Supreme Court Sets Precedent - Teachers Can Bully Students

 

These days we are more sensitive to the bullying that students dole upon one another in school. Apparently, the teachers can bully students with verbal assaults as long as the student is a Christian.

Nearly every day in class, James Corbett, who had taught at the school for the past 20 years, would ridicule and harass Chad Farnan about his Christian and creationist views.  One of the statements made by Corbett in the classroom in front of Farnan’s fellow students was,“When you put on your Jesus glasses, you can’t see the truth.”

After repeated verbal abuse in front of his classmates, Farnan filed suit against the teacher in December 2007.  He accused the teacher of promoting hostility to Christians in the classroom and in promoting ‘irreligion over religion’ which is a violation of the First Amendment.

The case was appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is the most liberal court in the entire US.  In keeping with their liberal history, the Ninth Circuit Court overturned the District Court’s ruling declaring that the teacher had a qualified immunity since there was no precedent of any case where a teacher had been held liable for anti-religious statements and those statements been ruled to be unconstitutional.

Based on his belief that there was no justifiable reason for his attacks on his student, the judge ruled in favor of the student but the victory was short-lived as the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals predictably ruled to the left of center and overturned the district judge.
 
The case then appealed to the US Supreme Court in hopes that they would make a precedent setting ruling to defend the religious rights of students in public schools.  In March this year, the US Supreme Court announced that they will not hear the case, thus making the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling will stand as the final decision.
 
A precedent in this case has been set, but not the one hoped for.  The precedent that was set allows teachers to verbally abuse, ridicule and harass the religious beliefs of any student and they can do so in the classroom in front of other students.

US Constitution 1st Amendment

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Pastor Goes to Jail for Hosting Home Bible Study

Michael Salman, the pastor from Phoenix who was fined and sentenced to jail for holding Bible studies in his home, started his 60-day jail sentence at 10 a.m. today.

The preacher asked for prayers as he left his wife and six kids to report to Maricopa County Jail.

"I have spent time with my family this morning praying, crying and saying our goodbye. My heart is broken, but glory to God," Salman wrote on his Facebook page this morning. "Our God wil take care of us and my family. Please pray for us! Until God opens the prison's door, I will be with you all in prayer and spirit."

Salman was found guilty of code violations for hosting Bible studies on his 4.6 acre property, which he has been doing for the past 7 years. He was sentenced to 60 days in jail along with three years probation and ordered to pay a $12,180 fine.

Read the article herehttp://www.christianpost.com/news/arizona-pastor-goes-to-jail-holding-home-bible-study-religious-freedom-77909/

Town repents after threatening to shut down Bible study

An Apple Valley couple was in shock after they were told their home Bible Study was in violation of town law, according to a citation found on their front door.

“I was appalled when I read the letter,” said M. Sharon Rogone, who leads the weekly study with her husband, Phillip. “Soon we will be an underground movement. If this is America, then where is our religious freedom?”

The “courtesy” citation, posted Wednesday by a code enforcement officer, stated the town’s code and a complaint “that church services are being held at this address.”

The citation also gave the Rogones until June 27 to comply, or else the town would take legal action.

“I wrote to Bill O’Reilly, FOX News, Glenn Beck and to as many people as I could,” said Rogone, who attends High Desert Church in Victorville and has hosted the study in the couple’s Choco Road home for the last seven years.

“There are about 15 of us, and we have about seven cars here that all fit in our driveway, or in front of our property,” Rogone said. “We’re not rowdy or obnoxious. We even invited the entire neighborhood over to hang out.”

Read the entire article here: http://www.vvdailypress.com/articles/shut-35120-study-apple.html

Opportunity for Impact

An Americans United for the Separation of Church and State official told Vanderbilt University Christians to "stop whining" about the institution's all-comers policy and hold their meetings in private homes like Christians in communist China.

Executive Director Barry W. Lynn said "I would suggest that people in this position – to use a phrase on a button in my dentist office that he always wears when he works, it says, 'stop whining.' I'd say stop whining here. Why not do what evangelicals do: go out into the world, out into the community and have your meetings, if you have to, off campus. Show your faith and meet with students not in a club room somewhere in the university, but in those home churches that kept Christianity alive during the darkest days of communist China."

