Transcript

America's Providential History Podcast explores growth of American Republic

>> Stephen McDowell: Welcome to America's Providential History Podcast, where we talk about the real story of America and explore the hand of God in our history. Now, here's your host, Stephen McDowell. Hello. I'm glad you're joining us for this edition of America's Providential History Podcast. Today we will be exploring the growth of the American Republic, and look in particular at Cyrus McCormick and the Reaper. Now, in the past number of many podcasts, we've looked at how Christianity was the foundation of America's liberty and independence, that America was birthed as a unique nation in history, a nation built upon the principles found in the Bible. That was the seed that gave birth to this unique nation. And so, after America was birthed in liberty, we want to begin to look and examine the fruit that came forth.

Benjamin Rush says Christianity is the only true and perfect religion

What was it like to live under liberty in this newly formed American republic? Benjamin Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence and father of medicine in America, said that Christianity is the only true and perfect religion, and that in proportion as mankind adopt its principles and, and obeys its precepts, they will be wise and happy. So he represented the view of most of the founders of America. They understood that Christianity is true religion. It's the only true and perfect religion. But it's our responsibility to adopt its principles and obey its precepts. This is what the Bible teaches over and over and over again. That Christianity is not merely a mental assent to believe in something, but it's a living faith that our transformation within us is reflected in how we live our life. And so if we, adopt the principles of the Christian faith, if we obey the precepts, which of course presupposes, we know the principles and know the precepts, but the fruit of obedience, as Benjamin Rush says, and the Bible teaches, they will be wise and happy. Christianity is good seed. It's truth, it's seed that the creator of all things reveals to man. And so if we plant the seed, we can expect good fruit. So with the planting of this Christian seed that produced liberty in America, what fruit began to come forth in this early nation? Well, abundance of good, fruit came forth. 1. We began to see great advancements in inventions, technology, scientific discoveries, transportation and communication. Part of this was due to the principle of property that was, encoded within our, nation. When you have copyright laws and patent laws, this recognizes that the product of a man's mind is property as well as the product of his hands. And this biblical idea of people benefiting from the fruit of their labor encourages more labor and brings Forth prosperity. In future podcasts, I'll, look much deeper into biblical economics. But this was just one thing, one aspect of liberty and property that began to bear fruit. And so you have a lot of inventions like the cotton gin by Eli Whitney in 1793, the steamboat by Robert Fulton 1807, the transatlantic steam liner which came later in 1840. Erie Canal was built to encourage trade, trade which increased productivity in 1825. And then in 1831, there's a very significant invention by a young, Christian man, Cyrus Hall McCormick. Now, Cyrus Hall McCormick advanced civilization and destroyed famine by fulfilling his kingdom business. See, God calls people to serve him in every sphere of life, that it's our responsibility to discern God. What have you called me to do? What have you gifted me to do? To work and labor and develop those talents and skills, to use them to elevate man and advance mankind. And Cyrus McCormick was a man who certainly did this through, the invention of the reaper. Now, McCormick used his God given talents and fulfilled his kingdom purpose. He was acting like the faithful stewards that Jesus spoke of in the parable of the talents or the minas. Jesus told his disciples a parable, and it's presented in the Gospel of Luke and Matthew, and told this parable of a master getting ready to go on a journey. And he calls servants together, and he gave each of them a coin. In the version in Luke chapter 11, he gave, 1911, he gave them a coin, a mina, a talent. And he said, do business with this until I return. So the first servant took his talent and through trade, through business, he produced 10 more. The second one took his talent and through trade, through business, he created five more talents. The third one was, knew his master was an exacting man. He was afraid, so he buried his talent. So when the master returned, the first servant came and said, look, master, your talent, your sir Mina has made 10 more. Response was, well done, good and faithful servant. You shall be in charge of cities. 10 cities. And so the second one as well, he received praise from the master and placed an authority. But the third one was in big trouble. The master said, you knew I was an exacting man, reaping where I do not sow. But you were afraid. You hid the talent. Now, he didn't lose it. He didn't squander it. He wasn't like the prodigal son. But he did not use what his master had given him. And consequently he ended up losing it it because he said, look, you should at least put it in the bank, got a little bit of return. Not too much these days, but a little return. But he didn't even do that. So he was in big trouble.

