Introduction: The Question Every Soul Must Answer

Beloved, there are many questions that press upon the heart of man. Am I prepared for tomorrow? Am I secure in my possessions? Am I respected among men? Yet there is one question greater than all others: Are you at peace with God? Not merely, are you at peace with yourself? Not merely, are you at peace with your neighbor? Not merely, do you have quiet circumstances and a settled mind? The question is this: has the holy God of heaven reconciled you unto Himself through the Lord Jesus Christ?

The Bible teaches that sin has brought enmity between God and man. Peace is not natural to the fallen heart. Peace is not produced by religion without regeneration, morality without mercy, or sincerity without salvation. True peace with God is a gift of grace, purchased by the blood of Christ, proclaimed in the gospel, and received by faith. Let us search the Scriptures and hear what God says concerning the condition of the sinner, the work of the Savior, and the blessed assurance of the believing soul.

1. There Is No Peace for the Wicked

Isaiah 57:21 declares, “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.” This is not the opinion of a preacher, nor the verdict of human philosophy; it is the word of God Himself. The wicked may have pleasure, wealth, reputation, and outward calm, but they do not have peace with God.

Sin is not a small matter before a holy God. It is rebellion against His authority, transgression of His law, and rejection of His rightful rule. The sinner may try to quiet the conscience with entertainment, achievement, religion, or comparison with others, but God’s testimony remains -there is no peace to the wicked.

If you are outside of Christ, your greatest need is not self-improvement but reconciliation. The storm is not merely around you; it is within you and above you, for sin has set you at odds with the God who made you. The first mercy of God in the gospel is that He tells us the truth about our condition.

2. The Way of Peace Is Unknown to Sinners

Romans 3:17 says of fallen humanity, “And the way of peace have they not known.” Man does not stumble naturally into peace with God. Left to himself, he invents his own way. He trusts in good works, church attendance, family heritage, religious ceremonies, personal sincerity, or the false hope that God will overlook sin.

But the way of peace is not found by human wisdom. The sinner’s problem is deeper than ignorance alone; it is blindness of heart. The natural man does not know the seriousness of sin, the holiness of God, the certainty of judgment, or the necessity of the cross until God awakens him by the truth of His Word.

Dear hearer, if you are trying to make peace with God on your own terms, you are walking a road that cannot save. God has not left the way of peace to human invention. He has revealed it in one Person, His beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

3. Jesus Christ Has Made Peace by His Blood

Colossians 1:20 proclaims that God was pleased, “having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself.” Peace with God is not achieved by man climbing up to heaven, but by Christ coming down from heaven. It is not purchased by silver or gold, but by the precious blood of the Son of God.

At Calvary, the Lord Jesus Christ stood in the sinner’s place. He bore the curse, endured the wrath, satisfied divine justice, and offered Himself as the spotless sacrifice for sin. The cross was not a tragic accident; it was the appointed means by which God could be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Peace has been made, not by ignoring sin, but by judging it in the body of Christ. The blood of Jesus does what human effort cannot do: it cleanses, redeems, reconciles, and brings the guilty sinner near to God. There is no peace apart from the blood, but there is full peace through the blood.

4. The Gospel Preaches Peace by Jesus

Acts 10:36 says, “The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ: (he is Lord of all:).” The gospel is not merely good advice; it is good news. It announces what God has done in Christ. It declares that the crucified and risen Savior is Lord of all, and that peace is preached by Him and through Him.

This message is not limited to the respectable, the religious, the educated, or the outwardly moral. It is preached to sinners. It calls rebels to lay down their arms, guilty souls to come for pardon, weary hearts to come for rest, and lost men and women to come to the Savior who seeks and saves. The gospel does not say, ‘Make yourself worthy, and then come.’ It says, “Come to Christ, and He will save.” It does not say, ‘Cleanse your own heart, and then believe.’ It says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” The peace of the gospel rests upon the finished work of the Savior, not the unfinished efforts of the sinner.

5. The Believing Soul Has Peace with God

Romans 5:1 gives the triumphant conclusion: “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Notice the certainty of the language: “we have peace.” The believer is not merely hoping that peace might come someday; the believer has peace with God now through the Lord Jesus Christ. To be justified is to be declared righteous before God, not because of our merit, but because of Christ’s righteousness received by faith. Faith does not purchase peace; Christ purchased it. Faith receives what Christ has provided. The moment a sinner trusts in Christ, the war is over, the debt is answered, the guilt is removed, and the soul stands accepted before God.

