The Last Lion
God and Ronald Reagan
With the passing of Ronald Reagan, and the outpouring of
affection and love by millions of the American people, during
the week of pageantry surrounding his funeral, it behooves us
to really get to know our 40th president. What was the faith of
this man who stood
up to the
criticism and character assassination by his enemies, and
who defeated Communism and the “Evil Empire” without
firing a single bullet? The gut instinct of the American people
tells us that here was a truly great man. What is the true story
of Ronald
William F. Dankenbring
Known as “The Gipper,”
and “The Great Liberator,” Ronald Reagan, the 40th president of the
Ronald Reagan once
said to an audience, “A leader once convinced a particular course of action is
the right one, must have the determination to stick with it and be undaunted
when the going gets rough” (Cambridge, England, Dec.5, 1990).
In his farewell
address to the nation,
“I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political
life. In my mind, it was
a tall, proud city built
on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed,
and teeming with people
of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce
and creativity. And if there had to be
city walls, the walls
had doors, and the doors were open to anyone with the
will and heart to get
here.”
In an
address to the House of Commons,
“If history teaches us anything, it teaches
self-delusion in the face of
unpleasant facts is
folly.”
Reagan died at the age of 93, after a long,
full and abundant life. In an
emotion-filled service at the National Cathedral, thousands of mourners paid
tribute to Reagan, eulogized as a man of humility and humor who himself glowed
with the light of that “shining city on a hill” he often evoked. “Ronald Reagan belongs to the ages now,” said
President George Bush. His father,
former president George W. Bush, choked back tears, and said, “I learned more
from Ronald Reagan than from anyone I’ve encountered in all my years of public
life. I learned kindness. We all
did. And I learned courage.”
Ronald Reagan was laid to rest, as the sun
set over the
As the sun touched the
distant mountains, the flag of the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan, which was draped over
the coffin, was given to Nancy, his widow, who shared a final moment at the
casket, dabbing a handkerchief to her eyes, saying, “I love you,” as she
briefly lost her composure for the first time during the long week of grieving.
With pomp and
pageantry, the nation and the world paid tribute to this illustrious man, one
among millions, who in self-effacing humility took upon himself the challenges
of a world facing the threat of nuclear annihilation, and without firing a
single shot, vanquished the
A Man’s Character
During his tenure as
president of the United States, Ronald Reagan was vilified by the left,
excoriated by the press, hounded and harassed by his critics who accused him of
being shallow in his thinking, too old for the job, and who were horrified by
his blunt, direct, and to them “unsophisticated” foreign policy. His critics accused him of being an
“intellectual lightweight.” His
opponents attacked his intellect, disparaged him as an actor, and were furious
when he cut taxes and ran up the national debt by increasing defense
spending. The French and much of
Nevertheless, he was
right and they were wrong. As a result
of his “simplistic” policy, “We win, they lose,” as he once said, the Evil
Empire of the
Ronald Reagan restored
the prestige and the might of
Reagan not only cut
taxes, which he believed were prohibitively high, but he also backed Paul
Volker, chairman of the Federal Reserve, in his fight against inflation, even
though the medicine led to a deep recession which temporarily drove his
popularity down, but in the long run created the stage for the longest economic
boom in American history.
Known as the Great
Communicator, Ronald Reagan was the most persuasive when he spoke
directly. On a visit to the Brandenburg
Gate on the West Berlin side of the Berlin Wall, in June 1987, a year before he
left office, Reagan challenged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, with his
ringing, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
The Communist Empire
did not collapse on its own accord. Reagan challenged the Soviet military
buildup, and thereby exposed their soft underbelly of economic weakness,
leading to winning the Cold War without firing a single shot.
Dick Morris headlined
an article, “Reagan Deserves Giant Status.”
He pointed out that when Reagan upped the
At the Washington
Cathedral, Margaret Thatcher, in her eulogy of Reagan, noted, “And so today the
world – in
Margaret
Thatcher’s Eulogy
Baroness Margaret
Thatcher declared:
“We have lost a
great president, a great American, and a great man. And I
have lost a dear friend. In his lifetime Ronald Reagan was such a cheerful
and invigorating presence that it was easy to forget what daunting historic
tasks he set himself. He sought to mend America’s wounded spirit, to
restore the strength of the free world, and to free the slaves of
communism. These were causes hard to
accomplish and heavy with risk.
“Yet they were pursued with almost a lightness of spirit. For Ronald Reagan
also embodied another great cause – what
Arnold Bennett once called ‘the great cause of cheering us all up.’
His politics had a freshness and
optimism that won converts from every class and every nation – and
ultimately from the very heart of the evil empire.
“Yet his humor often had a purpose beyond humor. In the terrible hours
after the attempt on his life, his easy jokes gave reassurance to an
anxious world. They were evidence that in the aftermath of terror and in
the midst of hysteria, one great heart at least remained sane and jocular.
They were truly grace under pressure.
“And perhaps they signified grace of a deeper kind. Ronnie himself certainly
believed that he had been given back his life for a purpose. As he told a
priest after his recovery, ‘Whatever time I’ve got left now belongs to the
Big Fella Upstairs.’
“And surely it is hard to deny that Ronald Reagan’s life was providential,
when we look at what he achieved in the eight years that followed. Others
prophesied the decline of the West; he inspired America and its allies with
renewed faith in their mission of freedom.
“Others saw only limits to growth; he transformed a stagnant economy into an
engine of opportunity.
“Others hoped, at best, for an uneasy cohabitation with the Soviet Union; he
won the Cold War – not only without
firing a shot, but also by inviting
enemies out of their fortress and turning them into friends.
“I cannot imagine how any diplomat, or any dramatist, could improve on his
words to Mikhail Gorbachev at the Geneva summit: ‘Let me tell you why it is
we distrust you.’
“Those words are candid and tough and they cannot have been easy to hear.
But they are also a clear invitation to a new beginning and a new relationship
that would be rooted in trust.
“We live today in the world that Ronald Reagan began to reshape with those
words. It is a very different world with different challenges and new
dangers. All in all, however, it is one of greater freedom and prosperity,
one more hopeful than the world he inherited on becoming president.
“As Prime Minister, I worked closely with Ronald Reagan for eight of the
most important years of all our lives. We talked regularly both before and
after his presidency. And I have had time and cause to reflect on what made
him a great president.
“Ronald Reagan knew his own mind. He had firm principles – and, I believe,
right ones. He expounded them clearly, he acted upon them decisively.
“When the world threw problems at the White House, he was not baffled, or
disorientated, or overwhelmed. He knew almost instinctively what to do.
When his aides were preparing option papers for his decision, they were
able to cut out entire rafts of proposals that they knew ‘the Old Man’
would never wear. When his allies came under Soviet or domestic pressure,
they could look confidently to Washington for firm leadership.
“And when his enemies tested American resolve, they soon discovered that his
resolve was firm and unyielding.
“Yet his ideas, though clear, were never simplistic. He saw the many sides
of truth. Yes, he warned that the Soviet Union had an insatiable drive for
military power and territorial expansion; but he also sensed it was being
eaten away by systemic failures impossible to reform.
“Yes, he did not shrink from denouncing Moscow’s ‘evil empire.’ But he
realized that a man of goodwill might nonetheless emerge from within its
dark corridors. So the President resisted Soviet expansion and pressed
down on Soviet weakness at every point until the day came when communism
began to collapse beneath the combined weight of these pressures and its
own failures. And when a man of goodwill did emerge from the ruins,
President Reagan stepped forward to shake his hand and to offer sincere
cooperation.
