This week is Independence Day on Thursday and this last week, Monday, my wife and I went to Plymouth, Massachusetts to visit “Plimouth Plantation,” the second successful English colony in America. Most of the founders of this colony today we know as the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims strongly believed that the Church of England, and the Catholic Church, had strayed beyond Christ’s teachings, and established religious rituals, and church hierarchies, that went against the teachings of the Bible. Many of the Pilgrims were members of a Puritan sect known as the Separatists. They believed that membership in the Church of England violated the biblical precepts for true Christians, and they had to break away and form independent congregations that adhered more strictly to divine requirements. The first American history book was written by the governor of the Plymouth colony, William Bradford, covering the years 1620 to 1657. In his history, Bradford drew deep parallels between everyday life and the events of the Bible. The Pilgrims were not Baptists. They practiced infant sprinkling. However, America had religious foundings that centered upon the Bible. I remind you of this as we look forward to July 4th.