Abraham Davenport was a member of the founding generation. When everyone around him thought Jesus was coming back, and I mean thought he was coming back that second, Davenport didn't change a thing. We should have a similar posture.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. I read 1 Peter 4 this morning, underlined a bunch. I was going to go over a bunch of different things here, but I can't really make it past this one sentence. 1 Peter 4, 7, but the end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be serious and watchful in your prayers. 

That's the ESV. I almost always quote ESV, but I do want to give NASB here. The end of all things is near. Therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer. sound judgment, sober spirit, serious prayers, watchful of your prayers. John Calvin said it ought to be the chief concern of the believer to fix his mind constantly on Christ's second advent, his second coming. 

We should be thinking, we should be fixing our minds constantly on the second coming of Jesus. This is Christmas, so it's all about the first coming. That's great, but the second coming is quite important as well. Remember, Joy to the World is actually about the second coming, it's not really a Christmas song. So I was doing some research on that sentence because that stuck out to me so much. In my research, I came across this poem about a particular day in New England. 

Let me quote here from the newspaper in 1780. It says here, the Northern states wrapped in a dense black atmosphere for 15 hours. Again, this is 1780, the day of judgment supposed to have come. Cessation of labor. People stopped working. Religious devotions resorted to. 

The herds retire to their stalls, the fowls to their roosts, and the birds sing their evening songs at noonday. clips there was, it was crazy. All the crickets came out. Science at loss to account for the mysterious phenomenon. One of nature's marvels. Redness of the sun and moon. 

Approach of a thick vapor. Loud pearls of thunder. Sudden and strange darkness. Alarm of the inhabitants. End of the world looked for. Dismay at the brute creation. 

An intensely deep gloom. This is the newspaper in 1780. Difficulty in attending to business. lights burning in the houses, vast extent of the occurrence, condition of the barometer, change in the color of objects, quick motion of the clouds, birds suffocate and die, the sun's disk seen in some places, oily deposits on the waters, impenetrable darkness at night, incidents and anecdotes, ignorant whims and conjectures, an unsolved mystery. " That was in 1780. So this poem was written by James Whittier about Abraham Davenport. Abraham Davenport was the grandson of the founder of the New Haven colony, and he was a state rep. And I just want to read through the poem here that can give us some insight into how we should be acting every day. In light of 1 Peter 4, 7, the end of all things is at hand. Here is the poem. In the old days, a custom laid aside with britches and cocked hats. It's like the founders, their tricorn hats. The people sent their wisest men to make the public laws. And so from a brown homestead, where the sound drinks the small tribute of the Mayanas, waved over the woods by ripawoms, so in Connecticut, and hallowed by pure lives and tranquil deaths, Stamford sent up to the councils of the state wisdom and grace in Abraham Davenport." It's the people put forward 

Davenport and all his wisdom and grace. "'Twas on the May day of the far old year 1780 that there fell over the bloom and sweet life of the spring, over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon, a horror of great darkness, like the night and day of which the Norrland sagas tell, the twilight of the gods." It's " It's a reference to Norse mythology, end of the world. It was bad out there. The low -hung sky was black with ominous clouds, save where its rim was fringed with a dull glow, like that which climbs the crater sides from the red hell below, like a volcano. Birds ceased to sing and all the barnyard fowls roosted. The cattle at the pasture bars lowed and looked homeward. 

Bats on leathern wings flitted abroad. The sounds of labor died. So everyone stopped working. Men prayed. Women wept. All ears grew. 

Think about the state of people. where it goes dark for a while and everyone freaks out and starts praying and thinks it's the end of the world and that it's not the end of the world, second coming. I wanted to say like there's something like this that happened if people would think it was aliens or people's instinct would be like a nuclear attack or war or something like that. I wonder how many people would think second coming. That's what happened in 1780. Men prayed, women wept, all ears grew sharp to hear the doom blast of the trumpet shatter the black sky. 

That trumpet would be 1 Corinthians 15 -52, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. So people were waiting to hear that doom blast, that the dreadful face of Christ might look down from the rent clouds, not as he looked, a little guest at Bethany, but stern as justice and an exorable law. Meanwhile, in the old state house, dim as ghosts, sat the lawgivers of Connecticut, trembling beneath their legislative robes. The state reps are freaking out. 

