Benjamin Franklin’s Appeal for Prayer at the Constitutional Convention

Image: The Signing of the United States Constitution by Louis S. Glanzman, 1987

I'm currently reading a book about the history of prayer in America and I came across a June 28, 1787 speech by Benjamin Franklin appealing for prayer, which had been wholly neglected, at the Constitutional Convention. This is a portion of that speech, with emphasis added...

"In this situation of this Assembly, groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us, how has it happened, Sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights to illuminate our understandings? In the beginning of the Contest with G. Britain, when we were sensible of danger we had daily prayer in this room for the divine protection. Our prayers, Sir, were heard, and they were graciously answered. All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a Superintending providence in our favor. To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth—that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that 'except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it.' I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing Governments by Human Wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest."

Source: Benjamin Franklin’s Appeal for Prayer at the Constitutional Convention https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/benfranklin.htm 

The Last Judgement

Image: The Last Judgement (Detail) Hieronymus Bosch (1482)

And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. (Revelation 20:11-15)

Et vidi thronum magnum candidum, et sedentem super eum, a cujus conspectu fugit terra, et caelum, et locus non est inventus eis. Et vidi mortuos, magnos et pusillos, stantes in conspectu throni, et libri aperti sunt: et alius liber apertus est, qui est vitae: et judicati sunt mortui ex his, quae scripta erant in libris, secundum opera ipsorum: et dedit mare mortuos, qui in eo erant: et mors et infernus dederunt mortuos suos, qui in ipsis erant: et judicatum est de singulis secundum opera ipsorum. Et infernus et mors missi sunt in stagnum ignis. Haec est mors secunda. Et qui non inventus est in libro vitae scriptus, missus est in stagnum ignis. (Apocolypse 20:11-15)

Καὶ εἶδον θρόνον λευκὸν μέγαν καὶ τὸν καθήμενον ἐπ' αὐτοῦ, οὗ ἀπὸ προσώπου ἔφυγεν ἡ γῆ καὶ ὁ οὐρανός καὶ τόπος οὐχ εὑρέθη αὐτοῖς. καὶ εἶδον τοὺς νεκρούς μικρούς καὶ μεγάλους ἑστῶτας ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ, καὶ βιβλία ἠνεῳχθησαν· καὶ βιβλίον ἄλλο ἠνεῳχθη, ὅ ἐστιν τῆς ζωῆς. καὶ ἐκρίθησαν οἱ νεκροὶ ἐκ τῶν γεγραμμένων ἐν τοῖς βιβλίοις κατὰ τὰ ἔργα αὐτῶν καὶ ἔδωκεν ἡ θάλασσα τοὺς ἐν αὐτῇ νεκροὺς, καὶ ὁ θάνατος καὶ ὁ ᾅδης ἔδωκαν τοὺς ἐν αὐτοῖς νεκροὺς καὶ ἐκρίθησαν ἕκαστος κατὰ τὰ ἔργα αὐτῶν. καὶ ὁ θάνατος καὶ ὁ ᾅδης ἐβλήθησαν εἰς τὴν λίμνην τοῦ πυρός οὗτος ἐστιν ὁ δεύτερός θάνατος. καὶ εἴ τις οὐχ εὑρέθη ἐν τῇ βίβλῳ τῆς ζωῆς γεγραμμένος ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν λίμνην τοῦ πυρός. (ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ΙΩΑΝΝΟΥ 20:11-15)

The Protestant canonical text

Image: 'The Candle is lighted, we can not blow out' (Leading Theologians of the Protestant Reformation) published by John Garrett line engraving, after 1673

“We may look at sacred texts as being those which contain a power and authority and are given certain status within a given community. Such communities and traditions are held together most typically through liturgical acts, which help to focus life upon that which is ultimate and to which the sacred texts give testimony. The status of the sacred text is canonical: as well as being normative for a community or tradition, it is also that community or tradition's canon or canonical text. The term 'canon' has a variety of meanings, but in the context of sacred texts it means the defined groups of texts for the community or tradition . . one does not add to or subtract from them.”

Source: Ninian Smart and Richard D. Hecht, edd. Sacred Texts of the World: A Universal Anthology (New York: Crossroad, 1982), p. xiii-xiv.

The Protestant canonical text was the sacred text chosen by the Protestant faith community. This was a new sacred text for a new religious community. A religious community and a sacred text that had never before existed, distinctly, as such.

This religious community came out of the Catholic church, took with it the ancient creeds of the church and created from the Latin and Greek churches texts of the New Testament—along with the Old Testament Hebrew text of the Jews—a new sacred canonical text never before used by any religious community. 

Why many pastors are confessional or received text advocates

Image: Trinitarian Bible Society's Η ΚΑΙΝΗ ΔΙΑΘΗΚΗ (The New Testament)

Like it or not, confessional or received text folks now constitute a particular sect of Protestantism. A traditional, or traditionalist, sect.

Why would someone seek to follow the 17th century traditional Protestant scriptural text and theological confession? Probably in order to have a firm faith foundation, which provides them with maximum certainty, with well established theological doctrines, and a well established traditional Protestant canonical text.

Such a foundation allows these believers to make continual progress in living their Christian faith.

Foundational issues of the Christian faith, such as Scripture and doctrine, must be settled, well established, in order to make such progress. This is especially important for those who are new believers, who are reading the Scriptures and learning Christian doctrine for the first time.

This is why many pastors are confessional or received text advocates.

The academic challenges and uncertainties of modern text criticism certainly appeal to the intellect, and to intellectuals, but having the certainty of a settled sacred text and doctrine appeals to the hearts and minds of pastors and ordinary Christian believers.

Sadly, the academic challenges and uncertainties of modern criticism also leads some people—both intellectuals and ordinary believers—to loss of faith in Scripture and traditional Christian doctrines.

