Removal of Ten Commandments Monument
Symbolic of Rejecting God
Chief Justice Roy Moore of the Alabama Supreme Court has gained widespread notoriety by his defiant stance against a federal court order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from his office. This 2˝ ton block of granite has been described as an icon in the controversy over separation of church and state.
Another significance could also be inferred. The founders of our nation were religious men who based our legal system on principles of biblical moral law. John Adams, a member of the Continental Congress and second president of the United States, said the U.S. Constitution "was made only for a moral and a religious people."
Justice Moore obviously believes that the laws of God, including the Ten Commandments, are relevant and appropriate. The United States has long been considered a Christian nation. However, in our current pluralistic culture, Christianity has been relegated to only one of several alternative faith traditions. Humanism, agnosticism, atheism and other godless secular belief systems are deemed as other viable options. Many consider the Ten Commandments as a cultural anachronism and inappropriate for any governmental official.
Governmental officials are “sworn in” by placing their hand on a Bible. Why? What significance does that have any more? Should we offer instead a choice of religious writings or no book at all? That would certainly be more politically correct.
The phrase “one nation under God” from the pledge of allegiance must also be seen as an anachronism. To be “under God” implies trust and faith in God and his laws. Our dollar bills still bear the insignia, “In God we trust.” How do you trust God and reject his law? Can we tell God, “Please bless, protect and provide for us, but don’t tell us how to live our lives”?
At the east entrance of the Supreme Court building is a massive sculpture of Moses bearing the two tablets on which the Ten Commandments are inscribed. Two tablets with Roman numerals 1 through 10—a clear symbol of the Ten Commandments—are carved onto the oak doors between the south courtroom and main hallway.
To be complete, the purge would have to include tearing down these and many other symbols with allusions to or quotations from the Bible and God found throughout federal buildings and monuments in our nation’s capitol.
Thomas Jefferson’s reference to “a wall of separation of church and state” made its debut into our culture in a Supreme Court ruling on a February 10, 1947 religion-in-school ruling. Since then it has become a mantra for anti-Christian advocates who want freedom from religion, rather than the freedom of religion intended by those who framed the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
In this paranoia regarding “separation of church and state,” historical and legal facts are being overlooked or ignored. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Has anyone considered that the strong-arm tactics of this case represent a violation of Judge Moore’s first amendment rights?
The toppling of the statue of Saddam Hussein was a poignant metaphor for the destruction of Saddam’s regime. Similarly, the carting away of the Ten Commandments is symbolic of the removal of the laws of God from their foundational position in our governance, and an acknowledgement that they are no longer relevant or appropriate in our culture.
The larger issue here is that human nature is inherently resistant to the law of God. Paul wrote in Romans 8:7, “For the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.”
This is not just a philosophical issue. It has devastating moral consequences that Paul spells out in Romans 2:18-32. Read for yourself this passage, a graphic description of the sexual revolution occurring in the U.S. and other western nations today.
The statue at the UN building in New York quotes Isaiah 2:4, “They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruninghooks.” This prophecy of the coming kingdom of God on earth also states that the law of God will be restored to its rightful role in the governing all human conduct (Isaiah 2:2-4). Then and only then will mankind reap the benefits of peace and prosperity that are so lacking in today’s world.