Parable of the talents represents all the talents God has given us

Now, in this parable of the talents, the talent, or the miner, represents a wise use of money, for sure, because God wants us to wisely use everything he puts into our hands. But I believe it represents much more. It represents all of the talents, skills and abilities that God has given each one of us. He's called us to use them, to multiply them, to cause them to increase. And in so doing, we're actually fulfilling his calling. Actually, we're fulfilling helping to bring the kingdom of God on earth. Because in Luke 19:11, the context of the parable of the talents is the disciples supposed the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately. So he told them that parable to get their mindset right. Say, look, you know, this is really how my kingdom is going to come, as you use your talents and abilities to bring, increase, to flourish, bring flourishing to the earth to provide a needed good or service to your fellow man. And this was in accordance with the mission God gave to Adam and Eve when he created him to be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, cultivate the earth to be productive. And Cyrus McCormick was a faithful servant who did take his talents, his minas, if you will. And through trade, through the calling God had on his life, produced in abundance more. So let's take a look at this man. Now, McCormick was born in 1809 in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, just a generation before the Founding fathers gave birth to America, gave birth to this free Nation. So Cyrus McCormick was born at the perfect time and place in order to fulfill his godly call in life. As I say, it was in this environment of freedom and liberty, freedom for people to get ideas, to create wealth, to benefit from the fruit of their labor that, sparked his invention and as we'll see, the building of a business, around his invention. So he was born in the right country. He could have come forth at no other country in the world at that time. He had the right upbringing in his family. His family were farmers. They were godly individuals. They labored hard. They instilled Christian values and work ethic within Cyrus McCormick. and he was brought up on a farm, which was, the environment that he needed to help, encourage him to invent this. Now, Cyrus's father. See, for thousands of years, when the harvest time came, when you planted grain, of course it would mature in the field, and it came A time here it'd be in the autumn, the fall, fall. And here in Virginia at this time, and it came time for the harvest. People would take a scythe or sickle and, you know, it's kind of a knife on a handle, and go out and cut the grain by hand in the field. That's how they had done it for centuries and centuries, thousands of years. We see that in biblical times. They would cut it like this. And it was backbreaking work. All hands on deck. Everybody had to turn out in the field because you only had a narrow time to get the harvest in a couple of weeks perhaps, because if not, it could rot in the field or bad weather would damage the crops. So we, night and day, you would work everybody young and old. And Cyrus was part of this labor for hours and hours during this time as well. But a lot of people thought, well, there must be a better way to cut the grain than by hand. And a lot of people had worked or attempted to build a machine that would harvest the grain in the field. In fact, Cyrus's father was one of Those men, Robert McCormick, who had been working to invent a reaper. And he did this in his workshop on his farm in the Shenandoah Valley. In fact, today it's still there, his home still there. You can go see it. The workshop where he invented the reaper is still there that you can see. And Cyrus, as a young boy, observed his father attempting to build a reaper and was around the workshop. And that, I'm sure, inspired him as well to carry on the work that his father never succeeded in doing, as well as many other people who had tried to invent a, reaper as well. And so he was inspired from his father. I'm sure he was inspired from working on the farm, because he was out there for hours on end bringing in the harvest. He probably thought, there's got to be a better than this that would, help to inspire him as well. So his father never succeeded in building a reaper, but his son did. In fact, in 1831, he invented a machine that had all the necessary components to properly cut the grain in the field and handle it in a way that it wouldn't be damaged. And he gave his first test of the reaper in July of 1831. He cut six acres of oats in an afternoon, which was the work of 6 to 24, men to a small number of people who gathered to watch this first public, exhibition that had, taken, place. And so when people saw this, they were quite amazed and began to think, wow, what a nice discovery this young man had made. Now, when you look at the reaper, in fact, there's a model of it there at his house in the Shenandoah Valley. it looks like a fairly simple device. It was drawn by a horse and had a paddle wheel on it that kind of pushed the grain over. It had a moving knife that cut it. And then the farm would stand and rake the cut grain off a platform for it to be bundled and then processed after this. But, so here we have the first public exhibition of a machine that would transform the way individuals live. So praise began to come, but there is no more praise than was given by his father, who said, it makes me feel proud to have a son do what I could not do. This is this biblical concept of generational transfer. You know, God may put a vision in your heart to accomplish something in his life, and you may never succeed in fulfilling the full vision of what he has for you. But it may well be that through your natural children or spiritual children or others, that you pour into them a vision to carry on, to pick up the task that you started and couldn't see the ultimate fulfillment. And so this was happening that Robert, saw, in his son, the fulfillment of the vision he had in his heart. Now, Cyrus McCormick had built a machine that would be a great blessing to farmers and to all the citizens of America and other nations, but nobody knew about it. And so he set about to build a business to make and sell reapers. And he did it in a kingdom manner with kingdom fruit. And that business he built was even more astonishing than the invention itself. One historian said of Cyrus McCormick, he did more than any other member of the human race to abolish the famine of the cities and the drudgery of the farm, to feed the hungry and straighten the bent backs of the world. McCormick did it in a biblical fashion. He did not help to feed the hungry, to provide for the poor by using the force of government to take from the productive and give to the unproductive, as modern welfare states generally tend to do. No, no. He understood that what I'm going to do, I'm going to give every common farmer a tool that's going to make him 10, 20, 30 times more productive than he possibly could have been before. This is the biblical method of elevating mankind and providing for the needs of mankind is giving tools to people to make them more productive. Productivity is really, very important concept. It's the key to accomplishing so much of the mission that God has given us here in this earth. And so tools have been a very important part of that. And this was one of many tools. And we'll explore more in future podcasts that God gave to primarily his servants. Most of these great inventions that have elevated mankind have come forth from Christian individuals, and certainly almost all within Christian cultures themselves, because it's Christians who have access to the mind of Christ. There's freedom in America that the culture that Christianity produced in America, liberty and freedom, recognizing and protecting property, rights are very important for inspiring invention and development of business. And so McCormick did, more than any other person throughout all of history to help elevate men out of poverty. astounding the, number of talents or minas he reproduced, through the calling God had on his life. So he went about trying to build a business to sell these reapers. To promote the reapers. He would travel around, begin to tell farmers, I've got this machine that's going to change your life. You need to get one of these machines and begin to promote these ideas. One historian wrote. He said his whole soul was wrapped up in his reaper. He recognized and saw the tremendous potential that was going to come forth from this invention. And he believed God had given him this invention and that he saw the value of it. So he held on to it. I'm not giving up. And this was very important, this tenacity that was imparted to him from his parents to hang on to this vision, because it took him quite a while before he could sell his first reaper. But during this time, as he meditated, on this potential, this thought came to him. Perhaps I may make a million dollars from this reaper.

