The Perfect Law of Liberty
But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass [mirror, NASB]: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed. (James 1:22-25)1
The law of Yahweh2 is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of Yahweh is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of Yahweh are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of Yahweh is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of Yahweh is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of Yahweh are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward. (Psalm 19:7-11)
Is this what anti-Christ Thomas Jefferson3 and the other men who put their names to the Declaration of Independence had in mind when it was penned and signed? Hardly!
Is this what the Declaration of Independence and the government it birthed eleven years later brought to America? Not even close!
At best, those men and their assurances were:
[W]ells without water … speak[ing] swelling words of vanity … promising liberty while slaves of their own corruption. (2 Peter 2:17-19)
If ever there were someone in America’s history who fit 2 Peter 2:17-19, it was Thomas Jefferson and the other Enlightenment and Masonic theistic rationalists of his day, aka constitutional framers and founding fathers.
The Declaration Speaks for Itself
In Part 2 of this blog series, I addressed both the author and purpose of the Declaration of Independence. Let’s now look at the Declaration itself.
The Declaration of Independence is one of America’s greatest icons, upon which many patriots, Christians, and non-Christians alike hang their hats. But if you claim to be a Christian,4 you need to divorce yourself from any fanciful notion that the Declaration is either biblical or Christian, or that the Declaration has the capacity to make the biblically seditious Constitution5 biblically compatible.
Do you really think an anti-Christ, devoid of both the Spirit of God and His perfect law of liberty, and with no such intent, had the wherewithal to create a biblically compatible document? This was neither the design of nor within the spiritual wheelhouse of Thomas Jefferson—as further evidenced in the Declaration he created.
With Bibles in hand, let’s begin our examination of the Declaration of Independence, paragraph by paragraph, line by line:
Paragraph #1
Declaration of Independence (Unanimously Adopted by Congress, July 4, 1776, at Philadelphia)
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
Secession
The Declaration’s opening paragraph is a declaration of secession from Great Britain. Not only does secession have biblical precedent, it was, in one instance, commanded by God:
[I]t came to pass at that time when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, that the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite found him in the way; and he had clad himself with a new garment…. And Ahijah caught the new garment that was on him, and rent it in twelve pieces: And he said to Jeroboam, Take thee ten pieces: for thus saith Yahweh, the God of Israel, Behold, I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon [via Solomon’s sons Rehoboam], and will give ten tribes to thee…. Because that they [Rehoboam and what was to become the two-tribed house of Judah] have forsaken me, and have worshipped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the children of Ammon, and have not walked in my ways, to do that which is right in mine eyes, and to keep my statutes and my judgments…. (1 Kings 11:29-33)
In Chapter 12, we find God’s command for secession being executed. Jeroboam and the ten northern tribes secede from King Rehoboam and the two southern tribes, dividing the united nation of Israel into two houses.
It’s important to note that although the house of Israel’s secession was by Yahweh’s determination, the house of Israel fared no better under King Jeroboam than the house of Judah did under King Rehoboam. In fact, a case can be made that the house of Israel fared much worse than did the house of Judah.
In other words, secession from a wicked nation does not necessarily equate with a righteous result—not if those seceding don’t themselves submit to Yahweh as their Sovereign to thereby establish a government of, by, and for Him with His triune moral law (the Ten Commandments and their respective statutes and judgments) as supreme.6
Christendom’s Need for Secession
America has progressively devolved into a more and more unrighteous nation, much like the united kingdom of Israel under King Rehoboam and similar to England in the late 1700s—which precipitated the 1776 Declaration of Independence. In fact, it’s much worse now than it was in late 18th-century America when the Declaration of Independence was sent to King George III. Consequently, the eloquent, impassioned words of the Declaration of Independence resonate with a lot of folks today. It’s therefore not uncommon to hear people once again promoting secession.
For today’s dominion-minded Christians this is a very pertinent discussion. One day, reestablishing biblical, self-sustaining communities (ecclesias7) for the purpose of dominionizing society on behalf of the King of kings8 will invariably entail both God’s austere judgment upon our sinful nation and biblical secession for Christians who are serious about their kingdom calling and obligations.
