Making America Grateful Again

Well, lately, lately and I guess for the last several months, we've heard a lot of talk about America. And a lot of talk that may make us think when we hear it, what land are we living in? Because many of the things that I hear about America seem very foreign to me.

And we hear things about what a bad country America is, what a bad people we are, and how racist we are, and how intrusive we are in other people's lives, in other countries' lives. And I look around and I certainly understand that America has made a lot of mistakes, as any nation has made mistakes in its time. But I look around America and I think, well, there's a lot of good that America has done, too. There has been no nation on Earth that has been more generous than America.

There's no nation that has ever done as much for other countries of the world as America. There's no nation on Earth that has provided a livelihood and an opportunity for people to grow and develop their potential like America. There's a lot of good that America has done, even though there's a lot of wrong that America has done. We could all sit here and list all the faults of America, but we could go to any government, any nation in the world, any of them.

And I daresay we would find even more faults with that nation, and maybe less good things that they have done, and nations that have been less of a benefit to the world. So this week, this week, we have Thanksgiving. I've listened to the news like you listen to the news, and I hear media and governors around the country saying, Forget Thanksgiving this year. Stay home. Don't celebrate. Don't gather with people. It's a totally foreign time that we live in.

Who would have thought a year ago that Thanksgiving was coming that we would be hearing? Don't congregate with other people. Just stay at home with your people. And I think that's the way you're there, and kind of putting fear in the minds of people about even this holiday, which is supposed to be a time that people stop and thank God for the blessings that we've had in this country. But it's the times that we live in. There's never been a time like the time we live in now.

There probably will never be a time like the times that we lived in leading up to this time. We've been here for the decades and centuries of this country that we've enjoyed in the past like now.

And we look to a future that's very uncertain and looks very much when you hear all the voices and all the hate and all the contempt on each side and all the different directions that people would like to see the country go in. A time that looks ahead that's very, very ominous in a way. And we look into the Bible and we see that an ominous future lies ahead for all of us.

This week is Thanksgiving. And this week, when on Thanksgiving, I'm going to choose to be very thankful and grateful to God for the opportunity that I've had to live in this country. Because with all of its faults and all of its problems, I tell you there is no place else on Earth I would rather have lived during my lifetime. I've had a couple of...we've had the opportunity to travel to foreign nations during feast times. I've had a couple of my kids who have studied abroad, you know, during college and other places who thought, oh, they'd very much like to live in this culture or that culture, and they come home.

Now, we come home every time, and many of you who have traveled in foreign areas, you come back and you say, there's no place like America. As nice as some of these places might be, there is no place like America on the face of the Earth today. Now, we as a people have a lot, a lot to be grateful for. And sometimes we just need to stop and think about what it is that God has given us and the opportunities that we've had to live in this land in this time. Frankly, I would not want to live at any other time in history.

I would not want to live in any other country. I would not want to live under any other kingdom except God's kingdom that is yet to come than I do right now.

You know, I ran across a slogan or a little thing on the internet, wasn't looking for it, and I thought, well, that's really clever. And I think it has to do with a group. And when I say a word, you'll know what group it is that was kind of promoting itself, a band type thing that is no longer, I guess, in existence now.

And I thought, well, that's kind of clever. You know, we've heard a lot of talk the last four and five years about making America great again. Maybe it's time that we start, and I'd love to see some politician or someone stand up and say, let's make America grateful again. And I checked it, and it's not copyrighted, so I can say that. But maybe it's time for America and everyone in America, on both sides of the fence, and the fences are getting higher and higher, the wall between, to stop and think about what we've had and what's been worked in this country, to maybe think about God and what He's given us in this country and stop thinking all about ourselves and what the power is that we want or the things that we want or how things get done our way.

Maybe it's time that someone stands up and says, be grateful for what you have. Start thinking about the positive, and let's not hear about all these other things, because, frankly, you don't even know where you're planning to take this. You know, sometimes when we hear about some of the things that are going on. So this time, this time I'm going to pause.

I'm going to be thankful and I'm going to be grateful to God for the fact that I've lived in this country during this time in my lifetime. Because you know what? I don't know what next Thanksgiving will be. I don't know that we'll ever have an America that was the way it was up until the time this Thanksgiving. It may be a tarred, different Thanksgiving next year than it was this year from what we had last year. I don't think anyone would have seen, you know, in one year's time, the bitterness, the animosity, the violence, everything that you name that has become part of this country.

