All Scripture quotations are taken from the New American Standard Bible 1995 Ed. (NASB95)

In our remembrance of the 250th anniversary of the publishing of the Declaration of Independence, it’s important to remember the lasting effects of the American Revolution on the United States and the world at large. The God of all creation was the One who ordained the Revolution to happen, and He did so for good reasons. One of those reasons was to put Americans in a position where they could be the greatest promoters, supporters, and adherents to the gospel of Jesus Christ who have ever lived since the Protestant Reformers or the early church. The Lord used the Revolution to set up conditions and people that He would use to bring perhaps the third greatest spiritual revival in history, and certainly the greatest one in western history – the Second Great Awakening.

From a struggling and divided coalition of independent societies, the Lord brought out a united force of Christians that would advance into the American frontier with the gospel, establish new churches, and settle Christian communities. Out of the cold, poisoned, and unstable aftermath of the American victory over the British, the Lord would revive His people again, and set in motion the greatest force for biblical missions and evangelism the world had ever seen since the middle ages. In essence, He created one of the greatest nurseries and homes for Christian flourishing and progress in modern history, multiplying biblical churches, missionaries, and a global missions movement that would prepare other converted peoples to begin their own missions, which blossomed in the 20th century. But this stronghold for the body of Christ had to brought out of the rubble of the devastating and distracting war that held most American Christians’ attention for almost a decade. Let’s think about how the Revolution wasn’t simply the birth pangs of a new geopolitical body, but the preparation for one of the greatest spiritual revivals in recent history, which may have done more to shape the character of early America than the Revolution itself.

The Revolution Brought About a Spiritual Slumber Among Most Americans

The first way in which the Revolution paved the way for the Second Great Awakening was that its struggles, troubles, destruction, and rewards had a great distracting and deadening effect on the hearts of most Americans. It’s remarkable that only a few decades before 1776, most of the middle and northern colonies had experienced a spiritual awakening of gigantic proportions, with society-transforming results. Roughly tens of thousands of Americans had come to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, pastors, preachers, and churches had been established, and pastoral training schools founded, such as the College of New Jersey.

Yet once the War for Independence began, most colonists’ minds and hearts were constantly consumed by the concerns and struggles of surviving, fighting, or avoiding the war. Many churches were decimated in number, due to many of the men enlisting in the war effort. Some churches found it necessary to disband, since they were right in the midst of the fighting. And some churches were even persuaded or forced to leave the colonies entirely, like the Anglicans and most Methodists. These two groups were mostly loyal to the British King, and often in danger of persecution or prosecution for being members of the state Church of England.

As for those soldiers and politicians directly involved in the war effort, they had far less time and energy to give to diligent devotions, unless they had already been devout Christians beforehand. One rare exception to this condition was the fact that George Washington saw fit to make great efforts at installing Christian chaplains for most of his units. He knew that most of them were professing believers, and needed the encouragement and discipline of Bible teaching, prayer, and pastoral counseling to strengthen their morale in the often horrid conditions they experienced. Still less were the representatives for the Continental Congress concerned with learning and practicing God’s Word. Most of them were Deists, nominal Theists, or nominal Christians, and were more concerned with building a new nation than with promoting the kingdom of God.

In addition to these general distractions from the War, there were insidious forces that deliberately sought to contradict and undermine Americans’ faith in the teachings of Christ and the Bible. The most dangerous of these were some the Enlightenment ideas that accompanied some of the principles on which the new American governments based their structures. For example, the prominent political pamphleteer Thomas Paine was an ardent hater of Christianity, and often confessed that one of his biggest motivations was to turn people’s affections and faith away from the Bible, and toward so-called human “reason” according to the Enlightenment. Likewise, during the War, there were at least a few French philosophers, such as Voltaire, who were formulating anti-Christian frameworks purported to be in the interest of creating a utopian world where human reason reigned, and provided for everyone’s happiness. This was the sort of thinking that inspired the French Revolution, which soon revealed itself as an anti-God, humanistic, and tyrannical dictatorship. One of the main factors that prevented the Revolution from being corrupted by the Enlightenment was the strong influence of biblical and Protestant teaching and leaders on the political leaders, and the common people.

Nevertheless, the inclusion of the French army and navy in the War, and the influence of French philosophers on American leaders and soldiers alike, produced damaging effects on their interest in Scripture and the Christianity. This especially reared its ugly head shortly after the War, as many of the colleges that had originally been founded to instill a Christian worldview in its students were filled with students who outright denied believing in Christ. This was true of such places as Hampden-Sydney College and Yale College, both of which experienced revivals that converted great numbers of former Christ deniers.