“Nothing was more typical of Ronald Reagan than that large-hearted
magnanimity – and nothing was more American.
“Therein lies perhaps the final explanation of his achievements. Ronald
Reagan carried the American people with him in his great endeavors because
there was perfect sympathy between them. He and they loved America and what
it stands for – freedom and opportunity for ordinary people.
“As an actor in Hollywood’s golden age, he helped to make the American dream
live for millions all over the globe. His own life was a fulfillment of that
dream. He never succumbed to the embarrassment some people feel about an honest
expression of love of country.
“He was able to say ‘God Bless America’ with equal fervor in public and in
private. And so he was able to call confidently upon his fellow-countrymen
to make sacrifices for America – and to
make sacrifices for those who
looked to America for hope and rescue.
“With the lever of American patriotism, he lifted up the world. And so today
the world – in Prague, in Budapest, in Warsaw, in Sofia, in Bucharest, in
Kiev and in Moscow itself – the world mourns the passing of the Great
Liberator and echoes his prayer ‘God Bless America.’
“Ronald Reagan’s life was rich not only in public achievement, but also in
private happiness. Indeed, his public achievements were rooted in his
private happiness. The great turning point of his life was his meeting and
marriage with Nancy. On that we have the plain testimony of a loving and
grateful husband: ‘Nancy came along and saved my soul.’ We share her grief
today. But we also share her pride – and the grief and pride of Ronnie’s
children.
“For the final years of his life, Ronnie’s mind was clouded by illness. That
cloud has now lifted. He is himself again – more himself than at any time
on this earth. For we may be sure that the Big Fella Upstairs never forgets
those who remember Him. And as the last journey of this faithful pilgrim
took him beyond the sunset, and as heaven’s morning broke, I like to think –
in the words of Bunyan – that ‘all the
trumpets sounded on the other
side.’
“We here still move in twilight. But we have one beacon to guide us that
Ronald Reagan never had. We have his example. Let us give thanks today for
a life that achieved so much for all of God’s children.”
Columnist Jack Wheeler
writes about the Reagan legacy to the world.
He reflects back on how Reagan brought hope to the despairing millions
behind the “Iron Curtain.” And then they
heard his speech about the Soviet “Evil Empire.” It galvanized their hopes, dreams, and
aspirations. Says Wheeler:
“Then the world changed:
Ronald Reagan was elected President of the United States. At first, there
seemed to be no difference. Czechoslovakia remained completely a colony of the
Soviet Union as before, with one of the most repressive Communist governments
in all Eastern Europe. While President Reagan had a reputation for being an
anti-communist, he seemed focused, as best Palous and his friends could tell,
on working to resurrect the American economy.
“ ‘The moment came for us,’ Palous recounted, ‘when we heard Radio Free
Europe broadcast in Czech the speech by President Reagan in which he called the
Soviet Union the “Evil Empire.” Luckily, RFE broadcast it several times,
because it was hard to hear on our illegal short-wave radios and the signal was
mostly jammed by the Soviets.
“ ‘This was the moment of hope for us. Finally – finally and at last –
the President of the United States…’ Palous raised his pointed index finger
straight up in the air, then brought it straight down in a sweeping arc to
touch the table… ‘touched to the point. These were the words we had always
dreamed we would hear from the leader of the Free World but never had before.
We knew in that moment we now had a chance to bring freedom to our country.’”
Says Jack Wheeler, “This helps to
explain the unprecedented outpouring of love, admiration, and mourning by the
American people for Ronald Reagan that we have witnessed this week. Other than
those on the left whose bitterness and hate have hardened their hearts, for
scores of millions of Americans, Ronald Reagan touched something very deep
within them. They have come to realize this week that he saw the goodness and
decency in their souls, and the goodness and decency in the soul of America.
“And like the professional dramatist that he was,
his timing was impeccable to the last. There is no one else on the American
scene today capable of carrying on the vision of Ronald Reagan’s America other
than George W. Bush. President Bush is not inspired by his father’s presidency.
He is inspired by Ronald Reagan’s presidency. It’s almost as if Ronald Reagan
chose his passing to be timed for maximum support of his grand-successor’s
re-election.” Says Wheeler, “The Democrats might as well commit political
hara-kiri. Come November, they are toast.”
The funeral of Ronald Reagan may have a strong
influence on the November elections in the United States. Says Wheeler, “The emotional earthquake that
has occurred in the American people this week will reverberate for a long time
to come. The most immediate aftershock will be a surge of increased affection
and support for Ronald Reagan’s heir. It is irrelevant to argue that President
Bush is not the equal of President Reagan – for no one is, no one can be, no
one will be. President Bush will be re-elected, and by a landslide, not because
voters have illusions of him being another Reagan, but from a clear
understanding that he will continue the Reagan legacy.”
George Bush, the current President, like Reagan
began his presidency at the time of a recession. Like Reagan, he has lowered taxes, and the
national debt has increased, due to the ongoing fight against terrorism. Like Reagan, his policies have been called
“simplistic,” and he has been derided as a “cowboy” both at home and
abroad. But like Reagan, his strong
stance against Communism and the new enemy terrorism has resulted in great
victories in Afghanistan and Iraq, and a prolonging of relative peace and
safety.
What kind of man was Ronald Reagan? What were his roots? What were his beliefs? Why was he such an effective leader and statesman? How could one man stand up to and demolish by his courage, convictions, and actions, the greatest threat to world peace the world had ever known?
Legendary singer, songwriter, actor and movie star Pat Boone, a noted evangelical Christian, was a long-time friend of Ronald Reagan. In an interview with Jon E. Dougherty, of Newsmax.com, Boone discussed his long-term relationship with the Reagans. Boone’s and Reagan’s children attended the Thomas Dye School in Bel Air, California, a private K-8 primary school. They would often stand around talking and visiting after school functions. At the time, Reagan was the spokesman for General Electric and toured the country giving speeches on behalf of GE. Boone was impressed with his political comments and told his wife Shirley, “Boy, it’s a shame that guy Ron Reagan doesn’t run for office. I like what he says, I like the way he says it.”
Boone was
one of the first members of the entertainment industry to join Reagan’s
campaign for governor of California.
Later, when Reagan ran for re-election, John Wayne, Frank Sinatra, and
Dean Martin, also came on board. Said
Boone, “Everyone now loved him after he had proven what he could do as
governor. He’d taken some very strong
stands.”
As Reagan
neared the end of his second term as governor, the topic of abortion was
becoming heated. Reagan prayed about it,
and later told Pat Boone he didn’t believe in abortion because “he thought of
it as ending a life just to solve another problem.” Still, he sympathized with women who were in
danger of losing their lives over pregnancy, as well as the few who were
impregnated because of rape or incest. Reagan later wrote a small book, Abortion
and the Conscience of a Nation. It
spelled out his opposition to the procedure and was published, despite
opposition from some in his own administration who felt it would be used
against him politically.
Boone is “infuriated” at how some of the major media has treated Ronald Reagan, their distortions of his personal life, political accomplishments and especially his Christian beliefs. Says Boone, “The same critics would have disapproved of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, John Quincy Adams, James Monroe and Abraham Lincoln. In other words, they would have thrown out all those presidents for the same reasons.”
