Alan Keyes
Our resolution every year: no king but Jesus
'Liberty's first line of defense'
By Alan Keyes
The new year, 2016, promises to be a fateful one for America. Constitutional government, delimited by respect for the God-bespoken affidavits of right encoded in human nature, teeters on the brink of whimpering dissolution. Such are the "unalienable rights" respecting which America's founders took their painstaking stand for the independence of the people of the United States. These rights are inseparable from humanity, lest it become a stranger to itself. But now the American people are estranged from their God-endowed estate of liberty. Instead of representatives, they ponder which masterful charlatans will fill the bill for their election, well knowing that, whoever wins the night, no murmured promise will outlive their party's cheers. As per Pelosi's dream: Elections do not matter that much.
But at least we are a people not cheaply for sale, no indeed! The price we get will be the price we pay. Like gamblers on a cast, our citizen's occupation gone, we shall lose all upon the overthrow of liberty.
Obama's tenure in the White House has produced harbingers of this overthrow, concrete and unmistakable. In light of his high crimes and misdemeanors, anger seethes, hungry to sup upon itself, like the ancient Romans' mother of shrewdly discarded valor. But like Volumnia, this people "shall starve with feeding." The Trump now sounds, ostensibly to call down banishment, death, and curses upon all our enemies. Yet this he means to do by means that further confirm Obama's minted harbingers of chains, taking for precedent what he should undo.
The one whose very name promises to secure the gift of God, delivered on the cross, makes shift instead to tout anew the people's self-degrading willfulness. Like Stephen Douglas, once Lincoln's bane, he cares not whether God's rule for right is voted up or down, so long as it exalts the people's will. But how can the people's sovereignty be maintained when the authority from which it rises is disavowed and, being thus discharged, is cut off from supplying lawfulness to power. The people raised to power by reason's rule must fall from thence once it is made the fool.
With only such stars as these upon the rise, no wonder liberty must fall. People relying on this political astrology fail to recall that once Caesar was slain, Caesar rose up to power again, though with another's name. And Roman liberty lost its life. Americans should be proof against this sham, seeing behind the mask the worldly despots' plan. They should as well be proof against the lure of proffered safety or largesse, by lawless means secured. We should not think to barter rightful liberty for lawless safety. We did not when we took our stand behind the Joshua who was Heaven-sent to set not one, but all the nations free. Acknowledging only one as our despot and Lord (Jude 4), America's people of goodwill sought safety first in the kingdom of God within.
We had the courage then to know that ambitious promises of power are not our liberty's first line of defense. That line is drawn by God, defining righteousness. And it is manned by every man and woman in the land willing, for the love of God, to stand with God forever, come what may, inspired by Christ's exampled choice to let His will hold sway. This is the first arm that we keep and bear, upheld by Christ within us, beyond the reach of tyrannous confiscation.
This first and true militia is the exercise of right, whereby the heart of each of us is trained to bear the fight. This is the able body that God calls upon to move, with the swiftness of His anger and with care for His great truth. Sometimes we fight with passion, and with words God's heart imbues. Sometimes we use such weapons as the soul of wrong construes. But our surest hope of victory no other weapon wields than our trust in God, our Savior, slain before us in the field. By His death our arms are christened, by His blood our life renewed, by His singular resurrection is our conquering hope assured.
For we know that our hope, with Jesus, is not in our stars, nor in ourselves, but in the presence here within us of the light, which darkness swells. When the day is at its grimmest, when our will dims down to naught, that is when this light shines brightest and its victories are wrought. Though our "leaders" have forgotten Him, our true guide reminds us still, representing as He does the Grace no emptiness can spill. However deep our troubles seem, he fits us to withstand, with our God upon our left side and His Word in heart and hand.
This is our resolution now, in this and every year, that we'll have no other ruler, leader, despot, king, or guide than the one who stands above us and yet never leaves our side. This is why we stand with liberty – not for profit, power, or pride – but in witness giving proof that our worth in this and any world is measured by God's truth. This is the scale in which we weigh; no other scale can do. For the finger of God that bears it down surely uplifts it too.
