The Day of Trouble is Near

There is much debate about whether America had a “Christian Founding.” Like many disagreements, the position one takes often depends on the assumptions one, and these assumptions need defending. In the case of a historical judgement, our arguments typically reflect present concerns more than they do past realities. Whether someone believes that America was founded as a Christian country often reveals the extent to which they think Christianity should be a factor in shaping our current politics. It may be fine polemics, but it’s bad history.

Wherever one falls on the question, it would be virtually impossible to argue that Christianity had no bearing on the formation of our country. The sheer complexity of Christianity as a belief system ensured that its influence would be extensive, variegated, and often hidden, but at other times obvious.

Because we tend to take 1776 as the “birth” of our country (for the record, I think this is a mistake) we also tend to ignore how the 150+ years of history prior to the Declaration shaped our identity. The influence of Christianity in those years was, again, not uniform, and different colonies experimented with different kinds of religious establishments, but one cannot discount the influence of “covenantal” thinking on American political development. One way to think about covenants is to contrast them with contracts, which are dissoluble. Covenants contain within them an element of permanence and cannot be disclosed for non-performance of one of the parties; along those lines, however, they will often contain a series of rewards and punishments both for upholding and ignoring its terms.

The Hebrew Scripture provided a model for how covenants work. “I will be your God and you will be my people.” When Israel failed to perform its duties (including caring for the widowed and orphaned) God would punish them. The Old Testament prophets, typically in the middle of these hard times, engaged in the act of calling the people to repentance and back to obedience.

Similarly, in colonial America, the covenantal idea of rewards and punishments could operate in two ways: it could explain why bad things were happening, or it could look at the dissolute behavior of the people and predict that bad times were a’coming. (A contemporary example would be the conservative Christian leaders who believed Hurricane Katrina was God’s judgment being visited upon that city for its decadence — a point of view that has a long patrimony in America.)

Increase Mather and his son Cotton are two of the most important figures in Colonial history, articulating with great fervor the Puritan understanding of social life and its connection to religious liberty. The sermon here is another example of the jeremiad, in this instance a prophetic foreboding.

The abounding of Iniquity is a sign that the day of trouble is near. Therefore, the Lord Jesus Christ speaking of the signs fore-running that day of Calamity which then was coming upon Ierusalem, saith, Iniquity shall abound, Mat. 24.12. If Iniquity do abound amongst those that are the professed Enemies of God, and of his People, that's a sign that their day is near, and that the things which shall come upon them do make haste, Ioel 3.13. Their wickedness is great; and then it followeth in the next Verse, The day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. So we see in Sodom, wickedness was grown to a marvellous height there, and then on a sudden the fatal Morning came upon them. If strange Prodigious Wickednesses are breaking forth, that's a sign that strange Punishments are at hand: but especially if it be thus amongst a Professing People. … when the signs of the Lords Presence are taken away, it argueth that a day of trouble is coming on apace. Unity, is a sign of the Lords Presence; Live in peace, and the God of Love and Peace shall be with you. Hence breaches and divisions, inasmuch as they are an evidence of the Lords departure from a people, are a sign of miseries at hand. So again, Ordinances, Civil, but especially Sacred Ordinances, when administered according to the minde of Christ, are tokens of the Lords gracious Presence in the midst of his people. Therefore when the Lord removeth these, or the Instruments of upholding and managing these, for the edification of his people, it is a sad sign.

The language here can be confusing. The terms of the covenant bind God and Israel to one another, and the Lord dwells in the midst of the people. But if the people are unfaithful, God withdraws His presence, their sin being repugnant to his holiness. The covenant is maintained, but God removes His protective care, thus creating space for all the chaos and disorder that always rests on the other side of divine protection. God punishes simply by refusing to keep the evil at bay, and the greatest evil will be division, hardened factions within the community. Factionalism, by which we mean the spirit of disagreement, is a sign that the people are not united in Christian love. The Spirit of God creates unity among a people, so disagreement is a sign of the Spirit’s absence. Such absence spells trouble.

Hence also, divided Counsels are signs that bode no good to such a people. When one shall be violent for this, and another shall be as strong and resolute against it; this is wont to be the Iudicial Effect of the Lords mingling a perverse spirit: for then he doth set the Egyptians against the Egyptians, Isa. 19.2. This we see, Psal. 55.9. Destroy, O Lord, and divide their tongues. According to that Prayer of David, Absoloms Counsellors were divided, which proved the ruine of that party…

Mather addresses one of the central problems of political life - how do we explain agreement and disagreement, and how do we manage the latter? - by stipulating that disagreement within the political body always leads to dissolution and chaos. Whatever else is meant by religious liberty, it is not the freedom of the individual to believe whatever he or she chooses, or do whatever they list, if it introduces dissension.