Boone told Newsmax that he and
his wife were invited to the governor’s mansion following an evangelistic
campaign the Boone’s had attended earlier in the day in Sacramento. The Reagans treated their guests – a handful
of ministers and the Boones – to cold drinks and other refreshments. One minister present asked if he and the
others could pray for the governor, and Reagan readily consented. Boone testified, “I’ve prayed with him
[Reagan] before; I call him ‘The Electric Man’ because there’s something that
happens when he’s praying. His hand just
vibrates. He is deeply spiritual.”
As they
were praying, George Otis, who was leading the prayer, suddenly broke in and
began to speak prophetically, Boone recalls.
“He uttered, ‘My son, I am pleased with you . . . If you continue to
walk upright before me, you will live at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.’”
Says
Boone, “We were all stunned. We quickly
said, ‘Amen,’ and when we looked up at Ron, he was glassy-eyed. It did seem to all of us that George was not
simply speaking from his own consciousness, but that he was actually delivering
a prophetic word. It was so
specific.” Years later, when Reagan was
elected as president, Boone called him on the telephone and asked him if he
remembered the prayer. “Yes, I do,” he
responded.
The prophecy came true. In 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected as
president of the United States by a landslide vote, ousting the pusillanimous
Jimmy Carter from office.
At that time, I was so enraged at
Carter’s feeble presidency, that I voted for Reagan with great joy and
emotion. I felt inspired by the Spirit
of God to do so, and certainly have never regretted it since that time! Biblically speaking, I exercised my right as
a citizen of the United States to cast my ballot where my heart and spirit led
me. As a citizen with a right to vote in
such an election, it would have been a dereliction of duty to fail to exercise
my opportunity to choose between right and wrong, and support the right!
A glimpse into the real Ronald Reagan can be obtained from his many
speeches. The Scriptures state: “For out of the abundance of the heart the
mouth speaks. The good person brings
good things out of a good treasure” (Matt.12:34-35, NRSV).
It was 1964. Ronald Reagan gave
a television speech for Barry Goldwater, running against Lyndon Johnson, that
launched his own political career. Entitled “A Time for Choosing,” Reagan told
no jokes. He began:
“I am going to talk of
controversial things. I will make no
apology for this.
It’s time we ask
ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by
the Founding
Fathers. James Madison said, ‘We base
all our experiments
on the capacity of
mankind for self-government.
“The idea that
government was beholden to the people, that it had no other
source of power, is
still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history
of man’s relation to man
. . .
“You and I were told we
must choose between a left and right, but I suggest
there is no such thing
as a left or right. There is only an up
or down. Up to
man’s age-old dream, the
maximum of individual freedom consistent with
order, or down to the
ant heap of totalitarianism.”
Reagan
forthrightly said that liberals refused to acknowledge that the choice was not
between “peace and war, only between fight and surrender.” He went on, “All
those who disagree with the ‘peace’ crowd, are indicted as warmongers. Let’s set the record straight. There is no argument over the choice between
peace and war, but there is only one guaranteed way you can have peace – and
you can have it in the next second – surrender.”
In the speech that lit a bonfire under
Reagan’s political future, given at the waning moments of the Barry Goldwater
campaign for president, Reagan continued:
“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the
last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step
into a thousand years of darkness. If we
fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we
justified our brief moment here. We did
all that could be done.” Although Goldwater
went on to lose the election, the speech electrified a nation, and Reagan was
persuaded to run for governor of California, beginning an incredible career of
service to the nation and a peace-hungry world.
Reagan’s Spiritual
Beginnings
Ronald Reagan’s mother
Nelle was an amazing Christian woman whom President Reagan credited for truly
influencing him and his brother Neil. He
wrote, “Nelle Reagan, my mother, God rest her soul, had an unshakable faith in
God’s goodness. And while I may not have
realized it in my youth, I know now that she planted that faith very deeply in
me. She made the most difficult
Christian message seem very easy” (Hand of Providence: The Strong and Quiet
Faith of Ronald Reagan, Mary Beth Brown, p.18).
In An American
Life, Reagan wrote, “I was raised to believe that God has a plan for
everyone and that seemingly random twists of fate are all part of His
plan. My mother – a small woman with
auburn hair and a sense of optimism that ran as deep as the cosmos – told me
that everything in life happened for a purpose.
She said all things were part of God’s Plan, even the most disheartening
setbacks, and in the end, she said, you didn’t let it get you down: You stepped away from it, stepped over it,
and moved on. Later on, she said,
something good will happen and you’ll find yourself thinking – ‘If I hadn’t had
that problem back then, then this better thing that did happen wouldn’t
have happened to me’” (p.20).
Nelle prayed like she
had a direct connection with God.
President Reagan declared, “I’ve always believed that we were, each of
us, put here for a reason; that there is a plan, somehow divine for all of
us. In an effort to embrace that plan,
we are blessed with a special gift of prayer, the happiness and solace to be
gained by talking to the Lord.” He went
on, “Many of us have been taught to pray by people we love. In my case, it was my mother. I learned quite literally at her knee. My mother gave me a great deal, but nothing
she gave me was more important than that.
She was my inspiration and provided me with a very real and deep faith”
(p.28).
Ronald Reagan lived by
a little saying Nelle had written in her Bible many years ago: “You can be too big for God to use, but
you cannot be too small.”
A fellow worker with
Reagan when he broadcast sports events at radio station WHO in Des Moines,
Iowa, said of him, “I always thought he was a deeply religious man. Not the kind who went to church every Sunday. A man with a strong inner faith. Whatever he accomplished was God’s will – God
gave it to him and God could take it away.”
Reagan knew God in a
personal way, as we all can, if we choose to do so. Adrian Rogers, then president of the Southern
Baptist Convention, met with Reagan in 1980, during the presidential primaries. He cross-examined him extensively and came
away reporting, “Governor Reagan said that his faith is very personal, that God
is real to him. He had a personal
experience when he invited Christ into his life. I asked him if he knew the Lord Jesus or just
knew ‘about’ him. Reagan replied, ‘I know
him” (Brown, p.88).
It was this
rock-bottom faith that impelled Ronald Reagan to confront the Soviet Union
boldly, with great energy, and enabled him to do “exploits” (Dan.11:32).
In the magazine Modern
Screen in 1950, May issue, Reagan talked about prayer and dealing with
hardships. He had lost a daughter, just
days old, had almost died himself, and his first wife had departed from
him. He knew personally the assurance
promised in Psalm 34:18 – “The LORD is near to the broken-hearted, and saves
the crushed in spirit.”
Ron confided to the reporter, “Unfortunately,
my rate of prayer increases with my troubles.
There hasn’t been a serious crisis in my life when I haven’t prayed and
when prayer hasn’t helped me.” He went
on, “There was a wonderful line in Kings Row – ‘Some people grow up and
some people just grow older.’ I believe
God intends us all to grow up, and that there are times when all of us ought to
take stock and see if we are growing up or if we are merely growing older. Sometimes it takes a tragedy to help us grow
up.”
Throughout his life, Ronald Reagan has
“always felt hands on his shoulders, keeping him safe, and he has never doubted
that they belong to God,” says his daughter Patti. He would frequently tell her, “God always
listens, and He’s always watching.”
