The Puritans

        O reader, this will be a special blog. I am taking my time to read all the sources related to this blog with care for I feel that the very identity of America is with the Puritan: more specifically the Puritans that settled at Plymouth plantation. Although there were many settlements in New England that called themselves Pilgrims and Puritans, all of them branched out from the mustard seed planted at Plymouth, Massachusetts bay colony. What made that congregation of individuals so unique? I’ll explain by answering these questions. Who are we as a people? What is America’s identity? This blog is an attempt to answer those questions by identifying the Puritans of Plymouth; for the very identity of America branched from them.

        There was one English plantation in America that everyone knows: the Jamestown colony. It was founded by a Puritan. That’s right: John Smith. William Bradford identified Smith as a Puritan in his book A History of Plymouth Plantation. It was no surprise that the Pilgrims that eventually landed at Cape Cod wanted to go to Virginia, and they even thought that they were going to Virginia during their trials to receive a ship to cross the ocean. Some believed that the Puritans left England because of religious persecution, but it wasn’t about that parse. They were persecuted for their beliefs, but that wasn’t the main reason for coming to the New World. Bradford gave two main reasons: to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ, and to protect their children from the corruption around them.

        These courageous people sold all they had in England, and in Holland, to be part of a voyage to America. They gave all that they had to lay it at their apostles’ feet. They were a covenant keeping people that held on to their bibles for everything that they did. They had guns for protection, and were geniuses in educating their young. The most important thing to notice about them was their devotion to God, and the acknowledgment of His providence: God’s guidance in human affairs. Miracles happened for them: baskets of corn were abandoned by Indians upon the arrival of the group. There was an Indian named Squanto that was fluent in English, and taught the Pilgrims how to use the corn to plant them in the soil. There was a sailor on the voyage that mocked the sick, poor people, and wanted to toss them over the side. The man ended up getting the disease, dying from it, and became the first to be tossed over the side of the ship while on the ocean

        These were only some instances of God’s intervention in the lives of the founding families of America. They were Sabbath-keeping Christians that believed in baptism, laying on of hands, and the resurrection. They elected their leaders by popular vote. Read the English Primer, the poems of Anne Bradstreet, Edward Winslow, and William Bradford to paint a better picture of the Puritans. They considered the English church to be a high place of worship, and were only persecuted because they wanted to reform it to be more biblical and less ritualistic with religious ceremony. When that didn’t work, they had to move away from England to avoid being corrupted themselves. That’s why they were called Puritans. I believe that the very identity of America came from the Puritans of Plymouth Plantation.

My Covenant

        O Reader, I feel the need to explain some key aspects of biblical truth that does effect Americans today. If you would truly listen to what’s being said, perhaps you would make the best decision according to your common sense. Americans today have no idea or concept of covenant keeping in their daily lives. Most of us don’t even understand what a covenant is unless you are someone that’s baptized and under the New Covenant in Jesus Christ. We don’t live in the times of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph—who were covenant keeping men of their day. For the most part, the concept of covenant keeping is very foreign to Americans today. 

However, it wasn’t foreign to the Pilgrims that sailed over here, and established a covenant with God under the Mayflower Compact. It wasn’t foreign to the founding fathers whom established a covenant with God through the Declaration of Independence, and added to it through the constitution. Abraham Lincoln knew about the covenant in His first augural address by describing the covenant process all the way to the Constitution. Americans today don’t have a clue what a covenant is anymore, and that’s a big problem. God is a covenant-keeping God, and is loyal to His everlasting covenants—even if we aren’t loyal. America was a covenant-keeping people in her founding. I’ll explain more of that in a blog about the Pilgrims, but it’s the truth.

We established a covenant with God at the founding of this nation that said: We are your people, and you are our God. We gave “our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor” to God in order to keep His covenant, and have “firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence”. (http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html) Declaration of Independence, 1776. Anyone that doesn’t understand what a covenant is would read these words, and not see the gravity of them. They gave their entire livelihoods to God under obedience to His covenant: obedience to God. They were conditions of a covenant with God in order for Him to be King over us, and receive His providence, His protection, and His blessings on the nation. The providential history of covenants dates back to Adam, but the most common occurrence about covenant-keeping started with Abraham.

Abraham was promised by God a child from his own loins. God promised him a multitude of descendents, and Abraham was 90 years old at the time. Paul said in Romans 4:13-25 that Abraham was as good as dead and Sarah’s womb was dead, yet Abram believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Because of this, God made a covenant with Abram that God would be the God of Abraham and his descendents, and Abraham and his descendents would be God’s people. The sign of that covenant was circumcision. The child of the covenant was Isaac, and he was born to a 90 year old Sarah. Abraham was 100 years old when Isaac was born. God does fulfill His promises, and God is a covenant-keeping God. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph were all circumcised as a sign of God’s covenant with Abraham.

The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are the signs of an American covenant with God. Should we not obey the Lawgiver named Jesus Christ? Is He not the Husband? And, is the church, which America secures, not the bride? I am hinting of my own covenant with God. I haven’t considered it a covenant until recently, but it is. The history of my covenant with God was summarized in the blog: My Oath. God is a covenant-keeping God, and I know this from experience. I have yet to see the results of His promise to me that I would have a beautiful wife, but I have to remain faithful to that covenant that I made with Him. It’s not easy with such beautiful women around me, and the covenant-loyal woman is far away from me. God is not finished with both of us, and God has a sign of His covenant with me. It’s my T-shirt small business and the very first T-shirt design. It’s the literature that I write, and the books that I review. It’s the music that I create. I choose to keep obeying the covenant with Him.

Recently, an opinion article was written by LOUIS MICHAEL SEIDMAN in the New York Times. He encouraged the disobedience of the constitution, and demonized it from every political angle: The fiscal cliff in congress, the rise of Presidential power, and the two schools of the judicial branch of government. It’s clear to me that this constitutional law professor has a Marxist, leftist view of American history, and doesn’t see the constitution from a covenant-keeping perspective that I do. He doesn’t look at the constitution from the Pilgrims or the Founders perspective, or from a providential world-view of American history. No, he simply wants to give up on the constitution and elaborated about why it should be given up on by demonizing it with his propaganda against the constitution. It’s clear to me that he is in defiance of God’s covenant, and that bothers me much. Here’s the article from the New York Times: (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/opinion/lets-give-up-on-the-constitution.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0).

 From my own experiences, I do not agree with him that disobeying God’s covenant with us is a good idea. I’m sure the founding Fathers and the Pilgrims that came here from the Mayflower would obey God rather than Man. I would much rather obey God rather than this man, and continue to keep my covenant with Him.