For more than a year now, Vanderbilt University and several religious student groups have been locked in a battle over discrimination.

The university insists that groups like the Christian Legal Society, the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Vanderbilt Catholic and others cannot require prospective leaders to share their faith and values. To do so would run afoul of the university’s non-discrimination policy to admit “all comers.” If the student groups don’t shape up, they’ll have to ship out.

One group already has. In March, Vanderbilt Catholic said it would pick up and move off campus, rather than sign a pledge that non-Catholics were welcome to apply for positions of leadership. To do that, the group's leaders said, would be to compromise the entire purpose of the organization.

It seems that this is a perfect opportunity for Christian leaders to join one of the 7 gay and lesbian organizations and run for leadership positions. This would allow a Christian voice to be heard in the groups that most likely have none.

Christ dined with many people who were not believers and did not compromise his beliefs. This is an opportunity for Christians to join non-Christian clubs and make an impact for Christ! Get as many Christians as you can to join these secular clubs and vote Christian leaders into positions of influence in the club.  The opportunity to spread the Word and see the impact is ready to be had at Vanderbilt. This applies to all colleges and universities as well.

Christian Persecution Not Newsworthy

Saudi fatwa against Gulf churches

In an article published by the Middle East Forum, Raymond Ibrahim, a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an associate fellow at the Middle East Forum, cites several Arabic language web publications that quoted Sheik Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, declaring it is “necessary to destroy all the churches of the region.”

Ibrahim reported the Muslim leader’s comment was in response to a question by a delegation from Kuwait, where a member of parliament recently also called for churches to be removed.

“Accordingly, the grand mufti ‘stressed that Kuwait was a part of the Arabian Peninsula, and therefore it is necessary to destroy all churches in it,’” Ibrahim reported.

“As with many grand muftis before him, the sheik based his proclamation on the famous tradition, or hadith, wherein the prophet of Islam declared on his deathbed that, ‘There are not to be two religions in the [Arabian] Peninsula,’ which has always been interpreted to mean that only Islam can be practiced in the region,” Ibrahim wrote.

In the Middle East, Christians already are facing increased persecution, including death, in countries where militant Islamic factions have stepped into the vacuum of power created by “Arab Spring” revolutions.

For example, Coptic Christians who have worshiped in Egypt for millennia are reporting higher levels of persecution from Muslims. In North Africa, Muslims have promised to eradicate Christianity in some parts of the region. In Iraq, where Christians did not flourish but were given some accommodation under strongman Saddam Hussein, entire Christian populations have fled.

Wrote Ibrahim, “Considering the hysteria that besets the West whenever non-authoritative individuals offend Islam – for instance, a fringe, unknown pastor – imagine what would happen if a Christian counterpart to the grand mufti, say the pope, were to declare that all mosques in Italy must be destroyed; imagine the nonstop Western media frenzy that would erupt, all the shrill screams of ‘intolerance’ and ‘bigot,’ demands for apologies if not resignation, nonstop handwringing by sensitive politicians, and worse.”

As noted by Ibrahim, there were outcries of hatred and bigotry when Terry Jones burned a Quran at his church in Florida last year. There have been no denouncements of the Muslim Leader saying that churches in the Arabian Peninsula be destroyed.

"The desecration of any holy text, including the Quran, is an act of extreme intolerance and bigotry," President Obama said of Terry Jones burning the Quran. He has made no statements on the destruction of churches in the gulf or on the Christian persecutions in the area.

David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in the Afghanistan war, issued a similar statement."We condemn, in particular, the action of an individual in the United States who recently burned the Holy Quran. We also offer condolences to the families of all those injured and killed in violence which occurred in the wake of the burning of the Holy Quran."

Christian bishops in Germany, Austria and Russia have sharply criticized Saudi Arabia's top religious official after reports that he issued a fatwa saying all churches on the Arabian Peninsula should be destroyed.

