When America’s Leaders Called For Prayer and Fasting

From my friend William J. Federer – a look back at why America was blessed with victory over our enemies – and blessed above any nation before us.

When suffering the evils of tyrants, the first order of business was to call for a day of Prayer and Fasting.

In these dark days of tyranny from our own leadership – where are even the church leaders on this score?

Fast asleep and lukewarm in the comfort of pews filled with donors.

God bless us with Repentance.

Or this experiment in self-governance is doomed.

When our leaders used to call us to prayer and fasting

By William J. Federer
© 2010

To punish Massachusetts for the Tea Party, King George III decided to destroy its economy by blockading Boston’s harbor on June 1, 1774.

Thomas Jefferson drafted a Resolution for a “Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer” to be observed the same day. It was introduced in the Virginia House of Burgesses May 24, 1774, by Robert Carter Nicholas and supported by Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee and George Mason, passing unanimously:

“This House, being deeply impressed with apprehension of the great dangers, to be derived to British America, from the hostile invasion of the City of Boston, in our sister Colony of Massachusetts … deem it highly necessary that the said first day of June be set apart, by the members of this House as a Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer, devoutly to implore the Divine interposition, for averting the heavy calamity which threatens destruction to our civil rights. … Ordered, therefore that the Members of this House do attend … with the Speaker, and the Mace, to the Church in this City, for the purposes aforesaid; and that the Reverend Mr. Price be appointed to read prayers, and the Reverend Mr. Gwatkin, to preach a sermon.”

George Washington wrote in his diary, June 1, 1774: “Went to church, fasted all day.”

Virginia’s royal governor, Lord Dunmore, interpreted this resolution as a veiled protest against King George III and dissolved the House of Burgesses, resulting in legislators meeting in Raleigh Tavern where they conspired to form the first Continental Congress.

On April 15, 1775, just four days before the Battle of Lexington, where was fired “the shot heard ’round the world,” the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, led by John Hancock, declared:

“In circumstances dark as these, it becomes us, as men and Christians, to reflect that, whilst every prudent measure should be taken to ward off the impending judgments … the 11th of May next be set apart as a Day of Public Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer … to confess the sins … to implore the Forgiveness of all our Transgression.”

On May 15, 1776, Gen. George Washington ordered:

“The Continental Congress having ordered Friday the 17th instant to be observed as a Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer, humbly to supplicate the mercy of Almighty God, that it would please Him to pardon all our manifold sins and transgressions, and to prosper the arms of the United Colonies, and finally establish the peace and freedom of America upon a solid and lasting foundation; the General commands all officers and soldiers to pay strict obedience to the orders of the Continental Congress; that, by their unfeigned and pious observance of their religious duties, they may incline the Lord and Giver of victory to prosper our arms.”

At the Constitutional Convention, 1787, Ben Franklin stated:

“In the beginning of the Contest with Great Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayer in this room for Divine protection.”

Proclaiming a Day of Prayer, Ronald Reagan said Jan. 27, 1983:

“In 1775, the Continental Congress proclaimed the first National Day of Prayer. … In 1783, the Treaty of Paris officially ended the long, weary Revolutionary War during which a National Day of Prayer had been proclaimed every spring for eight years.”

Maybe Americans should once again, as Reagan concluded: “… seek His help for the challenges we face today and in the future.”

For America: A Day of Fasting and Prayer

We have chronicled the danger of Barrack Hussein Obama to our liberties, our nation and possibly, our very existence as Christians here on this blog. The masses that Seig Heil and worship him as messiah should jolt every American to his or her core – because we have seen this kind of messiah-worship before – and we know where it leads: to holocaust and death.

In a conversation with brethren in the last few weeks, we recalled how when Haman falsely accused the Jews in the Book of Esther, and sought to have the entire people annihilated, Esther called for her people to a Fast and prayer for God to protect and preserve them from the rising storm being levied against them.

