Government – Our New God and Savior ( A Commentary on the Controversy Between the Government and the Catholic Church over Contraceptives and Abortifacient Drugs)
Recently a huge controversy erupted over a decision by the Obama Administration to command religious organizations like the Catholic church and their sister organizations to provide birth control and some abortifacients in all their insurance coverage. Such a decree from on high is completely against the long-held religious doctrine of the Catholic church. Also it flies in the face of many evangelical churches whose established teaching sees abortifacient drugs as abortion. This would be little more than a government imposed type of “Abortion on Command.”
There are two reasons why the recent Obama administration decree to the religious community is so odious. The first reason is the way that it egregiously disregards the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States. The actions of the government trample upon the “free exercise” of religious principle in this case. What the Obama administration has done is use Obama-care and the unconstitutional powers is gives them to tell the church where it will and will not stand on issues of conscience. This is just a foretaste of what is coming from the behemoth 2700 page Obama-care bill. Truly we are slowly learning what Nancy Pelosi meant when she told us we would have to pass the bill in order to find out what is in it. Now we are learning to our growing horror that it contains multiple violations of the very principles contained in our founding document. Who would have thought that the very right of freedom of religion would be crushed by a health care bill. The fact we are slowly beginning to see is that this bill gives government the power to tell the religious community what they will believe and what they will practice. Thus the new religion of the United States, socialism, will be forced on all of us by the out of control Obama administration.
The second objection is how this decree has unconstitutionally made the government the “lord” of commerce by being able to tell insurance companies that they MUST offer contraception and other birth control and abortifacients to women free of charge. This action breaches the public trust by allowing unelected officials in the Health and Human Services agency to tell companies to give away services with no recourse for their expenses in doing so. What else will our government tell us to give away at full charge to us – but no charge to the recipients? This is nothing more than a “Robin-hood” form of the government taking from one and choosing who it will give it to in the end. Again the political, and now apparently religious, views of Socialism are being made the official doctrine and law of our country. This won’t last because any economy based on Socialism will, as Margaret Thatcher so wisely said, eventually run out of other people’s money.
This was trumpeted as a compromise, but the truth is that it is an end run around their former decision. Someone will have to pay for these things. The illusion of free contraceptives and abortifacients will be countered by the higher premiums that these organizations will pay for their policies. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Someone will have to pay. Oh, by the way, that someone is those of us in the church community, who find forced compliance on these matters truly disgusting.
There is no room to compromise on this, especially when the compromise offered is an insult to any thinking person’s intelligence. I fully support those in the Catholic community, as well as anyone in the religious community, when they call for a full repeal of these degrees of our new “King George” that go against everything our forefathers fought and died for when they broke away from England. At risk is far more than just an open political battle with our current administration. Honestly, at risk is the freedom to hold ANY view that goes against our current administration’s enforced public conscience. How long do you think it will be before other matters of conscience come under fire? Slowly we are being introduced to the new doctrinal views of our government. These views do not allow for religious conscientious objectors – only for those who bow at the altar of government as our new god and savior.
God speaks of the blessing of those who live godly lives. In a contrast He also speaks of the lawless - and never does so in any kind of glowing terms. Therefore we should realize that there is a blessing to a land that abides by its laws - and a potential disaster looming for those who ignore the rule of law. What we are facing more and more is a president who refuses and even flaunts the fact that he is not going to abide by the law of the land. In the last 3 years President Obama has trampled the Constitution again and again. He has a blatant disregard for our founding document - acting as if he is a law unto himself. This does not bode well for our nation - and if he is not confronted soon - for our future freedom.
Whether we are referencing the federal government forcing people to buy health insurance or the most recent appointment of government officials without the consent of the Senate, this president thinks he can do whatever he wants. So far, because we have a Congress without the backbone to oppose him and bring him to court for his offences - he can. Our recourse in these matters is to call the president's bluff and force a Constitutional crisis. That crisis would involve the courts determining if the president has acted outside the laws of our land. What is sad is that even the most casual perusal of the Constitution should lead to the conclusion that our president is out of control. But no one has the guts to call his bluff. They probably fear being called a partisan or even worse a racist - as that is often the way that this administration deals those who oppose it. But I care little what race a man is or what party he is from - either we have a governing document by which we determine law, or our president can make up whatever laws he chooses.