Any secession movement not based upon Yahweh as Sovereign and His moral law as the basis and foundation of its government will only prove to be but another contemporary instance of man doing what’s right in his own eyes, per Judges 21:25. It will likewise be doomed to failure.
Case in point: the 1776 American secession movement from Great Britain, which eleven years later culminated in a government of, by, and for the people, created by a cadre of Enlightenment and Masonic theistic rationalists. This is sometimes described as the Grand Experiment in Self-Government.
Grand Experiment / Grand Failure
Self-government! What could go wrong? Everything!
Self-government is merely a cover for what’s otherwise known as secular humanism, and secular humanism (regardless the form of government in which it manifests itself) is destined for failure. A Grand Failure is precisely what the Grand Experiment here in America has proven to be.
Everything gone wrong nationally in America can be traced back to the founding fathers’ Grand Experiment. Patrick Henry and other anti-federalists of his day had the foresight to predict its failure. Henry stridently warned his fellow Virginians at the Virginia Ratifying Convention in 1788:
…I say our privileges and rights are in danger. …the new form of Government … will … effectually … oppress and ruin the people…. In some parts of the plan before you, the great rights of freemen are endangered, in other parts, absolutely taken away…. There will be no checks, no real balances, in this Government: What can avail your specious imaginary balances, your rope-dancing, chain-rattling, ridiculous ideal checks and contrivances? …And yet who knows the dangers that this new system may produce: they are out of the sight of the common people: They cannot foresee latent consequences…. I see great jeopardy in this new Government.9
Without the parameters of the Bible’s moral law, even the First Amendment has proven to be a toxic brew. For example, Amendment 1 condemns the prohibition of speech, whether spoken or written. Does the Bible provide for free speech or does it limit speech? What about freedom of speech and freedom of the press as it concerns Yahweh Himself? Does God grant us freedom to curse Him or blaspheme His name?
On the other hand, freedom of speech and freedom of the press is used to provide protection for those who promote false religions, in utero infanticide,10 sodomy, drug abuse, violence, obscenities, and other abominations condemned by Yahweh.
The provision in Amendment 1 for United States citizens to assemble peaceably appears innocuous. But is it harmless to give sodomites, infanticide advocates, and Satanists the right to assemble peaceably? If you are a proponent of the Constitution and a defender of Amendment 1, you must also champion the rights of such criminals and anti-Christians to assemble and promote their wicked agendas.
Homosexuals and infant assassins claim freedom of speech and the right to assemble to combat Christians who speak out or assemble against these heinous people and their brazen debauchery. By labeling what Christians do as hate crimes, these immoral people are able to employ Amendment 1 against Christians speaking and/or assembling against these atrocities. According to the Bill of Rights, it is the alleged religious right of these sodomites, baby killers, and Satanists to use Amendment 1 against Christians.11
Long Enough!
Regardless whether we’re counting from 1776 and the Declaration of Independence or 1787 and the United States Constitution, it’s been long enough—the experiment has failed. It was destined to do so—that is, if you believe our Lord and Savior:
And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it. (Matthew 7:26-27)
[E]very kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand. (Matthew 12:25)
Built on Sand
The House known as the Constitutional Republic (sired by the Declaration of Independence and born of the Godless, Christless, biblically seditious Constitution) was not, by any stretch of the imagination, built upon the rock of Yahweh’s holy word but instead upon Enlightenment and Masonic traditions12:
[Y]e made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. Ye hypocrites … in vain … do [you] worship me, teaching for doctrines [or enacting as laws] the commandments of men. (Matthew 15:6-9)
Divided House
Furthermore, the Constitutional Republic began and continues a divided house.
If some of the constitutional framers were Christians, as some claim, what were they doing yoking themselves with Enlightenment and Masonic theistic rationalists?
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. (2 Corinthians 6:14-18)
That we are not to invite anti-Christs into our political houses also eliminates forming governments with them:
Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust, and not before the saints? Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge … [the] things that pertain to this life? … But brother goeth to law with brother, and that before the unbelievers. (1 Corinthians 6:1-6)
The Apostle Paul denounces Christians going to the courts of the unregenerate to settle legal issues between themselves. How much more so contracting with non-Christians to form a government—a government in which the Christians would invariably be forced to compromise on its form and foundations.