January 5, 2016
The new year, 2016, promises to be a fateful one for America. Constitutional government, delimited by respect for the God-bespoken affidavits of right encoded in human nature, teeters on the brink of whimpering dissolution. Such are the "unalienable rights" respecting which America's founders took their painstaking stand for the independence of the people of the United States. These rights are inseparable from humanity, lest it become a stranger to itself. But now the American people are estranged from their God-endowed estate of liberty. Instead of representatives, they ponder which masterful charlatans will fill the bill for their election, well knowing that, whoever wins the night, no murmured promise will outlive their party's cheers. As per Pelosi's dream: Elections do not matter that much.
But at least we are a people not cheaply for sale, no indeed! The price we get will be the price we pay. Like gamblers on a cast, our citizen's occupation gone, we shall lose all upon the overthrow of liberty.
Obama's tenure in the White House has produced harbingers of this overthrow, concrete and unmistakable. In light of his high crimes and misdemeanors, anger seethes, hungry to sup upon itself, like the ancient Romans' mother of shrewdly discarded valor. But like Volumnia, this people "shall starve with feeding." The Trump now sounds, ostensibly to call down banishment, death, and curses upon all our enemies. Yet this he means to do by means that further confirm Obama's minted harbingers of chains, taking for precedent what he should undo.
The one whose very name promises to secure the gift of God, delivered on the cross, makes shift instead to tout anew the people's self-degrading willfulness. Like Stephen Douglas, once Lincoln's bane, he cares not whether God's rule for right is voted up or down, so long as it exalts the people's will. But how can the people's sovereignty be maintained when the authority from which it rises is disavowed and, being thus discharged, is cut off from supplying lawfulness to power. The people raised to power by reason's rule must fall from thence once it is made the fool.
With only such stars as these upon the rise, no wonder liberty must fall. People relying on this political astrology fail to recall that once Caesar was slain, Caesar rose up to power again, though with another's name. And Roman liberty lost its life. Americans should be proof against this sham, seeing behind the mask the worldly despots' plan. They should as well be proof against the lure of proffered safety or largesse, by lawless means secured. We should not think to barter rightful liberty for lawless safety. We did not when we took our stand behind the Joshua who was Heaven-sent to set not one, but all the nations free. Acknowledging only one as our despot and Lord (Jude 4), America's people of goodwill sought safety first in the kingdom of God within.
We had the courage then to know that ambitious promises of power are not our liberty's first line of defense. That line is drawn by God, defining righteousness. And it is manned by every man and woman in the land willing, for the love of God, to stand with God forever, come what may, inspired by Christ's exampled choice to let His will hold sway. This is the first arm that we keep and bear, upheld by Christ within us, beyond the reach of tyrannous confiscation.
This first and true militia is the exercise of right, whereby the heart of each of us is trained to bear the fight. This is the able body that God calls upon to move, with the swiftness of His anger and with care for His great truth. Sometimes we fight with passion, and with words God's heart imbues. Sometimes we use such weapons as the soul of wrong construes. But our surest hope of victory no other weapon wields than our trust in God, our Savior, slain before us in the field. By His death our arms are christened, by His blood our life renewed, by His singular resurrection is our conquering hope assured.
For we know that our hope, with Jesus, is not in our stars, nor in ourselves, but in the presence here within us of the light, which darkness swells. When the day is at its grimmest, when our will dims down to naught, that is when this light shines brightest and its victories are wrought. Though our "leaders" have forgotten Him, our true guide reminds us still, representing as He does the Grace no emptiness can spill. However deep our troubles seem, he fits us to withstand, with our God upon our left side and His Word in heart and hand.
This is our resolution now, in this and every year, that we'll have no other ruler, leader, despot, king, or guide than the one who stands above us and yet never leaves our side. This is why we stand with liberty – not for profit, power, or pride – but in witness giving proof that our worth in this and any world is measured by God's truth. This is the scale in which we weigh; no other scale can do. For the finger of God that bears it down surely uplifts it too.
To see more articles by Dr. Keyes, visit his blog at LoyalToLiberty.com and his commentary at WND.com and BarbWire.com.
© Alan KeyesThe views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
