The 4th of July. Friends and family, picnics, backyard bar-b-q, fireworks, and red, white and blue. The day we all should stop and realize just how great it is to be an American.

Not because Americans are great, but because America is great. Freedom yet justice, liberty and law, a revolutionary idea that became a reality.

What would those founding father think if they could see this nation today? Did they think this great experiment in freedom would last over two hundred years? Or two world wars? One great internal conflict?

What would they think of Henry Ford's Model T? Thomas Edison's light bulb? Bell's telephone? IBM's Personal Computer?

The first man on the moon? The incredible story of Apollo 13 - and the courage of all those modern day Lewis and Clarkes.

How would they react to a flag with the same 13 stripes, but 50 stars? A nation reaching from Atlantic to Pacific, from Washington D.C. to Washington state. And just as impressive, a volunteer military ready to protect that land - something that has been proven time and time again.

I think they'd be proud.

But what would Ben Franklin, who petitioned the congress to open each day with prayer, who argued that the favor of God was as important to the forming of the constitution as it was the fighting of the revolution - what would he think if he knew how hard it was to find a public prayer in a public place?

What would General Washington think if he knew American children were killing each other in the streets and in the schools? And that the blame was readily placed on the weapons, which when used properly, are protection for both country and citizen. What would Washington think of those who questioned how violence had found its way into the lives of our children, without considering how the Bible had been forced out. And that instead of teaching morality, schools provided the tools to make a promiscuous lifestyle at best 'safer'.

What would Thomas Jefferson think, if - as he wrote about self-evident truths - he knew that in universities across this nation professors would freely lecture about the absence of any absolute truth, taking away the moral basis for the very freedom they enjoy?

Would John Hancock's signature be larger if he realized that only two hundred years later the Creator he believe endowed him with unalienable rights would not even be mentioned in most science textbooks? Or that those rights were denied the weakest among us - our unborn children?

What would they think of judges who instead of considering the 10 commandments, would rather render decisions based on popular opinion and international consensus?

What would they think of career politicians who long to reshape the world into their image, or see their name in a newspaper, or enjoy power, influence, and special favors?

If those founding fathers could see today the monuments we have raised up to memorialize their lives - would they rather we had forgotten who they were and remembered what they believed?

Truly, much has changed, since that first Independence Day.

Yet in the time we now find ourselves, we must not equate this nation with the Christian values, the Biblical foundation, the moral conscience she was built upon. For if America falls, if she fails, the Bible will still be true. If America ceases to be a 'Christian' nation, true Christianity will not be changed. And regardless of the place He's given in our culture and society, Jesus Christ is still the epicenter of all history, and the only answer to life's questions.

But as we celebrate the birth of our nation, do we not owe it to those who have sacrificed so greatly, who risked so much, who gave their all for our freedom, do we not owe it to them, to do what we can, that their sacrifice be not in vain?

In the words of Abraham Lincoln: