(How we measure time has an interesting history. Here I have recorded for you the history of how we now measure time across the world. Do study it so that you will always know how we got here:)

Prior to the invention of clocks, watches and digital devices, people all over the world looked to the position of the sun, moon and stars as a kind of clock in the sky. Ancient peoples, for millennia, based their calendars on the position of the moon, whose lunar cycles incrementally shifted throughout the seasons, serving as an enormous generational calendar.

Remnants of March being the first month of the year can be seen in the old Roman Latin names of months: September, October, November, and December: “Sept” is Latin for seven; “Oct” is Latin for eight (ie. octagon=eight sided); “Nov” is Latin for nine; and “Dec” is Latin for ten (ie. decimal=divisible by ten).

As the Roman Empire expanded and conquered more nations, these lunar calendars were difficult to reconcile with each other. In 45 BC, Roman Emperor Julius Caesar became, in a sense, the first globalist. He wanted a unified calendar for the entire Roman Empire.

Caesar made January 1st the beginning of the year, leading some Christian leaders to consider it a pagan date. Julius Caesar introduced the solar-based “Julian Calendar,” with 365 days, and an extra “leap day” at the end of February every 4th year. Rome’s old fifth month, Quintilis, was renamed after Julius Caesar, being called “July.” As it only had 30 days, Caesar took a day from the old end of the year, February, and added it to July, giving the month 31 days.

The next emperor, Augustus Caesar, renamed the old sixth month, Sextilis, after himself, calling it “August.” He also took a day from the old end of the year, February, and added it to August, giving that month 31 days, and leaving February with only 28 days.

Augustus Caesar also wanted a world-wide tracking system to monitor and tax everyone under his control — an empire-wide census. Luke 21:1-3 “And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.) And all went to be taxed, everyone into his own city.”

For the first three centuries of Christianity, followers of Christ were persecuted throughout the Roman Empire in ten major persecutions.

Finally, Emperor Constantine ended the persecutions in 313 AD, and effectively made Christianity the recognized religion of the Empire.

Just as Julius Caesar unified the Roman Empire with the Julian Calendar, Constantine proposed at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD to to use the calendar to help unify the “Christian” Roman Empire.

The most important events in the Christian calendar were Christ’s Death, Burial and Resurrection. Christ’s crucifixion as the Passover Lamb occurred on the Jewish Feast of Passover; His being in the grave occurred on the Feast of Unleavened Bread; and His Resurrection occurred on the Feast of First Fruits, or as it was later called, Easter.

The Apostle Paul wrote in First Corinthians 5:7-8 “For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

First Corinthians 15:20 “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept.”

Constantine wanted a common date to celebrate Easter, and insisted the date be on a Sunday in the Roman solar calendar. This effectively ended the original method of determining the date, which was by asking Jewish rabbis each year when the Passover Feast was to be observed based on the Hebrew lunar calendar – traditionally beginning the evening of 14th day of Nissan. Constantine’s act was a defining moment in the split between what had been a predominately Jewish Christian Church — as Jesus and his disciples were Jewish — and the emerging Gentile Christian Church.

The new method of determining the date of Easter was the first Sunday after the first paschal full moon falling on or after the Spring Equinox. Tables were compiled with the future dates of Easter, but over time a slight discrepancy became evident. “Equinox” is a solar calendar term: “equi” = “equal” and “nox” = “night.” Thus “equinox” is when the daytime and nighttime are of equal duration. It occurs once in the Spring around March 20 and once in the Autumn around September 22. In the year 325 AD, Easter was on March 21.

During the Middle Ages, France celebrated its New Year Day on Easter. Other countries began their New Year on Christmas, December 25, and still others on Annunciation Day, March 25.

By 1582, it became clear that the Julian Calendar was slightly inaccurate, by about 11 minutes per year, resulting in the compiled tables having the date of Easter ten days ahead of the Spring Equinox, and even further from its origins in the Jewish Passover.