And it doesn't look like it's going away. Who knows what next year will bring? Only God knows what next year will bring. But I'm very grateful to have been here. I want to talk about just a few things today. And I could talk about the things. It's been nice to have a land that we live in and all the blessings that God's given us. We could list the fact that we haven't had famines, that none of us have really, I don't think, ever had a day of involuntary hunger.

I don't think we have involuntary want for anything. We live in a land that we have just been richly blessed. We have homes, we have cars, we have grocery stores, we have clothes, we have everything. Even those who may say they have been underprivileged in some areas still have a lot, and a lot more than they would be if they were living in another country. And we need to stop and think of that, and a lot more than people all in the 6,000 years of mankind's history have had before us.

We live in a blessed time. And even though I may not say it over and over and over again, I know and you know, it's because of God's blessing on this country that we live the way we do. So we could talk about all the physical blessings, but there's something at the core of all of it that we need to remember and be very thankful for. There's one word. One word, you know, that word is liberty. Liberty. Because it's the liberty that this country brought to the world.

A new concept, because all the thousands of years before America came and that Constitution was set up, it was a world that was dominated by monarchies, tyrannies, kings who lord it over people. None of us appreciate that, and no one alive today knows what it's like in America. Now, maybe people in Russia, maybe people in China, maybe people in some other parts of the world, like North Korea, they understand what it's like to have a dictator and a king who tells you what you're going to do, when you're going to do it, where you're going to work, what you're going to worship, how your life is going to be.

None of us have any clue what that's like, because we've lived in a land that was an experiment, if you will, and I believe blessed by God, where liberty was part of the foundation of this country. It was something that hadn't been tried before, and it literally changed the world. Before that, you had thousands of years of kings who would tell you, basically, they wanted to be worshipped. If you're going to worship something, worship me. It was all about power. It's all about what they want.

It's all about what they did. And you were relegated to a class. If you were born as a farmer, chances are, no matter how brilliant you were, you were going to be a farmer, because that was the class you stayed in.

There was no movement unless, by accident, somehow you came to someone's attention. People didn't develop. People didn't become the people that they could have become, as they lived in a very oppressed and suppressed society. But then came America. Then came America. Let me read you a transcript, or a section here, from a book by the name of the Age of Democratic Revolution. It was written by R.R. Palmer. He says, There is little doubt that the American Revolution of the 1770s and the formation of a republic in the 1780s served as a profound example to all European observers.

Hundreds of books, pamphlets, and public lectures analyzed, romanticized, and criticized the American rebellion against Great Britain.

American independence fired the imagination of aristocrats who were unsure of their status, while at the same time giving the promise of ever greater equality to the common man. The American example served as a great lesson. Tyranny could be challenged. Man did have inalienable rights. New governments could be constructed. The American example then shed a brilliant light. As one French observer remarked in 1789, This vast continent, which the seas surround, will soon change Europe and the universe. And indeed, it did. It swept. Liberty was the key word during that time. The world was changing. They saw what was happening in America, and people around the world began to look at it and say, Why not us? Why does one man who happened to have a birthright, or a birth order, or a birth claim on a throne have the right to tell us what we're going to do and relegate us to his thoughts, his ideas, his will? Is that what life was all about? Well, for billions of people who lived, that's what life was about. Until the 1700s, 1800s, the 1900s, and the 21st century. And this country led the way in it. None of us, absolutely none of us, understand. And I mean none of us in this room, and no one in this country today. Maybe some of those who emigrated from, you know, Cuba. Maybe some of those from some of the socialist countries. Maybe some of them from the communist countries. Understand what it's like to live under that regime. No one that was born in America understands that at all.