Reagan put a lot of stock in the power of
prayer. When governor, people would
stand across from his desk and say, “We have a problem.” Reagan commented on this in a letter to a
young lady, saying, “The help I have found is in turning to God and asking His
help in prayer. I believe very much in
the power of prayer and feel if you ask sincerely for His help, it is
forthcoming. For me that has been the
answer.” He declared, “I have spent more
time in prayer these past months than any previous period I can recall. The every day demands of this job could leave
me with many doubts and fears if it were not for the wisdom and strength that
come from these times of prayer” (Brown, p.143).
Paul Kengor in his new
book God and Ronald Reagan: A
Spiritual Life, tells a side of America’s president few really know. It is a surprising book. Kengor is not a religious zealot but a
professor of political science who set out to write a book about how Reagan
defeated Communism and the Soviet Empire.
But when he got into the original papers and letters of President
Reagan, a whole new side of him opened up and “he discovered a degree of
religious intensity that has not been publicly known” (“Reagan the Believer,” NewsMax,
February 17, 2004).
As he began to write
the book, the story of Reagan’s faith “overtook the rest of the book,” Kengor
wrote. Reagan’s mother was the greatest
influence in his life, and she was a devout Christian who tithed faithfully and
devoted her life to the poor and helpless, regularly visiting local hospitals,
mental asylums, jails, carrying her Bible, apples, and cookies. She was fearless in her Christianity. She tithed scrupulously and taught her son to
do the same.
Says Paul Kengor,
Reagan’s “Christian commitment” was the least appreciated aspect about the man
whom many did not understand. “He was
very devout. He got that from his
mother.”
Kengor asserted, “The
man even looked at Alzheimer’s optimistically.
Reagan believed that Alzheimer’s is what God had chosen for him. It was God’s plan for how Reagan would die
and he believed that we have no reason to question God. Reagan truly believed that even something
that negative could be part of God’s plan.
We don’t quite appreciate how eternal his optimism was.”
One of Ronald Reagan’s
favorite metaphors for describing the America he loved was “a shining city on a
hill.” This is a paraphrase of Matthew
5:14 – “You are the light of the world.
A city built on a hill cannot be hid.” Using it for America, Reagan
cited John Winthrop’s 1630 sermon before the founding of the Massachusetts Bay
Colony.
In a speech in 1969,
Reagan declared:
“On the deck of the tiny Arbella off the coast
of Massachusetts in 1630,
John Winthrop gathered
the little band of pilgrims together and spoke
of the life they would
have to live in that land they had never seen.
“ ‘We shall be as a city
upon a hill. The eyes of all the people
are upon
us, so that if we shall
deal falsely with our God in this work we have
undertaken and so cause
Him to withdraw His present help from us, we
shall be made a story
and a byword through all the world.’”
Peter Robinson, a
fellow at the Hoover Institution, in his book How Ronald Reagan Changed My
Life, interviewed Judge William P. Clark, a former Reagan national security
adviser, and asked about Reagan’s “interior life.” Clark responded that the president was “a man
of prayer.” His favorite setting for
speaking to God was the out-of-doors.
“He didn’t need a church to pray in.
He referred to his ranch as an open cathedral with oak trees for
walls.” On trail rides on horseback with
the president, Clark said he would often recite the prayer of St. Francis of
Assisi, which begins: “Lord, make me an
instrument of Thy peace.” Reagan would
often resort to his ranch with its humble ranchhouse in order to “recharge his
batteries.” Says Mary Beth Brown, “his
days and nights there allowed him to withdraw from worldly affairs and spend
time in prayer and meditation, seeking God’s will and listening to His voice”
(p.149).
Clark related,
“Sometimes, the president would look around and say, ‘What a wonderful place
for prayer.’ And sometimes he’d just
look up at the sky and say, ‘Glory to God.’”
Reagan’s faith enabled
him to deal with adversity. Robinson
wrote, “His father was a drunk. His
first marriage broke up. His career as a
movie actor, that he loved, ran down like a clock after the war. And 70 days after taking office, he was
shot.” Says Robinson, “He was someone
who understood how to take the bad in life and find good in it. To see this exuberant and fundamentally
light-hearted person who had achieved the highest office in the land and had
transformed the world – it took me months to get used to the idea.”
Reagan’s own mother,
in 1962, died of Alzheimer’s disease.
Reagan told friends that his mother’s death was “a step through an
eternal window – to that rainbow waiting around the bend.”
“How we die is God’s
business,” Ron told his daughter Patti.
As a 17-year old, Reagan wrote a poem called “Life.” In it he said:
“Why
does sorrow drench us
When
our fellow passes on?
He’s
just exchanged life’s dreary dirge
For
life’s eternal song.”
Reagan’s faith itself
was deep, personal, and strongly influenced his political beliefs and
activities. It was much more complex and
embracing than a simple fundamentalist faith.
His son, Michael Reagan, says, “My Dad was always religious. I remember
him pointing to the lovely landscape and magnificent California trees around us
when we took walks together and he’d say that they were the revelations of
God’s handiwork. He never really pushed
his beliefs on others, though . . . he lived his religious beliefs . . . He
always espoused his belief in God and how God made this beautiful land that we
live in. He’d say that this is God’s
plan. He knew God all of his life. There may have been times when he wasn’t
hand-in-hand with God, but God was always close.”
Michael Reagan wrote
in the “Foreword” of the book Hand of Providence: The Strong and Quiet Faith of Ronald Reagan, written
by Mary Beth Brown, “My father is a godly man.
He loves God. When he decided to
run for president, he didn’t do it to raise himself up, to be admired, or to
have others think he was great. He
didn’t do it out of selfish reasons or because it is the most powerful position
in the country. He did it out of
duty. He believed God had called him to
run for president. He believed God had
things for him to do” (p. x).
Says author Mary Beth
Brown, about Reagan’s faith, “Current biographers have looked at Ronald Reagan
through jaded eyes. When you see someone
through the eyes of a secular humanist, you will fail to see the vibrant
Christian faith and fruits of the Holy Spirit that were evident in the life of
Ronald Wilson Reagan. To understand this
man, his decision-making process as president, and the unprecedented success it
produced, you must understand his reliance on God.
“The writers who have
attempted to explain Ronald Reagan have ignored this most important aspect of
his life: his faith in God, who rules in
the lives of men and women who are committed to Him. Reagan believed he had a calling upon his
life from God, and he wanted to fulfill that calling” (p.xiii).
Former political
associates attested to his deep faith in God.
Says Brown, “In studying his life, words, and actions, I discovered that
Ronald Reagan is a deeply religious man who cannot be adequately appreciated or
explained without understanding his Christian faith.”
When asked about his
personal faith, Reagan himself told a questioner, “Having accepted Jesus Christ
as my Saviour, I have God’s promise of eternal life in heaven, as well as the
abundant life here on earth that He promises to each of us in John 10:10.”
In 1984, Reagan showed
his indefatigable spirit of faith, when he declared:
“If we trust him, keep his work, and live lives for
his pleasure, he’ll
give us the power we
need – power to fight the good fight, to finish
the race, and to keep
the faith.”
Reagan believed that
acceptance of Jesus Christ as Savior is paramount to salvation. He accepted Christ as Savior as a teenager,
and continued to profess that belief throughout his life. He credited God and divine intervention for
his survival of the assassination attempt on his life in 1981. He wrote during his recuperation, “Whatever
happens now I owe my life to God and will try to serve Him every way I can.”