In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII decided to revise the calendar by eliminating ten days. He set a leap year every 4th year with a minor adjustment. There is NO leap year in years divisible by 100, but not by 400. Thus, there is NO leap days in 1700, 1800, 1900, 2100. Yet there ARE leap days in the years 1600, 2000, 2400. It sounds complicated, but it is so accurate that the Gregorian Calendar is the most internationally used calendar today.

Pope Gregory’s “Gregorian Calendar” also returned the beginning of the new year BACK to Julius Caesar’s January 1st date. As England was an Anglican Protestant country, it reluctantly postponed adopting the more accurate Catholic Gregorian Calendar. Most of Protestant Europe did not adopt the Gregorian Calendar for nearly two centuries. This gave rise to some interesting record keeping. For example: ships would leave Protestant England on one date according to the Julian Calendar, called “Old Style” and arrive in Catholic Europe at an earlier date, as much of Europe was using the Gregorian Calendar, called “New Style.”

Another example is that England’s William Shakespeare and Spain’s Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote of La Mancha. They died on the same date, April 23, 1616, but when the differences between England’s Julian Calendar and Spain’s Gregorian Calendar are removed, Cervantes actually died ten days before Shakespeare.

In 1752, England and its colonies finally adopted the Gregorian Calendar, but by that time there was an 11 day discrepancy between the “Old Style” (OS) and the “New Style” (NS). When America finally adjusted its calendar, the day after September 2, 1752 (Old Style), became September 14, 1752 (New Style). There were reportedly accounts of confusion and rioting. As countries of Western Europe, particularly Portuguese, Spanish, French, Dutch and English, began to trade and establish colonies around the world, the Gregorian Calendar came into international use around the globe.

All dates in the world are either BC “Before Christ” or AD “Anno Domini” — meaning in the Year of the Lord’s Reign.

(So as confusing as all that appears, it is how we got to today’s calendar.)

Ron
 

May 25, 2025 is Memorial Day in America.  It is the national holiday to honor those who have died in the U.S Military. Below, I have chronicled its history for you to aid you in celebrating it.

The actual founding of Memorial Day in America started with the ending of World War One.

On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, World War One ended. Though the “cease-fire,” called “Armistice,” was signed at 5:00am in the morning, it specified that 11:00am would be the time the actual fighting would cease. Tragically, in the intervening six hours of fighting, an additional 11,000 more were killed.

Following World War One — “the war to end all wars” — President Warren Harding, in 1921, had the remains of an unknown soldier killed in France brought to Arlington Cemetery to be buried in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Inscribed on the Tomb are the words: “Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God.”

On October 4, 1924, President Calvin Coolidge stated at the dedication of the Monument to the American Expeditionary Forces: “They did not regard it as a national or personal opportunity for gain or fame or glory, but as a call to sacrifice for the support of humane principles and spiritual ideals. If anyone doubts the sacrifices which they have been willing to make in behalf of what they believe to be the welfare of other nations, let them gaze upon this monument and other like memorials that have been reared in every quarter of our broad land. Let them look upon the representative gatherings of our VETERANS, and let them remember that America has dedicated itself to the service of God and man.”

American Soldiers Killed by German Machine Guns in World War One

In 1926, President Coolidge began issuing proclamations honoring veterans every year, and in 1938 the day became a legal holiday.

In 1954, the name “Armistice Day” was changed to “Veterans Day” to honor all soldiers of all American wars. Four million Americans served in World War One. Sixteen million served in World War Two. Nearly seven million served in the Korean War. Nearly nine million served in the Vietnam War. From the First Gulf War till the present, 7.4 million men and women served.

While Veterans Day honors the living soldiers, Memorial Day honors those who died while serving.

General Douglas MacArthur told West Point cadets, May 1962: “The soldier, above all other men, is required to practice the greatest act of religious training, sacrifice. In battle and in the face of danger and death, he discloses those Divine attributes which his Maker gave when He created man in His own image. No physical courage and no brute instinct can take the place of Divine help which alone can sustain him. However horrible the incidents of war may be, the soldier who is called upon to offer and to give his life for his country is the noblest development of mankind.”