And I dare say if they did, and if they talked to some people, they would say, you don't want to live there. You don't want to live there. You know, for all of America's problems, there's so many people who want to live here. So many people who want to live here that we have problems even in that area. But you know, as America began to emerge, as America, the country began to emerge, things began to explode. Again, don't discount God's blessing. I'm not ignoring that. But things began to explode in America. All of a sudden you had a country that was producing. You had a people that people were emigrating to. You had a people that could come over and they could develop their talents. They could get an education. They could do things that they never thought they could do. You know, my own grandfather on my father's side, why did he leave Hungary, Austria, or Eastern Europe where he left? He left his family behind and came all the way over here just for the opportunity to get out of the kingdom that he was in there with a new one coming into power because he didn't want to live under that austerity and learn a new language that was going to be pushed down their throats. Or for some other reasons as well. And he got over here and he didn't become an elite. He didn't go to college. But you know what? His life was so much better here than it was over where he was before. And I look at, you know, you look at the other people, so many of them could say that same thing. They left here and then they came here. And they had a life. They had a life and they could do things here that they could never have done before. Because liberty allows people to do things. To become something other than what they were born into. It is something that is a very positive thing. And the Constitution that our fathers framed, based on the Bible, based on the Bible, it did begin a country that has resulted in the greatest, most wealthy nation the world has ever seen. Progressively increasing to the point that we are today, where now we have so much, all we can do is talk negative things about it. Let me read a couple of the, couple of quotes here from some of our founding fathers on the Constitution and how it was put together. Because it was put together on principles that the country does not espouse much today. In 1778, James Madison, who was the fourth president, said, We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government. Far from it. We have staked the future upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to sustain ourselves, according to the Ten Commandments of God. Can you imagine any president saying that today? So foreign! So foreign to what any politician would say today. And yet, these were the people who were there that were putting the Constitution together. The government that was going to govern this people that came from England, they came from suppressive states, people that were held back and weren't able to do anything. People like Patrick Henry, who saw liberty as so important, said, Give me liberty or give me death. That's how important it was to him. In 1832, Noah Webster said, The principles of all genuine liberty and of wise laws and administrations are to be drawn from the Bible and sustained by its authority. That's after the Constitution was written, after the country had been operating for a while. And George Washington said, Without faith, there is no freedom. Without God, there is no liberty. And isn't that true?

So liberty has always marked America. Liberty and the right to do things. Taking the yoke off people so that they were free to develop their potential. Didn't happen in other countries. Didn't happen for 6,000 years. Free to develop their potential. Free to get an education. Free to become what they could become. To explore their talents. Do what they can be.

And it's set on fire, an economic engine that the world has never seen the likes of and probably will not see the likes of again. That's what happens when you take the yoke off people. That's what liberty does. It was a new thing in the world then. And it came about here in this country. And it teaches us something that we even hear in the news once in a while today. If you bound people by regulations and throttle them, you know, everything just sort of stagnates. But when you allow commerce to go, when you take the yokes off of people and give them liberty, things can fly. God created all of us with talents. God created all of us with the ability to do things. In this land, in this country, in this time that you and I have been privileged to live in, we've had the opportunity to do that. Our forefathers and the people that came before us have no idea, have no idea of the lives that we live. They have no idea even what they might have been capable of because they just were never given the opportunity to do that. Turn with me back to Luke, Luke 4.

Jesus Christ spoke of liberty when he stood up in the temple one day early in his ministry, and he talked about it. And when we go back and look at the chapter in Isaiah that he was quoting from, we see some of the principles and the results of what has happened in this land that I'm thankful that I've had the opportunity to live in. In Luke 4, verse 18, he stood up and he read from Isaiah 61, he said, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. You know, the masses, the masses in life have been poor. They've been suppressed. They have had to live life, you know, from what I grow to what I eat. They haven't had the things that you and I have at our disposal.

He's anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, and of course that's speaking spiritually poor as well. He sent me to heal the brokenhearted. I wonder what it was like to live in the 1200s, in the 1300s, in the 1400s. I wonder what life would have been like. I wonder if I would have woken up in the morning and been happy to do the job I was doing. I wonder if I would have thought that's all it is and life was just a chore and you just kind of live and then die.