They're dim as ghosts, right? It is the Lord's great day. Let us adjourn. It's second coming. We're done. 

Bang the gavel. 

Let's get out of here. Some said, And then, as if with one accord, all eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport. He rose, slow, cleaving with a steady voice the intolerable hush. Here's what he said. This well may be the day of judgment which the world awaits, but be it so or not, I only know my present duty and my Lord's command to occupy till he come. So at the post where he has set me in his providence, I choose for one. 

to meet him face to face. No faithless servant frightened from my task, but ready when the Lord of the harvest calls. And therefore, with all reverence, I would say, let God do his work and we will see to ours. Bring in the candles. And they brought them in. Then by the flaring lights, the speaker read, albeit with husky voice and shaking hands, an act to amend, an act to regulate the shad and all why fisheries. 

So just take a dumb bill about fish. Whereupon wisely and well spake Abraham Davenport straight to the question. With no figures of speech, save the ten Arab signals, yet not without the shrewd dry humor now. to the man. So it's just like logical, no -nonsense, right to the point, but also witty and thoughtful. His awestruck colleagues listening while, by the way, the world's coming to an end. 

His awestruck colleagues listening all the while between the pauses of his argument to hear the thunder of the wrath of God break from the hollow trumpet of the cloud. And there he stands in memory to this day, erect, self -poised, a rugged face, half seen against the background of unnatural dark, a witness to the ages as they pass that simple duty hath no place to fear. JFK would sometimes use this story, this poem, as in his campaigns. He would say, I hope in a dark and uncertain period of our own country that we too may bring candles to help light our country's way and not hide, not be afraid. But I love his argument. He says, God put me here to do this work. 

I'm going to keep doing it. When he's, if he's coming down, this is, I want him to see me doing this, what he put me here to do, which of course means if you're not doing what God is calling you to do, we better get doing it. The end of things is at hand. Therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers and everything else. The sound judgment of first Peter four, seven, sound judgment, sober spirit, sound judgment is really interesting word. It means the Greek word here. 

It means saved mind. This word is used six times in the new Testament. Mark 5 15, I'll just give a couple. Mark 5 15, and they came to Jesus and observed the man who had been demon possessed, sitting down, clothed, and in his right mind. There it is. Luke 8 35, and the people went out to see what had happened. 

And they came to Jesus and found the man from whom the demons had gone out. sitting down at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. If you're in your right mind, you would be at the feet of Jesus. Romans 12, for though the grace given to me, I say to every man among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think, but to think so as to have sound judgment as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. Sober judgment, a saved mind. It means you're sane, you're clear thinking, you have self -control. 

A self -control against earthly passions, earthly pleasures. William Barclay made a whole list of how Greeks, like ancient Greeks, used this word in a secular way. So Plato defined this word as the mastery over pleasure and desire. Aristotle said it's the power by which the pleasure of the body are used as law commands. Pythagoras said it is the foundation on which the soul rests. Euripides said that it is the fairest gift of God. 

This other Greek philosopher said it is the safeguard of the most excellent habits of life. So the idea is that someone with a sane mind is someone who knows and loves Jesus and therefore has serious prayers. You are serious about your prayers. You're watchful in your prayers. You have sound judgment and a sober spirit for the purpose of prayer and in doing what you're supposed to be doing all the time. And so Confident in that, that even when it looks like the world around you is coming to an end, when everyone else around you thinks the world is coming to an end, at this very moment, like it's pitch black outside in the middle of the day, the world's coming to an end, this is the second coming, even then, you'll say, well, I just need to keep doing what I'm doing. 

Let's be sane minded, save my life. Let's be doing what God would want us to be doing when he does come, because it's going to happen in a flash. Matthew 25, 27, as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the son of man. To drive it home one last time, if you're doing right now what you're not supposed to be doing, you better stop. The second coming could be right now. The end of all things is at hand. 

Mike Slater . locals . com for the transcript and commercial free. Mike Slater .

A sailor on the Mayflower, not one of the Pilgrims, boasted about his health and mocked the sickly Pilgrims. Then, he got what was coming to him. We must learn the lesson his fellow sailors learned: to thank God for all things.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving. I have one final Thanksgiving message and then after that we'll move on to our one month long analysis of the movie It's a Wonderful Life, which we saw on Thanksgiving night. Last year was the first time we watched It's a Wonderful Life from start to finish. And if you asked me two years ago if I've ever seen It's a Wonderful Life, I'd be like, oh yeah, definitely. 