General McArthur

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan placed a soldier from the Vietnam War in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. DNA tests later identified the body as that of pilot Michael Blassie, who was flying an A-37B Dragonfly when he was shot down near An Loc, South Vietnam. In 1998, the body of Michael Blassie was reburied at Jefferson Memorial Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri. Michael Blassie was a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1970, and before that, a graduate of St. Louis University High School in 1966.

A-37B Dragonfly

On Veterans Day, November 11, 1921, President Warren G. Harding stated: “On the threshold of eternity, many a soldier, I can well believe, wondered how his ebbing blood would color the stream of human life, flowing on after his sacrifice. Standing today on hallowed ground, it is fitting to say that his sacrifice, and that of the millions dead, shall not be in vain. I can sense the prayers of our people, of all peoples, that this Armistice Day shall mark the beginning of a new and lasting era of peace on earth, good will among men.

President Warren Harding

In 1954, The American Legion sponsored a Back-to-God program. President Dwight Eisenhower addressed them in a broadcast from the White House, February 7, 1954: “As a former soldier, I am delighted that our VETERANS are sponsoring a movement to increase our awareness of God in our daily lives. In battle, they learned a great truth—that there are no atheists in the foxholes. They know that in time of test and trial, we instinctively turn to God for new courage and peace of mind. All the history of America bears witness to this truth. Out of faith in God, and through faith in themselves as His children, our forefathers designed and built this Republic.”

President Eisenhower

Eisenhower continued: “We remember the picture of the Father of our Country, on his knees at Valley Forge seeking divine guidance in the cold gloom of a bitter winter. Thus Washington gained strength to lead to independence a nation dedicated to the belief that each of us is divinely endowed with indestructible rights. We remember, too, that three-fourths of a century later, on the battle-torn field of Gettysburg, and in the silence of many a wartime night, Abraham Lincoln recognized that only under God could this Nation win a new birth of freedom.”

On February 20, 1955, President Dwight Eisenhower again addressed the Nation:  “The Founding Fathers recognizing God as the author of individual rights, declared that the purpose of Government is to secure those rights.  In many lands the State claims to be the author of human rights. If the State gives rights, it can – and inevitably will – take away those rights. Without God, there could be no American form of Government, nor an American way of life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first-the most basic-expression of Americanism.”

Ron
 

On September 21, 1996 the US Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act. It was one of the most important and wonderful laws passed by Congress in modern times. Then, on June 26, 2015, the United States Supreme Court rendered its landmark Obergefell vs. Hodges decision which voided and wiped out the Defense of Marriage Act. It was one of the worst decisions of the Supreme Court in history. Below, I have chronicled these two events for you. And you just must understand them and how they changed US history.

As I mentioned above, this Public Law 104-199 (110 Statute 2419), passed by both Houses of Congress on September 21, 1996 was called The Defense of Marriage Act. Most legal analysts defined it as: “In determining the meaning of this Act of Congress, the word ‘marriage’ means only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife, and the word ‘spouse’ refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.”

It was a good law. It upheld the meaning of marriage as expressed in the Bible and defined marriage as it was understood and acknowledged by most all of the population of America, both liberals and conservatives.

The Defense of marriage Act was not only acknowledge and welcomed by conservatives, but was welcomed by most all liberals in America. On September 21, 1996, President Bill Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and stated: “I have long opposed governmental recognition of same-gender marriages and this legislation is consistent with that position.”

In 2000, Hillary Clinton stated: “Marriage has historic, religious and moral content that goes back to the beginning of time, and I think a marriage is as a marriage has always been, between a man and a woman.”

On February 2, 2004 Barack Obama stated in Chicago: “I am not a supporter of gay marriage. I think that marriage, in the minds of a lot of voters, has a religious connotation. I know that is true in the African-American community.”

So, the population all across America was very much in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act, including most all leaders, both private a governmental.

Then on June 26, 2015, the United States Supreme Court rendered its landmark Obergefell vs. Hodges decision, which stated that all states (1) must recognize marriage between two same-sex individuals within their state; and (2) must recognize marriages of same-sex couples performed in other states.

