As we start a new year some thoughts come to me from something my pastor’s wife said Sunday morning, January 1, 2012. She recently did a study on the number 12 and its significance in Scripture. It reminded me of the deep importance of God in the development of our nation and the importance of God in the coming year. This is what she said:
In the Bible “12” represents God’s perfect government and Divine authority. To write “12” in Hebrew two Hebrew letters are used … “yod” which signifies hand or outworking and “beth” which signifies house. “The outworking of the household in harmony under Divine authority.” I am claiming this for each household and our house of worship that we will see God’s authority extended to our territory from our homes and churches.
OH YEAH! AMEN!
Before I started my writing career 18 months ago, I was inspired by a series of documentaries I watched about the founding of our nation and how our founding fathers placed so much importance on Divine Providence. I saw how their faith in God and their devotion to Biblical principles guided them in their pursuit of liberty and freedom for all, not just the wealthy, elite group in which most of them belonged.
Our nation was founded by men who believed in God very strongly and prayed every step of the way; through the years of protesting to King George of England about their grievances; through the horrible years of the Revolutionary War when death, suffering, fear, and want were the order of the day; then through the 11 years it took to actually form a nation, write the Constitution of the United States of America, and have it ratified by the various states.
Those in charge of government, both political parties, vote into law legislation they don’t read. And frankly, they don’t know or care 
what it says. And then we have the endless array of bureaucrats who justify their jobs by adding to the endless stream of tyrannical rules we are expected to follow, followed up by judges who rule according to their atheistic agenda rather than according to the Constitution.
We have a president who is not constitutionally eligible to serve, yet both parties ignore the Constitution because it is easier to do that than stand up and do what is right. We have state elected officials who ignore the Constitution of the United States, as well as their state Constitution because these documents get in the way of their personal or political party agendas. We have cronyism more blatant than ever before in my life time, total disregard for the citizens of this nation, total disregard for the laws of this nation, and a situation that seems can only be resolved by armed conflict ala 1776. There is another way.
There is an old saying I have heard since I was a small child:
“it is always darkest just before the dawn”.
I have spent many cold dark mornings sitting in a tree waiting for some of Bambi’s family to come strolling into my line of fire and I can vouch for that old saying. As night begins to turn into day it really does seem to get darker and colder for that last hour or so of night. Starlight seems to dim and the night gets so dark I can’t see my hands in front of my face for what seems like a very long period of time.
Then suddenly, I see a twinkling of light, followed by another, and another, until the eastern sky behind me begins to slowly brighten, just a little at a time. Then shadows begin to appear a few at a time. The tree branches seem to take on different shapes as the shadows begin to form and the woods slowly come alive with the sound of squirrels rousting from their nests to go in search of breakfast. I hear birds begin to rustle in their nests and start to chirp; first one, then two, then more as the light begins to creep in and another morning breaks.
I believe 2011 was the darkest hour before the dawn. So many bad things happened in 2011 that it is easy to get discouraged, to become fearful of the future. The year was so dark with the activities of
Barack Obama and the Democrat Party, activities that are totally counter to the Constitution, freedom, and our way of life. The Republican Party was no help either, but rather added to the dismay and the darkness. The 87 TEA Party freshmen members of the House of Representatives seemed to buckle at every turn and become part of the problem instead of part of the solution to the problem.
The National Defense Authorization Act (S. 1867/HR 1540) was passed at the last minute and then the two biggest supporters of it came out 
and casually announced they had no idea what was included in the legislation. “Sodomy and Bestiality are no longer against the rules for our military? The president can order American citizens missing fingers or stocking up on food held without charge indefinitely? I didn’t know that was in there.” We heard that from those “staunch conservatives”, Lindsey Graham and John McCain. Ron Paul, the darling of the “Libertarians”, says Iran should have nukes and that Israel is the root of all evil and isn’t worth our time and money to defend. The national debt that Obama, and the Republicans in Congress, pledged to diminish was instead raised by $2.4 trillion. Mitt Romney, the darling of the Republican establishment, has more positions than a symphony orchestra on any issue you can name. The rest of the candidates aren’t much better. Need I go on or would that depress you even more?