The weakening of interest in spiritual things also came about from the financial and material benefits gotten by many of the Patriots after they won. For example, one of the ways in which American soldiers were compensated for their service was with titles to unfarmed land in the frontiers of such places as New York and the Ohio River Valley. Eager to start new lives after the war, and desiring to become prosperous farmers and/or business owners, many men and their families left their church-influenced communities for the wilds of America, and often also left Christian fellowship and Bible teaching as well. Further, since the British no longer controlled American trade, many American business owners now found promising opportunities to expand their markets, and make quick money. As the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil, so the love of money pulled many Americans away from an interest in the gospel and knowing Christ.

In sum, the American Revolution was used by the Lord as a test of people’s ultimate loyalties. If they had had a firm, vibrant, and disciplined faith in God’s Word before the War’s trials, they usually remained steadfast, and resumed normal, faithful, Christian living afterward. However, if they had an unstable, superficial, or nominal faith in Christ; or none at all; then usually the Revolution had the effect of captivating them with earthly things, and hardening their hearts against the truths of the gospel. Nevertheless, this was just the right environment and people for the Lord God to spectacularly display His soul-transforming redeeming grace in a newly founded nation.

How Independence Opened Up New Ways to Hear and Learn the Gospel

Although the American colonies had enjoyed great revivals during the First Great Awakening in the 1730s-40s, revival historian Iain Murray asserts that “there seem to have been no areas where there was general revival during the years of the War of Independence.”1 Soon after the Revolution ended in 1783, this state of affairs changed. Now, as revival results in the mass repentance and conversion of church members and sinners, what sorts conditions made the new United States ripe for a spiritual harvest of souls? More specifically, how were droves of people drawn to the teaching and preaching of the gospel, and preachers and pastors raised up to proclaim Christ?

As I’ve already said, the North American Frontier was more opened up and promoted for settlement by the defeat of the British. No longer did Americans have to be concerned with the presence of British troops, or Loyalist inhabitants opposing them. In fact, the infant U.S. government made huge efforts in promoting and protecting the advance of American families into the Frontier lands by selling great numbers of land tracts through such policies as the Northwest Ordinance. As a result of the War’s end, and the encouragement of the state and national governments, thousands of people flocked into the new territories, such as upstate New York, Ohio, western Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee. With so many people gathering around various river valleys and strategic areas for farming and trading, preachers were given a great opportunity to reach largely non-Christian settlers with the gospel.

It may seem odd that scattered families of frontier folk would make excellent hearers of the gospel, but there are a couple of factors to consider. First, it could be extremely lonely in the frontier woods and fields of central America. Thus, the potential and promise of a church community appealed to many frontiersmen, who usually had grown up in towns centered around churches and church services. Second, the factor of mere entertainment comes in. Compared to today, there was very little to do for leisure and recreation on the frontier, as the days were usually filled with the same incessant, toilsome, labor, from sunrise to sundown. So the announcement that a preacher would be coming to such-and-such village or trading post to deliver a sermon about eternal and spiritual things often incited intense curiosity in the frontier people. It could also intrigue them to hear that a preacher had made the arduous journey of hundreds of miles to live in the wild, forested, hills, for the express purpose of delivering sermons to people, and little else.

But how did these frontier preachers end up being sent to some of the most troublesome, uncertain, conditions of that day? Many of them had been sent out by several of the Christian colleges that had been established around the time of the Revolution. Among these, there were Dartmouth College, a Congregationalist school founded in 1769, and the Presbyterian College of New Jersey, founded in 1746, Dickinson College of 1773, and Hampden-Sydney College of 1775. All these schools had a part to play in educating and training preachers and pastors that ended up evangelizing the frontiersmen and women during the 1780s to early 1800s. One of the most notable graduates of them who spent years preaching the gospel on the frontier was James McGready. used mightily in bringing revival to thousands of people near the turn of the 18th century.

In addition to these preachers, the end of the Revolution also allowed the Methodists to take an influential role in igniting the revivals of the Second Great Awakening. Although he was presumably a British loyalist, the outstanding Methodist leader Francis Asbury traveled to the U.S. in 1771 to preach the gospel and plant Methodist churches. He labored for decades across the states, and is said to have traveled more miles, and to have had more influence on people, than John Wesley (though this is debatable). But through his efforts, and the efforts of hundreds of Methodist “circuit riders,” thousands of people were converted to Christ, and joined Methodist congregations between the 1790s and the 1840s. By mid-century, Methodism had become one of the top three denominations in the U.S., not too far behind the Baptists.