Consider that our president began his term in office by appointing a host of so-called czars that were never received the advice and consent of Congress. Consider that they still rule on matters without any congressional oversight. Consider that recently the Congress itself violated the Constitution by making it legal for American citizens to be arrested and held without charges indefinitely. Consider that our government can now use the Armed Forces against its own people. Consider that there is an FCC law working its way through the system that will allow an unelected official to remove any website from the internet he or she wants. The attacks against our free speech are staggering - and too often the one recourse we have, the Supreme Court, will either not hear the cases brought up or will completely ignore our Constitution in its rulings. We are sliding down a slippery slope at a speed that very soon will not be able to be stopped.
You might ask why this matters to someone who is writing a "prophecy/news update." It is because I believe we are watching Scripture fulfilled with this situation. My concern is both patriotic as well as spiritual. As a patriot I find it glaringly arrogant that the Constitution, our governing document is being treated like little more than toilet paper by a man who put his hand on a Bible and swore to uphold and defend it against all enemies foreign and domestic. If he fulfilled this oath, he would need to resign the presidency immediately - because he, more than any other elected official is denigrating it horrifically each day he continues this unconstitutional path upon which he is currently governing. I use the word "governing" lightly - because he acts more and more like a dictator than a president every day.
My concern spiritually has been that God is using this president as a form of discipline and judgement upon our nation. Jesus said that if the salt has lost its savor - it is good for nothing any longer except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men. The church has departed from God in the United States. For decades we have been watching the spiritual fervor and evangelistic zeal of God's people and God's shepherds subside. We have watched as the moral underpinnings of the church have come loose. We are now a nation that has the unfortunate responsibility of over 40,000,000 deaths by abortion upon us. The blood of these children, as well as the 4000 plus additional ones put to death each and every day cries out for God's judgment. We seem to no longer address the issue of heterosexual immorality and drunkenness that run rampant in our land. Our college campuses turn into drunken orgies on the weekends - and many are so addicted to alcohol that by the time they finish college they are drinking almost every day to cope. Homosexuality is arguably no longer considered a vice, but is trumpeted as a viable, acceptable alternative lifestyle. All this continues to grow in our land - while the lethargy of the churches is palpable. What do we expect God to do in a situation like ours? Do we expect Him to bless America? President Barak Obama is an instrument in the hand of God to judge our land - and he is doing his job by ignoring our Constitution and doing whatever he wants.
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ . . . I do not write these words out of anger and recrimination against our president, but I write them as a warning to us all. I could as easily bring charges against 8 years of the presidency of George W. Bush - because he did little or nothing to stand against the tsunami of immorality that has crashed against our shores with ever-increasing ferocity. We've listened to the lie that this is about the economy - but the truth is that unless we repent and return to the Lord - our economy is the least of our problems.
Let me finish by answering my own question, "Dude, where's my Constitution?" Our governing document has gone the way of God's Law in our land. We have decided that we cannot tolerate the 10 commandments any longer in America. Long before that decision was codified, our nation was trampling on it by their moral decay. Yet we would be amiss if we did not lay a certain amount of responsibility at the foot of the church in America. We've lost our moral fortitude. We've lost our boldness to speak. We've tolerated prophetic charlatans in our pulpits who preach, "Peace, Peace!" when there is no peace. One of our most prolific preachers refuses to speak of sin - and focuses mostly on how we can be rich and healthy and have our best life now. In a word - we've lost our savor. We are not salty with the gospel or the truth - and now we are being systematically being thrown out and trampled under the foot of a growing dictatorship. That is how it has always happened historically - and that is how it is happening today. Oh, that we would awake out of our slumber and realize that November 3, 2012 is not the day of our potential deliverance. It will matter little who is elected in November if we do not do much before then to repent, fall to our knees, and cry for God's mercy on our MORAL FAILURE. The trampling of the Law of God is always followed by the historic trampling of the rule of law in a nation. That, dear saints, is usually followed by the systematic destruction of the visibility of the true church . . . and then . . . the complete discarding of any governing document and the rise of a dictator who rules by his own tyranny.
[AFTERTHOUGHT . . . May God restore us and make His face to shine upon us! May God grant us broken repentance and return to Him and to the joy of seeking His face and walking in His ways! May our greatest concern in the days ahead be His glory rather than our comfort within a decaying political system. May we act with the same kind of passion in our prayers for revival in the church that we do with the positioning of ourselves to attain political victory this coming Fall.]