The United States of America—Providence has nurtured it, protected it, and guided it from its very beginnings. With God’s blessing, it has prospered and risen in prominence to become the most powerful nation on earth.
The first Europeans to settle in the New World wanted something different. Otherwise they would not have left the known, to launch forth into the unknown. Many of them had observed, if not experienced first hand, tyranny, oppression and persecution. Their belief that freedom was possible drove them across the sea on a long and arduous journey.
A good number of the 100 brave or desperate souls who set sail from England in September of 1620 did it in pursuit of the dream of freedom. In late December, their ship landed at Plymouth Harbor, on the shores of what is now the state of Massachusetts.
The Mayflower had been headed for Virginia as its charter specified, but it had been blown off course. Early winter was not the best time to arrive on the cold New England shores, but the very spot where they landed was, as the Bible had predicted centuries before, uniquely a wilderness. All up and down the coast there were native settlements, but there were no native Americans residing at Plymouth.
There was evidence of human occupancy, but not one living individual. A whole people group had been decimated by disease prior to the pilgrims coming to that very spot. The most surprising part of the story was the one lonely Indian who emerged from the woods, speaking perfect English and offering his aid to the new settlers. Many survived that winter with Squanto’s help, and Plymouth became the first permanent settlement of Europeans in New England. We call these settlers of Plymouth Colony our Pilgrim Fathers.
Through revolution and civil war, through the drafting of the Declaration of Independence and our U.S. Constitution, God preserved this favored nation. Yet today we find our homeland in an unsettled state. Many voices sound the same warning—a crisis is coming. Agitation is everywhere. There are tempests, earthquakes, fires, floods and a disturbing level of violence, all warning of an approaching storm. Nothing seems secure. Nowhere seems safe.
In September of 2015, Pope Francis travelled to America to encourage her lawmakers to adopt his solutions for a world in need. According to the New York Times, the pope made “a passionate defense of immigration, an endorsement of environmental legislation, a blistering condemnation of the arms trade and a plea to abolish the death penalty.” (Peter Baker and Jim Yardley, The New York Times, September 24, 2015). While many of these issues are political bombshells, the endorsement of environmental legislation is the one of most concern to those who cherish religious freedom.
In the history of America, this is the only pope ever to address our Congress. He did so as the pope of the Holy See, an independent, sovereign entity that holds Vatican City as its territory and maintains diplomatic relations with other states. Diplomatically, the Holy See acts and speaks for the Roman Catholic Church, of which, of course, the pope is also the head. His appearance to address our lawmakers constituted a major breach in the time-honored and tested wall of separation between church and state. While a spiritual leader might understandably address the leaders of a nation in a pastoral sense, encouraging them to faith and moral excellence, Pope Francis addressed the United States legislative body in a political sense, encouraging and even urging them to legislate his published political agenda.
Though it went unobserved by the media, religious freedom was the elephant in the room during the pope’s visit. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution specifically forbids the making of laws “respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The pope encouraged Congress to enact laws supporting his views of right and wrong on immigration, climate change, and various other issues, on a moral basis. Bible prophecy predicts that the United States of America will eventually force “the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast,” symbolizing the Vatican.
Indeed, one small group of Protestants sought to secure a place around the US Capitol Building to protest the pope’s speech before Congress in September of 2015. A colleague of mine travelled to Capitol Hill to enquire about securing such a spot. He was told that all spaces were already taken. They had been secured by the Vatican months before, because the papacy did not want any visible dissent during the pope’s visit. As they talked, another worker behind the counter looked over their records and said, “Wait, there is still a place available. Area 7 is still available.”
“Can I secure that spot?” asked my colleague.
“You can apply, but you’ll have to fill out this paperwork and have a Congressional committee review and approve it.”
The application was submitted and approved, the permit obtained, and on September 24, 2015, Seventh-day Adventist Protestants set up a table and handed out The Great Controversy, among other selections of literature, to many interested parties. Situated close to a security entrance to the Senate building, they watched vehicle after vehicle pull up and deliver its human cargo of priests and monks to the Capitol and Senate buildings.
