Well, thanks for coming this morning. We'd had a little thing with wall builders.
Tim had come about three or four years ago. How long has it been now?
Three years? Oh, my.
Anyway, he was scheduled to be with us here at OutWest, and then I was still at Water Springs,
and he was going to come and do a presentation to the kids.
And he got the dreaded COVID. It's all you guys' fault.
And so he hung out in a motel room here in Idaho Falls for a couple days and sweated it out.
And they were so gracious in getting back with us several times, actually,
even when I was delinquent in getting back to them and was willing to come and share with us again.
And so we're so thankful to have these guys and just what God's done with wall builders
and Tim's dad, Dave, and really excited to have him here.
So please welcome Tim Barton.
Well, it is my pleasure to be back with you guys.
If you're able to see the screens, I'm going to tell a lot of stories,
show images on the screens as we go, actually.
Will this work if I hold it here?
Is that okay?
All right.
This is an assisted hearing device, but it was on the podium.
It wasn't going to help him since I wasn't up at the podium.
All right.
So John Adams, in 1813, he wrote Thomas Jefferson a letter.
And at this point, it's 40 years since the founding fathers first met.
And he's reflecting back.
And he says, remember, when we got together, we were much younger back then.
And we had so many ideas.
But when we got together, we disagreed about so many things.
And he recounts all of this.
But then it's interesting.
He says, where they found common ground.
And what he wrote Jefferson in the letter, he said,
Where they found common ground were the principles of Christianity.
Now, this is really interesting because this is literally what John Adams is writing Jefferson.
And yet, if you were to go read virtually any textbook or history book today,
you're not going to find this kind of sentiment in there.
And it's maybe a curiosity as to why.
We might get into some of that later.
But for the founding fathers, they were very clear where the foundation of the nation came from,
where it was built.
In fact, when John Adams was asked about some of the most influential voices in the course of the revolution,
he actually even pointed to pastors and who they were and what they did.
And so this idea coming from a guy like just John Adams to start with,
that Christianity was influenced in our founding,
why would he maybe suggest that Christianity were those principles?
And I would point out that this is something earlier historians talk so often and openly about.
There was a female professor at Duke University.
Her name was Alice Baldwin.
She actually started the women's program at Duke University.
She led it back in the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s.
But in 1928, she came out with a book called The New England Clergy and the American Revolution.
And she actually went back and went through the history of the early pastors.
But one of the things she identified is that when you look at the Declaration of Independence,
every single grievance in the Declaration had been preached from American pulpits prior to 1763,
which is more than a dozen years before we even get the Declaration.
What she pointed out is that when the founding fathers came together,
they actually didn't have any unique ideas.
All they did was repeat what they'd been hearing from their pastors
for several decades leading up to this moment.
Now, that's also significant because you have a noted history to Duke University
saying what today would be so contrary to thought.
The idea that the founding fathers were influenced by their pastors.
If you go back and study history, though, you see how evident this is just through history.
Because when the founding fathers first got together, right,
this is the famous painting depicting what we would know as a signing of the Declaration.
It really was when the Committee of Five came back and presented the original draft of the Declaration.
But this is what we often think of with the founding fathers.
But that's not the first time they got together.
The first time the founding fathers ever got together,
John Adams says the opening motion was made by Thomas Cushing of Massachusetts.
And Thomas Cushing, his opening motion.
So they're meeting together.
And to give you context, when they first meet, they don't know each other yet.
Genuinely, they've been chosen by their own communities to represent their community as they go.
Patrick Henry, he's never met Sam Adams before.
These guys are brand new people.
And so when they first come together in a meeting,
the very first motion made is made by Thomas Cushing.
And the opening motion was that they should start with prayer.
Well, they discussed it for a little bit.
They agreed and they opened with prayer.
There's a very famous painting done depicting the very first meeting of Congress.
Now, again, this is a very famous painting depicting the first meeting of Congress.
And if you're close enough to see it, the imagery is pretty telling.
Because clearly these are people at a prayer meeting.
Right.
The records of Congress identify that that opening prayer lasted for roughly two hours.
I don't know how spiritual you feel this morning.
But if I was to suggest, right, like, I love Jesus.
We talk all the time.
We're good friends.
But I would like to know before an impromptu two-hour prayer meeting.
Right.
Like, I need to mentally prepare myself just a little bit in this moment.
And let me point out, this isn't like the spiritual leaders of the nation.
These were the politically minded leaders of the nation.
And yet, faith was so evident that the first thing they do,
the opening motion is prayer.
And the prayer lasts for two hours.
Well, it gets even better.
Because John Adams, in writing Abigail about this,
he said that in the midst of their prayer,
somebody encouraged that we should maybe read something from the Bible as well.
And so they went to the Book of Common Prayer, which was an Anglican prayer book.
And it had assigned chapters to be read every day of the year.
So it's like a Bible reading plan.
And there were four chapters that were ascribed that morning.
One of the chapters was something that when they read it,
John Adams says it was as if God himself had ordained that chapter of the Bible to be read that morning.
Here's what he wrote to Abigail about that.
I must beg you to read that Psalm.
Read the 35th Psalm to your friends.
Read it to your father.
Psalms 35 is one of the Psalms that David wrote while King Saul was chasing him, trying to kill him.
And he writes and says,
God, I've done nothing.
And he seeks my destruction.
Lord, you rise up.
Be my shield, my buckler, my strong right arm.
On he goes for more than 30 verses.
And they read it that morning.
Now, the Anglican prayer book that they're referencing to find these chapters was written back in the mid 1600s.
So this is like 100 years before this moment.
They open up and they're like, well, these are the four chapters for the day.
And they read it.
One of the other founding fathers said that that Psalm was accidentally extremely applicable to their situation.
Right?
Meaning like they weren't trying to find the most relevant verse in this moment.
They were just reading the Bible and God so spoke to them in that moment.