This amazing decision wiped out the Defense of Marriage Act and rendered it mute and ineffective. In 2015 we thought that the Supreme Court was conservative at that time. However, this decision proved otherwise. Legal analysts across the country could only say that there must have been a schism in the Supreme Court.

President Biden invited a drag queen, Marti Gould Cummings, to the White House to celebrate signing what is being referred to as the “Dis-Respect for Marriage Act,” effectively repealing the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 and making the liberal Obergefell decision into a Federal law. This decision was a flagrant creation of federal law by the Supreme Court, as never intended by the Constitution.

Of the decision, Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee stated: “This irrational, unconstitutional rejection of the expressed will of the people will prove to be one of the court’s most disastrous decisions. The Supreme Court isn’t the supreme branch. Five lawyers on the Supreme Court can no more repeal the laws of nature and nature’s God on marriage than they can the laws of gravity.

 Huckabee further added: “This irrational, unconstitutional decision threatens religious liberty — the heart of the 1st Amendment.  The Supreme Court is not the Supreme Being. The only outcome worse than this flawed, failed decision would be for the President and Congress, two co-equal branches of government, to surrender in the face of this out-of-control act of unconstitutional, judicial tyranny.”

Franklin Graham stated: “The court — since it never defined marriage — doesn’t have the right to redefine it. God gave us marriage. Period. And God doesn’t change his mind.

Graham stated further: “I’m disappointed because the government is recognizing sin. This court is endorsing sin. God gave marriage between a man and a woman and that’s what marriage is. If pastors are going to be forced to provide marriage services for gay couples, I’m not going to do it. Given the choice of obeying God or the government, I believe Christians will obey God, even if there is hell to pay.”

Abraham Lincoln stated in his Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861: “I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court.

Lincoln stated further: “The candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of the eminent tribunal.”

So, the Obergefell vs. Hodges decision is still the law of our land. And biological men are playing sports against girls and parading around naked in girl’s locker rooms. But I hope and pray that our Congress will pass a law to overturn and wipe-out the Obergefell vs. Hodges decision.

Jesus taught in Mark 10:6-9: “But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female.’ For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’”

The Obergefell vs. Hodges decision is being taught in many of our public Grade Schools, and is causing all manner of confusion to those young people. So, remember, Jesus added a warning in Matthew 18:6: “If anyone causes one of these little ones, those who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”

Ron
 

(Tomorrow is Mother’s Day in America. So, I thought it would be very appropriate for me to give you the real history of the founding of that day in America. Do read it below so that you will know.)

After the Civil War, abolitionist Julia Ward Howe, writer of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic, led a Mother’s Day for Peace in New York on June 2, 1872, to promote peace, national healing and reconciliation. She composed a proclamation to “appeal to womanhood throughout the world”

Julia Ward Howe personally sponsored a Mothers’ Day celebration in Boston in for the next ten years till interest dwindled.

In the following decades, Protestant churches and schools observed Decision Day for committing to Christ, Roll Call Day for church membership, Missionary Day, Temperance Sunday, and Children’s Day. And numerous efforts arose for observing a Mother’s Day.

A suggestion for honoring motherhood was made by University of Notre Dame’s first athletic director, Frank Hering. In 1904, Hering observed a Notre Dame professor passing out penny postcards to students, with the instructions to write: “Anything. Anything at all as long as it’s to their mothers. We do this every month in this class. One day a month is mother’s day.”

Hering proposed “setting aside one day in the year as a nationwide memorial to the memories of mothers and motherhood,” stating: “Throughout history the great men of the world have given their credit for their achievements to their mothers. The Holy Church recognizes this, as does Notre Dame.”

Taking the day from a suggestion to a reality was Anna Jarvis. She is the person most responsible for making Mother’s Day a nationally observed event.

Anna was from Grafton, West Virginia, the granddaughter of a Baptist minister. She a member of Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, where she taught Sunday school. In 1876, after one of her Bible lessons, Anna Jarvis closed with a prayer: “I hope and pray that someone, sometime, will found a memorial mothers day commemorating her for the matchless service she renders to humanity in every field of life. She is entitled to it.”