And that's all it is. My job is to do this, and I have absolutely nothing I can progress into. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives. Now, we know Jesus Christ is talking here about proclaiming liberty because sin is a yoke on us. Correct? Isaiah 58 tells us, in the fasting chapter, pray fast that the yoke can be taken off of you because sin holds us down. Sin suppresses us that we can never realize the spiritual potential that God has for us when we remain sinners and when we sin. And our own human selves, we don't have the power to take that yoke off. We are powerless against sin. We are powerless against Satan. It takes God's Holy Spirit for that to happen. And until that yoke is removed, until God, through His Spirit, takes that yoke off, we are people that are just floating through life. Maybe we're the presidents of company. Maybe we're the presidents of nations. But we have absolutely no idea what our potential is because God has created potential in man, as we've been talking about in the Bible studies, that mankind doesn't even realize, you and I realize, but because He's opened our eyes and because we have led Him through His Holy Spirit, teach us, train us, lead us to repentance, take the yoke of sin off of us, and realize we can't be captive to that anymore because it limits us and it will prevent us from becoming everything we, or everyone we could become. He sent me, He says, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind. How blind are so many people? Now, we look around even away, apart from spiritual principles today, and I listen to words. I listen to broadcasts. I listen to the news. And I find myself thinking, how blind are people? How silly are people? How unforesightful are people? And recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed. The masses, for 6,000 years, were oppressed. You had a ruling class, you had a king, even those in His court that might have thought they've risen to the height of what they could become, they were oppressed. They couldn't say any words that they wanted to say. They had to make sure that everything they did, everything they sought, thought, everything they said in private, had to be right in line with what the king is, because the moment the king heard that you disagreed with him, or had an opinion, off could come your head, there could go your position, you're relegated back to whatever position in life you came from. That's the life they lived. Christ was well aware of it. To set at liberty those who are oppressed. And, of course, He was speaking of it from a spiritual aspect as well. These people, they need to have sin, they need Satan the way, they need to understand the future, they need to have their eyes open to what God has done, and no longer oppressed, because God isn't a God of oppression. He's not a God of captives. He's a God of liberty. Jesus Christ said it twice, three times in this, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, who proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. He came. He came to earth. He made that statement. He sat down. And people were astonished at His words. What did He mean by liberty? And what did He mean that today you've heard this fulfilled in my hearing, or in your hearing?

Let's go back to Isaiah 61, from where He quoted.

And you can read through verses 1 and 2 there and see that, you know, exactly the same words that Jesus Christ read are exactly what's written there in Isaiah 61 and verses 1 and 2. But let's pick up the rest of verse 3. And remember, as people in the Endowed times, when they would hear a portion of Scripture, they knew the Bible so well, the following Scriptures just actually just came into their minds. So these verses in 3 and 4 that we'll read, they understood when Christ read it that those followed. In verse 3 it says, you know, well, He says in verse 3, to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes.

I come to proclaim liberty to the captives. I come to set the oppressed free. They need to know what their potential is. They need to be able to do that. And look what the words He uses here. I'm going to give them, and this life, I'll give them beauty for ashes. Their life has been miserable. It'll be beautiful when they have true liberty. When they have true liberty, they'll have the oil of joy instead of mourning. It's a very positive thing, right? They'll have the garment of praise instead of the spirit of heaviness. That's a positive thing. That they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified. And all we do, to kind of remember, God is the one who blessed us. Our forefathers know that. Abraham Lincoln, you've heard that quote so many times. How Thanksgiving was even set up, and Abraham Lincoln fully understood. The blessings we have in this country, there's no other explanation. It's not because we're so smart and we're so great. It's because God blessed this country. Because of the obedience of Abraham and the promise that He made to him. And then look in verse 4, what happens? As the oppression is taken away. As people have the freedom to become what they need to become. To experience what God had created them to be. Physically and spiritually, He's talking about here, of course. And they shall rebuild the old ruins. There's energy. There's a rebuilding that's going on. There's commerce. There's people interested in what's going on. They shall rebuild the old ruins. They shall raise up the former desolations. They shall repair the ruined cities, the desolations of many generations. You see energy. You see vibrance. You see commerce. You see people building. And you see people wanting to do that. When you take the yokes off, people begin to do things. When the yoke was taken off from all the tyrannies that dominated the world up until the 1700s, you begin to see building happen. You begin to see commerce. You begin to see economies. You begin to see people doing things that they never thought that they could do. And so they wanted to come to a place where they could develop and become who God wanted them to become or who they thought they could become in a free land where they could develop their potential. There was no place else on earth like this. That's why probably many of your ancestors came from wherever they came from, because they wanted to be in a land like this. That's why my grandfather came here. He didn't want to be where he was before. He wanted to be in this country. And so many, and so many like him, because there was and there is no place else on earth like this. And no matter what people say, and believe me, I can list the problems of this country, too. Is it a morally strong country? Absolutely not. I can list from here, for the rest of the day, if we wanted to, the faults in this country. But I'm telling you, even with all the faults, there is no place on earth like America today. No place else that I would rather live. Because when I look at the blessings that we have and the things that we've enjoyed, this is the place to be. This is the place to be. If we're looking at it realistically with wide open eyes, not a perfect place, certainly a place that's so much, and has moved so far from what the country was in the 1718s and early 1900s. Can't defend that at all. Can't defend some of the things that I see happen with people. Not saying that at all, not saying everything is good, but if there's a place on earth, I would challenge anyone to tell me you would rather live anywhere else than here.