Well, not only do they open with a prayer meeting and have a Bible study.
John Adams writes another letter to Abigail and tells her what else they've done.
He says, we've appointed a continental fast.
Now, this is the founding fathers, the first continental congress.
And one of the first actions they take is they call on all of the colonies to a day of prayer and fasting.
And as John Adams wrote, he said,
Now, a couple of things to note.
When John Adams says millions will be upon their knees, there's only about 3 million colonists at that time.
So John Adams, I think probably naively and mistakenly, is assuming that like, well, everybody's going to pray.
I don't know that everybody probably prayed.
But it does tell us something about what he thought about their culture as well.
That when it was time to pray, people were going to show up and they were going to pray.
This is also kind of interesting as we track what Congress does in calling people to pray.
Because this idea of Congress having a call to prayer is not a unique idea.
If we go back and look at American history, by 1815, there had been more than 1,400 official government prayer proclamations.
And I love pointing to this when someone likes to make the argument, well, you know, the founding fathers weren't really religious.
Or they were atheists or agnostics or deists and all these arguments.
This is my number one thing I like to point to.
Because, right, if they didn't believe in God or separation of church and state or they're atheists, agnostics, and deists,
then why do they pray all the time?
Because you know what an atheist, agnostic, and deist is not going to do?
That.
Right?
You're not going to call on, if you're the governor, if you're the president, or if you're Congress,
you're not calling on your state or on the nation to pray.
And yet they did it more than 1,400 times by 1815.
Okay?
Well, just during the American Revolution alone, they had 15 different calls to prayer from the Continental Congress.
And there were two kinds of prayer proclamations.
One was for prayer and fasting.
One was for prayer and thanksgiving.
And generally speaking, this was something that in moments of need, they would have a day of prayer and fasting,
asking for God to help to intervene.
But then it was only a couple months later that you'll find them having a day of prayer and thanksgiving.
Why?
Because they're thanking God for what they perceive to be his intervention in these moments.
We need to go back and thank God for what he did.
And then they need God's help.
So they have a day of prayer and fasting.
They need to thank God for what he did.
So they have a day of prayer and thanksgiving.
They went back and forth.
Well, the very first call to prayer was for prayer and fasting because they needed God's help.
They need God's intervention.
And John Adams actually writes Abigail another letter.
And I'm referencing several John and Abigail Adams letters.
Part of the reason is because even though this kind of writing is very clear in many of the founding fathers' works,
if you only are going to look at one place,
John and Abigail Adams wrote 1,100 letters back and forth to each other from the revolution to the end of their life.
It's a multi-volume set, but it's one place you can go look and you will find so many of these details.
And depending on the kind of person you are,
if you, for example, are someone who likes Hallmark movies, you would love their letters.
Because they are like the hopeless romantics.
I mean, Abigail, right?
Really amazing, brave, courageous.
But of course, she's a romantic.
And John, he has letters where he starts off with like the essence of Abigail,
I'm suffocating because I haven't seen you in over a week and you are the air that I breathe.
Right?
And that's like, if this wasn't a Hallmark movie, I'd be like, that's dumb.
Nobody says that.
Right?
Except John Adams actually writes that kind of stuff.
So you might like their writings, but they have a lot of information about what was going on, what they did.
And John wrote Abigail a letter and said, Abigail, it's amazing.
We have seen God's intervention in so many areas.
And he goes through and talks about how the British attacked one of the American outposts.
And the Americans were able to defend the British.
And then there was a colonel who led men and they attacked a British fort and they took the British fort.
And all of this is he's writing.
It's also worth noting that at this point in time, Great Britain is the number one military power in the world.
Ultimately, we had more militias than we had people in the Continental Army.
And even the Continental Army, like we were not good at military stuff yet.
This was, we were very, very bad.
A lot of times I think we even have misconceptions because we feel like as people, especially in the country,
we've grown up with guns, hunting, doing things.
And we're like, hey, if we had to do something, we'd take care of it.
Okay, I appreciate the sentiments, right?
But if a bunch of us had to go up against like SEAL Team 6, we're all going to die, right?
This is their reality is they might have some outdoorsmen and woodsmen,
but it's a very different game they're playing and having to deal with.
And so John Adams, as he's going through this, it's really remarkable.
My favorite part of the letter, it's toward the end.
He says that we have just destroyed a 64-gun British man of worship and a 20-gun British man of worship.
Now, this is one of my favorite things to point out because at that time, we did not have an American Navy.
We're building an army.
We don't have a Navy yet.
We start building a Navy, but at this point, we did have businessmen,
and they had ships because we're using it for trade and various things.
But we didn't have a Navy.
We're going up against actual military naval vessels of the British.
So what we did is we took whatever boats we could find, we put cannons on them,
and we would use those cannons to fight back against the British Navy.
One of the original boats of the American Navy is at the Smithsonian Museum of American History.
It's in Washington, D.C.
It's up on the third floor.
It's called the Gunboat Philadelphia.
That's the Gunboat Philadelphia.
Okay.
John Adams says, we just destroyed a 64 gun.
That's a ship with 64 cannons.
We destroyed a 64-gun British man of worship and a 20-gun British man of worship.
My question is, how?
Like, did you row really fast in their direction?
Because it makes no sense, but that was the point.
It didn't make sense, right?
What we were doing, and John Adams, in 1777, he writes another letter to Abigail and says,
Abigail, I was eating dinner tonight, and there were men at a table.
They were eating dinner behind me, and they were discussing all the stuff that was happening,
and they were trying to figure out the best explanation for what's going on.
And one of the men said something adamantly like, this is the answer.
He said, I think it actually is the best explanation we've heard up to this point.
Here was the explanation.
It appears to me the eternal Son of God is operating powerfully against the British nation.
Right?
They're like, how is this happening?
And the guy's like, oh, I know.
It's Jesus.
Right?