Cyrus McCormick invented the reaper 200 years ago

Now, that was a huge sum of money, 200 years ago. He said this thought was so enormous that it seemed like a dreamlike dwelling in the clouds, so remote, so unattainable, so exalted, so visionary. And in fact, for a long time, that's just what it was, visionary because he didn't make a million dollars, at least anytime soon. In fact, he almost lost his inheritance because he couldn't find anybody to buy any of his machines. And so he thought, well, I'm going to just start making some anyways. I'll have some on hand when I do sell one. So he mortgaged his farm that he had gotten as an inheritance to use that capital to begin set up a little factory and build these reapers. So he'd have some on hand, all the while promoting it, traveling around and trying to get people to buy it. But still nobody bought one of These reapers. In fact, do you know how long it took him to sell his first reaper? It took him nine years. Nine years here it was a machine that was going to bring prosperity to the farmer who bought it is going to increase the productivity of man greatly. It's going to bring a flood of less expensive food, which is the basic, basic necessity of all men, which is going to release productivity in many other areas because people are going to have more time. But nine years, as one gentleman wrote, Cyrus McCormick hung to his reaper as John Knox had to his Bible. And it's a good thing he saw God's called me to this. I'm going to be tenacious. I'm not giving up no matter what it takes. I'm going to get, get these into the hands of farmers so that they can then prosper. And so he was so identified with his invention and because he went around promoting it, traveled to villages, towns, farmers everywhere promoting the machine. You need to buy it. And as he walked into a town, the people could recognize him, say, look, here comes the reaper man. and so finally he did sell a reaper after nine years. And then when the farmer began to see the results, testify the results, and other people said, hey, I want one of these. And more and more gradually people began to want to buy reaper. And so McCormick recognized, Hey, I need to set up a factory to to build these in a, in a mass produced way. But he thought, well, it's not going to be in the Shenandoah Valley that I'm going to do this because there, there's lots of hills. It's not most conducive to using a reaper. But he looked to the west, the west then would have been that area of Illinois. And he said, there's the place, it's flat, you can grow a lot of grain there. This is where I need to go and set up this new business. And as he launched to do that, he created a new species of commercial organization. He introduced new concepts of business not known before and future podcast. I'm going to explore this in more detail when I look at some biblical principles of business exemplified in the life of Cyrus McCormick. and we will explore that. I have written about this and some of my books. I've got a little booklet on Cyrus McCormick and biblical principles of business. I have a book on steward in the Earth, a biblical view of Economics. I look at the story of McCormick and these principles that came from the Bible that he built his business upon. You can find those books at our website. Providencefoundation.com but he, so he set about, he moved to Chicago. It was in Chicago at that time. It was just a little mud town, is on the very western edge of the United States, which was gradually moving, westward. But as I say, Illinois being flat, was a great place for grain to grow. It was a great place for reapers to be built because there'll be lots of farmers who would need them and could use them. And he began to build a new species of commercial organization. And as we'll see, he's the one who started the assembly line half a century before Henry Ford did, and mass production of these where they all made the same. He could carry spare parts, so farmers wouldn't, if a part broke, wouldn't have to buy a whole new machine. Just the little part that he needed. He implemented many ideas. As I say, I'll cover this in future podcasts. One historian wrote of him. He instructed the wheat eating races how to increase the seven small loaves so that the multitude should be fed. He picked up the task of feeding the hungry masses, the Christly task that had lain unfulfilled for 18 centuries, and led the way in organizing it into a system of international reciprocity. So here it was. He fulfilled the desire, the command of God to go and elevate, mankind, meet the needs of mankind, provide for