Happy Birthday Uncle Sam.

I am intrigued by many, many things that have gone on in our countries past. I have been encouraged by a man named, Fredrick Douglas, whom I am hoping we all have heard of at some point during our american education. He escaped slavery to become a renowned american abolitionist, minister and reformer. He stood firm for equality among all people.

A popular quote from Douglas ::

" I would unite with anybody to do right, and with nobody to do wrong. "

Douglas gave a speech in 1852 in Rochester, New York about the fugitive slave laws that were passed. The fugitive slave laws, in short, enabled officers and watchmen the entitlement to capture slaves who escaped to freedom. They were required to turn them in so they could be returned to their "masters". I find the boldness in Douglas something that is profoundly necessary now a days in modern america.

"Let it be thundered around the world that in tyrant-killing, king-hating, people-loving, democratic, Christian America the seats of justice are filled with judges who hold their offices under an open and palpable bribe, and are bound, in deciding the case of a man's liberty, to hear only his accusers!

In glaring violation of justice, in shameless disregard of the forms of administering law, in cunning arrangement to entrap the defenceless, and in diabolical intent this Fugitive Slave Law stands alone in the annals of tyrannical legislation. I doubt if there be another nation on the globe having the brass and the baseness to put such a law on the statute-book. If any man in this assembly thinks differently from me in this matter, and feels able to disprove my statements, I will gladly confront him at any suitable time and place he may select.

I take this law to be one of the grossest infringements of Christian Liberty, and, if the churches and ministers of our country were nor stupidly blind, or most wickedly indifferent, they, too, would so regard it.

At the very moment that they are thanking God for the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and for the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they are utterly silent in respect to a law which robs religion of its chief significance and makes it utterly worthless to a world lying in wickedness."

Douglas, I could not have said it better myself.

Thank you for your relentless pursuit of truth.

Proverbs 31:8 " Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly, defend the rights of the poor and needy. "

This world is still indeed a wicked place that lacks the presence of God in many ways.

Yet, I am hopeful in the church and the God we serve.

Proverbs 29:16-18 " When the wicked thrive, so does sin. But the righteous will see their downfall. Where there is no revelation the people cast off restraint; but blessed is he who keeps the law. "