Like, that's the only explanation is clearly God is helping.
Right?
It's the only thing that makes sense.
There's no other way like rowboats are taking out naval vessels.
It doesn't make sense.
But they begin to recognize.
And also, let's point out, when they're writing this, it's 7077, and the men are discussing all of the ways they're seeing God's intervention.
Well, if we look back in history, it's really sad how few of the stories we know, how few of the stories are covered.
And even sometimes some of the stories that we might find to some extent online, it doesn't give the full depth.
But when you start to learn the stories, you realize God really showed up all the time for these guys in amazing ways.
Just to give you an example.
Let's back up 1776.
After you have the declaration, less than two months later, you have the Battle of Long Island.
The Battle of Long Island is also known as the Battle of Brooklyn Heights.
This is where, as the British have landed in force, there's more than 30,000 British troops.
They pin about 9,000 of the Americans, George Washington being one of them, up in New York.
They're on the island.
They're pinned against a river.
And this is back when there's a single-shot musket, right?
So it doesn't matter how special you think you might be.
No, no, no.
You're pinned against a river.
You are surrounded.
You're outgunned three to one.
Numbers really made a difference back then.
And to make matters worse, as they are pinned, kind of just waiting to see what the British are going to do,
they're trying to dig in and entrench themselves, the British fleet begins sailing up the river behind them.
Well, as soon as the fleet comes up behind you, now you're fully encircled, right?
You're surrounded.
You're in the crossfire.
You're done.
They know they're going to be captured.
They're going to be killed.
Something bad's going to happen.
But this is where the first of the unlikely events starts to unfold.
As the British fleet begins sailing up the river, it was a clear, sunny day.
And out of nowhere, a massive storm rolls in.
And the storm was so big, the wind was blowing the boats back down the river into the harbor.
Actually, some of the British naval officers reported that as they're calling a retreat,
they were so afraid their boats were going to be blown ashore into rocks.
And so they call a full retreat.
Well, Washington, right, obviously he knows a storm's going on,
but he recognizes as soon as the storm calms, they're just going to sail their boats right back up.
We're going to be trapped again.
So he said, we have to get off this island tonight.
So he called a meeting, gets officers together, says, you need to go find anything that floats.
And we're getting off this island.
Now, this is also important because back then, most Americans did not know how to swim.
It was not something we really taught.
It wasn't a leisure activity.
And to make matters worse, it's about a mile wide.
So even if you can swim, swimming a mile river is not going to be an easy thing to do.
Well, as they're navigating this, they go and they find flat bottom boats and they find John boats and they find canoes.
But there's only so many people you can fit on a canoe at a time.
And you got a mile across and a mile back.
And so they're doing this all night, across and back, across and back.
And they had 9,000 people.
Well, as the night is ending, there's more than 1,000 troops left on the island.
Washington being one of them, by the way.
Washington had determined he's going to be the last one off the island.
And you can imagine some of his officers were like, sir, we got to get you off.
And he said, no, I'm not going to abandon my men.
I'm going to make sure my men are okay.
And then I'm going to go.
It's just the kind of leader he was, which is why he was such a beloved leader from his troops.
He's going to be the last one.
Well, now, as soon as the sun rises, the British are going to see what they're doing.
There's now 30,000 against 1,000.
They're going to advance.
For sure, they're all going to be captured.
They're going to be killed.
Washington's going to be hung for treason.
This is not going to be good.
Except before the light of dawn appeared, something else unusual happened.
There was a fog that lifted off the river.
Now, that's not unusual.
Except the fog blew, and it settled between both encampments.
One of the guys who was there was Major Benjamin Talmadge.
He was the guy that went on to become the head of what was known as a Culper spy ring,
one of the more famous spy rings of the Revolution.
But here's what he described from that morning.
He said,
A very dense fog began to rise, and it seemed to settle in a peculiar manner over both encampments.
I recollect this peculiar providential occurrence perfectly well,
and so very dense was the atmosphere that I could scarcely discern a man at six yards distance.
So from me to the front row, he's like, you couldn't even see people.
The fog was too thick.
The fog stays between both encampments until the last three little boats are loaded.
They get to the middle of the river, and the fog lifts.
The British look and realize the camp is empty.
They charge the camp.
The British reported they saw the last three boats arrive on the other side of the river
where the Americans unloaded, and they had lived to fight another day.
Now, God did not give them the victory, but God kept them alive to keep going in the midst of the situation.
And if you are someone familiar with Scripture, I'm going to give you several of these moments.
I just want to point out there's a lot of biblical similarities in some of these miracles, right?
Like if you don't remember Moses, Israelites, Red Sea, Pharaoh's army,
there's some interesting similarities in this one in my mind,
but there's some that get even closer to other stories as we go.
Well, as you keep going, when you get to the end of that year,
the Americans largely have done nothing but lose all year long.
In fact, starting from where we were, the Battle of Long Island,
they lose in the Battle of Kips Bay, they lose the Battle of White Plains,
they lose the Battle of Fort Washington, they lose the Battle of Fort Lee,
they really lose all of New York.
So this whole campaign, all they've done is lose all year long.
Why does that matter?
Because back then, it was one-year enlistments.
If you're in the Continental Army, every enlistment was up December 31st,
and you had to re-enlist.
And it didn't matter if you joined in January or May.
Every enlistment ended December 31st.
Well, if you're George Washington, and you're trying to get people to sign up for round two,
and all you've done is lose all year long,
this is like, so I'm from Texas, the Dallas 4th area.
This would be like me trying to convince you to cheer for the Dallas Cowboys, right?
And I'm like, guys, no, this is our year.
We're going to do it.
We're going to take them this time.
You're like, you're an idiot, right?
Like, there's no way.
Okay.
This is George Washington's dilemma.
Now, to give you even some more context, at this point, morale's at an all-time low.
Because again, all they've done is lose.
