The Story of America’s Most Famous Metaphor: “A City Upon A Hill”: 100 Bible Verses That Made America

On this episode of Our American Stories, if you want to know about the history of America, it is imperative that you know the role that the Bible played in shaping our country. Our Founding Fathers—both Christian and non-Christian—were heavily influenced by the Bible. Here to share another story is Robert Morgan who is the author of 100 Bible Verses That Made America: Defining Moments That Shaped Our Enduring Foundation of Faith.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
If you want to know about the history of America,
it's imperative that you know the role that the Bible
played in shaping our country. Here to share another story
is Robert Morgan, who was the author of one hundred
Bible verses that made America, defining moments that shaped our

(00:32):
enduring foundation of faith. Let's take a listen.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
The Pilgrims, as we know them, were Puritans fleeing religious
persecution in England, and after their arrival on the Mayflower
in sixteen twenty, thousands upon thousands of more Puritans emigrated
to America. They were some of England's best trained scholars, barristers, educators,
and clergymen. On April eighth, sixteen thirty, a fleet of

(01:00):
four ships left the Isle of Right, carrying yet another
seven hundred Puritan immigrants to the New World. Among them
was John Winthrop, a noted English lawyer who was distressed
by the persecution directed towards his fellow Puritans from King Charles.
The first joining Winthrop afored the flagship Arabella, were his

(01:22):
two young sons, but his wife, Margaret wasn't able to
join him until the next year. John and Margaret, and
an unusual act of devotion, forged a plan for keeping
their love alive during their separation. They agreed together to
think about each other for an hour every Monday and
Friday afternoon. Well at some point daring or maybe before

(01:47):
or perhaps just after the voyage, Winthrop prepared and preached
one of the most influential sermons in American history. He
called it a model of Christian charity. It's also known
as the City upon a Hill's Sermon. In this speech, Winthrop,
who is a lawyer not a clergyman, painted a compelling

(02:08):
vision of the future of American society as he imagined
it to be, and, borrowing the words of Jesus from
Matthew five fourteen, offered an image that has been repeated
for nearly four hundred years by presidents and patriots alike,
that America is a shining city on a hill. Winthrop

(02:30):
said this to his fellow Puritans. The only way to
provide for our posterity is to follow the council of
the prophet Micah, to do justly and to love mercy,
and to walk humbly with our God. For this end,
we must be knit together in this work as one man.

(02:52):
We must entertain one another in brotherly affection. We must
be willing to abridge ourselves of superfluity for the sake
of one another's necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce
together with all meetness and gentleness, patience and liberality. We
must alight in each other, make others conditions our own,

(03:16):
rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having
before our eyes our commission and community in this work
as members of the same body. So shall we then
keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.
The Lord will be our God and delight to dwell

(03:38):
among us as his own people, and will command a
blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we
shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness, and
truth than formerly we have been acquainted with. He went
on to say, we shall find that the God of
Israel is among us when ten of us shall be

(03:58):
able to resist a thousand of our enemies, when he
shall make us a praise and glory. That means shall
say of succeeding settlements across the land. The Lord, make
it like that of New England. For we must consider
that we shall be a city upon a hill. The
eyes of all of the people are upon us. Beloved,

(04:20):
he said, there is now set before us life and good,
death and evil, and that we are commanded this day
to love the Lord, our God, and to love one another,
to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments
and his ordinances and his laws, that we may live
and be multiplied, and that the God of our fathers

(04:41):
may bless us in the land, whether we go to
possess it. It was there that Winthrop called America a
city on a hill for all the world to see?
Or is Ronald Reagan like to say, a shining city
on the hill?

Speaker 3 (05:01):
The fast few days, when I've been at that window upstairs,
I've thought a bit of the shining city upon a hill.
The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to
describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was important
because he was an early pilgrim, an early freedom man.
He journeyed here on what to day we'd call a
little wooden boat, and like the other pilgrims, he was

(05:24):
looking for a home that would be free. I've spoken
of the Shining City all my political life, But I
don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw
when I said it. But in my mind it was
a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than notions,
wind swept, god blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds,

(05:46):
living in harmony and peace. A city with pre ports
that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had
to be city walls, the walls had doors, and the
doors were opened to anyone with the will and the
heart to get here. That's how I saw it and
see it still.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Winthrop's vision of America is compelling, but it bears remembering
that Jesus Christ first coined that phrase, and he gave
it and his Sermon on the Mount to refer not
to America herself as such, but to his followers, the
Church on this earth. He told us in Matthew chapter five,
you are the light of the world. A city that

(06:28):
is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do
men light a lamp and put it under a basket,
but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all
who are in the house. Let your light so shine
before men, that they may see your good works and
glorify your Father, which is in heaven. That's the way
that Jesus used that image, and at one time or another,

(06:51):
almost every president has reminded us of this iconic symbol
of American freedom, that our nation, the home of the
brave and the Land of the Free, is a shining
city on a hill.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
Had a terrific job on the production, editing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hangler. A special thanks to Robert Morgan,
author of one hundred Bible verses that made America, defining
moments that shaped our enduring foundation of faith, by a
book by two the story of a City upon a Hill.
Here on our American Stories, this is Lee Habib, host

(07:31):
of our American Stories. Every day we set out to
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(07:52):
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