{"id":884,"date":"2016-08-16T20:46:44","date_gmt":"2016-08-16T20:46:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/?p=884"},"modified":"2016-08-16T20:46:44","modified_gmt":"2016-08-16T20:46:44","slug":"independence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html","title":{"rendered":"We Didn’t Get Here By Ourselves"},"content":{"rendered":"

As Americans, we value, celebrate our independence. I know I certainly do. I am proud to be an American. We are an exceptional country – in all of history. I know it’s not very PC to say these days…<\/p>\n

I’m not using the term “exceptional” because of our<\/span> accomplishments -that would be pride and arrogance. No. We have been blessed by God in remarkable ways. I know there has been the political debate of, “You didn’t get there by yourself.” – people have jumped on that and ridden it in every direction. But the truth is we didn’t get here by ourselves.<\/p>\n

Although it isn’t popular to say, America is dependent on God. I think, in the spirit of independence, \u00a0we have forgotten that. Our national motto is: “In God We Trust”. We didn’t get to be an independent, free, wealthy, fruitful country by ourselves – God has poured His blessing on this country. Even our independence is given to us by God.<\/p>\n

But are we grateful? Are we thankful for His many blessings? Do we praise Him for His goodness to us? Praise and gratitude foster a sense of dependence. We acknowledge that all we are and have has its source in God. We are not our own. We didn’t get here by ourselves.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As Americans, we value, celebrate our independence. I know I certainly do. I am proud to be an American. We are an exceptional country – in all of history. I know it’s not very PC to say these days… I’m not using the term “exceptional” because of our accomplishments -that would be pride and arrogance.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":466,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,20,49,40,89,16,84,46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-current-issues-in-the-news","category-foundations","category-gratitude","category-humility","category-personal-thoughts","category-praise","category-worship"],"yoast_head":"\nWe Didn't Get Here By Ourselves - Safe Place with Ruth Graham<\/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:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"We Didn't Get Here By Ourselves - Safe Place with Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"As Americans, we value, celebrate our independence. I know I certainly do. I am proud to be an American. We are an exceptional country – in all of history. I know it’s not very PC to say these days… I’m not using the term “exceptional” because of our accomplishments -that would be pride and arrogance.…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Safe Place with Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-08-16T20:46:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"We Didn't Get Here By Ourselves - Safe Place with Ruth Graham","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"We Didn't Get Here By Ourselves - Safe Place with Ruth Graham","og_description":"As Americans, we value, celebrate our independence. I know I certainly do. I am proud to be an American. We are an exceptional country – in all of history. I know it’s not very PC to say these days… I’m not using the term “exceptional” because of our accomplishments -that would be pride and arrogance.…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html","og_site_name":"Safe Place with Ruth Graham","article_published_time":"2016-08-16T20:46:44+00:00","author":"Ruth Graham","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html","name":"We Didn't Get Here By Ourselves - Safe Place with Ruth Graham","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/#website"},"datePublished":"2016-08-16T20:46:44+00:00","dateModified":"2016-08-16T20:46:44+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/#\/schema\/person\/76d20e190c3b83823997a9f422b86975"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2016\/08\/independence.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"We Didn’t Get Here By Ourselves"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/","name":"Safe Place with Ruth Graham","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Ruth Graham","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/#\/schema\/person\/76d20e190c3b83823997a9f422b86975","name":"Ruth Graham","description":"\u201cTransparent\u201d is the word most people use to describe Ruth Graham. No stranger to heartache, she seeks to provide a Biblical perspective to her journey of faith. She is warm and talks openly about her own need for a safe place as she journeyed through her husband\u2019s infidelities, her subsequent depression, her divorces, her teenage daughter\u2019s two unplanned pregnancies, another daughter\u2019s bulimia, her son\u2019s battle with drugs, grandson's special needs and returning to school at age 40. Although born into the \"famous\" Graham family Ruth did not feel she had a safe place to unburden the secrets of her life. She felt she had to project and image and wear a mask that she \"had it all together\". She had to meet others' expectations of her. It was not until a mid-life crisis did that she fully discover the unconditional love and grace of God. Her life's passion is to connect people to that same grace and love she found, no matter who they are or what sin. Ruth is an experienced conference speaker and Bible teacher. She has appeared on a variety of radio and television shows including: Good Morning, America, The Hour of Power, Focus on the Family, Moody Broadcasting, Fox & Friends, CBN, Life Today and CNN. She has worked in publishing for over 14 years and is the founder of the Ruth Graham & Friends Ministry. Ruth has three grown children and nine grandchildren. She lives in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. Her life Bible verse is John 1:16.","sameAs":["http:\/\/ruthgrahamministries.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/author\/rgraham"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/466"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=884"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":888,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884\/revisions\/888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}