This peace is not the absence of earthly trouble. Believers may suffer trials, burdens, tears, and persecution. But beneath all circumstances, they have a settled peace with God because their standing rests upon Christ. The world cannot give this peace, and the world cannot take it away.

Evangelistic Appeal: Come to Christ and Receive Peace

Now the question comes personally: are you at peace with God? You may have peace in your home, peace in your finances, peace in your plans, and peace in your conscience for a season, yet still be without peace with God. If you are not in Christ, the Bible says there is no peace to the wicked, and the way of peace is unknown to sinners. But hear the good news: Jesus Christ has made peace by the blood of His cross. He died for sinners. He rose again. He is Lord of all.

The gospel preaches peace by Him. Therefore, do not delay. Do not hide behind excuses. Do not trust in your own righteousness. Come to Christ.

Repent of your sin and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Receive Him as Lord and Savior. Bow before Him, trust His finished work, and call upon His name. The peace your soul needs is found only in Him. “Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Conclusion

There is no peace for the wicked. The way of peace is unknown to sinners. But Jesus Christ has made peace by His blood, and the gospel preaches peace by Him. The believing soul has peace with God. Come, then, to the Prince of Peace. Come guilty, come weary, come now. Christ receives sinners, and all who come to Him by faith shall find peace with God.

Invitation: If God has shown you your sin and your need of the Savior, do not harden your heart. Turn from sin and trust Jesus Christ today. Receive Him as Lord and Savior, and rest in the peace that He alone gives.

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I thought it appropriate, as our nation celebrates its 250th birthday, that no one deceive themselves into believing there is another 250 years ahead. Or even another hundred. Nor fifty. Not twenty. Not even 10.

Behind the flurry of national celebrations, behind the fireworks, the flags and patriotic symbolism filling every square inch of marketing space, one unrelenting truth remains unchanged…

…America’s days are numbered.

It is hard to imagine that level of Babylonian vulnerability (think Daniel 5), especially when social media is filled with the surprised reactions of European visitors rediscovering America’s greatness during the World Cup. It is hard not to feel a measure of pride in what our nation has accomplished over the past 250 years, or in the political course corrections unfolding at breakneck speed under the Trump administration.

While there are many, many injustices that are flooding our newsfeeds and causing us to lose faith in humanity, it’s also an extraordinary time to be alive, as a wave of new technologies promises to transform life on Earth in ways once thought impossible. For many, it is hard not to be optimistic.

But we should resist that impulse. It is a trap.

My intent here is not simply to present the view of a stick-in-the-mud doom-and-gloomer. It is simply the result of taking the Bible for what it says, and for what it does not say.

To me, that is realism.

From a biblical perspective, there are only two possible outcomes. The United States either disappears from the world stage at the Rapture of the Church, or it ultimately becomes the great geopolitical mystery known as Babylon the Great. Given the extraordinary military power, financial dominance, geopolitical influence, and natural advantages America possesses, including two vast oceans protecting its borders, there simply is not enough time left in human history for the nation to evolve into something entirely different. It will either no longer exist in its present form, or it will become something altogether unprecedented.

“And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever” (1 John 2:17, NKJV).

As the old ‘Spider-Man’ saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. Undisputedly, the United States of America is the greatest national power the world has ever seen. However, when that great responsibility becomes neglected, great power turns into an even greater liability. After decades of moral and spiritual neglect, those liabilities have now become eventualities.

Truth be told, the only way to address the systemic corruption and mounting existential challenges facing our nation on every front and at every level is through a complete overhaul.

That is where I believe we are headed.

The United States is simply too large, too interconnected, and too burdened by unraveling systems to continue indefinitely as the constitutional republic and capitalist economy we have known.

As historian Will Durant observed:

“A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential causes of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.”

Caesar and Christ (1944), Epilogue, p. 665

Some will object to this notion. They will say that America has survived a revolution, a Civil War, the Great Depression, two world wars, the Cold War, countless natural disasters, terrorist attacks, and deeply divisive politics, and she still stands.

That is true.

However, today we face new realities humanity has never encountered before.