So, we have this freedom that we've had, and we'll talk of a couple of concepts of freedom here. Where is it today? Do people in America still see freedom and liberty as a benefit, or is it just kind of one of those age-old concepts that now we've just taken for granted, and, hey, we see these problems, and so we're going to focus in on that, and it must be the freedom, it must be the liberty that's caused the problems. Where is America today? Is there anyone in America saying today, give me liberty or give me death? For instance, is there anyone in America that's willing to give their lives, as the forefathers did, to have a nation that would be able to be where people could be, and the people rather than the king dictated what you do. That you would have freedom of speech, we'll talk about that, freedom of religion, we'll talk about that. And in a land where that isn't happening, and where a land where people have so far departed from God, is it even possible, is it even possible for that liberty to be sustained? Because, you know, it wasn't until there was a constitution in a country that God blessed, a constitution that was based on the Bible, and principles that people lived by in there, they might not have known the Sabbath, they might not have known the Holy Days, but they understood the moral principles of the Bible, and they abided by those, and the land was blessed, and people were able to live in liberty as they lived by those standards.

Let me read from one of our forefathers here, John Adams. He said this, he said, The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue, and this needs to be inspired into the people in a greater measure than they have it now. He said this in 1776. They may change their rulers, and they may change their forms of government, but without virtue, they will not obtain a lasting liberty. Isn't that interesting that he would say that?

You have to live by some moral principles that people were living by then, were they living it perfectly? Absolutely not. Can we take exceptions out and say, This person did this, and this person did that? Absolutely we can. In any case that we do with human beings. But at that time, that was what was being espoused in America. Samuel Adams said this, If virtue and knowledge are diffused among the people, they will never be enslaved.

If they're living, if they're disciplining themselves, if they're living by a standard that is the right standard, they won't be slave. They discipline themselves. This will be their great security. Benjamin Franklin said, Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. So we look at the world we live in today.

Corruption. It's one of the key words. We could all talk about corruption in any way, shape, and form. Both sides of the fence, no one except from it. We live in a corrupt land. I think the blinders will be taken off. We see how much more corrupted it is. We live in a vicious land. We live in a violent land. You look at the videos that we see on TV, of people that are fighting and that using baseball bats and hitting each other.

I mean, it's just like ridiculous. It's like we live. It's like we're living in some of those third world countries that we've seen the pictures before. How can people live that way? But it's happening right here in this country. Why? Virtue is disappearing. The Bible is disappearing. As people depart from God, our forefathers had it right. They can't. They're going to need more masters. They need tyranny.

If they can't rule themselves, if they're not living by a standard, they have to have someone make that standard for them. I remember Vladimir Putin saying years ago, and I thought it was an interesting comment that he made, that America just doesn't understand his people. That his people need a strong ruler. They need someone to tell them what to do. I thought that was an interesting comment, but I thought, I think you know what you're talking about. I think you know that a liberty didn't work over there when they tried it in Russia. But they had no basis in virtue. They had no basis in the Bible. For years, they had no religion because tyranny has no religion.

When you have communism, when you have big government, religion goes out the window, government becomes religion. And we see that in the Bible, right? All we have to do is look at Revelation 13. We see what's coming down the pike, a time where there will be a tyrant, and there will be a religious figure who dictates everything you do, everything you think, every Sabbath you keep. And if you don't comply, and if you don't abide by that, then you're as good as dead. Because your life will be absolutely ridiculous. That's oppression in its purest sense. That's what's coming down the pike.

That's what people before this generation, in this last few hundred years, lived with all their lives. This nation was founded on principles that you and I understand, and we understand much more about the Bible than Benjamin Franklin and John Adams and Samuel Adams and the other people that we quoted. We understand what liberty is. True liberty. They understand that in a physical sense. We understand that in a spiritual sense. We turned over to 2 Corinthians 3.

In verse 17, So as now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. So you and I, we experience liberty. We understand it, in a physical sense and in a spiritual sense. We get it. If God's Spirit is leading us and governing us, we don't need someone holding something over our head day and night and saying, do this and do that and do this.

We live that because we believe it, and it's become us. But in this land that is departing so, so, so far from God, that it's unbelievable, actually. Some of the laws have been enacted, and some of the positions that people take, and you look at our morals and things that we couldn't even dreamt of 10 years ago would become the standard, and you could lose your job because you don't agree with this idea or that idea. Who would have ever thought that could have happened in America, that America would have ever embraced some of those things?

