Make America Christian Again

By Greg Koehn Ph.D

Obviously, this book finds its title from the slogan created by former president Donald Trump Make America Great Again. This book is intended to argue, that for America to be great, it must be Christian. This does not mean that other religions are not welcome as has never been the case in America, but rather as a country based upon biblical principles, there has always been true freedom of religion. The point being that this country was founded upon the teachings of the Bible which is why there is freedom of religion, each person is free to choose for themselves either heaven or hell. This book is divided into three sections, the first one discussing the fact that America was founded as a Christian nation and as such it grew to be the most powerful and prosperous nation on the earth. Since departing from the Bible, its teachings and its God, America is now in a steep decline. The second section discusses the 5 main institutions of any society and how that in each case, they work better when they follow the teachings and principles of the Bible. The final section is what can still be done to turn America back to its roots and back to the Bible. As Bible believers, we know the time is short and the coming of our Lord to take home His people and to judge the world in His righteousness is indeed imminent. But in these last days, lest us not be lax in the preaching of the gospel and making a stand for the things that are holy. Let us get off of our seats, onto our feet and into the streets, to be as the prophets of old and declare that thus says the Lord.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9798823016292

Greg Koehn Ph.D

I grew up in a Bible believing family and at the age of 6 placed my faith in Jesus Christ as Lord. Started to study the Bible from that point forward and preached my first sermon at the age of 15. I traveled as an itinerate preacher and evangelist from the age of 25 for about 7 years thereafter. Was married in 1970 and we have had 2 children who are now grown and made us grandparents of two boys and two girls. When I was not in full time ministry, I made a living as a salesman. My time spent out in the world making a living was valuable for me because I was able to see how life worked outside of ministry and the Church, which provided me with a more well-rounded view of life. At the age of 40, I was encouraged to get my official credentials for teaching the Bible. This led me to Grace University where I earned a BA in Bible, History and Philosophy; then a MS at the University of Nebraska Omaha in Urban Studies and then a Ph.D. at Louisiana Baptist University and Seminar in Biblical Studies. I was asked to stay on at Grace U. as the Director of Servant Leadership Training and Field Education. Over the course of the years that followed, I taught Evangelism and Apologetics;, Philosophy; Sociology; and Urban Ministries courses which I developed into a degree program. I have also served as a Pastor of Outreach at a Church in Omaha Ne., and as a Pastor of a rural Church in Henderson Ne. I am now retired except for the writing and promoting of this book and the website gregkoehnministries.com.

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© 2023 Greg Koehn Ph.D. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or

transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 10/17/2023

ISBN: 979-8-8230-1630-8 (sc)

ISBN: 979-8-8230-1629-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023919714

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expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the

views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction

History of American Christianity

1.     The Beginning

2.     Our Founding Fathers

3.     Our Founding Documents

Social Institutions

4.     Society versus Culture

5.     Family

6.     Religion

History of American Christianity

7.     Education

8.     Government

9.     Economics

10.   So What?

Application

11.   The Solution

Works Cited

About the Author

Acknowledgements

A thank you to my wife Lois for her many years of support and encouragement in our many years of ministry together.

A thank you to my daughter Lisa (Dr. Epp) for her contribution to chapter seven based on her expertise in the field of education.

Introduction

T his book is being written as a call to action, either revival or reformation. This brings us to an eschatological dilemma. Most Bible believing Christians believe that we are living in the last days. The Scriptures teach that our Lord’s return is imminent, therefore we have been living in the last days or at least in anticipation of the return of our Lord since the first century. Now that nearly two thousand years have past, it is even more possible that our Lord is returning soon. In addition, there are prophecies which speak of the last days and these are coming to past in rapid succession. Dr. David Jeremiah in his book What in the World is going on? delineates ten prophetic clues that you cannot afford to ignore ¹ His book and others like it, argue that our Lord’s return is indeed imminent. This means that we can approach these days in which we live in one of two ways. The first is that we can look at prophecy and see that things are not going to get any better (see II Timothy 3). Therefore, we can just do our best to maintain what we have until our Lord’s return when He will make all things right. There is no reason for us to expect or work toward a revival or another reformation because we are out of time and it will not change the times in which we live. The second manner of looking at things is to understand what the Scriptures teach and still be determined to impact our world for Christ. It is what I like to refer to as going down swinging.

This might beg the question of what might be our Scriptural basis for such an attitude? First, we understand that the Apostles taught and lived in view of our Lord’s imminent return. This did not stop or hinder them from obeying our Lord’s command to make disciples of the nations (Matthew 28:18-20). In fact, they were filled with an urgency to lead as many as possible to the Lord before His return. This resulted in the whole world being turned upside down (see Acts 17:6). A cursory look at II Peter 3 might be helpful in understanding our thinking in the light of prophecy.

