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If
ye
love wealth better than liberty,
the tranquillity of servitude than the
animating contest of freedom —go
from us in peace. We ask not your
counsels or arms. Crouch down and
lick the hands which feed you. May
your chains
sit lightly upon you, and may posterity
forget that ye were our countrymen!
Sam
Adams,
speaking at the State House in
Philadelphia, “to
a very numerous audience” on
August 1, 1776
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The original "Boston Tea Party" was an
unChristian act of vandalism. No true Christian should
participate in such acts of violence. I believe Sam Adams, John
Hancock, Paul Revere, and others who were involved in this ignoble
act repented of their deeds.
Ann Coulter, in contrasting the "Tea Party Movement"
and the "Occupy Wall Street" protests of October 2011 writes:
First of all, the Boston Tea Party was nothing like tattooed, body–pierced,
sunken-chested 19-year-olds getting in fights with the police for
fun. Paul Revere's nighttime raid was intended exclusively to
protest a new British tea tax. (The Wall Street protesters would
be more likely to fight for a new tax than against
one.)
Revere made sure to replace a broken lock on one of the ships
and severely punished a participant who stole some of the tea for
his private use. Samuel Adams defended the raid by saying that all
other methods of recourse -- say, voting -- were unavailable.
Our revolution -- the only revolution that led to greater
freedom since at least 1688 -- was not the act of a mob.
As specific and limited as it was, however, even the Boston Tea
Party was too mob-like to spark anything other than retaliatory
British measures. Indeed, it set back the cause of American
independence by dispiriting both American and British supporters,
such as Edmund Burke.
George Washington disapproved of the destruction of the tea.
Benjamin Franklin demanded that the India Tea Co. be reimbursed
for it.
Considered an embarrassment by many of our founding fathers, the
Boston Tea Party was not celebrated for another 50 years.
It would be three long years after the Boston Tea Party when
our founding fathers engaged in their truly revolutionary act: The
signing of the Declaration of Independence.
In that document, our Christian forebears set forth in
blindingly clear terms their complaints with British rule, their
earlier attempts at resolution, and an appeal to the
Supreme Judge of the world for independence from the crown.
The rebel armies defending that declaration were not a
disorganized mob, chanting slogans for the press and defacing
public property.
Even the Minutemen, whose first scuffle with the British began
the war, were a real army with ranks, subordination, coordination,
drills and supplies. There is not a single mention in the
historical record of Minutemen playing hacky-sack, burning candles
assembled in "peace and love," or sitting in drum
circles.
A British lieutenant-general who fought the Minutemen observed,
"Whoever looks upon them as an irregular mob will find
himself very much mistaken."
By contrast, the directionless losers protesting "Wall
Street" -- Obama's largest donor group -- pose for the
cameras while uttering random liberal clichés lacking any reason
or coherence.
On our home page we introduce you to "Five
Things" that Samuel Adams would tell you if he could
travel through time and be your personal coach. Here is an excerpt
that relates directly to the issue of acts of vandalism,
revolution, and terrorism.
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Huge
Mistake Number One: "Rights"
They emphasized "rights"
instead of duties.
Americans today think they have a "right" to
a first-class education, a high-paying job, wonder-working
healthcare, and just about everything they want -- all free, of
course.
This "entitlement"
mentality is bankrupting
America.
The Bible says to work six days and rest on the sabbath, but
modern Americans want to play six days and work only if
absolutely necessary. We are disconnected from our
calling to work and "exercise
dominion" over the earth. We substitute military
domination for Biblical dominion through service.
We all want something for nothing.
America's Founders did speak of duties (in a way and to a
degree that public schools today cannot), but their talk about
"rights” undercut and negated their talk about duties.
You ask, "What's
wrong with human rights?"
If America's Founders could see America in 2013, they would
see immediately what's wrong with "rights."
I’ll give you an example.
None of us has a "right to life."
- We all have a duty not to kill, but life is a gift,
and we don't have a claim on life. God wasn’t obligated to
create us, fearing that if He didn’t, He would violate our
“right to life.”
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- Only the Sovereign has rights.
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- George Washington understood that God was Sovereign, but
he inconsistently flattered Americans with talk about their
“rights.”
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- Today’s concept of “rights” is destroying America.
- The absence of a sense of a Duty to God is also destroying
America.
Has your mind been polluted by this toxic
concept?
You must avoid this mistake because it prevents you from
becoming a servant of others (Mark 10:42-45),
as we'll see below.
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| Consider these passages of Scripture:
Romans
12-13
1
Peter 2:13ff
Matthew
5:38ff
Luke
17:7-10
Jude
8-10 / 2
Peter 2:10-12
Many
Jews in Jesus' day expected the coming
Messiah to overthrow the Roman Empire
in a great military battle. The
"Zealots" were constantly
ready to resist the Romans and foment
violent revolution. Jesus disappointed
them all.
