Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Wednesday December 7, 2011

Today marks the 70th Anniversary of the Day of Infamy, the biggest sucker punch in the history of the world. Seventy years ago this morning the Empire of Japan launched a surprise aerial attack against the United States of America by bombing the Pacific Fleet anchored at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

Four years later the Empire lay in unconditional surrender at the feet of the Allied Forces of Christendom. The prominent leaders of the Empire of the Rising Sun were swinging by their necks while their compatriots hanged their heads in the bitter shame of defeat at the hands of a people they considered a debauched and inferior race.

I was a mere three month old child wonder when the war began and a little shy of four years old when it officially ended on the deck of the United States Battleship Missouri. The surrender ceremonies began at 9:00 AM September 2, 1945 with the arrival of dignitaries, a world class speech by Five Star General Douglas MacArthur. Every American student should be required to read his speech. Including the actual signing of the documents the ceremony lasted less than 30 minutes.

I often re-read the Articles of Unconditional Surrender and wonder what on earth happened to our backbone thereafter. There has been nothing like it since that slightly overcast Day in Tokyo Bay. Nothing even close.

Yet something even greater was born that morning as The Allies began something unheard of on the world scene. Japan was agonizingly slowly being rebuilt into a peaceful and prosperous entity, a true world class nation.

One outstanding request, which was largely ignored at the time, was MacArthur's request for the West to send 10,000 Christian missionaries to the Far East. For the most part the opportunity was missed, but some did respond and while Atomic bombs and the blood of Allied Soldiers watered the victory, the grand ideas of Christ prevailed for many years during the occupation and rebirth. And then.

And then materialism began its onslaught into the hearts of the upcoming generation that had missed the privations and stark fear of war, and most thoughts of God and accountability to Him were relegated to the junk pile of history. Soon Japan was in the throes of all the negatives of Western Society without the benefits of Jesus Christ.

Today Japan is in a similar mess as the United States with alcoholism, drug addiction, economic and moral dissipation rampant. The obvious truth is Western Civilization doesn't work in the West or Far East without Christ. MacArthur knew this and so should we Americans as we pause to remember Pearl Harbor seventy years later.

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2011 Use with Credit

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