Unless based exclusively upon Yahweh as its Sovereign and His law as supreme, secession merely replaces one form of government of, by, and for the people with another form of the same thing, even when alleged Christians are involved in its formation. Case in point: America’s secession from Great Britain.
Nature’s God
Paragraph 1 of the Declaration refers to “nature’s God.” Paragraph 2 begins “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights….” There you have it: the Declaration acknowledges both God and Creator, making it not only biblically compatible but a biblically-inspired document.
That claim has been parroted countless times. But does this make it true?
Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” [or proclaims “God and Creator”] will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?” And then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.” (Matthew 7:21-23, NASB)
Do you think this might apply to Thomas Jefferson (the chief architect of the Declaration of Independence) who identified Jesus’ virgin birth, resurrection, and ascension to heaven as a “dung hill”?13
For many [plural] deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward. Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds. (2 John 1:7-11)
To denounce Jesus’14 virgin birth, resurrection, and ascension is to denounce Yeshua Immanuel (Yah who Saves, God with Us15) as the incarnate God—that is, God in the flesh. According to the Apostle John, to denounce Jesus Christ is to likewise denounce Yahweh, the one and only Creator.
Consequently, Thomas Jefferson’s and his Enlightenment and Masonic compatriots’ generic God and Creator (sometimes referred to with the Masonic terms “Great” or “Grand Architect” of the universe) was not the God of the Bible. Instead, Jefferson’s God and Creator was one of his own making, “created” in his own “image,” resulting from Jefferson’s rejection of the God and Creator of the Bible.
Yahweh is the God over nature, not nature’s God. Jefferson’s God was Nature’s God—not the God of the Bible, nor the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
What exactly is meant by “Nature’s God”? Because it’s not a designation for Yahweh found anywhere in the Bible, it’s anyone’s guess what’s meant by “Nature’s God.”
One might argue that Nature’s God is tantamount to saying Creator. However, even if the term “Nature’s God” is equivalent with Creator and had come from the Bible, it’s apparent from 2 John 1:7-11 and Jefferson’s rejection of the Christ of the Bible that Jefferson’s nature’s god was merely the generic god of the 18th-century founding fathers, who were predominantly Enlightenment and Masonic theistic rationalists.16
That Jefferson’s God and Creator is not the God of the Bible is further evidence that the government Jefferson and his buddies established was not a government of, by, and for God (i.e., Yahweh) but merely another version of a government of, by, and for the people, not all that different from the one they were seceding from.
Laws of Nature
Hand in hand with anti-Christ Jefferson’s generic god is Jefferson’s generic laws of nature: a non-descript generic law for a non-descript generic god.
Many Christians have bought into both Jefferson’s Nature’s God and his laws of nature. Some of these people insist a case can be made for the laws of nature from Romans 2:
For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; (For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified. For when the Gentiles [ethne, nations], which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another. (Romans 2:12-15)
The Apostle Paul says nothing about laws of nature in this passage but rather nations doing what was “by nature”—that is, what would come natural to them because of the law written in their hearts.
Furthermore, the law Paul describes was not some non-descript law that people were left to speculate as to its stipulations, but instead one that, if transgressed, resulted in sin. This can only be referring to the very explicit moral laws of God:
Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law. (1 John 3:4)
Had this been the law Jefferson was referring to in the Declaration of Independence, there wouldn’t be so many biblical anomalies found throughout the Declaration. No, the ambiguous laws Jefferson cited were, once again, the generic laws of a generic god that anyone can interpret to mean anything they want it to. This was especially true for the theistic rationalists of Jefferson’s day, many of whom, esteemed finite man’s reason as much a moral authority as the Word of God.
For example, Benjamin Rush, one the fifty-six men who signed the Declaration of Independence, is often lauded as one of America’s great Christian founding fathers. Yet in “An Enquiry into the Effects of Public Punishments Upon Criminals, and Upon Society,” which promotes the unbiblical prison system and rejects the Bible’s punitive system of public executions and restitution as valid,17 Rush lauded capricious reason as the means for determining what is right:
Reason, tho’ deposed and oppressed, is the only just sovereign of the human mind. Discoveries … have derived their credit and usefulness only from their according with the decisions of reason…. These things are … the secret voice of God himself, speaking in the human heart….18
No two finite men reason identically on anything. Consequently, to such men as Jefferson and Rush, the Declaration’s nondescript “laws of nature” would prove very appealing. The same for many of today’s non-Christians and alleged Christians alike who have rejected the Bible’s explicit triune and integral moral law as supreme and, as such, government and society’s standard.
