Lost Episodes: Government Under God’s Will

Written by aaron | August 4, 2011

The English colonists settling in what is Exeter, New Hampshire, set forth their government on August 4, 1639, declaring:

“Whereas it hath pleased the Lord to move the heart of our dread sovereign Charles by the grace of God King &c to grant license and liberty to sundry of his subjects to plant themselves in the western parts of America…

We his loyal subjects, brethren of the church in Exeter,…considering with ourselves the holy will of God and our own necessity that we should not live without wholesome laws and civil government among us of which we are altogether destitute, do in the name of Christ and in the sight of God combine ourselves together to erect and set up among us such government as shall be to our best discerning agreeable to the will of God…

[A]nd binding of ourselves solemnly by the grace and help of Christ and in his name and fear to submit ourselves to such godly and christian laws as are established in the realm of England [1 Peter 2:13-17]…and to all other such laws which shall upon good grounds be made and enacted among us according to God that we may live quietly a peaceably together in all godliness and honesty [1 Tim. 2:1-2].”*

The Biblical worldview of these early settlers in New Hampshire regarding the purpose of government is yet another lost episode in American history.

*Source Citation: Thirty-three signatories in Exeter on August 4, 1639 as found in Jeremy Belknap, The History Of New Hampshire: From a Copy Of The Original Edition Having The Authors Last Corrections To Which Are Added Notes Containing Various Corrections and Illustrations Of The Text And Additional Pacts And Notices Of Persons And Events Therein Mentioned, John Farmer, ed. (Philadelphia: Robert Aitken, 1784; Dover, NH: S.C. Stevens and Ela & Wadleigh 1831), 432.