I enjoy gathering with family and friends for food, fellowship and fireworks on the 4th of July holiday, and I imagine you do too. As I participate in the festivities, I’m reminded that our founding fathers and their families paid a tremendous price in order for us to enjoy the freedoms we have in this great nation— like the freedom of religion and speech— that are in jeopardy today and that we all too often take for granted. Although they had security as far as the world measures it, each of the signers of the declaration valued liberty more than their belongings, even their lives. They pledged the following to one another:
“For the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the protection of the divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.”
Many people are unaware of the sacrifices they did in fact make. The British captured five of the signers during the war, including Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, and Arthur Middleton, and George Walton was wounded as well as captured. Richard Stockton was captured and never recovered from his incarceration by British Loyalists and he died in 1781. John Adams received a letter from Thomas McKean who wrote that he was “hunted like a fox by the enemy – compelled to remove my family five times in a few months.” The British captured two of Abraham Clark’s sons during the war.
The homes and property of eleven signers were destroyed. Francis Lewis’s home was demolished and his wife was taken prisoner. John Hart’s farm and mills were destroyed when the British invaded New Jersey, and he died while fleeing capture. Carter Braxton and Nelson lent large sums of their personal fortunes to support the war effort, and they were never repaid. They were willing to sacrifice so much because they knew the liberties they were fighting for were their ‘unalienable rights’, given to them by their Creator God.
The reality is that freedom is never free. There is always a cost. We who have enjoyed the freedoms for which our founding fathers sacrificed much need to be prepared to pay the cost to maintain those freedoms. We must be willing to exercise our freedom of religion and speech in our ‘politically correct’ culture that seeks to silence us who represent the Voice of God that calls people to turn away from sexual immorality, the killing of the unborn, violence, corruption and other evils that have become normative in today’s America, and to turn to God Who alone is the Source of all true freedom.
As much as I am grateful—and I truly am– for the sacrifices of our founding fathers who were willing to give up their property, their safety and security, and even their lives to establish our nation, I am far more grateful to Jesus Who was willing to lay down His life to secure the greatest treasure I will ever have–freedom from the power and penalty of sin. And that was the costliest purchase ever made. My freedom—and yours—could only be bought with the price of Jesus’ blood. Our Heavenly Father had to be willing to sacrifice the life of His blameless, Beloved Son Jesus in order to redeem my life and yours. If you ever wonder how valuable you are, remember the great price that God was willing to pay for you and your freedom! You are treasured by Him! He was willing to exchange a perfect life for your sinful one in order that you could be set free from your sin.
So as you celebrate the our nation’s independence this year, I hope you will thank God for our founding fathers who valued liberty more than security so that you can have the liberties you enjoy in our country today. I especially hope you will take the time to thank Jesus for being willing to give up all of the glories of heaven to come to earth to give His life in exchange for yours, so that you can be free from the power of sin in your life and able to spend eternity in paradise with God. Let us walk and rejoice in the freedom that Jesus has purchased for us! And let us use our freedom of speech to boldly and lovingly share with others in our nation that true and everlasting freedom can be their’s too— if they will put their trust in Jesus!
Please join with me in praying that our nation will once again seek after God and His counsel, return to Him, and in every way receive Him as Lord, knowing that God is Sovereign over all nations, the Source of a nation’s strength and blessings, and alone worthy of all honor, glory and praise!
The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nothing;
he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
The counsel of the LORD stands forever,
the plans of his heart to all generations.
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people whom he has chosen as his heritage!
The LORD looks down from heaven;
he sees all the children of man;
from where he sits enthroned he looks out
on all the inhabitants of the earth,
he who fashions the hearts of them all
and observes all their deeds.
The king is not saved by his great army;
a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.
The war horse is a false hope for salvation,
and by its great might it cannot rescue.
Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear him,
on those who hope in his steadfast love,
that he may deliver their soul from death
and keep them alive in famine.
Our soul waits for the LORD;
he is our help and our shield.
For our heart is glad in him,
because we trust in his holy name.
Let your steadfast love, O LORD, be upon us,
even as we hope in you.
Psalm 33:10-22 ESV
Written by Julie Van Gorp