No country on Earth hates itself like the United States. The anti-war crowd has shoved every failure, both real and imagined, in the faces of the public, while playing down every victory. Any notion of patriotism or national pride is redefined as American arrogance, an uncivilized parade of democratic “values” that even “we the people” can’t agree on. The legend of why America is great is viewed as mythical drivel.

As an American, I remember the legend: Having come to this new land to gain religious freedom, the citizens of the colonies were facing unreasonable oppression from the king of England. In a moment identifiable as the genesis of the greatest national experiment ever undertaken by mankind, 56 men with towering intellect and puffy white wigs signed off on a set of ideals: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain [inalienable] rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.” With those words, our ancestors metaphorically set off the first firework announcing our freedom.

More than simply stating those ideals eloquently, though, these men successfully fought to claim freedom, and the oppressors were driven off. Just a few years later, these wise men forged the finest legal document ever devised by man, one that would form “a more perfect union”—one that upheld the character of its citizens: the Constitution of the United States of America.

The Founding Fathers’ vision, their heroic action, and the example of character they set played a huge role in propelling the United States of America to its place as the greatest, most powerful nation on Earth, one destined to extend from sea to shining sea.

As Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan put it: “[T]he streets are paved with more than gold—they’re paved with the greatest thoughts man ever had, the greatest decisions he ever made, about how to live. We have free thought, free speech, freedom of worship. … Look at the great rich history, the courage and sacrifice, the house-raisings, the stubbornness. The Puritans, the Indians, the City on a Hill.”

This history is not inspiring our people anymore.

Instead of standing before the world as a place of character and freedom, the “land of opportunity” is viewed simply as a land of economic opportunity—and even that is slipping away. The legend of the greatest country on Earth is no longer taught, no longer believed by a coming generation and a new wave of immigrants, legal and illegal. Not only do other countries not view the United States as a city on a hill, its own citizenry has lost pride in its history, because it doesn’t really know how it became so blessed.

Noonan summed up the entirety of the legend in just seven words: “That God made this a special place.” That is more than just another patriotic sentiment: Your Bible has something to say about why God would make the United States of America special—something that all too few understand.

You owe it to yourself, to your family, to your loved ones to learn about the true history of this nation. Extensive documentation proves what our Founders believed—that this history extended back to biblical times. Knowing why this became the most powerful single nation in the history of the planet is inspiring. If you have not yet requested a copy of Herbert Armstrong’s The United States and Britain in Prophecy, we would be happy to send it to you at no charge. After reading it, you will understand that this nation became great not merely because of legal documents or the actions of the Founding Fathers, but because God Himself kept a promise to the patriarch Abraham and took a personal interest in this nation. You will know that the blessings you enjoy in the United States every day came from God Almighty.

This knowledge, though, also serves as a sobering warning. The same source that prophesied the rise of this nation also talks about its fall.

The breaking of our national pride is part of what tears the nation down (Leviticus 26:19)—and God Himself did the breaking because we have turned away from Him. With that pride gone, how can we expect other nations to desire a broken American ideal? How can we expect a new group of immigrants to want to embrace American culture as their own? If we as a nation do not believe the United States is a special place, how can anyone else?

How badly an understanding of our country’s heritage is needed! Not the history of 1776, but the United States true history with God!

We have a national heritage as part of ancient Israel. If we did embrace that message nationally, if we did recognize God as the great benefactor who gave us our blessings, how it would revolutionize our country! It would give us the ability to see which parts of the legend you read earlier are the truth and where we are simply crediting ourselves instead of our Creator. If everyone—patriots and self-loathing Americans alike—turned to God, He would restore the pride in our power He wants us to have.

But even if we don’t nationally turn to God in gratitude for the phenomenal bounty He has bestowed on us, we can still individually turn to Him in repentance, embrace our heritage and reap even greater rewards—regardless of what country we are from.

You have the opportunity to fully understand your heritage, to learn about the one part of the legend of the United States of America that is reality from your Bible: That God Himself made this country—the United States of America—a special place.