I cannot believe that the post titled "hunting for intelligence" has not prompted any comments. Has the post been skipped over or do words fail you as well?
Just to give you a quick update, we are having the church out to our house tonight for a Fourth of July celebration. I will be giving a quick devotional and reading excerpts from our Declaration of Independence.
My question will be about our rights. The Declaration states that we have the right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness..."
I believe that these "rights" have negatively impacted many believers. You see, we may have these rights from a governmental standpoint but we don't have them in our personal lives. In other words...
Mark 8:35 ; Galatians 2:20 - life?
I Corinthians 8:9; Galatians 5:13-14 - liberty?
Romans 14:19 - pursuit of happiness?
As believers, if we could forget about our rights, we could be more righteous. Right?
On July 12th I will be filling the pulpit at another church. I will be teaching Sunday School on our right to life. During morning worship I will be preaching on our liberty, and for the evening service... You got it! The pursuit of happiness.
Happy 4th of July!
2 comments:
Perhaps I am showing my ignorance, but I do not believe Scripture negates the ideas of life and liberty. Rather it gives the way we should look at how to approach them. They aren't inherent rights (by virtue of being born), rather gifts given to us through the blood of Jesus Christ (being born again). And as far as the pursuit of happiness, I think Scripture is clear in that we can only be happy pursuing God's will for us.
I'd like to think that our forefathers had all this in mind when they wrote the Declaration, but not even I am that naive.
If we could be less selfish then we could be more righteous.
I do not believe that scripture negates the right to life and liberty either. I believe it teaches that we have life and we need to give it up for others and for the Lord. We should not keep it for ourselves because it is our "right".
We have been given liberty in Jesus, but Paul commanded those that were slaves and servants to remain as they were called. (I Cor 7) As far as I have seen, God used slavery and servant hood to teach Israel. He has instructed us that we need to be servants to Christ.
We have the liberty to be servants!
These three things do not usurp Biblical Truth. My children still need to obey even if it conflicts with their liberty or pursuit of happiness!
Children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.
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