There’s another factor that contributed to the widespread and concentrated preaching of the gospel during this period. Although I have no hard documentation to back this up, it must be that the cooperative effort of the Revolution, which bound together so many diverse Americans, also instilled a unity of spirit and purpose between pastors and Christians of different denominations. This had already been fostered through the Great Awakening, and especially through meetings of the prominent preachers. Whitefield, who was Anglican, and the Tennant brothers, who were Presbyterian, to name a few, all were open to the cooperation of leaders and preachers of different denominations. This spirit of catholicity must have been enhanced during the Revolution, as Protestant pastors and churches sought not only to teach the gospel, but also to help secure independence from Great Britain. This unity among differing Christians was certainly seen in the Second Great Awakening, as Methodists, Baptists, Congregationalists, and Presbyterians all worked together to promote the preaching and hearing of the gospel through evangelistic and prayer meetings.

The final way that the Revolution cultivated to lay the ground work for the next Great Awakening was to impress on the hearts of believers a longing for the saving work of the Spirit. As I already noted, the kind of awakening and mass conversions that were seen previously, during the Great Awakening and a little afterward in Virginia, had not been experienced in any noteworthy way during the time of the Revolution. It’s known that during both Great Awakenings, believers united together to pray that the Lord would awaken slumbering Christians, and bring in unbelievers through the gospel in waves. We can be sure that regular group prayer meetings for revival were being held during or right after the Revolutionary War as well. And the Lord answered these prayers in a tremendous way for about half a century.

The Best Things God Accomplished through the Revolution and Revival

In all that I’ve said, my argument is this – God’s most important purpose for enabling the American states to gain independence through Great Britain wasn’t to found a new nation, but to establish a harvest field ready to be reaped and spread through the Second Great Awakening. Although the Revolution began the United States, the main event that shaped the general character and strengthened the American people for about a century and a half was this massive series of revivals. The results of the Second Great Awakening are amazing and still experienced today.

In the Presbyterian leader Heman Humphrey’s Revival Sketches, he writes:

“When that era dawned, there were no missionary societies, foreign or domestic, no Bible societies, no Tract societies, no Education societies, no onward movements in the churches of any sort, for the conversion of the world.” (200-201)

In other words, it’s fair to say that the Second Great Awakening was the greatest impetus for the beginning of the “modern missions movement”. Although some Baptists in England under Andrew Fuller had begun a missions society just before the turn of the century, the American churches that experienced revival and reformation during the first few decades of the 1800s gave much greater support and people to this effort to bring the gospel to the unreached peoples in the fringes of the British Empire.

Obviously, the most important manifestation of the Awakening was the conversion of sinners to Christ. This can be estimated through the increases in numbers of church members among the different denominations. Iain Murray gives this evidence in Revival and Revivalism:

In the first decade of the 1800s, the Presbyterian Church in America increased from 70,000 members to 100,000 (p. 123). In the same years, Baptist church membership went from 95,000 to 160,000 (p. 124). In the Methodist Episcopal church, the annual increase in the years from 1800 to 1809 were: 7,980; 13,860; 17,336; 9,064; 6,811; 10,625; 14,020; 7,405; and 11,043 (p. 125).

Similar increases in church membership just continued for at least the next two decades. What did American society look like when such droves of people were professing faith in Christ, and devoting themselves to assemblies through membership? It was said by many Americans in 1816 that they were living in “the age of Bibles and missionaries”.(116) One English woman, visiting New York City in 1833, wrote:

“’There is not a country in the world where religion and religious intelligence are so constantly and prominently brought before the attention as this. In fact it is, at least at the present time, one continued, interesting topic of conversation.’”(116)

Similarly, two representatives from the Congregational Union of England wrote after visiting many places across the U.S. in 1834:

“’They have no law for the regulation or observation of the Sabbath, but public sentiment secures its sanctification better with them than with us. I have never seen that day observed in Bristol or Bath as it is in Boston and Philadelphia. In the large town, the people attend in larger numbers at their respective places of worship; there are more places for their accommodation; and the average size is greater with them than with us.” (117)

One of the most famous and respected testimonies about early 19th century America comes from the French author of Democracy in America, written in 1831, where he declares,

“There is no country in the world where the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America” (vol. 2, p. 388).

These are obviously general observations about Americans’ outward practice of Christianity, but there were tangible and practical results. It doesn’t take much searching to find out that first half of the 19th century was one of the greatest times for the establishment of schools, social movements, and charitable organizations in American history. During this time the “Sunday school” came into being, which was originally designed to be an educational system for children working in the factories and mills of early industrialized cities. Because they had no opportunity or money to go to a regular school, churches would provide teaching and meals for them on Sundays, the only day without work. Another area of social change that was encouraged by the revival of Christianity in America was the push toward the abolition of slavery. Several groups were formed in the norther states to advocate for the outlaw of slavery, many of which were adamantly supported by Christians.

