All right, let's pray. Father, we just thank you for being such a great God. We thank you for adopting us as your kids. What a wonderful gift that was. And uh this morning we also thank you for this wonderful gift you've given us to be Americans and and to live in this great country. And so we thank you and we we praise you for that. Holy Spirit, please teach us this morning. Just ask that you would even translate what I say or what we talk about, and that each one of us could come away with with uh a word um from you. And so we just thank you and we trust you in Jesus. We just praise you and and we love you. And it's in your name that we pray. Amen. So this is an unusually great morning, I think, for us to to talk about um being a Christian and and America, and especially, I think, with an attitude of of thankfulness. And I don't really want to talk about politics. I get this thing, and I whenever I do this, I make people mad, so just get ready. But um my uh and I think it's the way I explain it, because I don't know that my perspective is that irritating. Either way, it's just really my opinion, so I'm not sure that it matters. But um I wish churches weren't quite so actively involved in politics. I I believe that Christians, we should be, man, we should be active, and we should be aggressive, and we should go for the candidates we believe in and do what we can and want to do to help them get elected, and I do that personally, I like it, you know, it's uh and and all that. But um, you know, as churches, there's a real balance, you know, because there's this idea of us being a Christian nation. And what makes us a Christian nation is not really um uh power and and and laws and those types of things. What makes us a Christian nation is that we're a nation of Christians. That's what that's that's how we are going to stay and and thrive as as a Christian nation. And so to that end, I think that we're a lot better off promoting fewer candidates and instead promoting Jesus, that he is the hope of the world. He is the hope for America, he is what even gives us the opportunity to be Christians and part of a great country like that. So I say all that so I can get that off my chest and I can just focus on what a great uh country America is, and and and I want to look at um a couple of uh of aspects of that. And the third the first really is just is the idea of thankfulness. And I've been thinking about this for a couple months, and it was really ever since um my niece and nephew um were sworn in as American citizens. Uh you might know that John and Stephanie Newby adopted um Valeria and David from Latvia. And so the uh it's such a huge thing uh for um for them. I mean, they they they get a wonderful, God gave them really now a wonderful mom, a wonderful dad, a uh a home, and people that that love them and and care about them and and are gonna take care of them. And then almost as an aside, they remember that part of the deal is they get to be American citizens. And what a gift is that. I mean, what a gift is that. It's something that people all over the world dream of having, to having the the freedom and the and the rights and all the thing that that things that come with being an American. In fact, we got a picture. That's them uh at their swearing in ceremony. Uh Emma's already a citizen, but uh Valerie is in the red and David in the blue. But uh it was such a big day, you know, and they uh um it was very emotional. There was a lot of people being sworn in, and they they had a slideshow and uh with uh Lee Greenwood singing, God bless America, you know, and everybody's crying, and uh and it's a big deal. And what had struck me is how much of a gift being an American is to me, and how it's just like, in a sense, it's just it's just a gift. It's not something I deserve, it's something that was thrown in by God. And um and I don't want to take that for granted, and and I want to be thankful, and we pray, you know, we ask God to bless us, and we ask God uh to bless each other. But just by living in America, we are some of the most blessed people that have ever lived in the history of creation, and it is such a um amazing and wonderful thing. The the first time it started to sink in, I think for me, was when um my son Andrew and I went to Uganda on a mission trip. Now we had been, Susan and I had traveled, but it wasn't exactly mission trips, you know, it was uh vacation trips. And and um but uh but we're over there and it's just so strikingly different. You know, Kampala, which is the main city, is just teeming with with uh people, and there's there's and and they're great people, and they're generally happy people. And uh, but it's just teeming with people and the roads are just rudded, you know, dirt roads, and even in the city, the electricity, a lot of places there isn't any. When there is, it's they have these rolling blackouts because they don't have enough power to generate, so it'll be like one day on, one day off. You you know, there may or may not be um running water. And then as you get outside the city, oh, and there's one other thing is that there's shops, these little um like uh entrepreneur type shops just line the cities and they've got uh and they're all different, but they have one thing in common. And the thing in common is that in front of every one of them there's a young man standing with a rival just to protect the shop and protect the people, and it's very different than than than here. And then you get outside uh Kampala, and we spend most of the time out more in rural areas and villages, and there's not even electricity um at all. And the uh you know the people live in in small uh huts or or I mean mostly huts, but that they've built by themselves, they've dug the bricks out of the ground and they big make these huts. And and to be rich is to own a goat. It's to uh to own a goat. And to be really rich is to have a bicycle. And