At no time in our nation’s history have we faced a precipice like this one.

Therefore, we are asking ANY and ALL of faith – who love this country; who cherish our liberty; who revere our Constitution and our heritage – to FAST in PRAYER from Sunset Saturday evening November 1st, to sunset Sunday evening November 2nd (The Sunday BEFORE the election) – to pray in earnest desperation for our nation, to repent and apologize to God for our individual and national sins of both COMMISSION and OMISSION. That we would PLEAD with Him to spare us from the despotism Obama and the Socialists will bring when in power.

2 Chronicles 7:14
if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. 

__________________

Day of fasting, prayer a prelude to Nov. 4
‘We are about to set a course that will affect our country for generations’

The foundation launched in honor of famed Christian speaker, broadcaster and leader D. James Kennedy, who founded the Coral Ridge Ministries, has announced a day of prayer for Nov. 3.

“We are about to set a course that will affect our country for generations to come,” said a statement from Jennifer Kennedy Cassidy of the D. James Kennedy Foundation.

“For this reason we are calling on all Christian leaders and their congregations to join with us for a day of fasting and prayer the day before the election on Monday, November 3rd,” she said.

“Please join with us as God instructed us in 2 Chronicles 7:14,” she said, citing the Bible:

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

“We’re less than a week until the most important election in our lifetime. Must is at stake that is vital to our nation,” she said.

Among the issues on which the 2008 presidential election is expected to have a major impact are life issues such as abortion, Christian liberty (including speech rights), the federal judiciary, taxes, government spending, foreign policy, national security, defense, energy and broadcasting, she said.

James Dobson’s Focus on the Family Action recently released a “Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America,” which targets the many evangelical Christians seeking “change,” particularly the young, who could tip the election in favor of the Illinois Democrat.

At the end of the letter, the fictional Christian laments that these people “simply did not realize Obama’s far-left agenda would take away many of our freedoms as a nation, perhaps permanently,” pointing to a new, liberal-majority Supreme Court unlikely to change for 30 more years.

“Many of our freedoms have been taken away by a liberal Supreme Court and a majority of Democrats in both the House and the Senate, and hardly any brave citizen dares to resist the new government policies any more,” the letter writer says.

The results the letter speculates may have happened by four years from now:

• Six liberal justices sit on the Supreme Court after the immediate resignation of John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the later resignations of Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy. 
• Homosexual marriage has been ruled a constitutional right that must be respected by all 50 states. 
• The Boy Scouts have disbanded rather than obey a decision forcing them to allow homosexual scoutmasters. (The Scouts already had been kicked out of public facilities because of an expansion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to cover people who engage in homosexual behavior.) 
• Elementary schools have compulsory training in varieties of gender identity. Courts rule parents cannot opt out their children, because the training is deemed essential to psychological health. 
• Evangelical and Catholic adoption agencies cease to exist after the Supreme Court rules they must agree to place children with homosexuals or lose their licenses. 
• Church buildings are now considered a “public accommodation” by the United States Supreme Court, and churches have no freedom to refuse to allow their buildings to be used for wedding ceremonies for homosexual couples. 
• High schools are no longer free to allow “see you at the pole” meetings where students pray together or any student Bible studies even before or after school. 
• The Supreme Court barred public schools in all 50 states from allowing churches to rent their facilities, even on Sundays, when school was not in session. 
• Obama signed the Freedom of Choice Act, as he promised the Planned Parenthood Action Fund last year, nullifying hundreds of state laws that had created even the slightest barrier to abortion. 
• The Supreme Court in 2011 nullified all Federal Communications Commission restrictions on obscene speech or visual content in radio and TV broadcasts, and television programs at all hours of the day now contain explicit portrayals of sexual acts. 
• As a result of a reversal of its 5-4 decision in the D.C. gun-ownership case, it is now illegal for private citizens to own guns for self-defense in eight states, and the number is growing with increasing Democratic control of state legislatures and governorships