Happy Fourth of July

Since it is the fourth of July, I want to share probably my favorite American history story with everybody. I love American history. One of my companions (he was Brazilian) said it best on my mission when he said that you could feel the Spirit reading the constitution and learning about America's history. For many of us who have been outside the country for an extended period of time, it is easy to realize just what we have here.

The story below is one I heard a few years back on "Sounds of the Sabbath" (it was crunched in between an Afterglow song and EFY's greatest hits I'm sure). It is a Glenn Rawson story, so all the credit for this goes to him. I liked the story so much that I sent them an e-mail requesting a copy of it.

The Prayer of George Washington at Valley Forge by Arnold Friberg

In May of 1782, after the American Revolution was over, while America still struggled with her newfound independence, a letter was received by General Washington. The letter was written by one of Washington’s officers, Colonel Lewis Nicola. It outlined the grievances of the soldiers at being yet unpaid for their services, and being underfed along with other things, and it detailed a plan which involved the General that would rectify the situation and solve the woes of the nation if only Washington would lend his support.

Well upon reading the letter, Washington was indignant, even outraged, and he wrote an immediate response saying, “Be assured, sir, no occurrence in the course of the war has given me more painful sensations than your information of there being such ideas existing in the army as you have expressed, and I must view them with abhorrence and reprehend with severity … if I am not deceived in the knowledge of myself, you could not have found a person to whom your schemes are more disagreeable. Let me conjure you, then, if you have any regard for your country, concern for yourself or posterity, or respect for me, to banish these thoughts from your mind and never communicate, as from yourself or anyone else, a sentiment of like nature.”

“I am, sir, George Washington,”

Since the first time I heard this story, I have stood in awe of the Father of our Country, because I believe his unwavering, even outraged response in this one instance changed the entire course of America’s future. You might ask, “What was it they were asking of him?” – To allow the military for the good of the country to install General Washington as ‘George the First’, the first king of America.

Glenn Rawson – February 1998