We haven't really trained.
We haven't developed.
We haven't gotten good yet.
And he's trying to get people to sign back up.
They're already having people desert.
And maybe even kind of logically so,
because they're realizing that I'm in a place in winter quarters
where we don't have enough food.
We don't have enough fuel.
I've got a home and a family, a wife and kids.
What am I doing here?
And so people are already deserting.
And then, as he's trying to get people to re-enlist,
nobody wants to re-enlist for round two.
So he realizes we're going to have to have a victory.
We're going to have to have something to put a good taste in the mouth of people to go,
hey, wait a second, maybe there's hope.
Maybe we can do this.
And his idea, you will know the story as we get there,
was on Christmas night, they were going to sail on Trenton
and march on Trenton, excuse me, across the Delaware,
which is not really sailing, but across the Delaware, march on Trenton.
And the idea was that they thought at Trenton,
there was between 1,200 and 1,500 Hessian troops,
which are German mercenaries hired by the British to fight the Americans.
And Washington thought, we'll bring this overwhelming superior force.
He was going to bring three armies from his side of Delaware.
He's going to have a fourth army come down from the north.
There's going to be 7,000 or 8,000 people against 1,200 to 1,500.
Overwhelming numbers.
We're going to have a victory.
This is going to be awesome.
Well, part of why he chose Christmas night,
also to give you some historical context,
Christmas was an illegal holiday in America up until almost a civil war.
Now, the reason it was illegal is because over in Europe,
there was a lot of people that had taken what were formerly religious holidays
or holidays after some very religious individuals or significant moments,
and they had commercialized them in many ways
and actually led to a lot of debauchery on some of them.
And when the pilgrims come, they've seen what was happening with Christmas over in Europe.
When the Puritans came, and you can go down the list,
it literally wasn't until the Civil War that Christmas was a holiday celebrated.
But part of why that matters is because the Hessians are from Germany.
And if there's a night we're going to have a celebration, right?
There is going to be a special celebration.
Washington and his brilliance is like,
okay, if we need a victory, here's my idea.
Let's wait until they're drunk, maybe unconscious, and let's go.
That's not a bad military strategy, right?
If you had to pick a fight with somebody, they're unconscious on the ground,
you've got a better chance, okay?
He's literally saying, let's march on Trenton.
And as they march on Trenton,
Trenton was one of the closest forts to where they were for their winter quarters.
They thought they could bring this overwhelming force.
And so they get ready.
The idea, again, of that night, they're going to cross to Delaware.
And so Washington is getting things ready.
He gets everything in order.
And they begin the midnight crossing.
The guy who was there with them at the crossing where they actually got across
was General Henry Knox.
I'm going to come back to him in just a minute.
But as they work the crossing,
where they were with their three armies going across,
there's 5,400 troops.
They're taking cannons and horses.
And their goal is to be across by midnight.
Well, the three armies are crossing in three different locations.
Washington did not know at the time,
but in two of the locations, they couldn't get anybody across.
The fog was so thick, they couldn't see the other side.
The ice chunks were so thick coming down
that they couldn't get boats to make it to the other side
because the ice was pushing them downstream.
It was so thick.
And the only place anybody got across was a crossing where Washington was.
But even where Washington was,
they were so delayed because of the bad weather
that they actually only get 2,400 troops across
and they don't even get across till 4 a.m.
They were supposed to be across by midnight.
Now they're four hours behind schedule.
And the reason it matters is because they have still a nine-mile march
and they wanted to be set up surrounding the fort before the first light of dawn.
That way, when light comes, the Hessians go,
oh my gosh, we're surrounded, right?
And this is part of the advantage.
Well, they get across.
They're super delayed.
Only 2,400 troops.
And then Washington looks and says, where's everybody else?
And he gets word, nobody else made it.
In fact, not even the army from the north was going to make it.
It's just us.
Well, they still have 2,400 against 12 to 1,500.
So they still have a superior force numerically.
But Washington knows we have to have a victory
or the whole cause might be lost.
So we're going either way.
So they continue marching that night.
Well, as I mentioned, they have a nine-mile march as they're going.
And to make matters worse, during their nine-mile march,
a blizzard rolls in on them.
And just also to give you some historic context,
when you joined the militia back then,
you were given a uniform.
And that was the uniform you had.
They didn't give you winter gear.
If you joined in March, whatever you had,
if you'd worn holes in it, you had holes in your uniform.
That's just the way it was.
At the time of winter, even the British, at this point,
the British are already reporting
they could track the movement of the American soldiers
during wintertime by their bloody footprints in the snow
because many of them had already worn through their boots,
didn't have shoes, didn't have the winter gear.
In fact, during this brutal storm as they're going,
two men actually froze to death.
And there's not a lot of great historic records
surrounding the details.
I can only imagine, right, as they're in the middle of marching.
If you don't have winter gear on, you're like,
guys, I just need to sit down for a second.
You sit down in a blizzard, and you're not dressed appropriately.
Like, that's probably why they didn't get back up.
Well, two men froze to death during this march.
But what they also did not take into consideration at that moment,
as I can only imagine feeling like,
God, why have you forsaken me?
Well, as they are taking this march,
the storm is also at Trenton.
And the guards on duty, the sentries,
they go to their CO, their commanding officer,
and say, sir, surely nobody's crazy enough
to be out marching and doing things in this kind of weather.
Can we please come in and stay warm by their fire?
And their officer agreed.
He said, yeah, you're right.
Nobody's doing anything.
You guys come in and stay warm.
So the Americans are never going to arrive before sunrise.
But now there are literally no guards on duty.
There's not a single century watching the roads,
watching the fort.
So the Americans are able to arrive with nobody on duty.
They get there.
They're in position by 8 a.m.
When they announce themselves,
it is a complete surprise to the Hessians.
And just to be very clear on this,
the Hessians are inside the fort.