we had interpreters or you know, translators, and they'd speak with Gandan Swahili, but the kids, no matter we were kind of like rock stars in the villages because most of the children had never seen a Mazunga, which is a white person. And so um and they just mopped us. It was really cool, and they wanted to touch our hair and and uh all that all that stuff, and and um the but anyway, the and so through the translators we talked to the kids and we talked to the adults and and and what almost all of them wanted to talk about was America. Is it true in America is everybody rich? Is it true that you can just go and buy whatever food you want? You know, is it is it true that that uh um that it's safe and you can be out at night and and all those types of things? And it is true. I mean, we have a different relativity, but but relative to them, everybody in America is rich. And the idea of go walking into a Publix or a Kroger or something and just picking whatever sounded good that day, even if you're using coupons, you know, I mean, it's just a uh it's it's it's an amazing thing. And it's an amazing opportunity. I came back and everything looked, you know, it wears off, you know how that is. But but but right when you come back, I cannot believe the roads. I mean, that the the we've got, you know, we could get in our car this afternoon if we want to and drive to Seattle, Washington on a safe, paved road, you know, and just having the safe, the the relative, you know, security and the peace and the freedom and the opportunity and the economic stability and all those things is a wonderful thing. And 1 Thessalonians 5 it says, be cheerful no matter what. Pray all the time, thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live. It's just to be cheerful and to be thankful. You know, the thank being thankful is talked about as one of the greatest forms of worship to God. Just being thankful. And I think that when we think about America and living in America, really are overwhelming. My overwhelming emotion and attitude should just be thankfulness. Just just uh pure thankfulness. What a what a gift to be here. And it's a gift from God, thankful to Him. You know, it's a gift from people, you know, the founders of the country, you know, it's uh people that have have died and and protected our country. You know, there's over 700,000 Americans that have died in battle, protecting our country. Right now, there's 23 million veterans living in America. How many veterans do we have this morning? If you're a veteran, would you and you don't mind, would you stand up really quick? No, you know we thank you. So we thank God and and and and we thank you. And we just have you know an overwhelming sense when we stop like we get to this morning and and just think about what a gift it is to be part of this uh country. I get um I get frustrated with Christians that talk as if America is just going to hell in a handbasket. Um because I don't believe it's true. It's not. You know, we we think that this country used to be so godly and now we're so heathen, and it's not true. This country's always been in process. There was a time in this country when abandoned children was a huge problem. You know, and so churches stepped in. They built orphanages all over the place to take care of children that were just being abandoned. You know, today not only do we adopt children in need here, but we get on waiting lists and stand in line to adopt children in need across the world. You know, this is this is a great country. And in many ways, we're becoming more godly, more pleasing to God. You know, oppression's a huge thing to God. I mean, for years and years, women were dramatically oppressed in this country. Now, you may or may not like to hear that, but it but it's true, and it's a big thing to God, because women are God's daughters, and He wants you to be respected, and He wants you to have your rights, and He wants you to be treated with equality. And all over the world, women look to America as just this twinkle of hope. Because still most places in the world, women are disrespected and women are oppressed, you know, and this is really a great country, and we're getting we're getting better. You know, same's true with uh with minorities. For years and years, um there was discrimination and oppression. I mean, and and it wasn't that long ago, you know, 30, 40 years ago. But, you know, it's getting better and better and better. And okay, this I probably okay, you know, politics aside, the fact that as a country we can elect an African American president is an amazing testament to how far that we've come. It really is. And in many ways, as a country, we're getting better and better and better. You know that Americans uh lead the world in giving? That per capita, as Americans, we give more than twice as much as any other country on earth. More than twice as much. And anytime there's a disaster across the world, we are dropping everything. And we're running to help. Because we care and we're loving. And it's part of the culture of America. And we've got some areas we've got to get better at. We've always had areas we've got to get better at. You know, we need to protect all life. We do. We've got to get better at that. We need to make sure God isn't removed from how we we govern and how we are as a country. Um, we've got to stop spending money and having these immoral deficits. I mean, there's things that that where we can just get better and better and better, but it's always been that way. And this is a great country. And I do not believe for a minute that God is just waiting to punish us and strike us and all that stuff. God is good, you know, and and he, I believe, providentially founded this country, and that he is not ready to punish us, he just keeps getting us back on track. And he and he blesses us so much, and he's gonna uh continue to bless us. And so our