Ronald Reagan really
believed in the power of prayer. He was
almost constantly in prayer. Biographer
Edmund Morris saw him sitting down mumbling to himself and was surprised to
learn that he was talking to God. He
once told Jerry Falwell that he tried to begin every day as president praying,
“O God, not my will, but Thine be done.”
Discussing his
mother’s faith in God, Reagan once said, “I now seem to have her faith that
there is a divine plan, and while we may not be able to see the reason for
something at the time, things do happen for a reason and for the best. One day what has seemed to be an unbearable
blow is revealed as having marked a turning point or a start leading to
something worthwhile.”
Former Attorney
General Edwin Meese worked with Reagan since he was governor and was a close,
personal friend. He observed, “The
president feels a person’s religious beliefs are a very private matter. He has never tried to exploit them or utilize
them for political purposes. At the same
time, he feels a Christian has an obligation, when the opportunity comes up
naturally, not to be reticent about professing his faith.
“Of all the people
I’ve ever known, I have never known anyone less uncomfortable about discussing
religious matters in a very matter-of-fact and confident way. To him, this is an important part of his
life, and when the subject comes up, he is not at all hesitant to talk about it
– and this was true way back in California” (Brown, op. cit., p.183).
A Nightmare and a
Warning
Reagan had a friend, Joan Sieffert, who had been president of the Pittsburgh chapter of Reagan’s fan club decades earlier when he was a Hollywood star. He had developed a bond with her and they remained pen pals for decades.
One night Joan awoke from a nightmare in 1974, when Reagan was governor of California. The dream was so startling that she was moved to write about it to her friend Ronald Reagan. In the dream, she vividly saw him “running for president, winning the presidency, and then being shot.” In the dream, he was shot “before entering a car.” The dream “really terrified” her. Reagan read the letter with some alarm and shared it with his wife Nancy. Nancy called Sieffert, traumatized, because as governor Reagan had already received death threats. But a defiant Nancy Reagan told her, “Ronnie believes that it’s God’s choice that he run the country. And I feel that way, too.”
Seiffert’s dream mirrored exactly what happened seven years later, in 1981, on March 30, when John Hinckley Jr. shot Reagan as he exited the Washington Hilton and was about to enter the presidential limousine.
Miracles
Galore
The assassination
attempt occurred on a warm and muggy day.
Reagan had not worn his bullet-proof vest, an oversight that nearly cost
him his life. John Hinckley Jr. carried
a .22-caliber Rohm snub-nosed revolver loaded with six specially made
bullets. As Reagan was about to enter
the presidential limousine outside the Washington Hilton, after having given a
speech to the Construction Trades Council, Hinckley’s moment arrived.
A reporter shouted,
“Mr. President! Mr. President!” Hinckley shoved several bystanders aside,
crouched, took aim, and fired. James
Brady, White House Press Secretary, went down, shot in the forehead; another
shot hit a Washington patrolman in the back of his neck. Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy took
the fourth bullet, as he used his body as a human shield to protect the
president. One last bullet struck the
limousine and ricocheted, hitting the president in the chest, an inch from his
heart.
Jerry Parr, the head
of the Secret Service detail, threw the president in the car, landing on him to
shield him from any further gunfire.
Parr thought the president had escaped unscathed, but Reagan began
coughing up pink, frothy blood. Instantly,
Parr knew the president had been seriously wounded, and they headed for the
George Washington University Hospital.
Time was running out. The driver
gunned the engine.
Entering the hospital,
Reagan collapsed and was lifted onto a stretcher. His blood pressure was zero and there was no
pulse. His face was white as a
sheet. He hovered near death. Patti Reagan, his daughter, says he looked
almost ethereal, with a light in his eyes that made her think that he saw
something – an angel, or God – or something.
Nancy later told her that at one point, after the doctors had operated
on him, he woke up and saw “figures in white standing around him.” He scrawled on a piece of paper, “I’m alive,
aren’t I?”
Patti later repeated
this to a friend, a nurse, who pointed out to her that no one in a recovery
room or in intensive care wears white; they’re all in green scrubs. Patti believes they were angels, and so does
Michael Reagan, her brother.
Does God not promise
that He will send angels to help His beloved children when they are in need,
suffering difficult circumstances, and cry out for help? As the apostle Paul wrote, “Are not all
angels spirits in the divine service, sent to serve for the sake of those who
are to inherit salvation?” (Heb.1:14, NRSV).
God says, “The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and
delivers them. O taste and see that the
LORD is good; happy are those who take refuge in him” (Psalm 34:7-8). David wrote, “For he will command his angels
concerning you to guard you in all your ways.
On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your
foot against a stone” (Psalm 91:12).
Dr. Benjamin Aaron,
who performed the operation, prayed, “Lord God Almighty, You’ll have to give me
strength now – I’m at the end of my rope – this will have to be on Your
power!” He had just finished working 33
straight hours with little sleep. As he
began operating, he prayed again, “Lord, I know you are a sovereign God who
controls all events, and it’s to You I commit this operation. If it be your will, O Lord, guide me and heal
this man through these hands.”
Just before going
under the scalpel, Mary Beth Brown writes, Reagan said to the assembled
doctors, “I hope you guys are all Republicans.”
One, a long-time democrat, replied, “Today, we’re all Republicans, Mr.
President.”
The bullet was found
within an inch of the president’s heart.
It was specially designed for use in big game hunting, called a
“Devastator,” because it was made to flatten out and cause maximum damage as it
ripped through a body. Its tip was
filled with lead azide, a chemical designed to explode on secondary contact
with something hard. The chemical is a
toxic poison. Amazingly, the bullet did
not explode when it hit Reagan’s chest.
Writes Mary Beth
Brown, “Many ‘miraculous factors,’ as the president called them, added up to
the saving of his life. And if any one
of them had occurred differently, he most certainly would have died that day in
March 1981. President Reagan points out
in his autobiography that most of the doctors that practiced at the hospital
had been attending a special meeting that afternoon: ‘Within a few minutes after I arrived, the
room was full of specialists in virtually every medical field.’ He had turned to the reporter at just the
right time when he was shot; otherwise, the bullet might have hit directly into
his heart. Reagan biographer Edward
Morris points out that the limousine miraculously reached the hospital,
although driving in uncontrolled traffic, in just three-and-a-half
minutes. And the bullet didn’t explode
while Dr. Aaron was exploring for it – or at any other time since it had
entered Reagan’s body. ‘Jerry’s [Parr]
decision to go directly to the hospital was the difference between my dad
living or dying,’ Michael Reagan says in his autobiography, On the Outside
Looking In. Michael also says his
father told him ‘that it was only divine intervention that kept him alive’”
(p.14).
Later, Dr. Aaron
visited the president at the White House.
“They both agreed that it was by God’s grace in answer to the prayers of
the president, his wife Nancy, Dr. Aaron, and millions of American citizens
that the president was still alive.
“President Reagan
spoke about those prayers when he said, ‘It’s a remarkable feeling to know that
people are praying for you and for your strength. I know firsthand. I felt those prayers when I was recovering
from that bullet.’
“Recovering in the
White House, President Reagan recommitted his life to God, writing in his
diary, ‘Whatever happens now, I owe my life to God and will try to serve him in
every way I can’” (p.15).
Michael Deaver, a
presidential aid, later told Peggy Noonan, “I know from conversations he and I
had after the assassination attempt that there was no question in his mind that
his life had been spared. He absolutely
believed it. He felt the Lord had spared
him to fulfill whatever mission it was that he was supposed to fulfill. And he was gonna make sure that he lived his
life to the fullest and did whatever he considered to be the right thing for
the rest of his life.”
