> > service." Were they ready? Real readiness, Emerson 
> explained, depended 
> > not only on martial skill and weaponry but also on moral 
> and spiritual 
> > resolve. To be successful, soldiers must believe in what they were 
> > fighting for, and they must trust in God's power to uphold them. 
> > Otherwise they would scatter in fear before the superior 
> British redcoats.
> > 
> > What were the men of Concord fighting for? In strident 
> political terms
> > that coupled the roles of prophet and statesman, Emerson argued for 
> > colonial resistance. For standing by their liberties and 
> trusting only 
> > in God, the American people were "cruelly charged with 
> rebellion and 
> > sedition." That charge, Emerson cried, was a lie put 
> forward by plotters 
> > against American liberty. With all of the integrity of his 
> sacred office 
> > behind him, Emerson took his stand before the Concord militia:
> > 
> > "For my own part, the more I reflect upon the movements of 
> the British
> > nation . the more satisfied I am that our military 
> preparation here for 
> > our own defense is . justified in the eyes of the impartial 
> world. Nay, 
> > for should we neglect to defend ourselves by military 
> preparation, we 
> > never could answer it to God and to our own consciences of 
> the rising 
> > [generations]."
> > 
> > The road ahead would be difficult, Emerson cautioned, but 
> the outcome
> > was one preordained from the beginning of time. Accordingly, the 
> > soldiers could go forth to war assured that "the Lord will 
> cover your 
> > head in the day of battle and carry you on from victory to 
> victory." In 
> > the end, he concluded, the whole world would know "that 
> there is a God" 
> > in America.
> > 
> > On April 19, the mounting apprehensions became fact as 800 British
> > troops marched on Lexington and Concord to destroy the patriot 
> > munitions. At Lexington, Gage's troops were met by a small "army of 
> > observation," who were fired upon and sustained 17 casualties. From 
> > there the British troops marched to Concord. Before their 
> arrival, the 
> > alarm had been sounded by patriot silversmith Paul Revere, and 
> > militiamen rushed to the common. William Emerson arrived 
> first, and he 
> > was soon joined by "minutemen" from nearby towns. Again a shot was 
> > fired-the famed "shot heard 'round the world"-and in the ensuing 
> > exchange, three Americans and twelve British soldiers were 
> killed or 
> > wounded. America's colonial war for independence had begun.
> > 
> > Words like Emerson's continued to sound for the next eight years,
> > goading, consoling, and impelling colonists forward in the cause of 
> > independence. The pulpit served as the single most powerful 
> voice to 
> > inspire the colonists.
> > 
> > For most American ministers and many in their congregations, the
> > religious dimension of the war was precisely the point of 
> revolution. 
> > Revolution and a new republican government would enable 
> Americans to 
> > continue to realize their destiny as a "redeemer nation." 
> If time would 
> > prove that self-defined mission tragically arrogant, it was 
> not apparent 
> > to the participants themselves. With backs against the wall, and 
> > precious little to take confidence in, words like those of 
> Mayhew's, 
> > Emerson's, and Paine's were their only hope.
> > 
> > Harry Stout is Jonathan Edwards Professor of American 
> Christianity at
> > Yale University. He is author of The New England Soul: 
> Preaching and 
> > Religious Culture in Colonial New England (Oxford).
> > 
> > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Steven G. Rockhill"
> > <revrock@...>
> > To: <pastorsforum@...>
> > Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2005 3:22 PM
> > Subject: [PastorsForum] The Revolution
> > 
> > 
> >> I have a question that is a little different than usual, and
> >> especially for all the history buffs out there.
> >>     Was the American Revolution justifiable from 
> Scripture?  If so, on 
> >> what grounds or principles (chapter and verse plus biblical 
> >> reasoning)? Does anyone have any info on colonial 
> Christians who spoke 
> >> out for or against the revolution.  And then more generally, is it 
> >> ever right for Christians to rise up and revolt against 
> the government?
> >>
> >> Thanks.
> >>
> >> Peace,
> >> Steve
> >>
> >> --
> >> To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: 
> >> pastorsforum-unsubscribe@...
> >>
> >> "In essential things, unity; in non-essential things, 
> liberty; and in
> >> all things, charity."
> >>
> >> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> >> ----------
> >>
> >> [This e-mail scanned for viruses and spam by Nmax - "Your MAXimum
> >> Connection!"]
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> No virus found in this incoming message.
> >> Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
> >> Version: 7.0.322 / Virus Database: 266.11.12 - Release 
> Date: 5/17/2005
> >>
> >>
> > 
> > 
> > 
> 
> -- 
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> ++++++++++++++++
> Pastor Steven G. Rockhill
> Lisbon Reformed Presbyterian Church
> PO Box 88
> Lisbon, NY  13658
> 315-393-9041
> revrock@...
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> +++++++++++++++
> 
> --
> To unsubscribe, send ANY message to: 
> pastorsforum-unsubscribe@...
> 
> "In essential things, unity; in non-essential things, 
> liberty; and in all things, charity."
> 
>