{"id":369,"date":"2014-06-22T23:22:32","date_gmt":"2014-06-23T04:22:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/focuspressblog.com\/?p=369"},"modified":"2014-06-22T23:22:32","modified_gmt":"2014-06-23T04:22:32","slug":"the-creator-and-our-happiness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tampaseo.expert\/focus\/2014\/06\/22\/the-creator-and-our-happiness\/","title":{"rendered":"The Creator and Our Happiness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This weeks\u00a0<a class=\"_58cn\" style=\"color: #3b5998;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/hashtag\/foundationsfriday\" data-ft=\"{&quot;tn&quot;:&quot;*N&quot;,&quot;type&quot;:104}\">#FoundationsFriday<\/a>\u00a0comes to you from a letter penned by Benjamin Franklin. This weeks article: &#8220;The Creator and Our Happiness&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Here is my Creed. I believe in one God, the Creator of the Universe. That He governs\u00a0<span class=\"text_exposed_show\">it by His Providence. That He ought to be worshipped&#8230;.That the most acceptable service we render to him is in doing good to his other children. That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental points in all sound religion, and I regard them as you do in whatever sect I meet with them.<br \/>\n-Benjamin Franklin (March 9, 1790)<br \/>\nThe more I examine the rich truth of God\u2019s presence at the founding of our nation the more I am convinced of God\u2019s providential hand in our establishment. In a letter to Ezra Stilies, President of Yale University, Benjamin Franklin appeals to him through the, \u201cone God\u201d that he calls the \u201cCreator of the Universe.\u201d We know Franklin to be referring to the God of the Bible because later on in his letter he refers to Jesus. I always find it amazing when the founders refer to God and use Him as their rock!<br \/>\nWhat I find the most interesting is after the description that Franklin gives of God he goes on to say that the, \u201cmost acceptable service we render to Him is in doing good to his other children.\u201d What is he saying? Perhaps this is a reference back to the Bible yet again, where we read, \u201cDo good unto ALL MEN especially to those of the household of faith\u201d (Galatians 6:10). While not a direct quotation, the principal is there. Perhaps that is why this founder could ascribe his name to a document that begins with these words, \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.\u201d<br \/>\nALL MEN are given certain rights from their CREATOR. While we easily assert the meaning of Life and Liberty, the right to pursue happiness is more interesting. Why would the founders in one of the greatest documents ever penned appeal to the simple happiness of people? Well, to answer that we must do some digging and find out what the founders meant. If you do some examination of the term happiness used in the 1700\u2019s it actually meant to do that which was right before God and his fellow man. To be happy was to do justly. Why would they concern themselves with this notion? Well when you look further at this letter, Franklin says that the immortal soul would be dealt justice on the day we stand before the Creator. So to truly live happily the way the founders intended we must know the Creator and His justice. However, we have long abandoned the idea of happiness being the idea to do that which is right before God and man and have replaced it with the concepts and passions of selfish ambition. Dare I say, it is because we have forgotten our Creator.<br \/>\n<strong>By Andrew Chavarrilla\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This weeks\u00a0#FoundationsFriday\u00a0comes to you from a letter penned by Benjamin Franklin. This weeks article: &#8220;The Creator and Our Happiness&#8221; &#8220;Here is my Creed. I believe in one God, the Creator of the Universe. That He governs\u00a0it by His Providence. That He ought to be worshipped&#8230;.That the most acceptable service we render to him is in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[20,35,83],"tags":[207,205,141,208,188],"class_list":["post-369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all","category-culture","category-government","tag-benjamin-franklin","tag-foundations-friday","tag-government","tag-happiness","tag-heritage","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Creator and Our Happiness - Focus Press<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tampaseo.expert\/focus\/2014\/06\/22\/the-creator-and-our-happiness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Creator and Our Happiness - Focus Press\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This weeks\u00a0#FoundationsFriday\u00a0comes to you from a letter penned by Benjamin Franklin. 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