That's an entrenched position.
They have food.
They have water.
They have ammo.
This is all important.
When the battle unfolds,
the Hessians freak out and they abandoned the fort.
Why does this matter?
Because the battle lasted only 35 minutes.
They were in an entrenched position.
Historians have reflected on this.
And they thought, well, maybe the Hessians like didn't see all of the American forces lined up.
And they thought they'd come out and flank them.
And instead they came out and ran right into the lines of muskets.
And in 35 minutes, this whole thing is called.
And at the end of this 35 minute battle, the results were.
Now remember, the Hessians are on team British.
They're German mercenaries, but they're fighting for the British.
On the British side, there was approximately 20 killed, 100 wounded, and 1,000 captured.
On the American side, there were three wounded.
Period.
And this is when they're like, well, that went so much better than we thought it was going to.
Right?
Like, this was incredible.
It gets even more interesting.
Because of the three that were wounded, only one of them had what would be considered potential fatal injury.
But he was a young officer in a small detachment.
When they're marching into Trenton, Washington says, okay, we need these small detachments to go guard the road to make sure that no British loyalists can go alert the British what we're doing so the British can't send reinforcements.
So go to the edge of town, guard the roads.
And so this small detachment is going.
As they are passing by one of the townhouses, there is a dog that begins barking.
And a man comes to the door.
He's got a musket.
Wants to know what's going on.
And they said, sir, we mean you no harm.
We're part of the Continental Army.
We're making a move on Trenton.
But you stay in your house.
No harm will come to you.
And he says, no, no, no.
Hang on.
I'm team patriot.
And if you're making a move, I want to come.
He says, I am a doctor.
And some poor fellow may need my assistance.
His name was Dr. John Riker.
He got his medical kit.
He joins a small detachment.
Well, when the fighting starts, the small detachment now is going to go rejoin.
And as they go to rejoin, this young officer gets shot in the shoulder.
The ball goes into his chest.
It nicks an artery.
And he's like bleeding out.
He ain't going to make it.
Except the guy standing right beside him is the doctor who puts his finger in the hole to slow the bleeding.
Like literally the doctor saves his guy's life.
Now, part of why this is even kind of significant is because this young officer went on to become a pretty significant guy in American history.
If you've ever seen the famous painting of Washington crossing the Delaware, he's the guy standing behind George Washington.
That's a known individual.
All the people in that painting were known individuals.
But this known individual was so well known, he went on to become the fifth president of the United States.
His name was James Monroe.
Okay.
There's so many things about this, right?
Because you look back and they had to be thinking, okay, so like we were never going to make it in time.
But then a blizzard coming.
It wasn't fun.
But then like it took the centuries off duty.
And we announced ourselves.
And they abandoned their fort.
Why would they do that?
And like we only had one guy fatally wounded.
But he was totally fine because the one dog that barked that night was a dog at the doctor's house.
And the doctor came and joined and was standing right beside him when he got shot and put his finger in the hole.
I'm like, this is crazy.
And they recognized, you know, I think God's helping us.
I just, I feel like God's on our side in this.
This is what they determined.
In fact, the people who were there, George Washington wrote about it.
And he talked about how providence had given them total victory.
The guy I mentioned earlier, General Henry Knox.
This is what he wrote about that experience.
He said, the hurry, fright, and confusion of the enemy was not unlike that which will be when the last trump will sound.
Right?
Which is interesting.
Like return of Christ, chaotic.
Nobody else is going on.
He's like, that's how it felt.
Like they didn't know what's happening.
It was crazy.
He continued, providence seemed to have smiled upon every part of this enterprise.
Everybody who was there and wrote about it wrote about how God had helped them in that moment.
Now, part of why this matters is because today we often look back from a different historic lens.
And we don't acknowledge the God side.
And yet when you read the writings of the people who were there, everybody who wrote about it said God helped them in this situation.
This is the faith aspect that has been largely left out of our history.
In fact, if you go to just about a year and a half later, George Washington, Battle of Monmouth.
He writes General Thomas Nelson Jr. a letter.
And he's talking about how it's so obvious God's been helping us this whole way in this revolution.
Here's part of what he writes to his friend from Virginia.
He says,
Now, he's telling his friend, General Thomas Nelson Jr., if people see all this, if they know the story and they can't acknowledge God, they must be worse than a non-believer or they must be wicked.
To not be able to acknowledge what God has done, well, his next line is my favorite.
He said,
But it will be time enough for me to turn preacher when my present appointment ceases, and therefore I shall add no more on the doctrine of providence.
George Washington was like, I've seen enough miracles, I can become a pastor.
But for right now, I'm going to try to win this war.
Right?
Like, this is the sentiment.
And let's also be clear.
When George Washington says, like, God's hand is so obvious in this, if there were anybody in American history, anybody, that knew about God's hand in war, it would have been George Washington.
Okay?
If you don't know his story, let me just back you up real quick to give you some background thoughts on this.
George Washington came to fame during the French and Indian War.
He was a young 23-year-old colonel, 70, 55.
This is when the Americans are still part of the British Empire.
And the British and French are fighting for control over the Ohio Valley Territory.
The British send in General Edward Braddock, kind of like their big dog guy who's going to come drive the French off.
And the British had overwhelming force.
Well, George Washington, as they are going, he tells them, hey, General Braddock, you're kind of new here.
The French and Indians don't really fight the way you've done open theater warfare over in Europe.
And General Braddock says, we don't need any of your help.
Our force is too big.
Well, he leads his men in a valley.
And they're ambushed by a much smaller, much, much smaller force of Indians and French.
And when they're ambushed, he did what they do in European theater.
He told all his men to come shoulder to shoulder to line up in the valley and point toward the woods.
Well, the French and Indians were hiding behind trees.
And now you've just put everybody in.
You don't even have to aim.
Like, just point and pull a trigger.
You're good.
It's crazy.