In general, however, the central and southern states especially became bastions of Christian preaching, learning, and living. During this time, the “Bible belt” of the South began to take shape, and towns and cities generally maintained strict standards of courtesy, respect, and justice. American society was basically influenced by Christianity in its education, social customs, laws, and family dynamics.

Besides being used as the most impactful event in shaping the U.S. into a Christianized country, the Lord also accomplished a great separation through this revival. The fact is, whenever God saves multitudes of sinners, and builds up His people in the knowledge of the truth, the devil’s forces are always at work to counterfeit and hinder the progress of Christ’s kingdom. Such was the case during the Great Awakening. Of course, in doing this the Lord was allowing His true followers to be distinguished from false followers. This is especially seen in the events of the “Burned-Over District” of upstate NY, where the majority of “Christian” cults were started. Out of the so-called “revivals” promoted by unbiblical “revivalists,” especially Charles Finney, we see the Mormons, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Restorationists, and less-known groups like the Shakers all formed. In addition, during the awakening, the propagation and growth of the Unitarians and Universalists was accelerated.

In spite of these works of the devil, the United States was still grounded in a widespread biblical worldview and outlook on life. New churches and denominations were founded, and whole communities were saved. Missions societies, Bible publishers, tract publishers, and Christian magazines were multiplied. The state of governments of the U.S. were generally devoted to upholding, promoting, and defending the practice of biblical Christianity. And American education was promoted, not only through Sunday schools, but even through the standardization of public schools, and the founding of Christian-minded colleges and seminaries. The groundwork was then laid for great advances in scientific and technological discoveries that would later benefit the rest of the world. But the greatest effect of the Awakening was to prepare and propel great numbers of Americans into frontier and foreign lands to preach and teach the gospel to peoples that had never heard. What should we learn from these things?

The Message of America’s Establishment for American and Western Christians

A few applications should be drawn from how the Lord worked through the American Revolution and Second Great Awakening:

  1. The Body of Christ, His Assembly, always takes precedence over earthly nations. The United States has never been, nor was it ever intended to be, a “Christian nation,” or a nation that has governmentally, societally, and corporately pledged loyalty and service to the Lord Jesus Christ. However, it would be hard to argue against the evidence that the Lord has used the U.S. to promote, protect, and propagate His Word and worship more than any other nation in modern history. I conclude with many others that the main purpose the U.S. is so distinct from every other nation is that its original laws, governments, and societies were designed to repress and regulate the evil of man, and to promote the dignity, diligence, and courtesy of people. No nation has ever enjoyed the degree of freedom of conscience, religion, and expression that the U.S. has. And this was granted so that the Lord’s people could freely preach, teach, learn, and apply God’s Word to themselves and to the outermost peoples of the earth.
  2. God’s kingdom doesn’t belong to this world, but to the next. Set beside the virtuous qualities of America’s founding are the many and abominable sins that have been practiced, taught, and strengthened during the Revolution and its succeeding awakening. No matter how much Christians worked and prayed, they couldn’t make their own societies, let alone American society, perfect. Pride, stubbornness, selfishness, and foolishness all abounded even during arguably the most God-glorifying and Christ-exalting period of American history. Churches and pastors competed with each other. Slavery was coddled and even promoted. And professing Christians and churches produced people and doctrines that deceived people into believing lies about God, Christ, and salvation. But we have the hope that what we enjoy in God’s kingdom now is only a taste of the complete and utter perfection of the new earth and new humanity.
  3. Focusing on earthly matters can easily distract believers from the Great Commission work of making disciples. Although there were exceptions, during the Revolution, much of the body of Christ’s work in America was severely stalled or slowed. There were mostly far fewer conversions and evangelistic efforts than the times before and after. And many Christians became too focused on promoting the United States, rather than the kingdom of God. Are you guilty of the same thing?
  4. Finally, as touched on in the first application, the Lord works through earthly means and circumstances to build up His people, and spread the gospel to the nations. Hence, much of the freedom, prosperity, and strength of early America was used to great effect to allow for the growth and advancement of Christians in spiritual life. This is part of what Paul instructs brethren to pray for in his first letter to Timothy:

“First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.” – 1 Tim. 2:1-2

Along with this, heed the words of the apostle Peter:

“Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves of God. Honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king.” – 1 Pet. 2:16-17