How many times it happens now! As I get older, I more often find myself exclaiming with aggravation that I've just come from the store and forgotten a necessary item. I must remember to write down my shopping list so that I don't forget the important things.
You may have experienced this too. Seems that as we get older, our brains get full...like a hard drive...and something must be deleted to make room for something new. Problem is, I don't want to get rid of anything...after all, aren't we the sum-total of all our experiences up to now? What if that seemingly unimportant event that happened so many years ago was actually pivotal in the development of our personality; in our morality; in our Self.
Some folks keep a journal or diary to keep from forgetting what's important. They're able to relive past moments and visit the clarity of that time...that state of mind.
In fact, isn't it true that throughout the ages we find anchor points of importance tethered to written works? I mean, we have a clear picture of the horror of Nazi invasion from the Diary of Anne Frank right? We get insight into the soaring ability of mankind to overcome adversity from The Miracle Worker.
But do most folks give our founding documents even that much credence? Here we are, a fairly young country...our Founding Fathers took great pains to ensure that the intentions for a new place, free from the tyranny, and empowered by the People, would succeed. They wrote it down.
Many of these Founders were deeply religious; some, not at all. But they made sure that the Declaration of Independence (from England) reminded government that the People were endowed with rights from our Creator...rights they had been denied under a Christian monarchy.
This reminder, that our rights are not given to us by other men, or governments, but are innately part of who we are as people, has been a truth down through our American generations. It guides us in the construction of laws and mores; in establishing appropriate behavior and the generosity to respect the rights of others.
How many folks today want to throw out this important truth!
Look around the world. What has happened in places where rights are granted to others by government or man. Or Nature? What's the natural order? Survival of the fittest, of course.
So, to those who believe that because they exist, they are owed something from others...let me remind them that if they cannot succeed on their own, the law of Nature says they must disappear. The law of social order says that the weak bees die. The law of man says they must be subjugated.
It's the laws of our Creator that insist we must rise above the Natural order. It's the beliefs of tolerance of our Judeo-Christian heritage that make it possible for us to accept that charity is the order from above.
The Bible / Torah are plainly important because it was written down...important events must be recorded for future generations...to know what happened, to understand the beliefs of our fathers, to improve upon the lot of mankind. Dark Ages are times when access to the written word is denied to people..and the knowledge of what came before, what should be next, is kept by those who mete out information to keep themselves in power.
I submit that if one studies the iron fist of China's growing military. If you smell squalor in cities where hope is lost. If you witness the ever-warring factions of the desert tribes of Africa, the slaughter of innocence and the violence committed against women and children...the starvation of a people to make them comply. These are cultures who do not believe in unalienable rights, or the protections afforded us by that tenet. These regimes are those who conquer in the name of some warlord.
Judeo-Christian culture, in its modern evolution through the influence of ancient Roman law, has been the basis of Western civilization, culminating in American exceptionalism...an new foundation of freedom and liberty on the Earth. God allowed Moses' people to wander in the bleakness of the desert for decades...testing their will to be obedient. To cast aside the graven image; forbidden practice. The reward followed after the trial...but it was only those who remained true who kept the blessings.
We have the prize! We have the treasure. We have the land of milk and honey.
We can only keep it through righteousness and willingness to fight for our Founders' hard-won victory over tyranny.
cross-posted at RedState.com
