✝️ OFFICIAL SUNDAY OPEN THREAD

Is Destructive Socialism America’s Future?

ddd

ast week, news & media headlines were filled with reports of socialist candidates gaining ground in major American cities. Fifty years ago, such a development would have been almost unimaginable. However today, socialism is becoming an increasingly influential force within the Democrat Party. Is this America’s future? Not if we reclaim our past.

Now that we’ve crossed the threshold of America’s 250th anniversary, now would be the perfect time to ask ourselves precisely what has made our country the freest and most prosperous nation in history.

Looking back over the last two and a half centuries, one would have to focus very narrowly in order to deny that America has experienced anything less than extraordinary blessings. Despite the undeniable cultural erosion in recent decades, our nation has still enjoyed a level of peace, prosperity, liberty, and opportunity unparalleled in human history.

So, what has been the foundation of that blessing? Psalm 33:12 declares, “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.”

Perhaps we can find more information by revisiting our nation’s course as set by America’s Founders. In fact, America’s blessings reach back even before the founding itself. In 1630, John Winthrop described the Massachusetts Bay Colony as “a city upon a hill.” He envisioned a people who understood they lived under a covenantal responsibility before God; a vision which profoundly shaped the character & nature of the future nation.

That same conviction appears in President George Washington’s Farewell Address in 1796. He wrote: 

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports… And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion… Can it be, that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its Virtue?”

Exactly what was Washington saying? He was saying he believed America’s long-term happiness, prosperity, liberty, and security depended on the character of its people. A free nation can remain free only if it remains virtuous. Yet no government can manufacture virtue. Laws may restrain evil, but they cannot transform the human heart. Virtue is cultivated as a result of men and women submitting themselves to God’s Will. Virtue is shaped by His word.

Which brings us back to today’s headlines about socialism in America. Socialism in itself isn’t America’s greatest problem; rather the symptom of a deeper spiritual and moral decline. Political movements may rise and fall, but the life and endurance of a republic is ultimately determined by the moral character of its people.

As America celebrates its 250th anniversary, we have an opportunity not merely to commemorate our history but also to recover the biblical foundation which has made that history possible. If, as Washington observed, the permanent blessing of a nation is indeed associated with its virtue, then America’s renewal begins with the renewal of God’s people.

If we want America to remain a nation blessed by God, we must first be a virtuous people who are shaped by His Word.✪