I've seen it because I've just seen bits and pieces my entire life. But that doesn't cut it. That's not the whole thing. Seeing bits and pieces of It's a Wonderful Life is not the same as seeing the movie It's a Wonderful Life. And it's my favorite movie, and it's incredible, and I want to encourage you to watch it now and not wait until Christmas. Because if you watch it on Christmas Eve, you kind of miss, you miss a whole month of opportunity to really reflect on it throughout all of Christmas. 

So go watch It's a Wonderful Life right now with the whole family. It's amazing, and we will do more It's a Wonderful Life analysis. I wasn't kidding, by the way. Not a month, of course, but I'll sprinkle it in now. But I have one final Thanksgiving message just about the pilgrims. We can talk about all the time, but what's going on here is some people sent some stuff from the old world to the new world and it didn't make it. 

So William Pierce wrote a letter back to the people who sent it and they said, we lost all your stuff. I don't know if we lost it or you lost it. It just got lost. Just the way it goes. So here's what he said. Dear friends, you may know that all your beaver and your books of your accounts are swallowed up in the sea. 

Your letters remain with me, and shall be delivered, if God bring me home. But what should I more say? Have we lost our outward estates? Yet a happy loss, if our souls may gain. There is yet more in the Lord Jehovah than ever we had yet in the world. Oh, that our foolish hearts could yet be waned from these thoughts. 

here below, which are vanity and vexation of spirit. And yet we foolishly catch after shadows that fly away and are gone in a moment. Would you have had that mentality if you were traveling to a new world with nothing but an ax and a Bible? God, well, all the stuff you sent over, it's gone. But anyway, it's great. It's a happy loss if our souls may gain. 

And if God has ever decided to bless you with any good things, which are all the things you have, you better not be boastful. William Bradford wrote this. He said, I may not omit here a special work of God's providence. There was a proud and very profane young man, one of the seamen. So remember there were 102 guys on the boat, but 61 of them were not Puritans or the separatists. They were the crew, 61, most of them. 

So one of the young men of a lusty, able body, which made him the more haughty. He would always be contempting the poor people in their sickness and cursing them daily with grievous execrations. It's an execration. Making fun of an angry denouncement or curse. Just making fun of the old sick people and did not let to tell them that he hoped to help to cast half of them overboard before they came to their journey's end. So he'd mock them for being sick and say, I can't wait to throw you overboard when you finally die. 

You're not going to make it. You're so weak. And to make merry with what they had. Stop complaining. Be strong like me. And if he were by any gently reproved, knock it off, he would curse and swear most of the time. 

But, okay, so you're with me on the scene here, right? You got 41 of these Puritans, these pilgrim separatists having a tough time, 66 days over the ocean and six more months off the coast, dying. This guy's making fun of them. But if it pleased God before they came half seas over to smite this young man with a grievous disease of which he died in a desperate manner, and he was himself the first to be thrown overboard, Thus his curses light on his own head, and it was an astonishment to all his fellows, for they noted it to be the just hand of God upon him. " So it's all the all the other not Puritans were like, oh, they're not be like that guy. I wonder if that's one of the reasons why they ultimately signed the Mayflower Compact. 

I'm like, well, these guys seem to have something special helping them out along the way. So I hope you brought the pilgrims into your Thanksgiving celebration. They're wonderful people. And this is who we came from. And we can't forget it. And I was reading Deuteronomy 8 the other day, and I thought of this story from William Bradford that we just shared. 

Deuteronomy 8 says, every commandment which I command you today, you must be careful to observe, that you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land of which the Lord swore to your fathers. And you shall remember that the Lord your God led you the way these 40 years in the wilderness to humble you and test to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know what manna is. not that man shall not live by bread alone but man lives by every word that proceeded from the mouth of the lord your garments did not wear out on you nor did your foot swell these 40 years you know incredible that is 40 years of walking your sandals never wore out your feet never your knees never hurt Clothes didn't wear out. You should know in your heart that as a man chastens his son, so the Lord your God chastens you. Man shall not live by bread alone. 