Mather makes a point difficult for us to understand: that punishment is a sign of both God’s faithfulness and goodness. First, the terms of the covenant require punishment for misdeeds, so if God didn’t punish he wouldn’t be perfect in his justice. Second, punishment is always directed toward the improvement of the agent punished, and is thus a sign of divine mercy and love. A loving Father punishes his children to help them learn what is right.

The Lord sheweth his great Faithfulness as to the time, the kinde, the measure, the manner, the duration of whatever afflictions may befall any of his faithful Servants. And his Power also is hereby discovered: it is a glorious evidence of the wonderful Power of God, that the Church should be upheld and preserved in the world, notwithstanding the troubles and miseries thereof. The Church's being continued in the world, is one of the great Wonders of divine Providence, wherein the mighty Power of God is seen.

Punishment is a form of suffering, and suffering purifies. During good times people tend to credit too much to their own merit and forget their dependence on God. Their faith lacks zeal. Just as metal is purified in hot fire, so a people is made holy by punishment. A church persecuted orders itself rightly, recognizing faith in God as the most important thing in this world and obedience as their calling.

God brings dayes of trouble with respect to his people. And that especially on a fourfold account. 1. For their Probation. 2. For their Instruction. 3. For their Correction. 4. In order to their Purgation.

Times of trial are tests of faith. God uses these trials to see who is holy and worthy of his love and who is base and to be cast from his presence. Mather then pivots to the key question: what did the people do wrong to bring down upon themselves God’s punishment and wrath? Below, Mather ticks off the details.

The not ordering matters aright, respecting the Worship of God, was the principal Crime which brought this trouble. Idolatry was the sin, that at this time above others, troubled Israel….That sin of corrupting the Worship of God, hath been the grand Procuring Cause of those astonishing and desolating Plagues that have come upon the earth. … So on the other hand, if there be a taking from the Word of God, in matters referring to his Worship, dayes of trouble will come. In case Churches shall not come up fully to practice the Institutions of Christ, and to stand perfect and compleat in all the will of God, the Lord will punish them for their neglects…

An important element of Christianity is that, like Israel of old, the church is a people “set apart,” in the world but not of the world. They carry the mark of distinction (symbolized in baptism) that they have been purified and belong to Christ and His church. But the marks are not merely external: the differences between Christians and others can be most clearly seen in their actions, the one marked by love of neighbor and the other by love of self. The covenant fails when one can no longer tell the difference between Christians and non-Christians, the former having become too worldly.

Brethren, what shall I say? As to matters of Religion, things are not as should be. There is a great decay as to the power of godliness amongst us. Professors are many of them of a loose, carnal, ungirt Conversation. We can now see little difference between Church-members and other men, as to their discourses, or their spirits, or their walking, or their garb, but Professors of Religion fashion themselves according to the world.

The most famous use of “the house divided” rhetoric, a phrase of Christ’s in the book of Matthew, is undoubtedly Lincoln’s “house divided” speech. But it has a lengthy patrimony in American usage, grounded in the twofold conviction of the unity of Christ’s body and the idea that disunity will lead to punishment and disaster. War will be the punishment: in Lincoln’s case the American Civil War, and within a year of Mather’s speech King Philip’s War, which consumed New England for three years.

We are divided in our Judgements; and if that were all, the matter were not much: but we are divided in our Affections, divided in our Prayers, divided in our Counsels: And will not an House divided be brought to desolation? We may say as that blessed Burroughs once complained, We have been so divided that it is the infinite Mercy of God that our Enemies have not come in at our breaches, and divided all amongst themselves. Alas! that Gods Diamonds should be cutting one another. I do believe, that one reason why the Lord threatneth to send upon us that Calamity of War at this day, is because of wars and fightings which he hath seen, and been provoked with in the midst of us. If you will needs be fighting (saith God) I'le send those upon you, that shall give you enough of it…

Like the prophets of old, Mather calls the people to repentance and to a return of the laws and expectations of the covenant:

We should be a Believing people. That's the way to be delivered out of trouble… It concerns us in this day of trouble to be a Reforming people. Let us amend our wayes and our doings, and the Lord will cause us to dwell in this place, Jer. 7.3.  … Who knoweth, but the Lord may bring these troubles within our sight, that so we may seek him early, yea that so the Spirit of Prayer may be awakened amongst us? … If thou hast but one Tear in thy eyes, if thou hast but one Prayer in thy heart, spend it now. And let us remember the words of the Lord Jesus, Luke 21.36. Watch ye therefore, and pray alwayes, that ye may be counted worthy to escape all these things which shall come to pass.

Discussion Questions:

1. Independent of the specific religious content of Mather’s sermon, does he correctly identify a formal problem: namely, that people who don’t conduct themselves properly can expect trouble to follow?

2. Is it possible for Christians to accept some parts of Christian teaching while rejecting the covenantal idea?

3. How was Lincoln a covenantal thinker?

By Jeff Polet

Director of the Ford Leadership Forum, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation

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