During this battle, every single officer was shot down off horseback and killed.
And actually, when General Braddock was finally killed,
George Washington was the last surviving officer, mounted officer on horseback.
And so he assumed command.
And when he assumed command, he realized what we're doing right now is crazy.
Well, General Braddock, he's wounded.
He's not dead yet.
But he sees Washington take over.
Washington calls a retreat.
And as they get out, Washington realizes what we've done is dumb on so many levels.
Their line coming in was about four miles long because they had troops and then their supply wagons.
They had various things spaced out.
And so they start to retreat.
But as they're retreating, men are, like, throwing cannons and guns and just leaving everything, running for their life.
They're scared.
And Washington is trying to gather things and keep things collected.
But as he ends up leaving, he gets back to the fort and it's several days later.
And men have already, like, just booked it.
They got there that same day.
And they gave word every single officer, mounted officer, was killed during that battle.
Well, that's true except for George Washington.
But he gets back to the fort and finds out word's gone out.
And he finds out that his mom's already been informed he's dead.
So he's got to write his mom a letter.
And he's like, Mom, the rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated, right?
Like, did not die.
But it's interesting what he writes her about that battle.
He says,
He got back to the fort and takes off his jacket.
And he's like, well, where did that come from?
There's four bullet holes now.
It gets even more interesting in this story.
Because obviously he's got to process this, right?
He knows the horses were shot off from under him.
But when you're wearing a jacket, and especially a military jacket back then,
this is not like a big baggy winter coat with lots of space in the side.
No, no.
This is a pretty form-fitting jacket.
So this is kind of crazy.
How did you get four bullet holes in your jacket and you're totally fine?
Well, the story continues because about 15 years later, which actually, first,
the Reverend Samuel Davies was one of the more famous pastors from the First Great Awakening,
the most famous pastor in Virginia.
And he actually had a sermon where he delivered.
It was on patriotism, the constituents of a good soldier.
And he's talking about, there was a detachment of men about to be sent out.
And he's talking about God's thoughts on war and how to be a godly warrior,
how to be a good soldier, et cetera, et cetera.
But what's interesting about this is in this sermon, he actually has a section where he talks
about George Washington and what had just happened.
You see this asterisk at the bottom.
He says, as a remarkable instance of this, and he's talking about God's protection over
his people.
I may point out to the public that heroic young Colonel Washington, whom I cannot but hope
providence has hitherto preserved, and so signal a manner for some important service to
his country.
Now, he's acknowledging, right, to see God protect somebody like this.
He says, I just wonder, does God have something really special for this kid, right?
Well, obviously, God did.
And now, let me jump you forward.
Fifteen years later, George Washington goes back.
He's in the same woods where he was early on, approximately.
And one night, he's camping.
Dr. William Craig is with him.
And they're approached by a group of Indians.
And the group of Indians come forward.
And one of them, there's actually multiple chiefs, but one of the chiefs stepped forward
and says, okay, you don't know me.
But about 15 years ago, we were in these woods together.
He said, we knew if we could kill the officers, we'd scatter the troops, and then we could kill
you all, no problem.
He said, when you were the last officer, I told all my braves to fire at you, because I knew
if we could kill you, we'd scatter the troops.
Well, here's part of what he told Washington in this account.
He says, I called to my young man and said, quick, let your aim be certain, and he dies.
Our rifles were leveled, rifles which, but for you, knew not how to miss.
Twas all in vain, a power mightier far than we shielded you.
I am come to pay homage to the man who is a particular favorite of heaven and who can never
die in battle.
Another chief was talking to Dr. Craig.
And Dr. Craig says, so why did you come?
And this is what he tells the doctor of why he came.
He says, Washington was never born to be killed by a bullet.
I had 17 fair fires at him with my rifle, and after all, could not bring him to the ground.
In this, he continued to say, my rifle was known as a rifle that never missed.
But after I couldn't bring him to the ground, I had to come meet this guy.
Well, now, part of the reason I even bring this up, Washington had multiple moments in his life
where he should have died and God protected him.
And the reason that matters is because when he says, in the middle of the revolution,
it's so clear that God is moving on our behalf, he would be the one to know that.
And let me point out what the natives said about him at the time was, he was never born to be
killed by a bullet.
He would never die in battle, which, of course, he didn't.
But if you go back to what the pastor said about him, Reverend Samuel Davies, and we do
have this whole story in a book, all footnoted, documented, super cool story of George Washington.
But Reverend Samuel Davies, right, when he talked about when Providence has preserved
somebody in like this really special way, he said, I just wonder if it's for some important
service to the country.
Now, last year, there was a moment I was like, oh my gosh.
Oh my gosh, right?
But this is not a pro-Trump statement I'm making.
This is a recognizing God's hand in our life statement.
Oftentimes, even in our everyday life, we don't recognize what the founding fathers talked
about so often.
Look what God is doing.
And President Trump, even in his inaugural address, he said, I know that God saved me.
He does know that God saved him.
It's so clear that God saved him, right?
You turned your head at just a moment, the bullet nicks your ear like absolutely God saved
you.
But this is part of the background, even of George Washington.
What was so clear to them was, look what God is doing on our behalf.
When the revolution finally comes to an end, these three guys signed the peace treaty,
Paris, and ends the revolution.
On the left is John Jay.
In the middle is John Adams.
On the right is Benjamin Franklin.
This is the peace treaty of Paris.
It's still on display in Washington, D.C.
It's at the State Department.
It's up on the sixth floor called the John Quincy Adams State Drawing Room.
If you look on the left at the top, it says Article 10.
Then you see there's signatures at the bottom.
The top one, David Hartley.
He was a British ambassador.
Then you have John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay.
This is the document that ended the American Revolution.
It brought peace between us and Great Britain.
And notice the title of this document.
In the name of the most holy and undivided Trinity.
Do you know America became a nation in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit?