Similar to Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, Anna Jarvis’ mother worked during the Civil War to organize Mothers’ Day Work Clubs to care for wounded soldiers, both Union and Confederate. Anna’s mother raised money for medicine, inspected bottled milk, and improved sanitation.

Anna’s mother raised money for medicine, inspected bottled milk, and improved sanitation. She arranged in 1868 a “Mother’s Friendship Day” — “to reunite families that had been divided during the Civil War.” She hired women to care for families where mothers suffered from tuberculosis, May 9, 1905. Inspired by her mother’s self-sacrifice and generosity, Anna Jarvis wanted to honor her and all mothers.

On May 12, 1907, Anna persuaded her church, Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, to have a small Mother’s Day service. The church then agreed to set aside every year the 2nd Sunday in May, the anniversary of her mother’s death, as a day to show appreciation to all mothers — the makers of the home.

The next year, May 10, 1908, Anna organized a Mother’s Day two places: Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, where she sent a telegram; and in Philadelphia, where she gave a moving speech in the auditorium of the 12-story Wanamaker Department Store.

John Wanamaker was a retail pioneer and founder of one the first department stores.

Wanamaker, who had paintings of Christ throughout his store, stated: “There is a power in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Keep uppermost the profound conviction that it is the Gospel that is to win the heart and convert the world. The things that were sweet dreams in our childhood are now being worked out. The procession is being made longer and longer; the letters of Christ’s name are becoming larger and larger.”

With the financial backing of John Wanamaker and H.J. Heinz, maker of “57 varieties” of ketchup, Anna Jarvis began a letter-writing campaign to ministers and politicians to establish a “national” Mothers’ Day. Due to the overwhelming support of pastors and churches, by 1909, forty-five states observed Mother’s Day. People wore white and red Carnations on Sunday to pay tribute to their mothers. On May 8, 1914, Congress designated the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.

On MAY 9, 1914, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the first National Mothers’ Day as a: “public expression of love and reverence for the mothers of our country.”

President Reagan said in his Mother’s Day Proclamation, 1986: “A Jewish saying sums it up: ‘God could not be everywhere – so He created mothers.'”

Mothers have the role of imparting values into children, as American poet William Ross Wallace wrote: “The hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world.'”

Dr. James Dobson addressed the National Religious Broadcasters, Feb. 16, 2002: “If they can get control of children they can change the whole culture in one generation.”

On February 3, 1983, at the annual National Prayer Breakfast, President Ronald Reagan stated:

“I have a very special old Bible.

And alongside a verse in the Second Book of Chronicles there are some words, handwritten, very faded by now. And believe me, the person who wrote these words was an authority. Her name was Nelle Wilson Reagan. She was my mother.”

Reagan stated: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

On Mother’s Day, May 8, 2020, President Donald J. Trump proclaimed: “We celebrate the exceptional mothers in our lives, whether they became mothers through birth, adoption, foster care, or other means, these women are deserving of our unending gratitude and praise this day and every day. The intuition and wisdom passed from mother to child strengthens the fabric of our Nation and preserves generations of wisdom and familial values. In our earliest days, our mothers provide us with love and nurturing care. They often know our talents before we do, and they selflessly encourage us to use these God-given gifts to pursue our biggest dreams. I encourage all Americans to express their love and respect for their mothers, whether with us in person or in spirit, and to reflect on the importance of motherhood to the prosperity of our families, communities, and Nation.”

The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy (2 Timothy 1:5): “I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also.

Abraham Lincoln’s father Thomas married Nancy Hanks in 1806. He took her to the humble cabin he had prepared for her, and within the first few years of her married life, she bore him three children. The first was a daughter named Sarah, who died; the third was a son (Thomas) who died in infancy. The second was Abraham, who, born into the humblest abode, under the humblest circumstances under the blessing of a Providence which he always recognized.

Mrs. Lincoln, the mother, was evidently a woman out of place among those primitive surroundings. She was five feet, five inches high, a slender, pale, sad and sensitive woman, with much in her nature that was truly heroic.”

