Post # 238 -- America’s Promise -- Happy Fourth of July!!!

Dear Family and Friends

I pray that each of you is making responsible choices this fourth

of July. it is so important not to begin a new wave of this

COVID 19. I know how hard it is not to be able to be with your

family members and enjoy this special day with them, but is it

worth them traveling to you or you traveling to them?

As it is during this trip to and from certain places that you may

go with a chance that you could pick up this nasty virus along

the way? This virus doesn't care who it inflicts. It is not only

something that the poor or the rich get. It is out there seeking

to destroy our peace, our way of life. You can look at it as a bad

guy you want to avoid!

Having a different perspective about this virus may help you

keep safe, because you would not go where it was dangerous for

you and your family, right? You would not walk calmly into a

burning building would you? It is harder because this virus is

invisible, but can be just as deadly as a bad guy out to do harm,

I pray that each of you can celebrate our Independence day as

safely as possible. Not only from this virus but the immediate

danger of fire and burns from the fireworks themselves. Please

handle with care those of you who are using fireworks and

please be safe if you choose to travel. Take your masks and

your gloves to keep the germs away when you touch things.

I want you to know that I love America and I am very grateful
that I am blessed to live in such a wonderful land with
freedoms that are often taken for granted or pushed to the
limits in some way or another. This country may have some
flaws, but don't they all?

We will always have God on our side if we follow His Son,
Jesus Christ and keep His commandments. I believe so many
of us have gotten away from the practice of praying to our Heavenly Father and including Him daily in our lives, that we
may need to make some, adjustments in our lives.

Here is a little bit of information about our Independence Day.
I wanted to share with you a little bit of our history for you to
read at your leisure. This  information was taken from the
following site: https://www.almanac.com/content/independence
-day-fourth-of-july

WHEN IS INDEPENDENCE DAY?

On the 4th of July, the United States observes a federal holiday in honor of the
Declaration of Independence. This holiday commemorates the adoption of the
Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, by delegates from the 13 colonies.

REFRESH YOUR MEMORY: THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

The Declaration of Independence is one of the most important documents in
the history of the United States. It was an official act taken by all 13 American
colonies in declaring independence from British rule.

Here is an excerpt from the Declaration of Independence (US 1776):

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, that among these are Life, Liberty and the
pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are
instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent
of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to
abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on
such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them
shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

We invite you to refresh your memory as an annual tradition. Read a
transcription of the complete text of the Declaration at www.archives.gov.

 

CELEBRATING THE FOURTH OF JULY

In the United States, Independence Day is a federal holiday traditionally
observed with parades, concerts, picnic food, and fireworks.

Take a look at our Fourth of July recipes to have a delicious picnic or barbecue
—and for a list of patriotic desserts!

I ran across a First Presidency Message that I wanted to share
with you on this Independence Day -- the Fourth of July!! The
message is titled “ America’s Promise” it is from the September
1979 issue of the Ensign magazine. I feel that this message is
quite appropriate for us today as it was back then, maybe
more so now.

First Presidency Message

America’s Promise

By President Marion G. Romney

Second Counselor in the First Presidency

During the early part of the eighteenth century, Samuel F. Smith wrote
his great poem:

My country! ’tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing;

Land where my fathers died,

Land of the pilgrim’s pride,

From every mountainside,

Let freedom ring!

My native country, thee,

Land of the noble, free,

Thy name I love;

I love thy rocks and rills,

Thy woods and templed hills.

My heart with rapture thrills

Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze

And ring from all the trees,

Sweet freedom’s song;

Let mortal tongues awake;

Let all that breathe partake;

Let rocks their silence break,

The sound prolong.

Our fathers’ God to thee,

Author of liberty,

To thee we sing.

Long may our land be bright

With freedom’s holy light.

Protect us by thy might,

Great God, our King!

(Hymns, no. 115.)

You know i have sung this song all my life and i never knew that
it was used at a Fourth of July celebration in 1832. I guess I
need to learn some more about history.

These lines, first used in 1832 at a Fourth of July celebration, indicate that
Samuel F. Smith had with poetic insight glimpsed some great truths
concerning this land—truths which, at about the same time, were clearly
made known to the Prophet Joseph Smith.

By divine revelation, Joseph, between 1827 and 1829, translated the
Book of Mormon, from which he learned that God is in fact the author
of our liberty and that to retain it, the inhabitants of the land must be
protected by his mighty hand. There is no other power that can
protect that liberty.

