(4) Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, "The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously"?
6 But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: "God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble."
7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
God is the source of grace for us, but in order to receive it and walk in the fulness of it, we have to humble ourselves in order to place ourselves in a right position with Him. When there is error in our lives, we can depend in the instruction of God's Word and direction of the Holy Spirit to take the necessary steps to correct it. That involves putting aside pride and adopting a mindset of humility, walking according to His ways.
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As we prepare to celebrate American independence this weekend, we can marvel at the wisdom of our Founders, as well as their boldness to carry out a plan to establish a new nation, under the direction of God, I believe. They humbled themselves and depended on Him; the Bible says in Proverbs 16:
16 How much better to get wisdom than gold! And to get understanding is to be chosen rather than silver.
17 The highway of the upright is to depart from evil; He who keeps his way preserves his soul.
18 Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before a fall.
19 Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly, Than to divide the spoil with the proud.
In the words of the Declaration of Independence, we find these powerful phrases that echo through the annals of time:
"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…"
Wanda Franz of the National Right to Life Committee included those words in a piece she wrote over 15 years ago, in which she stated:
The right to life is a "self-evident truth;" it is not based on the speculations and shifting opinions of men.
The right to life is "unalienable" and an essential part of us. It exists independently from what others want. It is not a grant from government. It exists, whether there is a government or not. And it certainly can't be ruled out of existence by unelected judges.
The government derives its "just Powers from the Consent of the Governed," namely us. The Founding Fathers believed in "the capability of a people to govern themselves," as Abraham Lincoln put it.
The reason for government is "to secure these Rights." So the Constitution is, to use the words of the political scientist Paul Rahe, the "instrument for the im-plementation" of the Declaration of Independence. Thus, judges are not free to ignore the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence.
She goes on to say:
Instead of being guided by the Declaration of Independence, the pro-abortion majorities in the Supreme Court's abortion cases since 1973 have blocked out the bright light of the Declaration and groped around in the resulting "penumbra" and made up a new "right" to suit their purpose. To grasp how far down we have come from the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, try fitting this new "right" of a mother to kill her unborn child to the concepts of a "self-evident truth" or an "unalienable right."
Michael Farris, President and CEO of Alliance Defending Freedom, commented at the Newsweek website on the restoration of a Constitutional perspective on abortion represented in the majority opinion in the Dobbs case. He said:
Justice Samuel Alito's thoroughly researched opinion makes it abundantly clear that Roe was an act of raw judicial power—which simply means that the Supreme Court made a policy decision on abortion rather than duly applying the language and meaning of the Constitution.
He went on to commend the Court, saying...
The Supreme Court acknowledged that it improperly seized the power of the people and their legislatures half a century ago. Now it has relinquished that power and given it back to the people. That's a marvel worth celebrating.
So, it's not a matter of taking away a so-called "right" to terminate a pregnancy and by so doing, taking a life. It's a matter of restoring the right of citizens to make decisions - it's, as it's been said, "We the People." Now, the question of abortion has been returned to each state. In 2018, the voters of Alabama approved a Constitutional Amendment affirming the right to life; the Insider website reported:
Alabama's ballot initative, Amendment 2, passed with 60% of the vote. The amendment proclaims to "recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children, including the right to life" in the state.This was a direct action by the voters of the state of Alabama on this issue. Consistent with that, the following year, the elected representatives of "We the People" passed the Human Life Protection Act, prohibiting most abortions in the state. After the Supreme Court ruling on Friday, that was allowed to go into effect. This is democracy in action, and the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized the democratic process that was established in our Constitution by allowing the people, through their elected representatives, and perhaps even by amendments to their state constitution, to set abortion policy in their states. In a stunning, sweeping, and divisive act of judicial activism in 1973, the nation's highest court imposed federal law in a matter that was not addressed in our Constitution. On Friday, the error was corrected.
I would imagine that more than a few Americans felt like that error could never be corrected - that it was settled for perpetuity. And, some wished it were. But, those in government, and in our individual lives, can realize that, when possible, when we realize that a mistake was made, we can make necessary steps to correct it.
There is certainly a spiritual application: God has given us a method through which we can correct our mistakes - Christ atoned for our sins and by owning up to those sins and confessing them to Him, we can receive forgiveness. The problem comes when we don't identify and take necessary steps to correct our errors.
That goes back to governmental leaders. How often do you see politicians admit their errors and attempt to correct them? Sometimes there will be apologies on personal matters and moral failures in order to save face. But, when there are policy directions that need to be corrected, how often do you see mistakes of the past repeated? That is why we need to pray for our leaders. An exaggerated sense of one's own ability - the Bible calls it pride - can lead to destruction. We have to constantly check ourselves and stay in a state of humility.
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