Says Brown: “This near-death experience had changed
Ronald Reagan in profound ways, and the world would soon feel the impact.”
After Reagan came out
of surgery, and the anesthesia had worn off, he looked up at the nurses
nervously hovering over him, and quipped:
‘Okay, let’s do the whole scene over again, beginning at the hotel.”
Can you imagine how
the world would be different, today, if Ronald Reagan had not been miraculously
spared, and continued to perform the duties of the presidency, which led to the
downfall of the Soviet Union and the “Evil Empire,” and the END of the Cold
War?
Reagan’s Legacy
When Ronald Reagan was
sworn into office, the world was in crisis.
People had lost their confidence in the country and its leadership. American hostages were being held in
Iran. An aggressive Soviet Union was
gobbling up countries in Africa, and central America, fomenting revolution
nearer and nearer to our shores.
Eight years later,
when Reagan left office, the scene had changed – dramatically. The Soviet Union was suddenly “left on the
ash heap of history,” as Reagan had prophesied.
The world was safer, and the economy had performed an about-face and was
booming, beginning a time of great economic expansion.
Says former Senator
Trent Lott, in speaking with Human Events, the time Reagan was tried and
tested the most was when he stood his ground in meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev
at Reykjavik, Iceland. Gorbachev was
making concessions and trying to get Reagan to agree to stop the Strategic
Defense Initiative (SDI). Faced with the
time for a decision, Reagan set his jaw, said no, and walked away. Gorbachev was left speechless – in disbelief
and horror. Says Lott, “I think that
decision marked the final nail in the coffin of the Soviet Union as it existed
at that time. They were imploding, even
though the CIA didn’t seem to know it, economically and militarily. . . I think
when the president refused to make that concession that was a defining moment
of his strength and character. It was
the final act in the Soviet Union coming to a close and the wall coming down” (Human
Events, June 14, 2004, p.3).
Wrote Wesley Pudens,
in The Washington Times, “The 40th president is rightly remembered
in tributes and praise for rebuilding both the economy and the nation’s
defenses, and doing both simultaneously. . . . The man the chattering class
regarded as bumbling, dumb and already moving into the suburbs of senility
understood what the intellectuals of academe and the smart alecks of the media
did not, that the bulging muscle of Soviet arms was all cattle and no hat, that
Soviet economic might was a myth and the Russians were ripe to be taken down.
“ ‘He was right,’ the
Economist observed the day after Mr. Reagan died. ‘By the year he left office the Russians had
lost Eastern Europe; two years later they abandoned communism. A large part of the chin-stroking classes of
America and Europe had thought the clumsy fellow’s Cold War policy unnecessary
and dangerous. When it worked, it became
retrospectively obvious.’”
Concludes Pudens,
“Everything about the life and accomplishments of Ronald Reagan says to the
embittered critics choking on his dust:
‘I may be slow, but I’m miles ahead of you’” (“The virulent venom of
frustrated rage,” Washington Times, June 14-20, 2004).
When it comes to pure
results, says Thomas Sowell, “Ronald Reagan was the most successful president
of the United States in the 20th century.” When Reagan called the Soviet Union an “evil
empire,” the media howled in disapproval.
When he proposed meeting the Russian nuclear build-up in eastern Europe
with a U.S. nuclear build-up of Pershing missiles in western Europe, his
critics were alarmed that he was going to get us into nuclear war. But the bogeyman did not materialize. Instead, to their chagrin, Reagan’s boldness
brought an end to a Cold War which had endured since 1945 and lasted through
seven consecutive presidential administrations.
The media pundits and academia thought
Mikhail Gorbachev would eat him for lunch in nuclear negotiations. Gorby was considered a brilliant and
sophisticated leader. But the results of
the meetings had an amazing effect. The
Soviet Union collapsed along with its entire empire; and Gorbachev woke up one
day the head of an empire that no longer existed. Says Thomas Sowell, “Ronald Reagan left this
country – and the world – a far better place than he found it. And he smiled when he did it. That’s greatness – if you judge by results”
(“Greatness goes against the grain,” ibid.).
Normandy and D-Day
In 1984, forty years
after the invasion of Normandy on D-Day, Ronald Reagan visited the beaches of
Normandy, France, and recalled that epochal battle. He declared, in stirring words at the U.S.
Ranger Monument:
“We stand at a lonely windswept point on the northern
shore of France. The air is soft,
but forty years ago at this moment,
the air was dense with smoke and the cries of men,
and the air was filled with the
crack of rifle fire and the roar of cannon.
At dawn, on
the morning of the sixth of June
1944, 225 Rangers jumped off the British landing craft
and ran to the bottom of these
cliffs. Their mission was one of the
most difficult and
daring of the invasion: to climb these sheer and desolate cliffs and
take out the enemy
guns.
“. . . Behind me is a memorial that
symbolizes the Ranger daggers that were thrust into
the tops of these cliffs. And before me are the men who put them
there. These are the
boys of Pointe du Hoc. These are the men who took the cliffs. These are the heroes
who helped end a war.”
In his remarks on that day, Reagan declared
also:
“The men of Normandy had faith that what they
were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a
just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead, or on the next. It was the
deep knowledge – and pray God we have not lost it – that there is a profound
moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for
conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those
others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.
“You all knew
that some things are worth dying for. One’s country is worth dying for, and
democracy is worth dying for, because it’s the most deeply honorable form of
government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty. All of you were
willing to fight tyranny, and you knew the people of your countries were behind
you.
“Something
else helped the men of D-day, their rock-hard belief that Providence would have
a great hand in the events that would unfold here; that God was an ally in this
great cause. And so, the night before the invasion, when Colonel Wolverton
asked his parachute troops to kneel with him in prayer, he told them: ‘Do not
bow your heads, but look up so you can see God and ask His blessing in what
we’re about to do.’ Also, that night, General Matthew Ridgway was on his cot,
listening in the darkness for the promise God made to Joshua: ‘I will not fail
thee nor forsake thee.’
“These are
the things that impelled them; these are the things that shaped the unity of
the Allies.”
These inspiring words again remind us of the spiritual strength and faith of Ronald Reagan, his strong belief in Providence, and his love for freedom and America.
Reagan also touched America’s heartstrings when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded soon after launch in 1986. As the country mourned and grieved, the president postponed his State of the Union address and led the nation in grieving. “We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and ‘slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.’”
Reagan replaced a president who spoke of America’s malaise, but he spoke of its destiny and greatness, notions that were regarded by many as naïve and arrogant, outlandish and prideful. Talk about a shining city on a hill was close to Reagan’s soul, although it was out of fashion with the “liberal” left-wing media pundits.
“Let us renew our faith and our hope,” he said in his first inaugural address. “We have every right to dream heroic dreams,” he declared. He gave the nation hope – and a sense of purpose, destiny, and exaltation of spirit.
As a person, Ronald Reagan was humble, modest, and good-natured. He had an easy laugh, a sparkling sense of humor, and a deep faith and love for his country, and above all, for God. He “seemed untouched by the arrogance and self-regard common to actors and politicians,” wrote Nancy Gibbs in “The All-American President” (Time, June 14, 2004).