Attacks on Christians

In Iran authorities have begun sweeping through towns arresting Christians suspected of holding worship meetings in an effort to stamp out the house church movement.

In Kerala state, India, a pastor and his children were attacked on Feb. 21. Pastor Titus Ignatius Kapan and his family were eating dinner at the house of a Hindu convert when Hindu extremists entered the house. They abused the pastor and his children before dropping huge boulders on the pastor’s car.

In Nigeria terrorist group Boko Haram claimed responsibility for suicide bombers who set off a car bomb at a church in Jos, Nigeria, killing a church member and a baby.

The execute branch of our government have consistently shown a lack of interest in the plight of Christians being persecuted domestically and in the eastern hemisphere. While U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary Daniel Baer was hailing the U.N. passage of a resolution endorsing the rights of gay, lesbian and transgender people, nothing was said of the nearly 900 dead or wounded Christians in attacks on 40 Churches where the victims were hacked and burned to death in Nigeria just two months earlier.

A few weeks later the Arab Spring kicked of unleashing a slew of attacks resulting in the murder of hundreds of Christians in Africa and throughout Europe and the Middle East. While our government was touting the Arab spring as a “victory” for the Islamic people, Christians were losing their lives for simply “not being Muslims.” Still with all of these blatant human rights violations taking place and the media’s refusal to report these attacks, we have heard virtually nothing from our government on this extermination of Christians.

Half of Iraq's indigenous Christians are gone due to the unleashed forces of jihad, many of them fleeing to nearby Syria; yet, as the Assad regime comes under attack by al-Qaeda and others, the jihad now seeps into Syria, where Christians are experiencing a level of persecution unprecedented in the nation's modern history. Likewise, some 100,000 Christian Copts have fled their native Egypt since the overthrow of the Mubarak regime; and in northern regions of Nigeria, where the jihadi group Boko Haram has been slaughtering Christians; up to 95 % of the Christian population has fled.

Meanwhile, the "big news" concerning the Muslim world in the month of February—the news that flooded the mainstream media and had U.S. politicians, beginning with President Obama, flustered, angry, and full of regret—was that copies of the Koran in Afghanistan were burned by U.S. soldiers because imprisoned Muslim inmates were using them "to facilitate extremist communications."

President Obama thanked the Muslim community for their help in dealing with the September 11 tragedy, which caused nearly 3,000 deaths.

The president honored the Muslims for their help on home soil a decade ago, and also thanked them for their contributions to the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Obama noted that American Muslims serve as firefighters, police officers and counterterrorism specialists. “Make no mistake,” Obama said. “Muslim Americans help to keep us safe.”

Obama said "I think that the United States and the West generally, we have to educate ourselves more effectively on Islam.

"And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we'd be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.  And so there's got to be a better dialogue and a better understanding between the two peoples."

Don Surber crunches the numbers and points out that Obama's claim is highly dubious. According to Surber, the US has an estimated three to eight million Muslims, less than one per cent of the world's total and less than at least 23 other countries.

What does he have to say about Christianity?

The president did say  'It's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment, or anti-trade sentiment, as a way to explain their frustrations.'

Conclusion

The media and many in our government clearly have antipathy towards Christians. It is no wonder there is no mention, no outcry for the assaults on Christians around the world other than from other Christians. Will there be silence as the assaults continue to grow here in the US?

Matthew 5:10-12 Blessed are they who have been persecuted for righteousness sake! For theirs is the kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all kinds of evil against you falsely, for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for your reward in Heaven is great. For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

House Protects Student Religious Rights

OKLAHOMA CITY (March 8, 2012) – Student religious groups would be guaranteed equal access to school facilities under legislation approved by the state House.

House Bill 2677, by state Rep. Jabar Shumate, would make it illegal for any state educational institution to “take any action or enforce any policy that would deny a religious student group any benefit available to any other student group based on the religious student group’s requirement that its leaders or members adhere to its sincerely held religious beliefs or standards of conduct.”

“Student religious groups should have the same access to school facilities as other groups,” said Shumate, D-Tulsa. “This legislation ensures that children will not be discriminated against based on religious belief. If the Girl Scouts can hold meetings at a school, a Christian group should have the same access.”