Because that's what the holy undivided Trinity is.
Now, that's the weirdest title for a peace treaty document I've ever seen.
I mean, genuinely.
Like, why would you do that?
Well, it's possible somebody had been reading Proverbs 3 that morning.
In all your ways, acknowledge him, and he will direct your steps.
Well, they literally are acknowledging him on the top of the document that makes America a free, independent nation, which is remarkable.
And the reason I point all this out, I could spend literally days and weeks going through some of these stories,
but I want to give you some understanding.
When John Adams says, right, it was the principles of Christianity,
this notion that Christianity was part of the foundation, the formation of our nation,
it's completely correct from historic records and documents, from the people who were there.
And yet today, we just don't hear or see this very much.
But I do want to point out, this was not something that was controversial up until, like, a couple decades ago.
Because if you go back to people like Woodrow Wilson, who, if you don't know him,
just know he was a really, really bad guy and not a good president, right?
Like, just make that mental note.
But Woodrow Wilson, he even acknowledged,
America was born a Christian nation.
America was born to exemplify that devotion to the elements of righteousness,
which are derived from the revelation of Holy Scripture.
This is Woodrow Wilson saying, it's clear America is a Christian nation.
You have people like Richard Nixon.
Now, Richard Nixon had his own set of problems.
But Richard Nixon, he even acknowledged, he said,
let us remember that as a Christian nation, we have a charge and a destiny.
Again, Christian nation.
We can go to people like FDR.
He explained, in the formative days of the Republic,
the directing influence the Bible exercised upon the fathers of the nation
is conspicuously evident, means it's obvious.
It's so obvious our founding fathers were influenced by the Bible, he continued.
We cannot read the history of our rise and development as a nation
without reckoning with the place the Bible is occupied in shaping the advances of the Republic.
Now, what that means is, he says, you can't read history and not see how the Bible has shaped and impacted America.
Well, I think you could read almost any history book today and it will not show you how the Bible shaped and impacted America,
which does raise a question.
What were they teaching back in the 1930s, 40s, and 50s that we're not teaching anymore today?
What are we leaving out?
What story are we changing and different?
Well, let me give you another example.
President Ronald Reagan, he explained,
Of the many influences that have shaped the United States of America into a distinctive nation and people,
none may be said to be more fundamental and enduring than the Bible.
Right?
The Bible was a foundation of our nation, what we built on.
In another speech, he said,
if we ever forget that we're one nation under God,
then we will be a nation gone under.
You also have people like Andrew Jackson.
Andrew Jackson, he explained,
the Bible is the rock on which our Republic rests.
Now, Andrew Jackson wasn't a Christian until toward the end of his life.
And even when he's not a Christian as president,
he's acknowledging this is the foundation of our nation.
I want to point out every single president in American history,
every single one up until President Obama said America is a Christian nation.
President Obama was the first one to say America is not a Christian nation
and actually encouraged that we should be less Christian than a nation.
And I'm not trying to do political digs right now.
I'm just, historically, this didn't used to be controversial.
Every single president in most of our lifetime has said this.
And part of the reason it matters is because
when you have people, even like President Trump,
saying, let's make America great again,
there's been a lot of great things about our nation.
Now, it doesn't mean we haven't had problems.
It doesn't mean we haven't had issues and things that we need to improve
and change and write course on some things.
But if you're going to make America great again,
you can only make her great again if you know it made her great in the first place.
And the foundation of our nation,
see, if we go back to like George Washington,
George Washington and his farewell address,
he was giving his final piece of advice to the American nation.
And he's encouraging them on what he thinks it takes to be successful going forward.
And actually, if you've never read his farewell address, you should.
There's so many great things.
He talks about avoid foreign entanglements,
let other nations figure out their own problems.
We need to focus on making America a strong nation.
He talks about avoiding debt,
because if we let our political rulers load us with debt,
then we will be perpetual slaves.
He talks about that we need to love principle more than we love party,
because the love of party would lead us to things that would be contrary to our principles.
Like so many good pieces of advice.
But then he says something I think is maybe the most profound.
He says,
Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity.
Now, let me point out,
political prosperity,
that's national success.
Okay?
Of all the things you could do
that lead to national success,
of all the things we could talk about that make a difference,
he said,
Religion and morality are indispensable supports.
Only once in his farewell address did he say something was indispensable,
meaning you can't do it without this.
The one thing he said you can't do it without is religion and morality.
And to be clear,
religion and morality was not like this vague,
ambiguous term,
and it's all religion.
No, religion was Christianity,
and morality was derived from the teachings of Jesus and the Ten Commandments.
Right?
The teachings of the Bible.
So what he's saying is without Christianity,
without the Bible,
then this experiment is not going to work.
In fact, he said,
In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism
who should labor to subvert these great pillars.
Anybody that opposes Christianity in the Bible,
they don't love America.
Because that's what a patriot is.
Now, that's not me saying this.
That's what George Washington said in his farewell address.
In fact, the following year,
John Adams became president.
And then, the following year,
John Adams wrote a letter to the militia of Massachusetts.
And the whole letter is great.
It's only like four or five paragraphs.
So much good content in there.
But this is probably the more famous line from that letter.
He said,
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.
It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
Now, why is he saying this?
Well, what he's acknowledging,
like in America,
the American idea was freedom for the people.
Right?
That our elected officials,
our rulers,
they weren't going to be the dictators and tyrants
telling us how to live and what.
No, we were going to be free.
But they knew freedom only works
if you have moral people.
Because if you get freedom to immoral people,
it looks like Chicago every weekend.
Right?
Like, that's not a good thing.
And so, if freedom's going to work,
you have to have a moral people.
But you only have a moral people
through a religious foundation.
Right?
It's through Christianity that we learn right and wrong.
And then, once we have the rights and wrongs,
freedom actually works.