The truths received by Joseph Smith went further. They identified the
“Great God” implored by Samuel F. Smith as Jesus Christ. They also
declared that in order for us to enjoy the protection of his might, we must
accept him as our God and keep his commandments.

“Behold,” says the revelation, “this [America] is a choice land, and
whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be free from bondage, and from
captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but serve
the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ” (Ether 2:12).

The words “Protect us by thy might, Great God, our King” imply that the God of the land is also King of the land. And this is true.

The Book of Mormon, quoting Jesus as he spoke here in America, reads:

“This land shall be a land of liberty … and there shall be no kings upon [it]. …

“… For I, the Lord, the king of heaven, will be their king, and I will be a light
unto them forever, that hear my words. …

“… For it is a choice land, saith God … wherefore I will have all men that
dwell thereon that they shall worship me.” (2 Ne. 10:11–19.)

The alternative to enjoying this liberty and happiness through acceptance of
and obedience to Jesus Christ is made clear by the Book of Mormon. It
gives certain answers and abundant evidence.

More than two thousand years before his birth in the flesh, Jesus Christ led
a small colony of people from Asia to America. As they came he instructed
their prophet leaders “that whoso should possess this land of promise, from
that time henceforth and forever, should serve him, the true and only God,
or they should be swept off … when they … are ripened in iniquity”
(Ether 2:8–9).

The descendants of this people, known as the Jaredites, became a mighty
nation. They flourished here for some two thousand years. Obeying Christ
in righteousness, they rose at times to great heights. Rejecting him, they
declined until they completely annihilated themselves in fratricidal wars.
An abridgment of their tragic history is found in the Book of Ether.

In 600 B.C., about the time the Jaredites were annihilating themselves,
Jesus Christ directed another colony to this land. He revealed to them, as
he had to the Jaredites, the truth that he is the God and King of the land;
that through accepting and obeying him as such, they could always remain
a free, prosperous, and happy people; and that if they chose to reject him
and disobey his laws, they would bring upon themselves certain destruction.

That they might be convinced, the Savior made available to them the
records of the Jaredites, whom they replaced.

The thousand-year history of these people records their division into two
factions—Nephites and Lamanites.

When they followed the guidance of the God of the land they reached great
heights. After his post-resurrection ministry among them, all who survived
the cataclysm which accompanied his crucifixion—both Nephites and
Lamanites—were “converted unto the Lord.” United, they built a society in
which for about two hundred years “there were no contentions and
disputations among them, and every man did deal justly one with another.
… There were not rich and poor, bond and free, but they were all made free,
and … the Lord did prosper them exceedingly in the land.

“Surely [concludes the prophet historian] there could not be a happier
people among all the people who had been created by the hand of God.”
(4 Ne. 1:2–7, 16.)

At the beginning of the third century A.D. this happy situation began to
change. Pride, with its attendant evils, found place in the hearts of people.
They began turning away from the ways of the God of the land. Finally they rejected him. By the end of the fourth century, as a result of contention,
crime, and carnage, their civilization had disintegrated.

Having proved unworthy of protection by the “might” of the God of the land,
the remnants of these people dwindled in unbelief until they reached the
degradation in which Columbus found them.

Lehi, the patriarch of the colony divinely led to America in 600 B.C.,
prophesied that “there shall none come into this land save they shall be
brought by the hand of the Lord” (2 Ne. 1:6).

Just as Jesus Christ has piloted to this land of America the vanguard of each
succeeding civilization which has dwelt upon it, so has he made known to
them his everlasting decree “that whoso should possess [it] should serve him,
the true and only God, or they should be swept off … when they … are
ripened in iniquity” (Ether 2:8–9).

Our present civilization is no exception. We who live in America are under
this everlasting decree. And the Lord has said, “My word shall be verified at
this time as it hath hitherto been verified” (D&C 5:20). Jesus Christ, the
God of this land, led Columbus to it. He led the Pilgrims to Plymouth. He
sustained and gave victory to the colonists. He established the Constitution
of the United States (see D&C 101:80). Over a period of some
twenty-six centuries he directed the writing of the Book of Mormon, which
contains the record of the former inhabitants of this land. At his command,
Moroni finished the record and hid it up in the Hill Cumorah, where, under

his surveillance, it was safely preserved for some fourteen hundred years.

By the power of Jesus Christ, the God of this land, the record was brought
forth, translated, and in 1830 published. For nearly 150 years now it has
been bearing its message to all who will receive it.