Under the legislation, if a student group is discriminated against by school officials, the affected student group or any of its members would have legal justification for a lawsuit seeking damages, declaratory judgment, and/or injunctive relief in state or federal court.

“Most student religious groups accept students of all backgrounds as members, but most require their officers to live up to certain standards based on their devout beliefs,” said state Rep. Dennis Johnson, a Duncan Republican who co-authored the bill. “Those groups should not face discrimination as a result of upholding the standards they were founded to advance. I am pleased this legislation received such strong bipartisan support.”

House Bill 2677 passed the Oklahoma House of Representatives on a 91-0 vote. It now proceeds to the state Senate.

Remember in October 2011 an after-school Christian kids' club sued the school district of Owassa, Oklahoma, a suburb of Tulsa, for preventing the club’s organizers from promoting events at one of the district’s schools. According to the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), the conservative legal advocacy group that is representing the club, the district took away the Kids for Christ club’s right to distribute fliers, make announcements, put up posters, and other activities at Northeast Elementary School, arguing that the club, which meets outside of class time, is religious. Meanwhile, the district continues to allow such groups as the Boy Scouts and the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), along with businesses such as a local burrito restaurant, to promote their activities.

New OK Law Amends the Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Act

Another bill passed by the Governor Fallin of Oklahoma amends 63 O.S. 2001, Section 2-509.

HB1798 creates a new felony for converting marihuana into hashish.  The penalty for a first conviction is a $50,000 fine and imprisonment for 2 years to life.  The penalties for a second or subsequent offense is double that of a first offense.

“It shall be unlawful for any person to cultivate or produce, or to knowingly permit the cultivation, production, or wild growing of any species of such plants, on any lands owned or controlled by such person, and it is hereby declared the duty of every such person to destroy all such plants found growing on lands owned or controlled by him.

Whenever any peace officer of the state shall receive information that any species of any such plants has been found growing on any private lands in the State of Oklahoma, he shall notify the sheriff and county commissioners of the county wherein such plants are found growing.  Within five days of receipt of notice, the county commissioners shall notify the owner or person in possession of such lands that such plants have been found growing on the said lands and that the same must be destroyed or eradicated within fifteen days.  When the fifteen days have elapsed, the reporting peace officer shall cause an investigation to be made of the aforesaid lands, and if any such plants be found growing thereon, the commissioners shall cause the same to be destroyed or eradicated by either cutting and burning or by applications of herbicides approved for such purpose by the Department of Agriculture in accordance with Section 2-505 of this title.

Whenever any such plants are destroyed or eradicated by order of the commissioners as provided herein, the cost of the same shall, if the work or labor be furnished by the commissioners, be taxed against the lands where on the work was performed, and shall be a lien upon such land in all manner and respects as a lien of judgment, if the owner is charged with a violation.

Knowingly violating the provisions of subsection B or subsection H of this section is hereby declared, as to the owner, or person in possession of such lands, to be a felony and punishable as such by a fine not to exceed $50,000.00 and imprisonment in the custody of the Department of Corrections for not less than two years nor more than life. Any subsequent offences will receive double the time in prison and double the fines. Any sentence shall not be subject to statutory provisions for suspended sentences, deferred sentences, or probation, except when the conviction is for a first offense.”

The amendatory language adds it shall be unlawful for any person to manufacture or attempt to manufacture any controlled dangerous substance by cooking, burning, or extracting and converting or attempting to extract and convert marihuana or marihuana oil into hashish, hashish oil or hashish powder.  

The Good News

Is there any good news?

These days of rising prices and high unemployment, inflation running high and crimes reported from neighbors to the biggest elites and government, people ask- “Don’t you have any good news?”

