God have mercy on America

Do you remember where you were that fateful day nearly seven years ago now when America watched in horror as the Twin Towers crashed to the ground, the Pentagon lay in disarray, and airplane wreckage lie strewn across a lonely Pennsylvania field?

Though it was nearly seven years ago, major life events stand out, causing our memories to recall them as though they were but yesterday. I remember being woken from a deep sleep long before the alarm was to sound. I remember working that day, every break spent around the lone television in hopes of catching the latest details.

I remember President Bush and his look of indignation, and how he promised to avenge America of those who were involved in this deed. And I remember how so many men turned from their own pursuits to swell the ranks of America’s military in her hour of need.

In the days following, I remember reading how America seemed to be turning back to God, as churches across our nation, which once seemed dormant, seemed to be teeming with new life. But then as the days wore on, and life got back to normal, I remember hearing the news that America’s new found spirituality began to die out.

I also began to see memorials spread across the Internet — artists’ depictions — and the hands of God receiving the souls of those who had died in the towers, and the sadness in my heart for those who were thus misled. But what I remember most is how I began to see and hear an old, old slogan: God Bless America.

Though I am sure that it was being uttered with good intentions and patriotic fervor, I began to contemplate this phrase in relation to the America that I have come to know. You see, the America I have come to know is different from what it was in the days of my forefathers. In fact, I have heard the old men who are my father’s age say that the America they grew up in was a lot freer than what she is today.

As I pondered this blessing, it began to occur to me that we no longer need to ask God to bless our country, for he already has many times over. He blessed our country in its founding, when those fledgling colonies took on the greatest military power of their day, and won. He blessed her when she went through the Civil War, and reunited that divided nation. He blessed her through two world wars and a great depression.

But somewhere along the line, despite all of God’s blessings, America’s populace decided that they no longer needed the one their forefathers called their Creator. Somehow they became vain in their imaginations and thought that his blessings were the works of their own hands. And then came that fateful day in 1963 that our Supreme Court agreed that God no longer belonged in our public classrooms. And being asked to leave, God took his blessings right along with him.

Oh, I am sure that this is an overly simplistic view for the sophisticated of our day, but we have tried everything else we can think of, and nothing seems to work. While we can trace back to 1964 the beginning of declining test scores and the rise of behavior problems, no one seems to realize that no matter how much money we throw at it or how many fingers we point, the real fault lies with God — he is not blessing our education anymore.

To be sure, there are a whole host of other areas in which we, as a nation are failing, and all because he has withheld his blessing. And while I have said that it is God’s fault, let me suggest that God is righteous to withhold his blessings. Just as a parent has the right to punish the child that is too big for his britches, God has a right to punish a nation that has rejected him. And truly, we deserve everything God should choose to dish out.

But let me also suggest that there may still be time left to amend our ways. More than just some flippant “Sorry,” a more appropriate cry would be, “Oh God, please have mercy on America!” The Bible says, He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.

This Patriot Day, my prayer for my nation will be that my people will return to the God of our forefathers in true repentance of their sins so that he may return his blessings upon our land.

May God have mercy on America!

Ron Hamman is pastor for Independent Baptist Church of Wasilla. Contact him at

357-4229.