The Pilgrim Path---Psalm 80: 3

“Restore us, O God; let your face shine, that we may be saved!”

NATIONAL HUMILATION AND FASTING / Lincoln and the United States Senate, April 30, 1863

“Whereas, the senate of the United States , devoutly recognizing the Supreme Authority and Just Government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and of nations, has by a resolution, required the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation:

And whereas, it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to owe their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord:

And, in so much as we know that, by His divine law, nations, like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with an unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to God that made us! It behooves us, then to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and fully concurring in the views of the Senate, I do, by this proclamation, designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th day of April, 1863, as a day pf national humiliation, fasting, and prayer. And I do hereby request all the People to abstain in that day from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite, at their several places of public worship and their respective homes, in keeping the day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion.

All this being done, in sincerity and truth, let us rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings, that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high, and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our divided and suffering country, to its former happy condition of unity and peace.

In witness whereof, I have here unto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington the thirtieth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventy.

By the President, ABRAHAM LINCOLN

William H. Seward, Secretary of State

“Men may be inclined to abandon their old religion and to adopt a new one; but they never can remain long free from all religion. Take away one object of worship and they will soon attach themselves to another. If unhappily they lose the knowledge of the true God, they will set up gods of their own invention or receive them from others” (Archibald Alexander).

“First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” First Timothy 2: 1, 2

Please remember to pray for these leaders:

Salisbury Mayor: Jake Day

Salisbury Council: Jack Heath, Muir Boda, Angela Blake, Michele Gregory, April Jackson

Salisbury Police Chief: Barbara Duncan

Wicomico County Executive: Bob Culver

County Council: John Cannon, William McCain, Larry Dodd, Earnest Davis, Nicole Acle, Josh Hastings Joe Holloway

County Sherriff: Mike Lewis

County Detention Center Director: Ruth Coulbourne

Governor of Maryland: Larry Hogan

Lt. Governor of Maryland: Boyd K. Rutherford

“It is not only unwise, but it is wicked to be disheartened because of the external feebleness of the Church, compared with the work she has to do, and the enemies she has encountered. God is her strength, her glory and her hope, and to despair of her is to deny God.” Thomas V. Moore

Refresh Thy people on their toilsome way;

Lead us from night to never ending day;

Fill all our lives with love and grace divine,

And glory, laud, and praise be ever Thine.

Daniel Crane Roberts (1841-1907)

Grace and Peace in Jesus Christ Our Risen LORD, Pastor Jason