Does it seem somewhat anti-intellectual for Christians to believe in and hold to these old ways?

I’m sure it does seem so to some people. But what is it really hurting to hold on to the old theology and the old text? Couldn't holding on to these actually be very helpful to them, and to those they are pastoring?

The goal of pastors isn’t to instruct their churches about the latest trends in modern speculative theology, doctrine, and text criticism. Although this sort of thing does have an immense appeal to both the ego and the intellect, especially in well educated and well read Protestant circles.

We should keep in mind that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (see: Proverbs 3:34; 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6).

Knowledge puffs up, but charity edifies (1 Corinthians 8:1).

Do we want proud pastors who are knowledgeable about the latest trends in modern theology, doctrine, and text criticism? Or do we want pastors who will follow the old, proven ways of making faithful disciples of Jesus Christ?

Personally, I want a pastor who builds me up in the faith. 

If there’s one major difference between the old 17th century Protestant theology with its traditional text of Scripture, and the modern theology with its critical text of Scripture it is this: the old way edifies, builds people up in their faith, whereas the new way promotes doubt and uncertainty, diminishing people’s faith, while at the same time puffing them up with knowledge, so-called (1 Timothy 6:20).

Let's encourage people in their walk of faith without filling their minds (and the margins of their Bibles) with doubts and uncertainties.    

Technopoly is totalitarian technology

With the rise of Technopoly, one of those thought-worlds [technological or traditional] disappears. Technopoly eliminates alternatives to itself in precisely the way Aldous Huxley outlines in Brave New World. It does not make them illegal. It does not make them immoral. It does not even make them unpopular. It makes them invisible and therefore irrelevant. And it does so by redefining what we mean by religion, by art, by family, by politics, by history, by truth, by privacy, by intelligence, so that our definitions fit its new requirements. Technopoly, in other words, is totalitarian technology.

Neil Postman, Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology (p. 48) 

The beast from the earth

Image: The Apotheosis of Washington (by Constantino Brumidi, 1865)

The beast from the earth is the sea beast’s religiously oriented accomplice. This false prophet’s lying wonders support the sea beast’s arrogant boasts and slanders against God, luring those who dwell on the earth into worshipping the beast. What does this earth beast/false prophet symbolize? Just as the beast from the sea is Rome and yet is much bigger than Rome, so the beast from the earth is the imperial cult indigenous to Asia Minor but also a larger phenomenon that continues in our day. As we saw in the background of the letters to the seven churches, several of those ancient Christian congregations found themselves in cities that competed vigorously for the honor of building a temple or shrine to the ruling Roman emperor and/or to the empire’s patron goddess, Roma. A city that bore the honored designation “temple warden” (neocoros) had enhanced its social prestige and its political and economic status. In the decades following John’s reception of the Apocalypse, religious devotion in the form of burning incense to the emperor would be made the test of political loyalty to Rome and its ruler. The worship of rulers as gods, descendants of the gods, or gods in the making (after death—apotheosis) is less overt in Western culture today than it was in the ancient world. Even in so-called secular states, however, governments can arrogate to themselves quasi-divine powers and issue quasi-divine promises of salvation to their loyal and believing subjects. Such states have no qualms about exploiting religious establishments in the interests of civic loyalty and cultural conformity. But people who, in allegiance to “another king, Jesus,” resist the state’s claim to ownership over forehead and hand, mind and deed, are seen as threats to good order and the common weal—and must be eliminated.

Dennis E. Johnson, Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation (pp. 196-197)  

The Temple Measured: The Church Safe While Suffering (Revelation 11:1-2)

Image: The Spoils of Jerusalem, Arch of Titus 

And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. 2But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months. (Revelation 11:1-2)

[T]he unmeasured outer court and the “holy city” that it represents, trampled under Gentile feet for forty-two months, provide a contrasting perspective on the same true church that is pictured in the measured sanctuary. In the paradoxical way in which Revelation’s visions so often describe the church, Christ’s holy temple-city is secure and vulnerable: secured from apostasy and divine wrath by the power and grace of the Lamb but vulnerable to attack through persecution by the world’s noncovenant peoples.  Although elsewhere in the Bible the title “the holy city” refers to the physical metropolis that was the capital of Israel and center of Jewish worship, in the book of Revelation “the holy city” is the new Jerusalem, the bride of the Lamb (Rev. 21:2; 22:19). Earthly Jerusalem, symbolizing anti-Jesus Judaism, as the site of the Lord’s crucifixion, has become identified with “the great city” (11:8), symbolic of human community that stands in the defiant tradition of Sodom, Egypt, and preeminently Babylon (14:8: 16:9; 17:18). Because a Christ-centered redefinition of the people of God has occurred, the name Jew no longer belongs to anti-Jesus Jews (2:9; 3:9), and pro-Jesus Gentiles have been redeemed and consecrated as God’s kingdom of priests (5:9-10). So also the “holy city” no longer belongs to earthly Jerusalem, which has become just one more expression of the “great city” that slays the saints (11:7-8; 17:6). The holy city is the bride of the Lamb, who will be revealed in beauty, ready for her wedding, at the end of history.

In the interim, however, the holy city will be trampled by the Gentiles, just as the earthly Jerusalem and its temple had been razed and trampled by Roman troops under Titus. The interim here is symbolized as forty-two months, which will be shown in Revelation 12-13 to symbolize the period of the dragon’s virulent but frustrated attempts to destroy the church through deception and violent aggression.

Thus the unmeasured courtyard, given to the Gentiles, and the holy city, trampled by the Gentiles, balance the portrait of the church as the measured sanctuary: though protected from apostasy and God’s wrath, the church is exposed to physical coercion, social contempt, and violence.

Dennis E. Johnson, Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation (pp. 168-169)