Now, in a time when people lose virtue, when they lose the concepts of what it is, tyranny is the only answer. Tyranny lies ahead. But this Thanksgiving, I'm going to be thankful, and I'm going to thank God a lot, that I've lived in this time and in a country that I had the liberty to do the things, because, frankly, I've been able to do things here that I know I never would have been able to do if I were born in the 14, 15, 1600s. I have no idea what I would have been, but I know I wouldn't have been able to do what I did today.

I know I wouldn't have been able to travel different places. I know I wouldn't have been able to progress through a career that I have. I know I wouldn't have been able to do many, many things. My life would have been so different, it would have been absolute agony when I think about it. And so would yours. So would yours have been. And so will people be, with the time ahead of us that the Bible prophesies, because we've left God and because we've forgotten Him, and because we're not even a little grateful as a people to Him for what He's provided for us.

Now, there are so many different parts of freedom. Let's talk about freedom of religion for a while. We could go on all day about the freedoms that we enjoy. Let's talk about freedom of religion.

You know, when the people came over here from England, many of them fled because of what? They wanted to practice the religion that they believed. They didn't want the king telling them, I believe this, therefore you believe it. The Bible had been opened up. People could now read it on their own. There was a Protestant Reformation in Europe, and the Catholic Church was being exposed for what it is. That it wasn't teaching the Bible. And as people read the Bible, they wanted to live the way of the Bible.

They couldn't do that in many of their countries because they were told, this is the way you believe. King believes it, therefore everyone believes it. Again, go back and read Revelation 13. That's what's ahead. Because the world's going back to that, that's where it's been, until religious freedom was part of this country. They knew what it was like, and they made sure, as this country was built, that it was going to... People could come and worship as they see fit.

So today we have how many different religions in America? We have Catholics, we have Protestants, we have Muslims, we have Buddhists, we have atheists. We have every religion known to man here. And some of them flock, and some of them actually use the Constitution against us, to have their religious beliefs. That's a whole other issue. But we can look at those things and we can say, this has been a land that you and I have been able to do things we wouldn't have been able to do in the 1300s.

We've gone through some of the church history, and what have we read? If you believe the Bible, and people found out, burned at the stake, beheaded, it wasn't tolerated. You know, you and I can come here every single Sabbath. You and I can talk to our neighbors about the Bible and what we believe.

You and I can go to the Feast of Tabernacles in a free country. No one is heckling us, no one is threatening us, no one is persecuting us. It's our right because we live in this country. It couldn't have happened in any other country. Now, we have the opportunity to do that. Did God ordain this time? Yes, yes, He did. And you know, we're in a minority here because we keep the Sabbath and because we keep the Holy Days.

We know it's rare on this earth today for people to keep all the laws of God and all the Holy Days of God and all the words of the Bible.

We're a rare commodity. Today we're still grouped in. Some people think we're Christians like everyone else. No, there's a big difference between us and the world's Christianity. I hope we all realize that and remember that. You can say you believe in Christ, but unless you're doing the things that Christ said, you're really not a follower of Christ.

Everyone in this room, we follow, I hope, the principles that the Bible espouses. Others who say they believe in Jesus Christ don't. They do the opposite. And so as time goes on, we will see other churches who cave to the world around them. When difficulties arise and trials arise, they'll cave. And our time will come. Our time will come. People will say, you need to believe this. If you want your tax-exempt status, this is what you need to be preaching. You need to stop preaching that. You know, we're not going to stop preaching what we preach. We're going to still preach the gospel of God as it is, no matter what comes from the government. No matter what comes from the world around us. Other churches won't, and there will be a distinction. And so when you read in Revelation about the Beast power being drunk with the blood of the saints, it won't be everyone else today who says they're Christians. It'll be true Christians who say, I'm not bowing to the power of the state. I'm not going to have my beliefs and my faith and trust in God dictated by a man. And so we live in a time that God has allowed us to do that. It is a blessing. I hope we all take that, and I hope this thanksgiving, we thank God for the fact that we've had the opportunity to live the way we have and worship the way that we do. You know, COVID has had a tremendous, tremendous negative effect on all of our lives. Tremendous negative effect. I mean, look at the arguments and look at the things that have occurred because of this. But I also look at the effect it's had on the Church of God. It's had some detrimental effects. It might have been a novelty back in March. It's not a novelty anymore. It can have some real detrimental effects on us if we don't watch what's going on in our attitudes. As we watch the news and we see governments continually attacking churches, you don't want to be in church gatherings because that's where the virus spreads. You hear that every time, right? That's always church groups and they're always on the news. It isn't anything to be taken lightly. It's not a coincidence. There will come a time where there won't be, you know, where it'll be. You know, church, you know, we might find a time in the future that it's like church services can't be. It's not church services, it's singing. That's the other thing that's always attacked. I heard that this week about Thanksgiving and even in another state, you know, in another state out west where a pastor is, the edict has come out. If you're going to gather at church, no more than 25 people, no singing, no shouting. It's like, well, how do you do that? How do you not have any singing at all? Because it's always something about the worship of God that's behind it. COVID has been a very, very useful tool for people who are into big government. COVID is a very, very useful tool. I'm not saying that there's not a real danger out there with COVID, but I'm saying it's been a very useful tool, a more useful tool to governments and people who want control than it is a real threat to people.