Everybody
has heard Jesus' line about going
"the second mile." Not one
out of a thousand Americans
understands its historical context,
and can apply it to geo-political
affairs today.
Imagine
Italy invades Israel. You may have to
imagine that some 21st-century
Mussolini emerges to rescue Italy from
bankruptcy and raise it to an imposing
industrial power. Imagine further than
Italian soldiers are on every corner
in Israel, imposing Italian rule on
Israeli citizens. Now imagine that
Italian soldiers are authorized to
conscript Israelis to carry the
soldiers backpacks for up to one mile.
You can easily imagine that Israelis
would be infuriated by this legal
enslavement, to say nothing of the
whole military occupation and
collection of forced tribute gig.
Now
imagine Benjamin Netanyahu telling
Israelis not to resist the
conscription, but carry the soldiers
provisions for an extra mile. How long
would Netanyahu remain in office?
But
that's exactly
what Jesus told His hearers to do.
Do not resist armed invasion and
occupation, even if it violates human
rights and international law.
This
one verse completely overthrows modern
concepts of war,
defense,
and national
security.
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- Huge
Mistake Number Two: Revolution
They
took up arms to abolish the government.
They overthrew the government by
force and violence.
Abolishing tyranny
is a good idea. But not with muskets and cannons. Killing a
human being created in the Image of God just because that human
being is an IRS agent and wants to take your money -- this is
not a Christian thing to do.
Nothing could be clearer from the teachings of Jesus and the
Apostles than that we must not take up arms to overthrow Caesar.
Understanding these commandments will require you to make a
complete turn-around in your thinking.
- Violent revolution is always wrong, but getting out your
musket and killing other Christians is even
- worse.
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- When you enroll in Samuel Adams
Coaching, you'll study
the Bible and find out that Jesus clearly taught that
Christians should not overthrow even the most barbaric,
violent, oppressive tyranny in history: the Roman Empire
that imposed a military occupation of Israel.
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- Britain in 1776 was certainly more civilized and
Christian than the Roman Empire, but Jesus and
the Apostles firmly prohibited resisting even the pagan
military occupation of Israel and attempting to overthrow
Caesar by violent revolution.
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- And this was not for tactical reasons or considerations of
prudence or the likelihood of success.
- Violent revolution is contrary to Christian ethics even if
it can succeed.
- Followers of Christ
don't kill their enemies.
- They convert them.
They pray for them.
- They preach the Word of God,
- the Spirit bears witness to the
Word,
- the hearts of the enemy are
changed
- and they repent
of socialism, fascism
- military occupation and
totalitarianism.
- When they repent, they resign their
political office.
- They end imperial conquest and confiscation.
- They end their enslavement and conscription of others.
- We preach; they repent.
- That's the Christian goal, not blowing their brains out.
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- America would be a very different nation if we had obeyed
our duties
instead of killing for our “rights.”
-
- Abolishing tyranny
is a good idea. But not with muskets and cannons. Killing a
human being created in the Image of God just because that
human being is an IRS agent and wants to take your money --
this is not a Christian thing to do.
-
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The Importance of Ideas
- The human beings that settled the New World
- were the same species of humans that remained in Europe.
- But America became extraordinary,
while Europe stagnated under monarchy and socialism.
- The difference was ideas.
- Ideas have consequences.
These same ideas can have consequences in your life.
The Samuel Adams
Coaching Program
Here's
a description of our program, along with our continuing
attempt to persuade you to sign up.
Samuel Adams Coaching
is a distance-learning program that helps you learn these
ideas and develop the skills to put them into effect and
promote them in our society.
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The Samuel
Adams Coaching
Program gives participants:
- a confident understanding of Biblical Christianity.
- conversational tools for engaging friends, co-workers,
and complete strangers about Christian Reconstruction in a
winsome and loving way.
- a community of like-minded believers for learning,
loving and living out faith together.
- a road map for living out an authentic faith in a
relativistic, postmodern world.
- opportunities to influence and transform the State, the
Church, communities, and culture.
The goal of our program is not to dump a bunch of
intellectual content into someone’s brain so they can then
spew it back out to others and sound really smart. Our aim is
to see people transformed from the inside out, to so inculcate
them in biblical truth, and in how and why those truths matter
in our personal lives and in our public institutions, that it
seeps into their mind, heart, and soul and transforms the way
they think, feel, and behave. This is the only foundation upon
which effective peacemaking can occur.
The program centers around the daily reading of the five
most important works in the history of America and Western
Civilization. |
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- The Bible
- The Catechisms and Confession of the Westminster
Assembly (1644-48)
- Capitalism and An Inquiry into
the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
- U.S. Supreme Court authorities proving The Myth
of the Separation of Church and State
- The Basis for Optimism
concerning the possibility of future progress and peace on
earth.
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Read
through the Bible in one year
with a mentor who can help you see
that Peace is Possible
Why Read the Bible?