There it is, Deuteronomy 8. Therefore, you shall keep the commandments of your Lord your God to walk in his ways and to fear him. Do we fear the Lord? For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, fountains and springs that flow out of valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates. I don't love pomegranates, but I guess if you were back then, pomegranate would be pretty special. A land of olive oil and honey. 

A land in which you will eat bread without scarcity. See Harry, here's how boastful I am. God's like, I will bring you to a land of pomegranates. I'm like, I don't really love. That's the kind of cuties. 

I love cuties. 

Cuties are good. 

I have cuties instead of pomegranates, the averils or whatever those things are. They're kind of like you chew them and you don't really get a lot of burst of flavor. And then it's kind of like, it's like a seed inside of it. It's not that impressive, but hey, whatever God, whatever you want to give me. A land of olive oil and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity in which you will lack nothing. A land whose stones are iron and out of whose hills you can dig copper. 

When you've eaten and are full, you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which he has given you. " That's what's true for us today. When you are eaten and you are full, every time that God provides and everything you have is God providing, then you should bless the Lord your God for everything that he has given us. We should break down every line of Deuteronomy 8, but the point is everything comes from God. God will protect you, provide for you with manna. Everything you have is manna. 

What's manna? Manna is everything you have and everything you earned is because God gave you manna to earn it with. He gave you the ability to... earn it. This radio show I have, this is not from me. Well, I'm very good at the radio. 

If I ever do anything good, it's only because God gave me the ability to do a thing. But even if I do good, if no one listens to it, then that's, and that's not up to me. I can't decide if anyone, if you decide to listen to this right now, that's all God. Everything, it's entirely 100 % in every way, all God. And then if you lose it all, will you still praise God? That's the story of Job, and that was the story that I first shared here with the pilgrims. When they're like, ah, we lost our stuff. 

Yet it's a happy loss if our souls may gain. One last part of Deuteronomy 8 verse 11, beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments, his judgments, his statutes, which I command you today. Lest when you have eaten and are full, and you have built beautiful houses and dwell in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold are multiplied. Gosh, this is today. Did you eat a big Thanksgiving meal? Do you have a nice house that's safe? 

Do you have things, herds and flocks, nice TV, whatever, nice car, your silver and your gold are multiplied, your stock market's doing well, and all that you have is multiplied. When your heart is lifted up and you forget the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, who brought you from the life of sin you were living in, from the house of bondage, who led you through that great and terrible wilderness in which were fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty land where there was no water, who brought water for you out of the flinty rock, who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and that he might test you to do good in the end. Then you say in your heart, my power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth. It is wonderful to have wealth and flocks and health like the sailor on the maple leaf. 

had. 

But we better not boast that God had nothing to do with it, because he had everything. MikeSlater . Locals . com. For the transcript and commercial, free website, MikeSlater . Locals .com

John Adams Thanksgiving Proclamation reads, "I HAVE therefore thought fit to recommend that Wednesday the Ninth Day of May next be observed throughout the United States, as a day of Solemn Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer". Humiliation? What is humiliation and why is this a part of Thanksgiving? 

Welcome to Politics by Faith. 

Morning. 

Just woke up, I'm still sleeping. Thanksgiving Eve morning. Billion things to do. Took like so much food, but it's great. Hope you have a nice Thanksgiving week. Want to share what I was just reading this morning. 

Luke 1 46. This is Mary after Gabriel told her that you're going to have a kid. Mary said, my soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior. For he has regarded the lowly state of his maidservant. For behold, henceforth, all generations will call me blessed. For he who is mighty has done great things for me. 

And holy is his name. And his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation. Would this be a good, would this be good to read at the Thanksgiving table? Reading the prayer of this girl praising God. This might be right. Uh, where did I leave off? 

Let's go here. 

And holy is his name. And his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm. He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. And he's put down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent away empty. 

He has helped his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy. And he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his seed forever. So I'm going to relate this to our pilgrims because it's Thanksgiving Eve, but also to us because we're pilgrims. 

We're pilgrims. 

I live in Nashville, but Nashville is not my home. I'm just a passing through. My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue. I think of that all the time. Just a passing through. I think about that a lot. 

The angels backing me from heaven's open door and I can't feel at home in this world anymore. This is not our home. So we're all pilgrims and our pilgrims from the old world to the new. They deeply understood that as well. My soul magnifies the Lord. Magnify is a great word, but it's an interesting word, magnify. 