Anyone who promotes the Declaration’s ambiguous “laws of nature” is almost surely an antinomian19 who’s rejected Yahweh’s moral law as supreme and, in turn, Jesus Christ as Master and Lord:
Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness20 and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. (Jude 1:3-4, NASB)
See Part 4.
Related posts:
“Biblical Examination of the Declaration of Independence, Pt. 1” (Blog article)
“Biblical Examination of the Declaration of Independence, Pt. 2” (Blog article)
“Biblical Examination of the Declaration of Independence” (Audio series)
“Ecclesia vs. Church: Why Understanding the Difference is Critical to Our Future”
Bible Law vs. the United States Constitution: The Christian Perspective
Bible Law vs. Constitutionalism” (Audio series)
Law and Kingdom: Their Relevance Under the New Covenant
A Biblical Constitution: A Scriptural Replacement for Secular Government
End Notes
1. All scripture is quoted from the King James Version unless otherwise noted.
2. YHWH, the English transliteration of the Tetragrammaton, is most often pronounced Yahweh. It is the principal Hebrew name of the God of the Bible and was inspired to appear nearly 7,000 times in the Old Testament. It was unlawfully deleted by the English translators. In obedience to the Third Commandment and the scriptures that charge us to proclaim, swear by, praise, extol, call upon, bless, glorify, and hold fast to His name, I have chosen to memorialize His name, per Exodus 3:15, in this article.
For a more thorough explanation concerning important reasons for using the sacred name of God, see Thou shalt not take the name of YHWH thy God in vain, the third in a series of ten free online books on each of the Ten Commandments and their respective statutes and judgments.
3. See Part 2 for evidence that Thomas Jefferson was an anti-Christ.
4. Not everyone claiming to be a Christian has been properly instructed in the biblical plan of salvation. Mark 16:15-16; Acts 2:36-41, 22:1-16; Romans 6:3-4; Galatians 3:26-27; Colossians 2:11-13; and 1 Peter 3:21 should be studied to understand what is required to be covered by the blood of Jesus and forgiven of your sins.
For a more thorough explanation concerning water immersion and its relationship to salvation, the bookBaptism: All You Wanted to Know and More may be requested from Bible Law vs. The United States Constitution, PO Box 248, Scottsbluff, Nebraska 69363, for free.
Additionally, listen to audio series “I Had a Dream: Judgment’s Coming. Are You Under the Blood?” Part 1 can be found here. Or a MP3 CD, containing all ten messages, can be requested from Bible Law vs. The United States Constitution, PO Box 248, Scottsbluff, Nebraska 69363, for free.
5. For evidence that the Constitution is biblically seditious, see Bible Law vs. the United States Constitution: The Christian Perspective, in which every Article and Amendment is examined by the Bible.
See also audio series “Bible Law vs. Constitutionalism.”
6. For more regarding how the Bible’s immutable/unchanging moral law applies today and should be implemented as the law of the land, see Law and Kingdom: Their Relevance Under the New Covenant.
See also A Biblical Constitution: A Scriptural Replacement for Secular Government.
7. See “Ecclesia vs. Church: Why Understanding the Difference is Critical to Our Future.”
8. Per Romans 12:21, 13:1-7, 1 Corinthians 6:1-6, 2 Corinthians 10:3-6, etc.
9. Patrick Henry, Ralph Ketcham, ed., “Speeches of Patrick Henry (June 5 and 7, 1788),” The Anti-Federalist Papers and the Constitutional Convention Debates (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 2003, 2nd ed.) pp. 200-08
10. Abortion is not always an act of violence. Sometimes it delivers a live baby.
The battle against this atrocity begins with identifying it correctly. By calling it “abortion,” we’re acquiescing to the opposition’s terminology. Look up “miscarriage” in any dictionary. A miscarriage is an abortion. So is a term baby. Why? Because term babies are aborted by natural means.