This is why when people look,
even today,
and there's some people that talk about,
well, the Constitution is old and outdated.
And whatever criticism they're going to say,
the problem is not with the Constitution.
The problem is with a rejection
of Christianity and the Bible and our culture.
The better we do following the Bible and Christianity,
the better we will do as a nation.
And let me just give you one thought
as well from the Bible.
If you go to Jeremiah 29,
probably most people are more familiar with verse 11.
For I know the plans I have for you,
declares the Lord.
Plans to prosper,
not to harm you,
give you hope in the future.
Now,
beyond the fact that I think that's often taken out of context,
right?
Put a pin on that one.
If you back up to the beginning of that chapter,
it's super interesting.
Jeremiah says,
I'm writing to everybody being carried away captive into Babylon.
So,
I'm writing to people
who are being taken to a place
they don't even want to be.
But then he says something so interesting.
He says,
but don't despair.
Don't stop getting married
and having kids and raising families.
Don't stop planting crops and harvesting.
Don't stop living your life.
And then he gets to verse seven.
And in verse seven,
he says,
seek the peace and prosperity of the city
to which I have carried you into exile.
Pray to the Lord for it.
Because if it prospers,
you too will prosper.
This is a message
that I want to encourage us as believers
that I think a lot of people have forgotten
or even sometimes mistakenly misidentify it
and say,
well,
it's Christian nationalism.
Now,
hang on a second.
Okay?
It doesn't matter what,
this is not a pro-America message.
This is a Christian message.
There's a mission team literally going to another nation.
And the idea is,
wherever God plants you,
you should work to bring God into that place
and you should work to make that place better.
In fact,
you should pray to the Lord for it.
Because if you're living there,
when it does better,
you do better.
And I think a lot of times as Christians,
we've disconnected from society in ways
and not realizing,
well,
how do we make our society better?
How do we make the place
where God planted us better?
Well,
sometimes it means
we need to pay attention
to what's going on in the school board meeting.
Sometimes we need to pay attention
to what's going on in the city council
and our local government.
Sometimes we need to get more involved
in the community.
And this is something that
even I would point out,
Jeremiah's writing to people
who were slaves in exile.
They don't even want to be there.
And the more you love Jesus,
the less you want to be here.
Right?
Like,
I am totally in exile here
because this is not my home.
I'm going somewhere else.
But as long as I'm here,
then I'm going to work
to be a good steward
with what God has given me,
with where God has planted me.
And I'm going to work
to make a difference.
And this is what I would encourage.
We have to restore
some of that mentality to us.
What made a difference in our nation
was the Bible
and the principles of Christianity,
but it was people
that knew the Bible,
that applied the Bible,
that followed those principles
that made a difference.
And where our nation is struggling,
we are more secular today
than we've ever been
in our nation's history.
There are fewer people
that go to church.
There are fewer people
that read the Bible.
There are fewer people
that have a biblical worldview.
The biggest problems
we have in the nation
is not just a political leader,
although I am thanking God
for a different political leader.
The biggest problem
in the nation
is we have fewer people
that know and follow
the Word of God.
And this is part of what we,
as believers,
have been called to do
to go make disciples.
Part of God's calling.
And if you want to know more
about some of the Christian
heritage of our nation,
some of the founding fathers,
we have a website,
wallbillers.com.
There's actually a couple
of resources on the table.
The American Story,
The Beginnings,
The American Story,
Building the Republic.
The American Story,
The Beginning starts from Columbus
and goes up through
the Constitution.
The American Story,
Building the Republic,
goes from the Constitution
through the first eight presidents
and just shows a lot
of the stories.
It's written in story form.
It's all footnoted.
So it's reintroducing you
just like today
with some of those battles.
So some of the stories
that were there,
what people said about it,
what was very clear God did.
We also,
what's called the Founder's Bible.
It's a normal Bible,
which is the most important thing
we should be reading.
But it has thousands
and thousands
and thousands of quotes
from the founding fathers
talking about how the Bible
or specific verses
shaped their life,
their thinking,
what they did.
And so it's a really great way
to actually see
how the Bible
shaped our nation.
And the last thought
I want to give you,
again from the Bible,
our name,
Wall Builders,
we took from the Bible book
of Nehemiah.
And Nehemiah 2.17,
as he's calling people
from around the nation
to come together,
what he says is,
come let us rebuild
that we will no longer
be a disgrace.
Those of us paying attention
know we've been dealing
with some disgrace
in this nation
for a couple decades.
Right?
For some of us,
for much of our lifetime,
we have never had
a better opportunity
to rebuild
than where we are
right now
for lots of reasons.
From a legal historic standpoint,
the Supreme Court
is making decisions
that have opened up
opportunities for us
to spread the Bible,
spread Christianity
like we've never
legally been allowed
to do in our lifetime
up until this moment.
There's never been
a better time
to be a believer
in America
to help share
and spread
what's going on.
And this is where
I would encourage us
with a challenge
of Nehemiah.
It's time for us
to roll up our sleeves
to get back to work
because God put us here
on purpose for a reason.
Maybe it's for such a time
as this
that we can work
to bring change
in this nation
and not just to the nation
but in the hearts
of mind of people
and when it does,
it brings change
to the nation.
Thank you guys
for letting me share.
Pastor?
All righty.
Thank you, Tim,
so much.
Hey, if I could have
the prayer team come up
and have everybody stand.
I get this turned on.
Hello?
I think in her heyday,
America was called
a light on a hill.
And we've been that.
We kind of grew dim there
for a while
like Tim was saying
but the Lord's called us
to shine it bright, right?
So if you'll sing with me,
I know this is elementary
but that's kind of my speed.
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
Oh, this little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine
Yeah, this little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine
Yes, let it shine
Let it shine
God bless you. Have a great week.
If you need prayer, come over here to the prayer team.
Stop by the table, see Tim.
Give him another round of applause.
Thank you.