On November 5, 1994,
when Ronald Reagan announced to the world that he had Alzheimer’s disease, he
declared his own inner character and feeling for the American people. He wrote in a letter revealing his condition:
“At the moment I feel just fine. I
intend to live the remainder of the years God gives me on this Earth doing the
things I have always done. I will
continue to share life’s journey with my beloved Nancy and my family. . . When
the Lord calls me home, whenever that day may be, I will leave with the
greatest love for this country of ours, and eternal optimism for its future.”
Nancy Reagan’s
Tribute
Nancy Reagan wrote
before her husband’s death her memories of Ronald Reagan. They appeared in “The Eternal Optimist” in Time
magazine, June 14, 2004. Nancy
declared:
“I think they broke the mold when they made
Ronnie. He was a man of
strong principles and
integrity. He had absolutely no ego, and
he was very
comfortable in his own
skin; therefore, he didn’t feel he ever had to prove
anything to anyone. He said what he thought and believed. He could move
from being a
sportscaster to moving pictures and TV, to being Governor of
the largest state in the country for eight years and
then to being President
for eight years, and somehow remain the same wonderful
man. Perhaps this
was helped by his strong, unshakable religious
beliefs.
“Ronnie always believed that God has a plan for each
of us and that we might
not know what it is now, but eventually we will.
“He never took off or landed in a plane without
looking out the window and
saying a silent prayer. I don’t think many people knew this. He was the
eternal optimist – the glass was always half full, not
half empty.
“I think his faith and his comfort with himself
accounts for that optimism.
Since he felt that everything happens for a reason, he
never saw things darkly.
After he was shot, and we almost lost him, he lay on
his hospital bed staring
at the ceiling and praying. He told me that he realized he couldn’t pray
just
for himself, that it wouldn’t be right, and that he
also had to pray for John
Hinckley.
Hinckley’s parents sent him a note and he wrote a nice one back
to them.
“Later, Cardinal Cooke visited Ronnie in the White
House and said, ‘God was
certainly sitting on your shoulder that day.’ Ronnie replied, ‘Yes, I know,
and I made up my mind that all the days that I have
left belong to Him.’”
Ronald Reagan was a very private man, but also gregarious; he loved
seeing and meeting people, Nancy recalls.
After being married to him 52 years, she said he was very sentimental
and romantic and tender. He wrote her beautiful,
touching letters when they had to be apart.
Nancy wrote:
“Ronnie felt this was his greatest accomplishment –
finding a safe ending to the
cold war. And his other great legacy, he felt, was
giving our country back its
optimism.
“At our last Kennedy
Center Honors show, Walter Cronkite went back onstage
at the end and brought
out all the cast, performers and crew to salute us. By
this time, the aisles
were filled with ushers, and he gave a very touching tribute.
The audience then
turned, faced us and sang, Auld Lang Syne.
I had dissolved
into tears by that
time. But Ronnie called down, ‘Beats
getting an Oscar.’ Only
Ronnie could do that.
“When we were leaving
the White House for the last time and walking toward
the helicopter, he
turned to me with his heartwarming grin.
‘Well, it’s been a
wonderful eight years,’
he said. ‘All in all, not bad. Not bad at all.’”
Like the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and World War II, the Reagan years and the end of the Cold War and demise of the Soviet Union is another of those fateful milestones of human history – one of those turning points of destiny.
Reagan lived longer than any other U.S.
president. He appeared in more than 50
Hollywood films, over two decades, with roles ranging from a college professor
in “Bedtime for Bonzo,” to doomed football star George Gipp in “Knute Rockne:
All-American” in which he wanted his teammates to “win just one for the
Gipper.” This phrase became a cry-word
of the Reagan campaigns.
Ronald Reagan was the “Last Great Lion” of
the 20th century – the man credited the most for the fall of the
Soviet Empire. The twentieth century
began with an American lion, Theodore Roosevelt; the world was largely saved
from tyranny by the British Lion, Winston S. Churchill, during the Second World
War; and the last lion of the century was once again an American lion – Ronald
Reagan.
Why was Ronald Reagan so successful, despite
his constantly chipping and carping critics?
To answer that question, we must make note of the fact that he was a
strong, Bible-believing, sincere Christian, a man who prayed often and believed
in Jesus Christ as the Messiah and Saviour.
Although he did not parade his faith before others, he prayed every day,
and attended church as much as possible.
Although he stayed away from public church going, after the
assassination attempt on his life, Reagan explained that he did this because he
did not want to endanger the lives of other people. After his term in office was over, he once
again attended church.
The Death of King
Josiah
We read in the Scriptures of the reign and death of the righteous king Josiah, grandson of Hezekiah. Josiah’s father, Manasseh, had been a very wicked king in Israel. But Josiah began to seek the Lord when he was a youth. “Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign in Jerusalem. He did what was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of his ancestor David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left. For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was still a boy, he began to seek the God of his ancestor David” (II Chron.34:1-3).
In 629 B.C., the twelfth year of his reign, Josiah purged away the high places, idolatrous altars, sacred images and pagan poles that were commonly worshiped. The altars of Baal were demolished. He brought the people back to the ways of God. During his reign the high priest discovered the Book of the Law, the Torah, lying forlorn in the Temple, which was in the process of being cleansed. The book of the Law was read to Josiah, and he heard the terrible curses which were prophesied to come upon the people if they forsook the laws of God. Josiah trembled, tore his clothes, and inquired of the Lord about the meaning of the discovery and the prophesied wrath of the Lord (II Chron.34:14-22).
The prophetess Huldah
told the king’s servants, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Tell the man who sent you to me, Thus says
the LORD: I will indeed bring disaster
upon this place and upon its inhabitants, all the curses that are written in
the book [see Deuteronomy 28] that was read before the king of Judah. Because they have forsaken me and have made
offerings to other gods, so that they have provoked me to anger with all the
works of their hands, my wrath will be poured out on this place and will not be
quenched. But as to the king of Judah,
who sent you to inquire of the LORD, thus shall you say to him: Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Regarding the words that you heard, because
your heart was penitent and you have humbled yourself before God when you heard
his words against this place and its inhabitants, and you have humbled yourself
before me, and have torn your clothes and have wept before me, I also have
heard you, says the LORD. I will
gather you to your ancestors and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace;
your eyes shall not see all the disaster that I will bring on this place and
its inhabitants” (II Chron.34:23-28).
Josiah was king 31
years from the age of 8. He died at the
age of 39, in battle against the king of Egypt.
Judah was still strong in his days.
But toward the end of his reign, he went to battle against Pharaoh
Necho, without seeking the Lord’s will in the matter, and even though the
Egyptian king warned him that God has commanded him to go to battle, and that
Josiah should not interfere or “meddle,” Josiah disguised himself and fought
against him. The archers shot him so
that he was mortally wounded. He died
and was buried in the sepulchers of his fathers.
The lamentation and
grieving throughout the land was tremendous, as Josiah had been a very good
king. “All Judah and Jerusalem mourned
for Josiah. Jeremiah also uttered a
lament for Josiah, and all the singing men and singing women have spoken of Josiah
in their lamentations to this day. They
made these a custom in Israel; they are recorded in the Laments” (II
Chron.35:24-25).
Fast forward to the 21st century. God spared king Josiah from having to see His judgment upon ancient Judah for their apostasy. Similarly, God has spared His servant Ronald W. Reagan from having to see His divine wrath poured out on this end-time generation. God did not bring the horrendous plagues of wrath and divine retribution on our nation, today, so long as the righteous President, Ronald Reagan, remained alive.
