Day 23: In God We Trust

At the rate I am going, 80 days will have gone by in my attempt to do my 40 day posts. :) Sorry, I'm just a slacker. I'd like to promise you an improvement, but I can't guarantee that. It's just the kind of person I am. :) So, if the posts continue to be sporadic, forgive me.

I was reading in 2nd Nephi the other day and a couple of passages of scripture really stuck out to me. Maybe because I have been thinking a lot about the 8/28 event that Glenn Beck hosted, or maybe because I just needed to read it. In the first chapter, Lehi is addressing Laman and Lemuel one last time before he passes away. He starts out by talking about the land of their inheritance; the promised land. In verse 5, he says, "Yea, the Lord hath covenanted this land unto me, and to my children forever, and also all those who should be led out of other countries by the hand of the Lord." He continues on in verse 6 saying, "there shall none come into this land save they shall be brought by the hand of the Lord." As I read that, I realized that all who came to this land were truly brought here by divine design. What an amazing thing. The Lord had His hand in it all. He brought those to this land that He knew would build it up to the great nation it now is.

But then, right after Lehi tells them about this great nation and the divine way in which they inherited it, he issues this warning in verse 7, "Wherefore, this land is consecrated unto him whom he shall bring. And if it so be that they shall serve him according to the commandments which he hath given, it shall be a land of liberty unto them; wherefore, they shall never be brought down into captivity; if so, it shall be because of iniquity; for if iniquity shall abound cursed shall be the land for their sakes, but unto the righteous it shall be blessed forever."

What a warning. No cushion, no buffer, just puttin it all out there and telling it how it is. As I look at the state of our nation, I get a little nervous. We seem to be losing sight of what really matters. God is being taken out of our schools, attempted to be taken off our money and essentially, out of our lives. If we don't change things, well, I don't really want to find out what "cursed shall be the land for their sakes" all entails. Call me crazy. I would prefer it being blessed forever because of righteousness. And in order to do that, to be righteous, we need to go back to our roots. We need to get back to what our Founding Fathers started. We need to recognize the Lord's hand in the creating and establishing of this nation. And, as is written on all our currency, we need to remember, "In God, We Trust." We are truly a blessed nation that has been given so much. Let's not condemn ourselves to captivity and cursings, but instead continue to be the promised land.