What doctors (and parents) do to infants in the womb is in utero infanticide. Had Roe v. Wade been waged over infanticide rather than abortion, it would have never made it to the court room. In fact, by employing the word “abortion,” Roe v. Wade was won before it ever got to court.
The Greek word brephos employed in the New Testament for infants already born is the same word used for infants in the womb (Luke 2:12 and Luke 1:41), without specifying the precise moment they became a brephos. Therefore, our only option is to then accept that they became such at conception. Thus, intentionally killing a brephos at any point is brephocide or, more properly, infanticide.
The same is true for one of the Hebrew words translated “child” in the Old Testament.
Christians need to stop using the non-Christians’ watered-down, politically correct terms such as “abortion” and “gay.” It’s infanticide and sodomy. There is no power in the former terms against evil and our first mistake is in acquiescing to the ungodly’s terminology.
11. See Chapter 11 “Amendment 1: Government-Sanctioned Polytheism” of Bible Law vs. the United States Constitution: The Christian Perspective.
12. For evidence that the Constitution was based upon Enlightenment and Masonic traditions rather than the Bible, see Bible Law vs. the United States Constitution: The Christian Perspective, in which every Article and Amendment is examined by the Bible.
See also audio series “Bible Law vs. Constitutionalism.”
13. Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, 24 January 1814, Lester J. Cappon, ed., The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams (Williamsburg, VA: Institute of Early American History and Culture, 1988) p. 384
14. Yeshua is the English transliteration of our Savior’s given Hebrew name, with which He introduced Himself to the Apostle Paul in Acts 26:14-15. (Jesus is a twice-removed transliteration: the English transliteration of the Greek Iesous, which is the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew Yeshua.) Because many people are unfamiliar or uncomfortable with Yeshua, I have chosen to use the more familiar name Jesus in this article in order to remove what might otherwise be a stumbling block.
For a more thorough explanation concerning important reasons for using the sacred name of God, see Thou shalt not take the name of YHWH thy God in vain, the third in a series of ten free online books on each of the Ten Commandments and their respective statutes and judgments.
15. See Part 2 for more regarding the names “Yeshua” and “Immanuel” and their import as it pertains to the deity of Christ and how they reflect upon the spurious claim that Thomas Jefferson’s God in the Declaration of Independence was Yahweh.
16. For more regarding the true religious beliefs of the 18th-century founding fathers, see The Religious Beliefs of America’s Founders: Reason, Revelation, and Revolution by Gregg L. Frazer.
17. See Chapter 17 “Amendment 8: Bail, Fines, and Cruel and Unusual Punishments” of Bible Law vs. the United States Constitution: The Christian Perspective.
18. Benjamin Rush, “An Enquiry into the Effects of Public Punishments Upon Criminals, and Upon Society,” read in the Society for Promoting Political Inquiries, convened at the house of His Excellency, Benjamin Franklin, Esquire, in Philadelphia, March 9, 1787, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans/N16141.0001.001?rgn=main;view=fulltext.
19. Antinomianism: The teaching that Yahweh’s triune and integral moral law (His Ten Commandments and their respective statutes and judgments) as society’s standard has been replaced by Yahweh’s grace and is no longer applicable under the New Covenant. This, despite such passages as Romans 3:31 and Jude 1:3-4.
Salvation, justification, forgiveness, and all things comparable are provided us exclusively by God’s grace via the blood-atoning sacrifice and resurrection of Christ. Praise Yahweh! This fact, however, does not mean Jesus abolished His Father’s morality as reflected in His Ten Commandments and their respective statutes and judgments as society’s standard. God forbid!
These are two entirely different issues. The first has to do with the remnant’s individual salvation, the second with whose ethics God intends for us to govern our lives.
For more regarding how the Bible’s immutable/unchanging moral law applies today and should be implemented as the law of the land, see Law and Kingdom: Their Relevance Under the New Covenant.
See also A Biblical Constitution: A Scriptural Replacement for Secular Government.
20. Noah Webster defined “licentiousness” as “excessive indulgence of liberty; contempt of the just restraints of law….”
Noah Webster, American Dictionary of the English Language, s.v. “licentiousness” (1828; reprint ed. San Francisco, CA: The Foundation for American Christian Education, 1967)
Pretty much good stuff.