Of course there is good news. We know these are signs of the return of our Lord Jesus Christ! We who believe watch in anticipation as we see the events unfolding in the world and in our localities. In talking about the final days Jesus said “But of that day and hour no one knows, no, not the angels of Heaven, but only My Father.” Matthew 24:36. However He said “Now learn a parable of the fig tree. When its branch is still tender and puts out leaves, you know that summer is near. So you, likewise, when you see all these things, shall know that it is near, at the doors. Truly I say to you, this generation shall not pass until all these things are fulfilled.” Matthew 24:32-34. “Therefore watch; for you do not know what hour your Lord comes.” Matthew 24:42

In speaking of “this generation” Jesus was speaking of the generation that would see the signs he described in Matthew 24.  Friends, we are this generation. Some 63 years ago Israel became a nation after there was none for around 2,000 years. This is also described as a sign in the Old Testament.

And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.

And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea.

And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth. Isaiah 11:10-12

 And He said to me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, our bones are dried and our hope is lost; we are cut off by ourselves. Therefore prophesy and say to them, so says the Lord Jehovah: Behold, O My people, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, and will bring you into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am Jehovah when I have opened your graves, O My people, and have brought you up out of your graves. And I shall put My Spirit in you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. And you shall know that I Jehovah have spoken and have done it, says Jehovah. Ezekiel 37:11-14

Both of these are concerning the rebirth of the nation of Israel and peoples that had been scattered will return. This has happened. And in Isaiah 67 the prophet tells of the nation being born in one day as happened in 1948.

Before she was in labor, she gave birth;

      Before her pain came,

      She delivered a male child.

      Who has heard such a thing?

      Who has seen such things?

      Shall the earth be made to give birth in one day?

      Or shall a nation be born at once?

      For as soon as Zion was in labor,

      She gave birth to her children

Isaiah 66:7-8

This accurately describes what happened on May 14, 1948 - when the Jews declared independence for Israel as a united and sovereign nation for the first time in 2900 years.

The New Testament also describes the last days as days of lawlessness. We have seen children gang raping other children. When I was a child we could play in the street at night unguarded with no fear. Homes were left unlocked. Schools have children murdering numbers of other children. Adults are attacking children in record numbers. You know what is happening these days so I will not dwell here.

Romans 1: 18-32 and the book of Jude describe a long list of behaviors that will not only occur but be acceptable. Homosexuality, wickedness, greed, evil, envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, unloving, unmerciful and untrustworthy. These are the characteristics of the final generation. These are all happening in ways and numbers never before seen.

Behavioral experts have found that infants begin to lie from as young as six months. In a poll, 75% of women say they lie about money to boyfriends, husbands, and family members. Over 60% of people felt they could wiggle out of their lies once discovered and not suffer the consequences. 13% of respondents admitted they lied to researchers in the study that found this statistic.

Nearly 40% of folks said they have lied about following a doctor's treatment plan and 30% lied to their doctors about their diet and workout regimen. 60% of people lie at least once during a 10-minute conversation. people are most likely to lie on the telephone rather than via e-mail, instant messaging or face-to-face conversations. 31% of people admit lying on a resume. Men lie twice as much as women. On average, men tell six lies per day to their spouses and colleagues; women tell three.

In every single region of the country, when we asked how people make up their minds on issues of right and wrong, we found that they simply do not turn to God or religion to help them decide about seminal or moral issues of the day. For most people, religion plays virtually no role in shaping their opinions on a long list of important public questions. This is true even for questions that seem closely related to religion: birth control, abortion, even teaching Creationism and the role of women in the clergy. On not one of those questions did a majority of people seek the guidance of religion in finding answers. Most people do not even know their church's position on the important issues. That, perhaps, is the true measure of America indifference to the teachings of organized religion: We don't follow what our church says because we're not interested enough to find out what it's saying." (pp. 200-201).

The researchers for the book The Day America Told The Truth concluded: “Americans lie. They lie more than we had ever thought possible before the study. But they told us the truth about how much they lie. JUST ABOUT EVERYONE LIES – 91 PERCENT OF US LIE REGULARLY. The majority of us find it hard to get through a week without lying. One in five can’t make it through a single day – and we’re talking about conscious, premeditated lies. In fact, the way some people talk about trying to do without lies, you would think that they were smokers trying to get through a day without a cigarette! When we refrain from lying, it’s less often because we think it’s wrong (only 45 percent) than for a variety of other reasons, among them the fear of being caught (17 percent). We lie to just about everyone, and the better we know someone, the likelier we are to have told them a serious lie…” (pp. 45-46, The Day America Told The Truth)

He are some of the startling conclusions made by the authors of this book:

• There are more serious liars right now (liars who do harm) than at any time in our nation’s past.