In Holland’s The Life of Abraham Lincoln (1866) it says: “Those who knew the tender and reverent spirit of Abraham Lincoln later in life, will not doubt that he returned to his cabin-home deeply impressed by all that he had heard. It was the rounding up for him of the influences of a Christian mother’s life and teachings. It recalled her sweet and patient example, her assiduous efforts to inspire him with pure and noble motives, her simple instructions in divine truth, her devoted love for him, and the motherly offices she had rendered him during all his tender years. His character was planted by this Christian mother’s love.”

The Life of Abraham Lincoln (1866) recounted: “Providence began at his mother’s knee, and ran like a thread of gold through all the inner experiences of his life. This great man never drew his infant life from a purer or more womanly bosom than her own; and Mr. Lincoln always looked back to her with an unspeakable affection. Long after her sensitive heart and weary hands had crumbled into dust; he said to a friend, with tears in his eyes: ‘All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother!'”

Lincoln wrote: “I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.”

Ron
 

(This amazing man, who you have probably never even heard of, was so important if not more so, than anyone else in the founding of America.  Do, for sure, learn about him here:)

In 1735, a young Oxford graduate named John Wesley was sent as the Anglican minister to the new American Colony of Georgia. He sailed on a ship called the Simmons.

The Simmonds, was also carrying a group of 25 German Moravian missionaries, as Wesley noted in his journal: “Sunday, January 25, 1736 at seven I went to the Germans (Moravians). I had long before observed their humility by performing those servile offices for the other passengers, which none of the English would undertake saying ‘their loving Savior had done more for them’ If they were pushed, struck, or thrown down, they rose again and went away; but no complaint was found in their mouth.”

On the Wesleys’ trip to Georgia, their ship, the Simmonds, was caught in a terrible storm which shredded the main sail and flooded the deck.

John Wesley saw how everyone panicked in fear except for the Moravians, who continued to sing praise songs. He noticed their relationship with the Lord was closer than his, as he wrote in his journal: “There was now an opportunity of trying whether they were delivered from the spirit of fear. In the midst of the psalm wherewith their service began, the sea broke over, split the main-sail in pieces, covered the ship, and poured in between the decks, as if the great deep had already swallowed us up. A terrible screaming began among the English.

The Germans (Moravians) calmly sung on. I asked one of them afterwards, ‘Was you not afraid?’ He answered, ‘I thank God, no.’ I asked, ‘But were not your women and children afraid?’ He replied, mildly, ‘No; our women and children are not afraid to die.’ From them I went to their crying, trembling neighbors, and pointed out to them the difference in the hour of trial, between him that feareth God, and him that feareth him not. At twelve the wind fell. This was the most glorious day which I have hitherto seen.”

John Wesley was unsuccessful in his ministry in Georgia, and after a year, the he sailed back to England. Depressed at his failure, he accepted an invitation to attend a Moravian prayer meeting in Aldersgate in May of 1738. John was touched by the Holy Spirit and had a profound conversion experience, writing that his “heart strangely warmed.” He wrote in his journal after the prayer service: “I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

Later in 1738, John Wesley traveled to Moravia in eastern Germany where he lived and worshiped for several months with Count Ludwig von Zinzendorf and the Moravian believers, experiencing first hand their sincere Christianity, being “the religion of the heart.” Wesley wrote in his journal: “God has given me, at length, the desire of my heart. I am with a church in whom is the mind of Christ, and who so walk as He walked.

John Wesley left Germany and returned to England, where he and his brother, Charles, began a revival movement within the Anglican Church called Methodism.

John preached thousands of sermons and organized a system of itinerate preachers who traveled through shires and towns in England in a circuit, or a circle of towns. John Wesley spoke of the inner witness of the presence of the Holy Spirit in one’s heart, as: “An inward impression on the soul of believers, whereby the Spirit of God directly testifies to their spirit that they are the children of God.”

Someone who was inspired by John Wesley to be an Anglican Methodist lay minister was 18-year-old Francis Asbury, born August 20, 1745.

(So, all the story about John Wesley is really just background; for the one that I really want you to know about is…..Francis Asbury.)

At the age 22, Francis Asbury was appointed by John Wesley to be a traveling preacher across England.