Other translations have exalt. The Greek here means to deem or declare great. to esteem highly, to extol, laud, celebrate. " It wasn't about her, it was about God. God, my soul exalts you, esteem celebrates, declares great you. My spirit has rejoiced in God, my savior. 

She knew she needed a savior. Holy is his name. His mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown great strength with his arm, scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts, put down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly. Our pilgrims so deeply understood being humbled and humility. Our founding fathers and generations after, they would call Thanksgiving a day of fasting and prayer, but also of humiliation. 

I know we've talked about this word in the past in this podcast a couple of times. A day of humiliation. It's like, well, what do you want me to do? Like go do embarrassing things? No, it's a day to really, truly, deeply recognize how nothing you are compared to the glory and power of God. and how you're capable of nothing, nothing on your own. 

To begin to understand how deeply our pilgrims knew this, let me quote from Jonathan Edwards. He was after the pilgrims. of course, but he was the leader of the Great Awakening in our country. He said, "...humility may be defined to be a habit of mind and heart corresponding to our comparative unworthiness and vileness before God, or a sense of our own comparative meanness." Meanness means like lowly state. You're in the lowest state. 

You're comparative meanness in his sight. This is a sermon he gave called The Spirit of Charity and Humble Spirit. "...humility may be Doth primarily and chiefly consist in a sense of our meanness as compared with God, or a sense of the infinite distance there is between God and ourselves. We are little, despicable creatures, even worms of the dust, and we should feel that we are as nothing and less than nothing, in comparison with the majesty of heaven and earth. Such a sense of his nothingness Abraham expressed when he said in Genesis 18 27, Behold, now I've taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes. When I read that, I can feel within me, and perhaps you feel the same, like, oh, that's so dramatic. 

Dust and ashes. Abraham said it. It's in the Bible. But even now, it's like, no, I'm great and mighty. It's like, no, you're nothing. Without God, Jonathan Edwards said, there's no true humility without somewhat of this spirit. 

For however sensible we may be of our meanness as compared with some of our fellow creatures, we are not truly humble unless we have a sense of our nothingness as compared with God. Our pilgrims, when they traveled to the new world, They traveled there with complete humility, knowing that they were capable of nothing on their own. Therefore, why is this important? Therefore, all the glory goes to God. If you think you're great and something, if you think you're something and then good things happen, you're like, ah, God, thanks for the assist or man, I did a lot. I did a lot of good. 

work there. I'm really pretty great. And you see how that goes down the road. You need total, complete humility. Again, as our founders would say, humiliation, a day of humiliation, recognizing how lowly we are and how incredible God is. This is William Bradford. 

Well, yesterday we talked about Ezra 821, their total reliance upon God. The pilgrims, that's their pastor, talked about Ezra as they were embarking on the ship to head off. William Bradford, thus out of small beginnings, greater things have been produced by his hand that made all things out of nothing. Right? So God, he's so incredible. He can make something out of nothing and look at the great things he did with us all by his hand and, and gives being to all things that are, and as one small candle may light a thousand. 

So the light here kindled has shown unto many, yea, in some sort to our whole nation. Let the glorious name of Jehovah have all the praise. A psalm that our pilgrims do intimately. Praise the Lord. Psalm 112, 1. Praise the Lord. 

Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in his commandments. His offspring will be mighty in the land. The generation of the upright will be blessed. Let's get back to Mary here. The ending. He has helped his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy. 

As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his seed forever, God keeps his promises. God doesn't forget. God's mercy isn't because we're great. It's not our merit. We don't deserve it. Hence it being called grace. 

It only speaks to God's character, not ours. Only God made his covenant with Abraham. He put Abraham to sleep. This should give us incredible hope. Even Mary, Mary, when this happened, is like, oh, yes. 

First of all, she knew God's promises, and she praised God, trusted God. This should give us incredible hope as well. Trust Him. God loves you. I think of God protecting the pilgrims who made it here, and God saving me, and also protecting my marriage, my children. Whatever you're grateful for today and every day, thank God for it. 

It's only because of Him. Our souls magnify the Lord. Hope you have a great Thanksgiving tomorrow. MikeSlater . Locals . com. Transcript, commercial fee on the website. MikeSlater .