• Lying has become a cultural trait in America. Lying is embedded in our national character. That hasn’t really been understood around the world. Americans lie about everything – and usually for no good reason.

• The majority of Americans today (two out of every three) believe there is nothing wrong with telling a lie. Only 31 percent of us believe honesty is the best policy.

Again, we see the words of the prophets coming to manifest in these days. The birth pains, as Jesus described, are growing in intensity and number. We are clearly coming to the end of the age. It is time to watch and pray as the great tribulation is almost here. The stage is set for the one world government spoke of in Daniel and Revelation.

The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces. And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time. - Daniel 7:23-25

And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. If any man have an ear, let him hear. He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints. - Revelation 13:1-10

Even though the power of a small group of International banksters is colossal today according to Harvard and Princeton professor emeritus, Carroll Quigley, they are finding it increasingly difficult to conceal their true nature. He said of this group:

"Their aim is nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. The system was to be controlled in a feudalistic fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences." (Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1966)

So where is the good news you ask? Jesus died so that we may live. Jesus said “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father but by Me.” John 14:6. And we are surely familiar with John 3:16 in which Jesus said “For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

What must we do to be saved? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, Acts 15:10. And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved, and your household. Acts 16:31

Being saved understands that the Lord Jesus Christ gave His life for you and me. You must believe to be saved. Then when He calls His people to join Him in paradise, For the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall ever be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words. 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18

When you are saved by grace that comes from God and not by men, then “Watch therefore, praying in every season that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things which shall occur, and to stand before the Son of Man.” As Jesus tells us in speaking of the tribulations of the end times in Luke 21:36

If you have not given your life to Christ, now is the time. Make the decisions now and see that these things are all good news to those who believe.

Separation of Church and State

Separation of Church and State

The 1^st amendment of the US Constitution says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

What does “congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion” mean? Quite literally this means there will be no Church of the United States in the vein of The Church of England.  During the colonial era the Church of England was established as the church or religious institution of England. In other words the federal government cannot set up a federal church or tell you what to believe or how to worship, if at all.

As mentioned the fact that congress shall make no law prohibiting the free exercise of a religion simply means the federal government cannot dictate your religious beliefs or that way you say or show them.  Interestingly the next item in this amendment tells congress they cannot abridge our freedom of speech. 

We have all heard presidents call the nation to pray or remember in our prayers someone or something that is going on. President Obama asked us to keep congresswoman Giffords in our prayers. President Lincoln decided to “designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th. day of April, 1863, as a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer. And I do hereby request all the People to abstain, on that day, from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite, at their several places of public worship and their respective homes, in keeping the day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion. “

The founding fathers did not intend to preclude a person’s religious ideals from their service to the country. As a matter of fact John Adams and John Hancock stated: “We Recognize No Sovereign but God, and no King but Jesus!” [April 18, 1775]  John Adams also stated “The general principles upon which the Fathers achieved independence were the general principals of Christianity… I will avow that I believed and now believe that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.”

Benjamin Franklin said “God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured in the Sacred Writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this. I also believe that, without His concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel” –Constitutional Convention of 1787 |

Patrick Henry stated that “It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.” [May 1765 Speech to the House of Burgesses]

Thomas Jefferson himself stated "I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus."

Does this sound like  people who wanted to have us hide our beliefs while in a government run building or institution? As Patrick Henry stated in his speech noted above “For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.” They were not afraid to declare their beliefs or to deny others, even those with differing views, the right to adhere to the principles of their personal beliefs. Indeed you have the right to not believe in a god, to worship yourself, others, animals or the earth itself. And I have the right to worship Jesus Christ and show this by reading a bible in a public or government building including schools!

More quotes here.