In 1771 most all of the preachers in America had died or were killed by the Indians. There was a great need for someone to go there and preach the gospel to the settlers Francis Asbury, at the age of 26, volunteered.

In 1771, Francis Asbury arrived in America, and for the next 45 years, he rode 300,000 miles on horseback, from the Atlantic to the Appalachians, from Maine to the Gulf of Mexico, spreading the Gospel. He became one of the primary forces and influences on the founding of America, though few today have ever heard of him.

In English colonies, everyone paid taxes to the King’s government, and the government paid the salaries of the Anglican pastors. Pastors lived on church-government owned farms called “glebes.”

On July 9, 1776, patriots in New York pulled down the statue of King George.

Several American colonies made it an act of treason for pastors to continued saying public prayers for the King. As the Revolution progressed, Anglican ministers faced a crisis of conscience. They had to choose between allegiance to the King and state, or allegiance to the patriotic American cause. The problem was, if they joined with those fighting for independence, they would lose their means of livelihood. As a result, most Anglican ministers returned to England, but Francis Asbury was one of the few who chose to stay in America.

Asbury stated: “I can by no means agree to leave such a field for gathering souls to Christ as we have in America.” Francis Asbury preached over 16,000 sermons in churches, town squares and court houses, addressing everyone he met, from travelers to workers in the fields to laborers in tobacco houses. He rode an average of 6,000 miles a year.

Episcopal ministers, Rev. William Smith of Maryland and Rev. William White of Philadelphia, in 1786, proposed a revised Book of Common Prayer where references to the King were replaced with references to Congress. Near that same time, at the Baltimore Christmas Conference in 1784, Francis Asbury moved the Methodist revival movement into its own denomination – the Methodist Episcopal Church.

Francis Asbury

Besides the Methodist Episcopal church the colonies had Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Puritans, Separatists, Pilgrims, Quakers, and Baptists.

Why so many churches? Answering that question is Robert D. Woodberry, assistant professor of sociology at the University of Texas–Austin who stated: “When Luther in 1521 defied an imperial order to recant by insisting that ‘my conscience is captive to the Word of God,’ he stopped being the reformer of an old order and instead became the founder of a new stream of Christianity. He could flout the commands of popes, church councils, and emperors, but not those of his own individual conscience.”

Woodberry continued: “Most Protestants follow his lead. They tend to believe that people can acquire saving faith only as they personally and individually appropriate God’s Word. They tend toward separation and independence from ancient church structures and traditions as well as political authorities. The main reason for this is the important role of individual conscience. Because saving faith must be uncoerced and individual, it requires in practice a diversity of independent churches to satisfy the inevitable diversity of individual consciences.”

So, how did diversity of churches lay the foundation for American independence? Woodberry at U.T. Austin explained: “’The authority of Christ,’ wrote the Scots Calvinist divine William Graham in 1768, ‘removes all civil distinctions. All are upon a level equally, as they shall soon be before the awful tribunal of the great Judge.’ This stirring fusion of theology, eschatology, and politics not only characterizes Scottish Calvinism but also says much about the relationship between Protestantism and democracy.”

Rather than view the many denominations negatively, it was instead viewed positively, that they would be a check on each other to insure no one would be established as the official state denomination.

Charles Carroll, the only Catholic to sign the Declaration, wrote to Rev. John Stanford, October, 9, 1827: “Observing the Christian religion divided into many sects, I founded the hope that no one would be so predominant as to become the religion of the state. That hope was thus early entertained because all of them joined in the same cause.”

So, Rev. Francis Asbury stated: “We should so work as if we were to be saved by our works; and so rely on Jesus Christ, as if we did no works. My soul is more at rest from the tempter when I am busily employed.”

Francis Asbury wrote: “My desire is to live more to God today than yesterday, and to be more holy this day than the last. God is gracious beyond the power of language to describe. O what pride, conforming to the world and following its fashions! Warn them, warn them for me, while you have strength and time and be faithful to your duty. Preach as if you had seen heaven and its celestial inhabitants, and had hovered over the bottomless pit, and beheld the tortures, and heard the groans of the damned.”