• The internet, providing global access to information.
• Social media, delivering worldwide news instantly.
• Artificial intelligence, enabling exponential information processing.

I believe the prophet Daniel may have been shown something regarding this time in which we live.

“But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase” (Daniel 12:4, NKJV).

In 1900, the global population was around two billion people. By 2022, the global population had crested eight billion. The Wright Brothers mastered manned flight in 1903. By 1969, we were launching men into space. In 1914, men rode into battle in World War 1 on horses, and came out the other side (1918) in tanks and planes. A single computer once required the space of an entire room in the 1940s; now, a computer 1,000X more powerful fits into your front pants pocket.

Inarguably, across nearly every sector, category, spectrum, and level, man has advanced more in the 20th-21st centuries than in all the previous centuries combined. I say “nearly” because the sectors in which mankind has not progressed but, in fact, has regressed are the spiritual, moral, and ethical.

Indeed, mankind is more powerful than he has ever been, yet is at his most morally compromised. This is the world we inhabit today…and the world faces unprecedented systemic challenges:

• Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS)
• Global surveillance networks
• Rising demand for Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs)
• Ever-expanding wireless infrastructure
• Satellite megaclusters
• Genetic manipulation
• Abortion on demand
• Normalizing Euthanasia
• Increasing cosmic anomalies
• Global jihadism
• Radical ideological movements
• Right-to-repair conflicts
• Massive data center expansion
• $40 trillion in national debt
• Unsustainable immigration
• Weaponized migration
• Declining birth rates
• Multicultural fragmentation (tribalism)
• Aging infrastructure
• Countless vulnerable points within critical systems
• Expanding corporate power
• Deepening political division

Even many of the strengths that once helped make America exceptional may become our greatest liabilities during a national crisis. The prophetic warning by the second President John Adams in 1798 was that the Constitution was “made only for a moral and religious people” and is “wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” In the best of times, these below were designed as a safeguard against government tyranny. In the rest of times, these same safeguards would work against the people because of political corruption.

• The Bill of Rights functions best within a morally grounded society. It’s abused in any other.
• Separation of powers was designed as a system of checks and balances. In our day, it causes systemic governmental paralysis.
• Religious liberty also permits competing worldviews that often reject biblical truth.

This is where we find ourselves.

The most powerful nation in human history stands on the edge of profound transformation, perhaps even collapse. We know it. Our adversaries know it.

Ultimately, however, the deepest problem mankind faces is neither technological nor political.

It is sin.

Humanity remains in a fallen condition. Left to itself, mankind cannot permanently solve its own problems because every heart is bent toward self-interest. As Scripture teaches, we naturally seek our own welfare before God’s. It’s our default setting, and unless we are reprogrammed by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which only happens when we place our faith and trust in the shed blood of Jesus Christ and His finished work on the cross, we cannot be changed from death unto life.

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3).

Conclusion

“For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself” (Philippians 3:20-21).

As I said, I’m not a doom-and-gloomer. The great news is that a Golden Age is, in fact, coming. It simply will not arrive through American greatness. As Chuck Colson once famously observed, “Our salvation is not returning on Air Force One.”

As believers in Christ, we are no longer citizens of terra firma. We are sojourners and ambassadors behind enemy lines whose true citizenship is in heaven. In other words, we are strangers in a strange land. We are former citizens of the physical world, but once we are born again, our eyes are opened, and we are awakened to the spiritual and eternal nature of the spiritual realm.

“…’cause there ain’t no future in living in the past.” – BlackHawk, “Like There Ain’t No Yesterday,” (1995)

We should not spend our days looking back and longing for the days of yesteryear. What lies ahead is of far greater consequence and peace than whatever lay behind us. We cannot unscramble the eggs of man’s present station concerning technology, geopolitics, and our millennia-long moral failings. As Christ followers, we should be looking ahead to what (or rather Who) is coming.

The redemption of mankind, first for the Church, then for Israel, will finally restore the earth to its Edenic-like reality, and restore those of us saved believers to our final, uncorruptible and immortal positions, not so that we can be exalted, but so that we can finally dwell with our Creator God forever in perfect joy, happiness, peace, and purpose.

I love America, and you may love the country you are from, but our true citizenship is not this nation or world. Our kingdom is coming, and soon!

“And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:1-5).

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