My opinion. But you know, God, when He created us, He created us to be free moral agents. You know, God could have been a very austere God and said, you know, to everyone, He could have sold to Adam and Eve, when they made the choice to take the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, He could have struck them dead right then. He could have created another group of human beings, and every time they took the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, just strike them dead. Did He do that? No! Right in the Garden of Eden, He gave them choice.

He knew who He was, and He said, I want you to take the tree of life, and hey, if you're taking the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, this is what your life's going to be like. He didn't dictate it. He doesn't make any of us. None of us are sitting here today because God made us be here. No one has held a stick over your head or a gun to your head and said, you have to be here. It's because we want to be here because we know the truth. Deuteronomy 30, we see that in God's Word. So when this country built in religious freedom, people were free moral agents. They didn't have to live. They didn't have to worship the way the King worshiped. They could worship according to their hearts and what their choice was. Deuteronomy 30, verse 19. It says, I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you. I've set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. This is a Hallmark verse. I think one of the key verses in the Bible. I've set before you, I give you a choice. I've opened your mind to it, but you choose. Life or death, blessing and cursing. And He coaxes us, urges us, choose life that both you and your descendants may live. Choose it. Don't choose your way. If you really want life, if you want to realize the potential you've got, choose life. But if you choose the other way, that's your prerogative. Over in Joshua 24, verse 15, as Joshua is about to relinquish his time as leader of Israel, He tells Israel the same thing we just read, but in even more blunt words. 15, if it seems evil to you to serve the eternal, if that's not what you want to do, if you think, you know, I don't want to do God's way, I don't want to follow His principles. Israel, if that's what you choose, if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day who you will serve. Whether the gods which your father served that were on the other side of the river, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. He told them, if you don't like it, don't do it. I'm not going to hold a hammer to your head. I'm not your king that says you must do that, or I'm going to lop your head off. God chose, made us all His free moral agents.

In John 1, as Jesus Christ was born into the Jewish nation, flesh and blood to His own people, who were the people of God, who were in their minds keeping God's word the way that He had written it.

In John 1, verse 11, it says, Christ came to His own, He was born into His own nation. It wasn't as if He was born into some foreign nation that had no idea who God was or the principles of the Bible. He came to His own, but His own didn't receive Him.

Did He make a pronouncement on them at that time? You're all dead? I'm going to just absolutely get rid of all of you? No. It was their choice.

They didn't follow Him. He still died for them, still died for you and me. Verse 12, But as many as did receive Him, like you and I did, because everyone that God calls has a choice, I will follow, or I'll just go on with my life the way it was. Too hard to keep a Sabbath, too hard to keep Holy Days, too hard to do these things. Why would I do it? Some people think. But as many as received Him, again, look, He gave them the right to become children of God. Look at the potential. Look what was opened up to them, things they would have never known.

They gave them the right to become children of God to those who believe in His name.

And so we live. We live in a time that we've been very blessed to live in. Our lives would have been so different if we were called and had the same belief, and I dare say probably even a more strong and firm belief, to live in times before us that we would have happened whatever would happen to us.

In Romans 14, as God gives us opportunity, it does say we will give account to Him.

That is a threat. What we do with our lives, how we live them, we will give account to God.

We have to keep that in mind, but He doesn't make us do anything.

In America, we've had the right, a very big blessing that I will always be grateful for that in this day and in this life, being able to follow God without a whole lot of threats. Without any threats, actually.

Being able to keep the jobs I've had and being protected by the government that says that this is your religious belief, you have the right to do that.