attitude, I really think, uh, should not be looking for the bad. The Bible says that we should be looking for the good and pointing out the good and thanking God for the good. And it's it really is an amazing country. And a good reason to be thankful. Okay, part of what made has made this country work is that as citizens we have rights. And uh I bring that up because really July 4th, you know, is the birth date, if you will, of the country, but but it's it's the it's that because it's the day the Declaration of Independence was uh was signed. And the Declaration of Independence is basically a letter that the colonies wrote to King George. And there's and the letter is hey, this is pretty drastic, but but it's gotten to a point where we have to do this. And here's why we have to do this. And so they itemized this whole list of grievances, if you will, um, that were forcing us to uh to declare our freedom. And what's most famous in this letter is the start of the second paragraph, it says, 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. And so what I want to talk about is does God really give us rights? Do we really have um rights? He does. He does. Our rights really do come from God. You know the Garden of Eden, which is a good place to always look back and see how God uh intended things and created things. God gave Adam and Eve life, he gave them freedom, and he allowed them to pursue happiness. And they didn't make the right choices, but he gave them that freedom. They had those rights. And as followers of Jesus, we can be really conflicted about whether or not we actually have rights. Um, I mean, didn't Jesus give up his rights? Aren't we following him? Don't we give up our rights? And so I want to talk about that for a few minutes and not to embolden anyone who's always going around demanding their rights, but actually to encourage anyone that is being mistreated or taken advantage of. To stand up for yourself and assert the rights that God has given you and that we're legally protected of as Americans. Now, if there's confusion about whether or not we have personal rights as Christians, it starts suddenly uh Sermon on the Mount. Now, Jesus said, You've heard the law says that the punishment must match the injury, an eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth. But I say, do not resist an evil person. If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also. If you're sued in court and your shirt is taken from you, give your coat too. If a soldier demands that you carry his gear for a mile, carry it two miles. Give to those who ask, and don't turn away from those who want to borrow. Now to understand the Sermon on the Mount, you know, the Sermon on the Mount is the most famous teaching, I think, that that Jesus did. It's also probably the most misunderstood teaching that Jesus did. Because to understand it, you had to understand that Jesus is talking to two different groups of people at the same time. And when we're reading it as it is written, we don't see, and you can tell when we look that he is going back and forth. He's speaking to normal people like us during part of the Sermon on the Mount, and then he's speaking to the religious leaders and the Pharisees and the self-righteous on other parts of the Sermon on the Mount. So he talks to uh I'll say normal people. And he says, God blesses you when you're humble. He says, God blesses you when you're merciful. God blesses you when you work for peace. He says, I haven't come to abolish the law, I've come to fulfill its purpose. And the whole purpose of the law was to show us that we need Jesus. That was the whole purpose of the old law, was to get us to the point where we can see Jesus as our Savior. And so then he turns his attention to the Pharisees. He says, if you're going to be saved by your righteousness, you'll have to do a lot better than these Pharisees. You'll have to far exceed these Pharisees. He says, You've heard that the law says, Don't murder, I say don't be angry. You've heard that the law says don't commit adultery, I say don't look at a woman lustfully. In fact, you should pluck out your right eye to make sure that you don't. And not only that, you should cut off your right hand to make sure that you don't do anything wrong. And then Jesus goes on to say, next, you've heard that the law says the punishment must match the injury, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. But I say, do not resist an evil person. If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer your other cheek. If you're sued in court and your shirt is taken, give your coat two. If a soldier demands you carry his gear for a mile, carry it two miles. Give to those who ask. Don't turn away from those who want to borrow. So, how many Christian men are walking around with one eye and one hand? Not many. Why? Because Jesus did not mean that literally. It was not literal. You know, you ask the questions. Do you take the Bible literally? Yes, the parts that are literal, we absolutely take literally. But there's other parts. There's parts that are metaphorical. There's parts that are making a point. There's parts that are poetry. I mean, there's all different parts of the Bible. And the parts that are literal, we take literally and we apply literally. This isn't one of them. Jesus is making a point to the Pharisees. I mean, is anger the same as murder? Well, it's not. It's only the same as murder if you think that you're righteous with God because you don't murder. Well, in that case, maybe there's a context there. But it's not the same. Lust isn't the same as adultery. Jesus is making a point that's saying, hey, see these self-righteous people? If you're going to be saved by your own righteousness, man, you're going to have to up the bar really high. And this is what it is. He didn't mean that literally. He doesn't want us to pluck out our eyes. He doesn't want us to