Posts Tagged ‘American Covenanters’

We Forgot God

July 14, 2013

The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God. (Ps. 9.17)

William Edgar, “The National Confessional Position,” in Gary Scott Smith, ed., God and Politics: Four View on the Reformation of Civil Government (Theonomy, Principled Pluralism, Christian America, National Confessionalism), p. 184:

The effort to make the Founding Fathers appear as militant secularists, like their French contemporaries, is a distortion of history. When today’s secular elites intone the First Amendment and rant about the wall of separation between church and state, so as to bludgeon Christians into public silence, they attribute a modern mentality to the architects of the Constitution, which they did not have. In fact, most of the Founding Fathers were indifferent to Jesus Christ (itself a terrible sin).

The Constitutional Convention never voted on Benjamin Franklin’s motion to begin each day’s deliberation with prayer….When asked why the Constitution did not mention God, Alexander Hamilton reportedly replied that the Framers had forgotten to.7

7 Mark A. Noll, The Search for Christian America (Westchester, Ill.: Crossway, 1983), p. 107.

Proceedings of the Fifth National Reform Convention, to Aid in Maintaining the Christian Features of the American Government, and Securing a Religious Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, Held in Pittsburg, February 4, 5, 1874, p. 41:

Dr. John Rodgers [1727-1811], 1788.

This eminent chaplain of the Revolution, observing with regret the omission of all acknowledgment of God from the Constitution, inquired of Alexander Hamilton, on his return from the convention in New York, how that body could fail to incorporate in the Constitution a suitable recognition of the Almighty. The well-known reply was, “Indeed, Doctor, we forgot it.” — Duffield’s “God of our Fathers,” p. 15.

 

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Pt. 2 Reformed Presbyterian Defence of The Terms of Communion

January 15, 2013

Reformed Presbyterian Defence of The Terms of Communion Part 1

December 31, 2012

Social Covenanting, Reformation and Covenant Renewal Under Hezekiah

November 22, 2012

 

James McLeod Willson: postmillenialism is not utopianism

November 21, 2012

For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.  (1 Corinthians 15:25)

Postmillennialists are often caricatured as believing that there will be a perfect world this side of Christ’s return.  This, however, is not true.  James M. Willson helpfully reminds us that although all organised opposition to Christ will be put down, there will always be sin in the world prior to the second coming:

The language of Scripture respecting the millennial period, is to be understood as descriptive of a state, not of absolute purity, but of an entire subordination of society to the will of God, revealed in the Bible attended with a very remarkable degree of holiness.  There will be sin in the world, but no open, or organized opposition to Christ.

J. M. Willson, Bible magistracy: or Christ’s dominion over the nations: with an examination of the civil institutions of the United States (Philadelphia, 1842), p. 38n.

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Covenanting and the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland (1640)

October 30, 2012

Although some think that they can claim a historical link with the Second Reformation Church of Scotland without acknowledging the covenants of the seventeenth-century, this supposition is a-historical.  This is because in 1640 the General Assembly of the Scottish Kirk made it an ex-communicable offence not to adhere to the National Covenant (which, incidentally, proves that the early Covenanters believed in close communion/confessional membership):

The Assembly ordains, that such as have subscribed the Covenant and speaks against the same, if he be a Minister, shall be deprived: And if he continue so, being deprived, shall be excommunicate: And if he be any other man, shall be dealt with as perjured, and satisfy publikely [sic] for his perjury.

‘Act for censuring speakers against the covenant’, Session 5, 1 Aug. 1640 in A true copy of the whole printed acts of the General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland, beginning at the Assembly holden in Glasgow the 27 day of November 1638; and ending at the 27 day of November 1638; and ending at the Assembly, holden at Edinburgh the 6 day of August 1649. Diligently compared, and exactly reprinted conform to the foresaid printed Acts. By a welwisher of the Church of Scotland, who (if he find encouragement by what is now done) intends to publish the rest of the Acts not heretofore printed, a part of which he hath by him (n.p., 1682).

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National Covenanting, Part 13

October 30, 2012

National Covenanting, Part 12

October 30, 2012

National Covenanting, Part 11

October 30, 2012

National Covenanting, Part 10

October 30, 2012

Pastor Brain Schwertley affirming that the Untied States is bound to the Solemn League and Covenant including all Presbyterian communions.