Thoughts on F&F 2006

I was overwhelmed with the amount of significant landmarks and remnants of essential places and people who persevered during America's formative years. As is said that, "History is always interpreted", it was refreshing to hear the many historic lectures given by Bill Potter, Paul Jehle, and Doug Phillips, as seen from a providential perspective. That is, acknowledging that the hearts of both the kings and the commoners, and the resulting blessings or consequences, have been, and always will be, in the hands of God.

One of the most exciting aspects of the Faith and Freedom Tour was observing over 20 families work, learn, and travel together. It was encouraging to see fathers taking the information given at each historic site by such historians, and make sure that they were understanding how important each monument, historic site, or graveyard was in the structure of our history.

This ties into one of the most interesting parts of the tour as we visited the old graves in Salem, the infamous city which was the birth place of the witch trials. I was shocked to hear that, at the heart of the several factors that led to this historic atrocity, were a couple of pre-teen girls who got together and decided against following the guidelines of their fathers. They wanted to discover their life mates regardless of the consequences or the guideline, and thus became involved in occult practices.

The aftermath of this rebellion resulted over 120 people being accused of being accomplices of the devil, 19 men and women hung, and a man, who suggested some good ol' corporal punishment for the possessed little girls, having stone after stone laid on his chest until his ribs caved in.

Several years later, the girls, now women, publicly confessed to their actions and confirmed that the accusations were made out of family spite, anger, and an effort to eliminate those who actually accused them of being involved in witchcraft.

Many principles can be drawn from this piece of history, especially as the story is further investigated, but what I took away was the importance of parents always being aware of the spiritual condition of their children, for children to obey their authorities regardless of whether or not they know why (a lesson for all of us), and for us never to make final judgment based on the accusations of someone else.

While this may seem pretty basic, I know that I have a lot to learn from the story of Salem. And I can also say that the parents who I met on the trip were certainly on the right path to keeping their children's hearts.