DAY 23 | State: PA
DAILY TOPIC: Relationship
PRAYER FOR RELATIONSHIP
Thank You, Lord, for clearly demonstrating the importance of relationships. We ask for Your protection over all our relationships, and for the wisdom to know how to love as you love. Thank You, Father, for forefathers who established this country based on the fact that You created all of us equal. Thank You, dear Lord, for every loving relationship in our lives. Thank You for the profound blessings and goodness we experience through loving one another. It is abundantly clear, Lord, that you designed us to be in relationships. We ask for the wisdom and insight and courage to love as You love, and to approach every relationship with You in mind. We ask You to destroy the enemy’s attempts to destroy relationships. Give us, Lord, appreciation and respect for the ways You created us different, one from another. Forgive our judgments against others and place in our hearts generosity of spirit toward others. Give us the grace to forgive each other’s mistakes, as You forgive ours. Heal the wounds of our past, Lord, and set us free from division, dissension, deception & manipulation.
And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these (Mark 12:30-31).
PRAYER FOR ISRAEL
Lord, thank you that the President recognized Jerusalem as the Biblical capital of Israel and moved our Embassy. We pray for peace and prosperity in Israel, and ask for an end to the violence and suffering. We pray for justice, and Your sovereign righteousness over Israel. We pray for mercy and Your Kingdom to rule over the land. Please protect the soldiers and civilians from bloodshed. Give wisdom to Prime Minister Yair Lapid (Yah–ear Law-pid) and the Knesset (The legislature of Israel). May Israel remain strong, not dividing the land You gave as an inheritance to Your chosen people. May the United States continue to fully support Israel, the nation that gave us salvation through Jesus Christ.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem, may they prosper that love thee (Psalm 122:6).
Day 23 - Amendment 23 & 24
23rd Amendment: Reserves the right of citizens residing in the District of Columbia to vote for their own Electors for presidential elections.
24th Amendment: citizens cannot be denied the suffrage rights for not paying a poll tax or any other taxes.
Prayer: We pray that duly elected officials will submit to God and that voting procedures would be honest and transparent.
PRAYER FOR NATIONAL GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS
Lord God, we ask for Your blessing and wisdom on the lives of these leaders in our nation.
EXECUTIVE
President Joe Biden
Vice-President Kamala Harris
THE PRESIDENT’S CABINET
Secretary of Agriculture
Secretary of Commerce
Secretary of Labor
Secretary of Health and Human Services
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
ATTORNEY GENERAL
Merrick Garland
SUPREME COURT
Chief Justice John Roberts
JUSTICES
Amy Coney Barrett
Samuel Alito
Brett Kavanaugh
Clarence Thomas
Neil Gorsuch
Elena Kagan
Ketanji Brown Jackson
Sonia Sotomayor
Lord, we ask for their courage to do what is right in your sight and to overturn the following decisions ...
1947: EVERSON V. BOARD OF EDUCATION
"Wall of Separation" Between church and state
(RULING: Ruled as Constitutional allocating taxpayer funds (to bus children) to religious schools because it did not breach the "wall of separation”: between church and state. Decision held that the establishment clause of the First Amendment applied to state, local and federal government. Bottom Line: Distributing public funds to parents to cover the cost of busing their children to religious schools did not breach the wall. And, finally, it was this ruling that established the vernacular ‘wall of separation’ which set the precedent for the next two Supreme Court decisions removing prayer and bible reading from our schools.)
Where did the term Wall of Separation come from?
Establishment Clause Definition
1962: ENGEL V. VITALE
Removed prayer from public education
(RULING: Unconstitutional for state officials to compose an official school prayer and encourage its recitation in public schools. PLAINTIFF: Steven Engel, New York parent / DEFENDANT: William Vitale, the school board president)
1963: ABINGTON SCHOOL DISTRICT V. SCHEMPP
Removed the Bible from public education
(RULING: Declared school-sponsored Bible reading in public schools in the United States to be unconstitutional. PLAINTIFF: Edward Lewis Schempp and family / DEFENDANT: Abington School District)
1968: EPPERSON V. ARKANSAS
Opened the door for evolution to be taught as fact in public schools
(RULING: Creation and Intelligent Design were ruled as religious studies in government schools. Government schools are to remain neutral https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/393/97/)
1973: ROE V. WADE: OVERTURNED BY THE GRACIOUS HAND OF THE LORD - JUNE 2022
Allowed Unrestricted Access to Abortion
(RULING: Unduly restrictive state regulation of abortion is unconstitutional. PLAINTIFF: Norma McCorvey, aka Jane Roe / DEFENDANT: Henry Wade, district attorney of Dallas County, TX, where Roe resided)
2003: LAWRENCE V. TEXAS:
Struck down the sodomy law, thus legalizing same-sex sexual activity in every U.S. state and territory
(RULING: The “Homosexual Conduct” law [prohibiting sodomy] was unconstitutional and violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause that protects a substantive right to personal liberty in intimate decisions)
2015: OBERGEFELL V. HODGES:
Legalized same-sex marriage nationwide
(RULING: The Constitution guarantees a nationwide right to same-sex marriage. State bans on same-sex marriage and on recognizing same-sex marriages duly performed in other jurisdictions are unconstitutional under the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. PLAINTIFF: Jim Obergefell, a same-sex widower / DEFENDANT: Richard Hodges, Ohio’s health director)
TODAY’S STATE FOCUS
We direct our prayers to the state of Pennsylvania and its leaders.
WE DECLARE THE 1776 PREAMBLE OF THE CONSTITUTION OF PENNSYLVANIA:
“We, the people of Pennsylvania, grateful to Almighty God for the blessings of civil and religious liberty, and humbly invoking His guidance.” (2nd State admitted to the Union on December 12th, 1787)
PENNSYLVANIA GOVERNOR
Tom Wolf [D]
PENNSYLVANIA ATTORNEY GENERAL
Josh Shapiro [D]
PENNSYLVANIA SENATORS
Bob Casey Jr. [D]
Pat Toomey [R]
PENNSYLVANIA REPRESENTATIVES
DEMOCRATS
Brendan Boyle
Dwight Evans
Madeleine Dean
Mary Scanlon
Chrissy Houlahan
Susan Wild
Matthew Cartwright
Conor Lamb
Mike Doyle
REPUBLICANS
Brian Fitzpatrick
Daniel Meuser
Scott Perry
Lloyd Smucker
Fred Keller
John Joyce
Guy Reschenthaler
Glenn Thompson
Mike Kelly
We ask that You turn their hearts towards You, Lord. We ask that You soften their hearts, Lord, to recognize and receive truth. Lord, we ask that You grant them the understanding and knowledge that come from the fear of You. We ask that You grant them wisdom and discernment, Lord, and that You make them bold to do what is right in Your sight. Lord, we ask that You direct their hearts to do Your will. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