After setting forth the everlasting decree concerning this land and reviewing
the destruction of two civilizations, Moroni, seeing the present inhabitants of
America, and knowing by the power of God that we would have the record,
penned this message directly to those who inhabit this land:

“And this cometh unto you … that ye may know the decrees of God—that ye
may repent, and not continue in your iniquities until the fulness come, that ye
may not bring down the fulness of the wrath of God upon you as the
inhabitants of the land have hitherto done” (Ether 2:11).

Now why do I emphasize this theme? I do so as a warning against the
ongoing anti-Christ trend in America today.

Some years ago reference was made on a local editorial page to
“a super-duper, eager-beaver atheist” who “does not like Christianity” at all,
“and is out to destroy it. … In a national magazine [this atheist] is quoted as
thundering from her ‘pulpit’ ‘Churches are leeches. …’

“Now that she has moved on prayer and Bible reading in U.S. public schools,”
the editorial continues, “her next targets, it appears, are tax-exemptions for
churches, ousting chaplains from the armed services and omission of ‘God’
in courtroom oaths, on money and in the pledge of allegiance.”
(Norman Vincent Peale, Deseret News and Telegram, 3 July 1964.)

An article in a recent magazine advanced and argued the thesis that America
is no longer “the Christian land of the Pilgrims.”

In distinguishing communism from the United Order, President David O.
McKay said that communism is Satan’s counterfeit for the gospel plan, and
that it is an avowed enemy of the God of the land. Communism is the
greatest anti-Christ power in the world today and therefore the greatest
menace not only to our peace but to our preservation as a free people. By
the extent to which we tolerate it, accommodate ourselves to it, permit
ourselves to be encircled by its tentacles and drawn to it, to that extent we
forfeit the protection of the God of this land.

Relying on that part of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the
United States which reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an
establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the
United States Supreme Court has ruled against Bible reading and prayer
in public schools. By so doing, said President David O. McKay, “the
Supreme Court of the United States severs the connecting cord between
the public schools of the United States and the source of divine intelligence,
the Creator himself,” who, of course, is the God of this land
(Relief Society Magazine, Dec. 1962, p. 878).

Now, of course, we all believe and wholeheartedly support the separation of
church and state; but we must not let this wresting of the First Amendment,
nor communism, nor atheism, nor any other anti-Christ influence, weaken our
conviction that Jesus Christ is the God of this land nor diminish our
determination to obey his laws. On such conviction and such obedience hang
all our hopes so well expressed in Samuel F. Smith’s patriotic hymn:

Our fathers’ God to thee,

Author of liberty,

To thee we sing.

Long may our land be bright

With freedom’s holy light.

Protect us by thy might,

Great God, our King!

(Hymns, no. 115.)

That it may be so, I humbly pray.

Sometimes we may tend to forget that God saved this land for
the promised land. And as the song says God is the author of our
liberty as well as our protector and ling. It is through our faith,
our trust, our prayers and our loyalty to God that we are
granted our liberty and our protection of our promised land. 

We also need to remember that God has a hand in all who come
to this great and wonderful land. We are all God’s children and
we need our Father in Heaven and His Son Jesus Christ probably
more now and in the future than we ever have in the past. We
need to keep our prayers and our conversations coming to Him.

Our  Heavenly Father wants to hear from each of us. He wants
to share our troubles and our happy moments as well, just as
any good Father does. He wants only the best life for each one
of His children -- and that is each one of us. We will be blessed
with that life if we keep the commandments.

I hope and I pray that you and your family and friends have
found a way to be together even when you must be apart. I
realize that we need to do things differently, but it seems to
me that if we keep our heart, mind and soul focused on
Jesus Christ and on the will of our Heavenly Father we will
make it through it all.

It seems to me that if we learn nothing else from this
experience with the COVID 19 is that we should enjoy
spending quality time together and making so with what we
have. I know that our family is most important and it is our
jobs as parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to help our
family ;learn about Jesus Christ.

We need our Savior Jesus Christ and His gospel in our lives to
help us to have the knowledge that we need to return to live
with Him and our Heavenly Father someday, when our life is
over here on earth. I pray that you and your family and friends
will keep an open mind as you learn about the Gospel of
Jesus Christ.

Oh my it seems that our talk is over and I have been rambling
again! I pray that your and your family members and friends
have learned something new this day about the Fourth of July.
I also pray that you have had an enjoyable day together but separately if needed. Until. my next post, be safe and
Happy Fourth of July to All!!!