cut off our hands. And if somebody punches you in the face, you do not have to turn and let them punch you in the other side of the face. If someone sues you for 10 grand and you lose, you don't have to pay him 20 grand. He wasn't being literal. And the whole Sermon on the Mount is that way. He goes back and forth. He tells normal people about the golden rule. He tells the religious people to stop showing off in front of everybody. He goes back to normal people and says, listen. Stop worrying. God's going to take care of you. He loves you. He'll take care of you. And he loves you. And you're important to him. And he wants you taken care of. And he's given you rights. You have a right to be protected. You have a right to live free. You have a right to pursue happiness. Because you're created by God. You have inherent value as his creation. We have those rights because they come from God. We have those rights legally because we're Americans. And so we exercise our rights with love and with compassion. And sometimes we don't exercise our rights. We choose not to. And we have forgiveness and all those things. But we don't throw away the rights that God's given us. Now the Apostle Paul understood what Jesus taught and what Jesus meant as much as anyone. Paul was a pretty unique guy. He was a Jewish scholar, well respected, you know, amongst the Jews, but he was also a Roman citizen. Excuse me, that's uh it was really unusual. Not many Jewish people were Roman citizens. But Paul was a was a Roman citizen. Rome was an occupying force. And so the Jewish people were allowed to, you know, live, but they didn't have rights. Roman citizens had special rights. Some of their rights were similar to our rights as Americans. You know, they they couldn't be they had a right to a free trial, and they couldn't be punished without one. And if someone mistreated a Roman citizen, the punishment to them was really severe. So Paul was a Roman citizen. And the thought is that his dad was probably a Roman soldier. Um, because he says that he was a Roman citizen by birth, that is probably his dad married a Hebrew girl, and and they were converted, and he was raised in a Jewish family. Um Paul was good at a lot of things. One of the things he was really good at was starting riots. He uh he actually kind of had a knack for it. Um he would uh he would start riots for all sorts of reasons. You know, sometimes it would be he'd be talking about uh God being the one true God, and people are making idols get all mad, and the next thing you know, um and mobs are a little more common over there, but uh next thing you know, there's a mob, and then there's a riot. Or or he could be talking about um um God and then palm readers and groups that you know he was costing them money. They'd get mad and there'd there'd be riots. Sometimes it'd be the Jewish people. He'd be talking about his experience with Jesus, and people would get mad. Next thing you know, um there'd be a riot. So what happens? The Roman soldiers would come and they say, Who started it? Everybody stops and they point to Paul. And so uh next thing you know, Paul's in jail. And it happened to him actually quite a um quite a bit. In Acts 16, he and his uh buddy Silas had uh gotten arrested and got beaten by uh soldiers, and uh it's kind of this this whole thing happens uh overnight. But then the city officials figured, well, that's probably good enough, and they're probably straightened out, so so they go to uh to let them go. And in Act 16, it says the next morning the city officials sent the police to tell the jailer, let those men go. So the jailer told Paul, these the city officials have said you and Silas are free to leave, go in peace. But Paul replied, they have publicly beaten us without a trial and put us in prison, and we are Roman citizens. So now they want us to leave secretly? Certainly not. Let them come themselves to release us. You see, Paul was saying, I have rights. I'm a Roman citizen. You can't just beat me and then let me go. And so when the police reported this, the city officials were alarmed to learn that Paul and Silas were Roman citizens. So they came to the jail and apologized to them. And then they brought them out and begged them to leave the city. The apostle Paul says, I'm a Roman citizen. He stood up for himself. He said, I have these rights. Releasing isn't enough. I want an apology. The mayor can come and give me an apology. And that's what they did. Now, not long after that, Paul's telling a group about how he got saved on the road to Damascus. And the group gets really angry. Turns into a mob, turns into a riot. Roman soldiers come to break it up, they ask who started it. They all point to Paul. Paul's in jail. This is Acts 22. And the commander brought Paul inside and ordered him lashed with whips to make him confess his crime. He wanted to find out why the crowd had become so furious. When they tied Paul down to lash him, Paul said to the officer standing there, Is it legal for you to whip a Roman citizen who hasn't even been tried? When the officer heard this, he went to the commander and asked, What are you doing? This man is a Roman citizen. So the commander went over and asked Paul, Tell me, are you a Roman citizen? Yes, I certainly am, Paul replied. I am too, the commander muttered. It cost me plenty. Paul answered, but I am a citizen by birth. The soldiers who were about to interrogate Paul quickly withdrew when they heard he was a Roman citizen. And the commander was frightened because he had ordered him bound and whipped. Paul said, You cannot mistreat me this way. He said, I am a Roman citizen, and I have rights. And so it was not ungodly, was it, for Paul to stick up for himself? To say, hey, I've been given these rights. And it's not unchristian for us to say, you know, you can't do this to me. You can't harm me. You can't mistreat me. I'm an American citizen. I have