Our response to God's Word determines our future. Throughout history, nations that followed God prospered for long periods of time like the Babylonians for 86 years and Persians for 208 years, while those that turned away from God like monarchies in Europe lasted only around 600 years. In the early 100s AD, Emperor Trajan and Pliny the Younger condemned Christians for undermining social order and progress. By the late 1800s, Christianity emphasized the authority of Scripture over tradition but also promoted secularism and reason during the Enlightenment, weakening its influence. This led to the French Revolution's Reign of Terror where King Louis XVI was beheaded and over 40,000 others killed, showing how a nation without

2. Our response to God’s Word
determines our future.

3. Our response to God’s Word determines
our future.
Babylonians- 86 years
Persians- 208
Greeks- 268
Romans- Nearly 1,000
Hitler’s Germany- 12
Monarchies of Europe- 600

4. 2 Chronicles 7:14
God has given His Church
the power and position to
preserve civilization.

5. Emperor Trajan
98-117 AD
Pliny the Younger
Christians were guilty
of hight treason
Christians were thought
to be anti-family
Christians were unjust
toward women
Christians were accused
of being backward

6. Emperor Trajan
98-117 AD
Pliny the Younger
“You have taken the
right line, my dear Pliny,
in your denouncing and
condemning these
Christians, for they
constitute a very bad
precedent, and also,
impede the progress of
keeping in step with the
age.”
Emperor Trajan

7. 18th- CENTURY CHRISTIANITY
“Sola Sciptura”: Authority of
Scripture over all things including
clergy, creed or church tradition
Reformation
The promotion of “Secularism”-
The influence of science and
reason over religion
Enlightenment

8. 18th- CENTURY CHRISTIANITY
God ordained the king, who is
answerable only to God and
not to the people.
Christian Monarchism

9. King Louis XVI
1793
King Louis
beheaded
Beheading over
40,000

10. King Louis XVI
1793
Maximillien
Robespierre
Reign of
Terror
“An orgy of
ruthless murder
of men, women
and children.”
Don Feber

11. Reign of Terror

12. 1799
By 1814 more than
6 million souls perished
Napoleon

13. “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin
is a disgrace and harm to any people.”
Proverbs 14:34

14. George Whitefield
John Wesley
David Brainerd Frances Ashbury
William Tennent Jonathan Edwards

15. Matthew 7:24-28

16. Theodore Roosevelt
1909
“I believe the next half
century will determine if
we will advance the cause
of Christian civilization or
else, revert to the horrors
of brutal paganism… The
choice between the two is
upon us.”

17. Woodrow Wilson
1918
“In these doubtful anxious
days when all the world is
at unrest, the road ahead
seems darkened by
shadows and danger. Our
answer is not to be found
in superficial politics or
economic factors…

18. Woodrow Wilson
“The answer lays deep in
our spiritual life… a
Christian conception of
justice… Our civilization
cannot survive materially
unless it be redeemed
spiritually, by becoming
permeated with the Spirit
of Christ.”

19. Franklin Roosevelt
1944
“If the Spirit of God is not
with us, and if we will not
prepare to give all that we
have to preserve a Christian
civilization in our land, we
shall go to destruction.”

20. WHAT UNIFIES THE CHURCH?
Centrality of Jesus Christ
Authority of God’s Word
Power of the Holy Spirit to
transform lives