Today we look at a new year fraught with danger yet full of hope. We have elections in November that, if allowed to occur by our benevolent
rulers, will determine the difference between a life of freedom and a life of tyranny for We the people. I wrote an article on this subject a couple of months ago in which I listed many of the things that have been done in the name of freedom but actually were done to take our freedom from us. I urged people to take a good look around them and to see what is happening. I have written many times about the issues facing the future freedom of We the People and what we need to do to remedy the problems. I am not politically partisan in my writing. I write truth, not party spin.
Most of our problems go much deeper than government abuse. The problems with government cannot be solved by man alone. God’s hand was prominent in the creation of this great and mighty nation, God’s hand has been prominent in the preservation of this nation, and God’s hand must be prominent in the future of this nation if it is to prosper once again. We as a nation have turned from God and accepted so many things that go against His Word. I remember a prayer given at the beginning of a State of Kansas legislative session a few years ago. I don’t remember all of it but the minister spoke of accepting sin by calling it all kinds of politically correct names. We must turn our eyes back to what made this nation great and acknowledge what has driven this nation to the brink of destruction.
I am encouraged by what I see, hear, and read on the many conservative social network sites I belong to. I am encouraged by the responses to items like this that I write. Even when I write about the bad things happening, I see people who are as outraged as I am and are willing to stand up and do something about it. I see people acknowledging God and His part in our nation. I see people who will pray, as we all need to do, but also stand and act on the promises of God for our lives and our nation. I am encouraged by God’s inspiration in my writing, in my life, and in my nation despite my failings and my sin. I wake up each day with a fresh start and a new grace to live through the day with. All of us have this grace, all we have to do is accept it and act upon it.
In Scripture, 12 is the number of God’s hand on our houses. This revelation gives me hope for this year, 2012, the year God will reach 
out to us in a way we have not seen before in our lifetimes. All we have to do is reach our hands back to God, accept that divine authority, and work within it to restore our nation. We can’t solve the problems of our nation from the top down, it must be from the bottom up. We can live on trickle down economics but we prosper on trickle up faith. We start with ourselves, move up to our household, then up to our community, our state, and finally our nation. It is each one of us accepting God’s forgiving grace and using the opportunity to make ourselves better first and expanding that improvement into an ever enlarging sphere of influence until it permeates our entire nation and we can once again be that “shining city on a hill” described by John Winthrop in the 1700’s.
This year, 2012, is a year that can turn our nation around if we will step up and do it. It CAN be done and WE can do it. No movement starts with a crowd, but with an idea one person is willing to act
upon. This idea becomes known and accepted by another person, then another, then another, until it becomes a movement. The TEA Party is such a movement. It is a concept, coined in a phrase by one man, that has become a concept embraced by 67% of We the People. It is a concept grounded in Godly principles and the acknowledgement that freedom isn’t free and We the people have to stand up for the values that established this nation and made it great.
We are God’s agents in this world and we must operate accordingly. We must seek guidance through prayer and have the courage to act on that guidance when the enemy, both spiritual and physical, comes against us. For too many years Christians have sat back and let evil take control of our nation because we were too complacent or too fearful to fight that evil. We have left it to others to fight our fight and they have not done so. Those we depended on to fight our battles for us have become part of the evil that we are fighting.
This year is the year we have unprecedented help available to us. We can use 2012, the year of “yod beth”, to restore America to what God and our founding fathers established. It is time for us to take up the full armor of God and restore the United States of America to what is once was and what it can be again. If we do not have faith, and the courage of our faith, to fight this battle then our freedoms will be lost forever. It is up to me. It is up to you. It is up to each American citizen to do their part for freedom. Pray, repent, and act; future generations are depending on us.
I submit this in the name of the Most Holy Trinity, in faith, with the responsibility given to me by Almighty God to honor His work and not let it die from neglect.
Bob Russell
Claremore, Oklahoma
January 4, 2012