certain rights. Now the story with Paul keeps going like that, because they want to send him to Jerusalem, and he's afraid that if they do, he's going to get uh killed, and so he appeals his whole case to Caesar. It's like appealing it to the Supreme Court, sorta. And so he's got that right. And so instead they uh they send him to Rome because that's what he had uh what we had wanted. And when we follow Jesus, we don't give up our basic rights. In fact, if anything, we appreciate them any more because we start to understand where they really come from. And here's the the type of thing that I'm I'm thinking of. See, we've had women here that are really conflicted because they're owed child support. And they don't want to be unforgiving, and they want to be like Jesus, and they don't want the ex necessarily to get into a lot of trouble, and so they don't know what to do. And so if they ask me, I point them to Paul. You have rights. You have rights. Do what you need to do. God changes people's hearts, and he especially changes them in jail. And so it um it could be a win-win, you know. But but we should. It's good to stick up for yourself. You know, yes, Jesus was taken advantage of. Yes, Jesus was mistreated, but he didn't mean for that to be our fate every day of our lives. He created with value and he gave us gifts. And he gave us rights. And so we should value those rights, and we shouldn't just give them away, you know? And we shouldn't trade them away for security. Um every now and then we just might need them. We just might need them. We should keep our rights, we should lovingly, with compassion, exercise our rights. And we should thank God for them because they do come from Him. They do come from Him. So if the worship team will come up, we're gonna stop here in a minute. Does God give us rights? Yes. Jesus Himself gave us the most important right of all. In John 1, verse 10, it says, He came into the very world he created, but the world didn't recognize him. He came to his own people, and even they rejected him. But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. Now that is an amazing, unalienable, God-given right. If we accept him and believe him, we have the right to become children of God. And you know, it's it talked about Valerie and David. Paul gets to Rome and he's in he's in jail for for several years, waiting, awaiting trial, and he writes uh a letter to um some people in Philippi, and in it he says something pretty remarkable, because he said, you know, I'm a Roman citizen, I'm a Roman citizen, I'm a Roman citizen, I'm a Roman citizen. And he's in Rome, in jail, and he writes to these people, and he says, My citizenship is in heaven. My citizenship is heaven, and that's the bigger perspective, the broader perspective. And just like Valerie and David got adopted into God's, or I mean into John and Steph's family, but then they got to be citizens of America? God adopts us into his own family, and we get to be citizens of heaven. And it's something that's maybe just an afterthought, but it's an amazing thing. I mean, what if we didn't have eternal life? What if God, the creator of the universe, just adopted us for this life and said, I'll be with you, I'll take care of you. What an amazing thing that would be. But no, with it, we get an even bigger citizenship, a more important citizenship. We're citizens of heaven. And with that comes eternal life. We don't have to fear death. It's an amazing thing. We have an amazing God. And you have that right. If you have not accepted Jesus as your Savior, man, exercise that right. Accept Him, believe Him. Become a child of God. He will fill you and strengthen you, and He will lead you, and He will take care of you, and He will provide for you, and He does love you. And besides all that, we get to be citizens of heaven. It's an amazing thing. We've got an amazing God. So let's uh let's stand and let's pray. I want to make sure that we uh just take a minute and really thank God for this country and and and for our leaders and for all that He's given us. So, Father, we just praise you. Thank you for being such a great God. Thank you for giving us so many things. Thank you for giving us through your son the right to be your children. We just praise you for that. And we accept that gift. And we're proud and thankful to be your children. We're proud and thankful to have you as our Father. We thank you for this country. We thank you for getting to be part of this just remarkable experiment, I guess, of human self-governance and looking to you. And we thank you for how your your hand has been providentially on this country. And we thank you for how you've blessed us and blessed this country and made it a light really for the whole world. And we praise you for that. We thank you for the people that have protected this country. And we ask you to supernaturally bless them, to repay them for their love for us, their bravery and their courage and their self-sacrifice. And we thank you for them. And we pray for our leaders. Father, we we we ask you to be with uh with President Obama and with Michelle and with their daughters, and that you would just keep them safe, and that you would speak to him. And when he gets off track, God, that you would guide him on track, and that you would give him your supernatural wisdom, and and and and you would just draw our whole country on the path that you would want us to be. Mostly we want to be a nation that that follows you, a nation that's given our hearts to Jesus. People look on the outside, God, but you look at our hearts. And so draw people's hearts to you in this country. We ask you to be with all our leaders. That you would stir up their hearts to follow you. And we do thank you, Father, for this most important right. And Jesus, we thank you for making that possible, this right to be your children. We praise you and we love you. In Jesus' name. Amen.