Verses 1-4: In the last days there are scoffers who come, who scoff at the promise of our Lord’s coming because it has for so long been delayed. It has now been close to two thousand years.

Verses 5-8: These scoffers are not aware of the nature of our God. He works according to His sovereign will and by His own Word. Therefore, He will do what He says He will do. His nature and His ways are far beyond ours. He lives outside of time, space, and matter and therefore one thousand years are no more than a day to Him.

Verses 9-10: He is not slack in His promise but not willing that any should perish. But His day will come and He will bring all this to a conclusion.

Verses 11-18: So, what manner of persons should we be? How should we then live? We look forward to His coming. We are to be diligent to be found in peace, without spot and blameless. The longsuffering of Lord works toward salvation. Therefore, it would seem that we should work toward the spread of the gospel which will bring about salvation. Finally, we are to grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can summarize that in view of the coming of our Lord and in view of all that is going on around us, we are to keep on keeping on or go down swinging.

In view of prophecy and what is transpiring in our day and age Dr. David Jeremiah concluded with the following:

When we have heard and understood the truth of Christ’s promised return, we cannot just keep living our lives in the same old way. Future events have present implications that we cannot ignore. When we know that Christ is coming again to this earth, we cannot go on being the same people. From the New Testament epistles, I have gleaned ten ways in which we should be different as a result of our prophetic knowledge.

1. Refrain from judging others

2. Remember the Lord’s table

3. Respond to life spiritually

4. Relate to one another in love

5. Restore the bereaved

6. Recommit ourselves to ministry

7. Refuse to neglect the church

8. Remain steadfast

9. Renounce our lives

10. Reach the lost ²

The longsuffering of our Lord is with a view toward more of the lost coming to Him that the whole world will hear, understand, and believe the gospel. In my book Attack Evangelism³ I give an in-depth study of our great salvation and I make the argument that as people change from the inside out, they in turn will change their culture, community, and world. The preaching of the gospel is the key to making America Christian again.

In order for us to argue for making America Christian again, we must first establish that America was ever Christian in the first place. Next, we will argue that a Christian nation is a better and more desirable nation and then how we can be become a Christian nation again. The only way for America to become Christian again will be through a movement of the Holy Spirit according to the sovereign will of God. The attempt of this work is to be what hopefully will be one of many tools to be used by the Holy Spirit to bring that about. A word of warning here that sarcasm will appear in this text. Do not be alarmed as sarcasm will not hurt you if you are able to think objectively. This work is better used by those who think objectively. Any Bible verses quoted will be from the New King James text and quotes from the Greek text will be taken from the Interlinear Greek-English New Testament by Zondervan.

It is also important to note the word Christian, in chapter one I seek to explain the difference between a true biblical Christian and one that is simply a social Christian. What I mean by a true biblical Christian is one who has believed on the Lord Jesus Christ by faith, apart from any kind of works, based totally upon the grace of God. The Bible speaks of those who believe as believers and I shall attempt to distinguish between the social Christian and the true Believer throughout this book. The title of this book is to Make America Christian Again and the meaning here would certainly be for many to come to God by faith in Christ as Believers. At the same time, it would still be better if America was once again be a country that followed the Bible and behaved as though all were Christians, even if not all are actually biblical Believers. It ought to be obvious that the best way for this to happen is for the vast majority of Americans to be biblical Believers, to make this happen refer to my book Attack Evangelism.

CHAPTER ONE

History of American Christianity

The Beginning

T his is not intended as an exhaustive study of the founders of this great nation but to give evidence to the Christian founding of this country. Here we have a problem with our definition of Christian. There are those who are Christian in the biblical sense of the word and there are those who are Christian in their social context. A biblical Christian is one who is a believer. This is one who has believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and as a result is a believer as in John 3:16 and though out the New Testament. Note: In John 3:16 the word believe is a present participle which means that a person not only believes but continues to believe and is a believer. A social Christian is one because they think of themselves as a Christian due to their social context. An explorer from a socially Christian country would consider themselves a Christian but may not be one by a biblical definition. A biblical Christian will live out their life according to the precepts and doctrine of the Word of God, the Bible. A social Christian may or may not live according to the Holy Scriptures which resulted in very non-biblical actions being taken. Or a person may be a biblical Christian but because of their training and social construct committed actions that are not biblical. For example, the treatment of the American Indian many times was not according to the teaching of the Bible and therefore not biblically Christian. The fault of this poor treatment does not lie with Christianity but with the social construct of the day and ultimately due to the sin nature of mankind. The Bible teaches that man is born in sin (see Psalm 51:5; 58:3) and therefore, sins by nature (see Romans 1-3). These sinful beings create a society which consist of a sinful social construct which will result in sinful treatment of other people. This is the circumstance of the early explorers coming to America. In spite of these actions that were taken which were not biblical, the society that was created consisted of biblical principles. Whatever might be the true meaning of their beliefs, the Bible and the glory of God was the priority of their actions however misguided they have become.