The protesting group had a printed banner with a picture representing the woman of Revelation chapter 12. Seeing the banner and identifying the woman as Mary, several priests approached what they assumed to be a group of Catholic supporters of the pope and his visit. When they saw The Great Controversy books on the table, nearly all of them turned abruptly about and went back to the security entrance, where they then entered the Senate building.
One Franciscan monk, however, was willing to engage in conversation. He was asked why all the priests and monks were going into the Senate building. “They are having meetings with Congressional leaders to educate them on how to implement the pope’s encyclical on climate change.”
“Really,” my colleague said. “Well, I’ve read the encyclical, and it seems to me that the pope wants to have a world-wide Sunday law put in place, and through this Sabbath rest for the environment, the whole world would shut their businesses and factories down one day a week, and thus there won’t be as much carbon dioxide pouring into the air. Legislating Sunday closing will help the environment because it will lower greenhouse emissions.”
The monk looked at my colleague, paused for a moment, and then said, “That’s exactly what this is about.” He then turned, walked toward the security entrance, and entered the building.
Once the Pope’s visit was over, the Seventh-day Adventist group entered the Senate buildings as well. They visited nine congressional offices, enquiring of the staff members what they thought of the pope’s climate change encyclical. Did they know that ultimately the pope wanted to legislate Sunday observance?
As they talked, it was suggested by some that they return to Capitol Hill and go to all the offices to make the rest of the leaders and their respective staffs aware of the pope’s agenda. There are 535 offices, with thousands of people working in those offices. How long would it take to go to every office and engage every person? The group decided that it would be best to return and hold meetings for large numbers at once, rather than going to each office individually.
After much praying and planning on our part, God opened the way for such meetings to take place. As of this writing, people are already on the ground, working to secure venues to hold health and prophecy meetings, both in and around the Capitol buildings. Through a series of providences, rooms in the Senate buildings and staging areas in front of the Capitol are being secured.
Unknown to us at the time, 30,000 evangelical pastors plan to descend on Capitol Hill to pray for the nation to get back to God. That meeting will occur on April 9th. We are submitting the paperwork to secure the same area in order to conduct a meeting immediately after their meeting closes. We hope many of these pastors will stick around to hear the meeting we will conduct there and return to inform their churches of what they saw and heard.
We are also working with local churches to have as many members as possible attend the April 9th meeting, to mingle with the crowd, to hand out literature, and to invite them to our meetings. We are in conversation with the General Conference and hope to channel any interest gained from these meetings to the local churches for follow-up.
Do we think we can avert the coming storm? No; it will come in fulfillment of prophecy, but we can and we should do all in our power to delay it, to hold up the wall of separation of church and state. During this time of relative calm, we must make strong efforts to arrest the attention of political and religious leaders, to inform them that to adopt the agenda of Rome will bring disaster upon the nation.
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When we first discovered what had happened in the nation's capitol when the pope made his appearance, we had to confirm it was of God. We believe it is and want to give influence to this work. Kim Kjaer is a former Amazing Facts evangelist. He also pastored in the Potomac Conference and recently served as the Executive Director of Blue Mountain Television, a Seventh-day Adventist television station in College Place, Washington. Pastor Kim is working with a group of dedicated lay people to bring the message of the soon coming of Jesus to Washington, DC.
Satan is working in clever ways, but where sin abounds we shall see God working in a manner that will turn the evil to good. We will continue to report as the work continues. Soon the "great controversy" will be ended, it will be too late to work for the saving of souls. Now is the time to pray about what we can do in this the greatest work ever entrusted to humans. As we pray, God will reveal just what He would have us do in this crisis hour.
We may read about the last time national Sunday laws threatened America and the world. "When the crisis regarding Sunday legislation came, our workers were right on the ground, prepared to act in a way that made them channels of light to others. If they had not been on the ground, the bill regarding Sunday legislation would have been pressed through, leaving our work in darkness and discouragement." Review and Herald, May 25, 1905.
If you decide to support this effort financially, all donations are tax-deductible and will be used for the Washington, DC project. For more information about the project and what is planned, Pastor Kim can be reached by calling (800) 876-1776.