He has now departed to his grave in peace. As the sun set over the western horizon, and the Pacific Ocean, Friday, June 11, as the Sabbath day drew nigh, President Reagan was laid to his final rest, until the day of resurrection.
As the pall-bearers carried his casket to its final resting place, a world mourned the passing of a righteous, great statesman – “The Great Liberator.” Margaret Thatcher paid her final respects at his grave site. A solitary bagpiper played the mournful, sonorous tones of “Amazing Grace,” as the bier was carried to its last destination. Millions wept openly, unashamedly, unabashedly. Fighter jets roared overhead in a final tribute, and one peeled away skyward – in the missing man formation – as a symbol of Ronald Reagan’s spirit soaring into the heavens to be with God. And a solitary buglar played Taps. And a band played “God Bless America.” And a mourning dove cooed softly as darkness closed over Reagan’s tomb.
2004 – Year of Transition
Ronald Reagan died
June 5, 2004, on the eve of the 60th celebration of the landing at
Normandy, France, June 6, 1944 – an epochal event which sealed the fate of Nazi
Germany. His death at this opportune
time, was in a fateful year, because 2004 is exactly 6000 years since the
expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, 3997 B.C. (See our articles,
“God’s 6000 Year Plan,” and “The Time of Jacob’s Trouble”).
His death occurred
after he suffered eight years with Alzheimer’s disease, which over time robbed
him of his memory. During these eight
years, Nancy cared for him and protected him and proved her love and devotion
to her beloved husband.
During the seven days of mourning, from June
5 through June 11, an entire nation was mesmerized and grief-stricken, and the
outpouring of emotion and feeling was such as has never before been witnessed
in the modern world. Policemen, firemen,
soldiers, veterans, a Sioux Indian, complete with Indian garb and headdress,
saluted the casket. World leaders
touched, caressed, and rubbed their hands over the casket in silent
homage. Hundreds of thousands filed by
quietly, in California and Washington, D.C.
Just as God mercifully took Josiah away so he
didn’t have to see the horrendous punishment and calamity which soon befell
Judah, in like manner God has mercifully taken Ronald Reagan away, before the
final grand-smash age-ending calamity falls upon a disobedient nation and
heedless world.
The death of Ronald
Wilson Reagan marks the end of an era – and the beginning of another era. A righteous and God-fearing man has just
died. And the Word of God says, “The
righteous perish, and no one takes it to heart; the devout are taken away,
while no one understands. For the
righteous are taken away from calamity, and they enter into peace; those who
walk uprightly will rest on their couches” (Isaiah 57:1-2, NRSV).
A close friend, Bill
Lund, remarked that it seems God had mercy on Ronald Reagan, by allowing him to
live these past eight years with Altzheimer’s, because in his condition he was
completely unaware of the tawdry and sordid and despicable deeds of the Clinton
administration and its president, which would have greatly stirred the anger
and remorse of Reagan. He did not have
to experience those events, as God mercifully allowed him to be unconscious of
that wickedness, and the horrendous acts of treason and political engineering
and corruption that followed in the decade of the nineties.
It is significant, I
believe, that Ronald Reagan served his country eight years as president – eight
years in which the clock of world revolution was arrested, and the evil days
were “held back.” The “mystery of
lawlessness” and the encroaching “New World Order” had already begun before his
time. But with Ronald Reagan, God gave
us a respite of eight years. The apostle
Paul foretold, “For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work, but only
until the one who now restrains it is removed.
And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will
destroy with the breath of his mouth, annihilating him by the manifestation of
his coming” (II Thess.2:7-8).
If we transpose those
eight years of the Reagan interregnum to the present, and count those eight
years from this point, in 2004, they bring us to the year 2012 – a year of
prophecy and destiny! The year 2012 is
significant from many counts. First, it
is the year of the END of the Mayan Calendar, which is supposed to be the END
of this world age and the beginning of a NEW world age. Secondly, it is according to the Jewish
records, a “Jubilee year” – a fiftieth year of the Sabbatical year cycle –
counting from the original settlement of the Promised Land by Joshua and the
children of Israel. (Write for our
article, “Will Messiah Return on a Jubilee Year?”). If indeed the Messiah is expected to return
in the year 2012, or near that time, 2004 would be just eight years before the
curtain rains down – and just one year before the beginning of the
severe WOE prophesied for the final “week of years” of Daniel’s 70 weeks
prophecy (Dan.9:24-26) – a year before the final “seven years” of this
age. (Read our article, “Daniel’s 70
Weeks Prophecy Revealed!”).
Of course, we don’t
now the day or the hour of the Messiah’s Return. Nor do we know for certain the exact
year. But God has given us several clues
and points or indicators which we would do well to observe and seriously
ponder!
When a powerful
righteous man dies, then we can expect great changes to follow. In this case, the times show that shortly all
“hell” is going to break loose on planet earth.
The “end” has been restrained, and forestalled, for eight years. The end of the age would have been terminated
this very year, being the 6000th year from the expulsion of Adam and
Eve from the Garden. But God has
evidently given us an eight year respite – so the end will not come until the
year 2012. But regardless, we can be
certain that the next eight years are going to be years of increasing woe,
tumult, horror, and travail, upon the earth and among nations. But after that, the shining of a new dawn
will come. The sun of God will arise
with healing in His wings (Mal.4:2), and the “shining city on a hill” will be
the Kingdom of God come down to the earth! (Isa.2:1-4; Micah 4:1-4).
A Lesson To Us All
Ronald Reagan showed us what is the “power of one” – one man who boldly faces the enemy of false ideas and concepts, and does what he believes in his heart is right and true.
Against all odds,
Ronald Reagan stood for eternal truths and changed the course of history. The world will not soon forget his stunning
legacy, or his monumental accomplishments.
When campaigning in
Texas, he revealed his principled courage and faith – his true character. In the 1976 Texas Presidential Primary
Campaign, he was picked up by Ray Barnhart, co-chairman of his campaign in 1976
and 1980, and was proudly informed that there was a change in plans. He was to be taken to Pastor Criswell’s
Sunday worship service at the Baptist Church.
Statewide, he was told, there were four million Baptists, and they would
be impressed.
Reagan listened in
silence, and then said: “We’re not going
to do it.” “Not do it?”, Barnhart
replied in shock. “There isn’t a
politician in Texas who wouldn’t cut off his right arm for this
opportunity.” Ronald Reagan
responded: “You don’t understand, Ray. My relationship with my God is MY relationship,
and we’re not going to abuse it.”
Reagan’s life stands
as a solemn, quiet testimony to the true Christian way of life. He believed life is the most precious gift of
God, and said, “This nation cannot continue turning a blind eye and a deaf ear
to the taking of some four thousand unborn children’s lives every day. That’s one every twenty-one seconds. One every twenty-one seconds” (Brown,
p.186).
Reagan “firmly believed that if we couldn’t
reinstate the freedom to pray in school and couldn’t convince the nation of the
immorality of abortion, that we are in for a dire future,” writes Mary Beth
Brown.
Before the National Religious Broadcasters
Convention in 1982, he posed the question:
“Do we really think . . . God will protect us in a time of crisis even
as we turn away from him in our day-to-day life?”
That question
resonates and resounds and reverberates through the halls of time and echoes
across the great divides and still haunts a nation and a world seemingly
hell-bent on destruction.