Stephen Stone
This Easter, we would do well to consider the remarkable words of Acts 10:38, which sum up the key to Jesus’ ministry in a way all of us can emulate as we seek to strengthen our country.
That brief passage says simply, but emphatically, that
God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.
Despite the fact that Jesus possessed divine power as the Son of God, He nonetheless submitted His will to that of His Father, as He made clear in John 6:38: “For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.” In doing so, He showed us the way to do the same kind of miracles, and exert the same kind of righteous influence, that He Himself demonstrated by His godly life.
It should be self-evident that the way to truly worship and honor Jesus would be to emulate His very mode of living, as best as we are able, as summarized above.
Such sincere effort to improve our influence for good is consistent with God’s emphatic warning in 2 Chronicles 7:14 to all professing believers that
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
These scriptural words are more relevant today than ever, as our culture continues to move steadily away from God’s laws and America’s God-inspired founding principles as a direct consequence of godless Marxists’ and Leftists' increasingly successful “Long march through our nation’s institutions” over the past hundred-plus years.
To the extent any of us can do so, we each need to awake and arise and stand forth in courage and righteous indignation and take back our country upon the principles of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bible—with God’s help and the power of His Spirit, as well as with all the faith we can muster as we seek to please God in all we do, and to obey His Spirit in everything we undertake in our daily lives—just as Jesus did, doing so with “all our heart, soul, and mind,” as Jesus commands in Matthew 22:37, as we seek to bless and help others in the interest of preserving our country.Steve's religious testimony can be found in "What does it mean to be converted to Jesus Christ," a position statement he wrote in 2013 for RenewAmerica.
Also see Steve's June 18, 2024, article "Teach Your Own" — about the importance of parents homeschooling the children God has given them and doing so with wisdom and thoughtful creativity, aided by reliance on Him.