Francis Asbury’s leadership resulted in the Methodist Church in America growing from just 1,200 people to 214,000, with 700 ordained minsters, by the time of his death in 1816.

Shortly after being sworn in as the first President, George Washington was visited in New York on May 19, 1789, by Methodist Bishop in America, Francis Asbury. The Bishop greeted Washington with the words: “We express to you our sincere congratulations, on your appointment to the presidentship of these States. We place as full a confidence in your wisdom and integrity, for the preservation of those civil and religious liberties which have been transmitted to us by the Providence of GOD. Dependence on the Great Governor of the Universe which you have repeatedly expressed, acknowledging Him the source of every blessing, and particularly of the most excellent Constitution of these States, which is at present the admiration of the world.”

Asbury continued: “We enjoy a holy expectation that you will always prove a faithful and impartial patron of genuine, vital religion— the grand end of our creation and present probationary existence. We promise you our fervent prayers to the Throne of Grace, that GOD Almighty may endue you with all the graces and gifts of his Holy Spirit, that may enable you to fill up your important station to His glory.”

On May 29, 1789, President Washington wrote a reply: “To the Bishop Asbury of the Methodist-Episcopal Church: I return to you my thanks for the demonstrations of affection and the expressions of joy on my late appointment. It shall still be my endeavor to contribute towards the preservation of the civil and religious liberties of the American people. I hope, by the assistance of Divine Providence, not altogether to disappoint the confidence which you have been pleased to repose in me; in acknowledgments of homage to the Great Governor of the Universe”

Washington continued: “I trust the people of every denomination will have every occasion to be convinced that I shall always strive to prove a faithful and impartial patron of genuine, vital religion. I take in the kindest part the promise you make of presenting your prayers at the Throne of Grace for me, and that I likewise implore the Divine benediction on yourselves and your religious community.”

Francis Asbury’s carriage driver and traveling assistant was “Black Harry” Hosier.

He had been at Asbury’s Christmas Conference of December 24, 1784, which began the Methodist Church. Though illiterate, Hosier listened to Francis Asbury’s sermons and memorized long passages of Scripture. “Black Harry” Hosier became one of the country’s most popular preachers, drawing crowds in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Boston, Connecticut, Philadelphia, Delaware, Baltimore and New York. Hosier rejected slavery, lifted up the common working man, and charged audiences “that they must be holy.” Hosier’s popularity gave birth to the name “Hoosier” being used to refer to persons of humble, low-born background who firmly held to fundamental Bible values, as the settlers who crossed the Ohio River to the Indiana shore.

President Calvin Coolidge unveiled an Equestrian Statue of Francis Asbury in Washington, D.C., 1924, stating: “Francis Asbury, the first American Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church made a tremendous contribution.”

Coolidge continued: “Our government rests upon religion. It is from that source that we derive our reverence for truth and justice, for equality and liberty, and for the rights of mankind. Unless the people believe in these principles they cannot believe in our government. Calling the people to righteousness (was) a direct preparation for self-government. It was for a continuation of this work that Francis Asbury was raised up.”

Coolidge added: “The government of a country never gets ahead of the religion of a country. There is no way by which we can substitute the authority of law for the virtue of man. Real reforms which society in these days is seeking will come as a result of our religious convictions, or they will not come at all. Peace, justice, humanity, charity—these cannot be legislated into being. They are the result of a Divine Grace .”

Coolidge continued about Francis Asbury: “Frontier mothers must have brought their children to him to receive his blessings! It is more than probable that Nancy Hanks, the mother of Lincoln, had heard him in her youth. Adams and Jefferson must have known him, and Jackson must have seen in him a flaming spirit as unconquerable as his own. He is entitled to rank as one of the builders of our nation. On the foundation of a religious civilization which he sought to build, our country has enjoyed greater blessing of liberty and prosperity than was ever before the lot of man. These cannot continue if we neglect the work which he did.”

Coolidge concluded: “We cannot depend on the government to do the work of religion. I do not see how anyone could recount the story of this early Bishop (Asbury) without feeling a renewed faith in our own country.”