the poor. He set up, developed a machine that would bring prosperity to your average farmer. And he set up a new business, a new species of commercial organization where many, many people benefited. His customers benefited the farmers. The people who worked with him benefited greatly. he made many millionaires, that way as well. He benefited, also. And to McCormick, his work was his calling, through which he fulfilled his divine mission and manifested God's kingdom on the earth. As I said, he did more than any other man to lift men out of poverty. He gave the average farmer a tool. That was the beginning point. Many testify the beginning point of my prosperity was when I got him a cormic reaper. But that not only brought prosperity to the farmer, but it brought cheaper food to everybody in America and later other nations as they began to use this tool. Because now one farmer could produce not just enough food to feed himself, he could produce enough food to feed 20 families and more. And so the harvest began to increase. The price of grains and food began to diminish. People where their basic needs of food are met, they could begin to explore other areas of business and invention and creativity and began to provide other tools and services to their fellow Man. So it's the starting point of the prosperity of a nation. See the rise of America and the rise of McCormick's business go hand in hand. One historian wrote the invention of the reaper was the right starting point for the upbuilding of a republic. It made all other progress possible by removing the fear of famine and the drudgery of farm labor. It enabled even the laborer of the harvest field to be free and intelligent because it gave him the power of 10 men. So what a great biblical example of a kingdom businessman. A man who used his talents and skills that God had given him through labor and work and perseverance, he increased them. He used wisdom to build a whole new business of making and selling reapers. Farmers all over the country and then later in other countries began to use this machine that enabled them to be 10, 20 times more productive. So it not only met their needs, but made food cheaper for everybody else. It gave them a time to pursue other areas of business and learning and knowledge and skills. And it gave man more, more recreational time, also which was really unknown before the inventions like the reaper and other, inventions like this to make making men more productive because people had to work all day long, six days a week. They always observed the Sabbath to just meet their basic needs. But now with inventions like the reaper, man had leisure time, as well. So here we see one marvelous example of the fruit of Christian liberty in the early American republic. The reaper is one invention that produced an abundance of fruit. And of course today we've developed so much more sophisticated and advanced machines, for farmers, agricultural machines to plant grain, to harvest the grain, to process the grain. In fact, Cyrus McCormick would later always was working to make his machines better and better and better. Other, people began to copy his machines, after he invented one and they copied the basic working parts, parts that were necessary. But he believed his was the best, always making it better. He later would build a self binding reaper that even increased the productivity more. Cut the grain, then it bound the grain and so that then could be taken to be, ah, processed. So he was always, making that pattern. This was just one of the inventions that came forth in this free nation of America that has had tremendous impact, in the nation and the world over.

The seed that was planted was the Christian faith, Christian liberty, Christian self

Now in the next podcast next week we're going to begin to look at some other inventions and other good fruit that began to come forth in this American republic. The seed that was planted was the seed of the Christian faith, Christian liberty, Christian self, government. And that seed gradually began to produce good fruit, as we would expect, understanding that biblical principle of the seed. The seed principle, the seed you plant determines that the fruit that's produced and the good seed of the Christian faith and Christian worldview is planted in the American republic, produced all kinds of good fruit. One example is McCormick's reaper. Well, if you want to learn more, Visit our website, providencefoundation.com and in future podcasts, we're going to look at a lot more of the good fruit that came forth in America. Hope to see you then. M. God bless you.