Myth:
The Old Testament
advocates war, slavery, genocide, and vengeful
retaliation. |
Myth:
The Teachings of Jesus
are impractical, utopian, unrealistic, and should be
relegated to the inner religious meditations of a Mother
Theresa, but should be kept away from public policy,
especially foreign affairs and military strategy. |
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Both sides of this
coin are wrong.
We need to examine these myths. |
| Jesus quoted the
Old Testament. The prophets spoke of a day when we would beat
our swords into
plowshares and everyone would dwell securely under his own
Vine & Fig Tree -- not because his property was being
taken from him to fund the "military-industrial
complex," which "keeps us all safe," but
because nobody was training for war any more. |
If we were to
follow the teachings of Jesus in Washington D.C., we would
experience security, peace, and economic prosperity. No war
that the U.S. federal government has waged has ever made
things better than they would have been without military
intervention. |
- How did the
Civil War make things better? It gave us
complete domination by the federal
government.
- What future was improved for Poland and
Czechoslovakia by World War II? They were
rescued from Hitler and turned over to Stalin.
- How did U.S. war help the people of Iraq? A
westernized, secular nation was converted into
an Islamic Theocracy that leans toward Iran.
Hundreds of thousands of Christians were
killed or made homeless. Infrastructure was
destroyed.
- Which improvements in the human condition
were won by war?
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Conclusion:
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We should take
both the Old Testament and the New Testament seriously. |
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- Each day as we read the Bible
we're going to focus on things that George Washington,
Thomas Jefferson, and Samuel Adams focused on in their
studies: virtue, morality and character.
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- Not the kind of character that makes a person a prissy
priest or clergyman.
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- But the kind of character than can create entrepreneurs,
CEOs, and heroes; build businesses and hospitals.
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- We'll study the character traits you see at left, and we
will begin developing them into habits in our own lives.
- We'll discover a program to develop extraordinary habits
in the next great work we're
going to read.
Thomas Jefferson, despite his criticisms of clergy and
ecclesiastical corruption, would want to be remembered as one
who lived and encouraged a life of virtue and morality. He
would not take credit for the army of people who champion
"separation of church and state" as a cloak for
selfish immorality and a lack of virtue.
The practice of morality being necessary for the
well-being of society, He has taken care to impress its
precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be
effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the
obligation of the moral precepts of Jesus, and nowhere will
they be found delivered in greater purity than in his
discourses.
— TJ to James Fishback, Sept 27, 1809,
Bergh 12:315. (1809.)
Jefferson had written in 1819, "I never go to bed
without an hour or half an hour's reading of something
moral, whereon to ruminate in the intervals of sleep"
-- to which Randall adds, "The book oftenest chosen . .
. was a collection of extracts from the Bible."
Henry Wilder Foote, "Introduction,"
The Jefferson Bible, 23
He was passionately devoted to the gospel of Jesus, which
stirred him to the depths of his being and was the most
powerful motive force in his life.
Donald S. Harrington, "Foreword," The
Jefferson Bible, 11
Speaking of "the widespread denunciation of him by his
political opponents as an anti-Christian infidel or
atheist," Foote observes,
[I]t is one of the minor ironies of history that such
slanders should have been so generally and so long believed
about the man whose knowledge of and admiration for the
teachings of Jesus have never been equaled by any other
President.
Henry Wilder Foote, "Introduction,"
The Jefferson Bible, 18
It was not, however, to be understood that instruction in
religious opinion and duties was meant to be precluded by
the public authorities as indifferent to the interests of
society. On the contrary, the relations which exist between
man and his Maker and the duties resulting from those
relations are the most interesting and important to every
human being and the most incumbent on his study and
investigation.
-- TJ, Report to the Visitors [school boards]
Oct 7, 1822
America's Founders were agreed that religion and morality
were an essential part of a public school education.
This is because good character, which is the embodiment of
religion and morality, was essential to liberty and a free
Republic. If everyone thinks he is his own god, and can steal,
enslave, or kill anyone who stands in his way, you cannot have
ordered liberty. People of bad character will clamor for a
strong government to take vengeance against other people of
bad character. Soon you have totalitarianism and lawlessness.
Read the Founders on the connection between morality and
liberty here.
Continue to Westminster
Standards
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What does the Samuel
Adams Coaching Program
cost? Click here.
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This program is a college-level course with an iron-clad
money-back guarantee. You could expect to pay an average of
$7,992.00 to attend a course that meets every day and gives you
ample office hours with the professor, and a chance to brainstorm
with other students.
Our guarantee:
If you complete the assignments in this course, you will be
transformed into:
• an Extraordinary
American
• an Extraordinary Christian
• an Extraordinary Human Being
or your entire enrollment fee will be refunded. No college offers
such a guarantee.
Sign up now.
Don't pay $7,992.00.
Make a one-time donation of $4997 for the entire year-long Coaching
Program.
If you'd rather pay in monthly installments,
consider an automatic donation of $497/mo.
Samuel Adams Coaching is
administered by
Vine & Fig Tree
a non-profit, tax-exempt organization
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