It's been a big blessing. It's been a big blessing to be able to do that, and this Thanksgiving I'll be very thankful to that for that, as I will be for the fact that we have freedom of speech. The people that founded our country, they didn't have freedom of speech before they came over here. They had to watch every word they said.

If they said something against the king, their lives could be over.

You and I have no idea what it's like to have a government where everything we say can be monitored and reported.

Someone thinks, oh, if I can report him, it's going to look good for me.

When I was growing up, maybe they don't talk about it in schools anymore, communism was a big thing.

It was the height of the Cold War, and we heard about communistic rule.

We heard about newspapers in Russia, Prabda, that this gave the opinion of the government, of what it was, and the censorship that went on.

It was always a marvel to me that people would live in a country where they had no idea what really was going on, just what the government wanted them to hear.

It was always interesting to me that people could be censored, and either today, we look at some of the countries in the world around us, and we hear about people who can lose their lives, get poisoned, because they are speaking out against the president of another country who doesn't like what they say.

That was kind of the mark of everything back then. That's the mark of tyranny.

You know, we've been free to preach the gospel. We've been free to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ around the world.

It could have only happened in a time like this, where liberty was the mark of the land.

We wouldn't have been able to do this back in the 1200s and 1300s. People that did that, you know, they had some secret groups, and they had to watch everything they were doing, but they weren't able to widespread preach it. We've been able to do that. You and I can assemble together here. You and I can talk about it.

I can talk about it with my family members who aren't in the church. I can talk about it with neighbors if they ask, people that I work with if they ask.

And you know what? No one gets mad. No one gets mad at me. No one says, I'm going to turn you into the government.

And yet lately, I've watched the news, and I see that I don't do this in related to COVID or that in related to COVID.

If I lived in a different state, people could actually be encouraged to turn me into the government for that and say, you know, this person isn't doing that.

That's kind of a foreign thing in America. So unless you're blatantly breaking the law on something, but that you would be actually a champion if you run and say, oh, this person isn't doing this or that person is doing this.

It's kind of a strange thing to have happen in America, so that never happened in my lifetime before.

Back in Luke, Luke 21, we read of a time when people will not like what we say and maybe even be told, turn these people in.

Luke 21, verse 12. Jesus Christ's words here about a time that you had ahead of us before His return.

In verse 12, it says, but before all these things, they'll lay their hands on you. They'll persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons.

You will be brought before kings and rulers for my namesake. Can you imagine that today? Can you imagine that someone and that you would be brought before the mayor of your city to answer what you're talking and what you're doing here today? I can't even imagine that.

But somewhere down the road, we may be living it.

You know, down in verse 16, it says, you'll be betrayed. You know what betrayed means? That means someone's going to hear what you say, and they're going to go run and tell someone else that's in authority.

You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers because of what you believe, because of what you say.

Government doesn't like what you say. Google doesn't like what you say. Twitter doesn't like what you say.

We have to censor this. This can't go out any place. You'll be betrayed even by parents and teachers, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death.

Hard to even fathom. Not if I was alive in the 12, 13, 14, 1500s. It's not hard to fathom. Hard to fathom today.

Looking at the direction of what's going on, this Thanksgiving, we find ourselves at a crossroad. What will it be like next Thanksgiving?

It's far different this year than it was last year. The world has come a long way. What will it be like?

When will freedom of speech end? Because it will end. What the Church of God teaches will stop. The Bible prophesies that back in the book of Amos.

Amos 8 and verse 11. God says, God says, They're not going to be able to find it. It's going to be shut down. Maybe Google will shut it down. Maybe all the governments will shut it down.

Not find it. Today, in any country in the world, you can find it.

For time coming, that freedom disappears. That liberty disappears.

So today, just a few days before Thanksgiving, where are we? I'm going to take the time for having lived in the America that was.

And all the opportunities that it has provided physically and spiritually to live the life I've lived.

And that you've lived. We should be very thankful to God for the time we've had, and the opportunities we've had, and the blessings that we've had.

It is because of Him. Not because of any of us or our goodness. To Him goes all the glory always.

I'll also have my eyes looking ahead, because I see the handwriting on the wall. I'll also be thankful to God that no matter what comes in the future, I know He will see us through.

I know that He will provide the way. I know that He will provide the strength. I trust Him to do what He said.

And we will follow Him no matter what comes our way.

So let's be thankful. Let's be thankful for the times that we had.

Let's look back at America and be grateful to God for that. Let's be grateful to Him for everything.

And as the Bible says, in everything, in everything, give thanks.