It is these biblical principles which were intended and implemented in many ways and the object of being to the Glory of God is where we intend our focus in this work. The early explorers were not atheist or polytheist, or pantheist. They were theist and specifically Christian theist in one form or another. The one possible exception to this rule were the North-men (Vikings). The Vikings were polytheists. However, they did not establish any kind of society in the new world and did not stay long. They did very little, if anything, to contribute to the future of this country.

The first people to come to this continent were what came to be known as the Indians. They now like to be called Native Americans but in fact they are not native to this land, none of mankind is native to this land. All people came from an area known as the cradle of civilization which is now thought of as the Middle East. In Genesis chapter 10 we have the earliest and most complete ethnological table to be found in the ancient writings. There are three heads of all the people groups in the world and they are the sons of Noah; Shem, Ham, and Japheth. From Shem come the people of the Middle East including the descendants of Abraham. From Japheth come the people groups of Europe and from Ham come the people groups of Asia and Africa. It was the descendants of Ham who made their way over to the American continent. They may have come over a land bridge that once existed, that connected the two continents of America and Europe or, most likely, they sailed over in ships. Being a descendant of Noah, they would have known how to make large sea worthy vessels. In fact, the descendants of Ham were the early ship builders and sea travelers. We can see the connection between the Indians of America and the people of the Middle East in their religion, writings, and architecture. Their religion has a direct connection to the religion of Baal from the tower of Babel. The pyramids of Egypt are also in South America for example. These people were primarily pantheistic and worshiped creation and spirits depicted as a part of creation. They are described in Romans 1:23-25:

...and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man - and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. Therefore, God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

These descendants of Ham became known as Canaanites and they were dispersed (Genesis 10:18). In ancient times their borders were described in Genesis 10:19, they became so corrupt in the land that the Lord God ordered their destruction (see Exodus 23:20-24). There are those, who do not know better, who refer to all the killing and bloodshed on the part of the Lord’s people both of Israel and of the Christians as being some sort of indiscriminate mass murder on a whim. It is worth taking note; that the people who were to be destroyed by Israel in the Old Testament were the people of the land, specifically the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and the Jebusites. Unless a person is one of those living in the land at that time, they are safe. There is a principle in the Scriptures that we see over and over again and that is, the wages of sin is death and those who sow seed to the flesh and to sin, will reap the whirlwind of the lust of the flesh, of sin and of death. It is well to keep this principle before us at all times.

Now back to our Native Americans who actually were the first immigrants to this country from the Middle East, the cradle of civilization. These first immigrants did not bring Christianity with them as they were pantheistic in their religion and as we have noted, they worshiped creation rather than the creator. In these postmodern times, these Indians are viewed as the noble savage, that they somehow oozed out of the soil of what is now America and settled into neat little countries or territories whose boundaries were honored by the neighboring tribes. This, of course, is absurd. There was constant warfare between tribes and the whole societal system was based upon the warrior. Those tribes that lived off the land and were not aggressive toward other tribes were displaced by the warrior tribes. The nomadic tribes would move into an area and take what they wanted and killed anyone who stood in their way. Captives from conquered tribes were made slaves and assimilated into the new tribe whether they wanted to or not. Many white settlers were murdered before they were able to finally take over the land and many were tortured before death relieved them of their pain. The noble savage was no different than any other depraved man, they tortured and killed at will and in South America human sacrifice was common to appease their false gods. It is common among sinful humanity that when one race of people seeks to dominate a land and are confronted with another race of people, there will be war and the winner will take over the land and write the history. The loser will either assimilate or be annihilated. The problem with the American Indian is that they did neither and live in a kind of limbo. Obviously, these statements are generalities and, there are exceptions.

It is believed that the first white men to come to this land were the Norsemen, otherwise known as the Vikings. They did not stay long as there was nothing for them to loot and pillage. Their influence is still felt, nevertheless, primarily because of their European descendants who immigrated later to this country and brought their folk lore with them.

This then brings us to the early explorers from the Old-World Europe to this New World of America. Inasmuch as this work is not intended to be an American history book, we will only mention a few that are germane to our subject. There is a little ditty, in 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue. Christopher Columbus is accredited with the discovery of America by the Europeans on behalf of Spain. It is worthy of note that when he came, he had as his intent to bring Christianity to this new land. Columbus wrote in his diary in 1492 his desire to find out the manner in which may be undertaken their conversion to our Holy Faith.⁴ It is certainly debatable whether or not he knew what real biblical Christianity was and there are historical indicators that he did not, in fact, bring biblical Christianity to the New World regardless of his intent. Nevertheless, he was not coming to advance the cause of Islam, or Hindu, or Shinto, or more pantheism, or any other religion, it was a discovery made with the intent of this being a Christian nation.

The Roman Catholic Missionaries