Even God Won't Take It From You

I have wondered often about our inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness: Which is the most important?

I have come to this: Liberty is supreme. Liberty, or free will, is the power to choose your destiny in myriad large and small ways. It is the only right God will never take from you. You may lose your life and your happiness, but if you really want nothing to do with God, He won’t interfere.

Americans can’t discuss liberty without dragging God into it because He is the one, per our Declaration of Independence, that endowed us with rights in the first place.

If you consider what the Bible has to say about liberty, you see at once that it is important to God. Eternity is at stake--Will you spend it with or without Him?—yet He won’t use his divine power to make that decision for you. He wants you to choose Him and his Heaven as your eternal home. He wants it badly. He sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty for your sin. But you can always reject his salvation. It’s always up to you. Like I said, you are at liberty to spend eternity where you choose.

God dignifies human beings above other creations by giving us liberty, and then He bows to our choices. He doesn't force us to do anything because He desires neither robots nor slaves. He respects us. We are the only creations made in his image, the only ones who have liberty to make decisions using reason. We are special. Distinguished. Exalted above other creatures because we can choose to live this way or that. Liberty is fundamental and unique to being human.

So, considering that God takes a step back and lets you choose your eternal destiny, doesn’t it make sense that your liberty now is just as important as it will be then?

Now the connection to this earthly place: Because even God will not violate the inalienable liberty He placed within us to choose how to live our lives, it should surprise no one when outrage to the point of violence results when our liberties are encroached, rule by rule, law by law, tax by tax. Loss of liberty is evil, infuriating, an outrage against our humanness. As our liberties erode daily, a tiny bit here, a tiny bit there, we become more enslaved. It is no wonder that global history is marked by intermittent, violent slave rebellions. Human slavery is a slap in the face to God, because we are made in his image.

When we need an HOA to tell us what color to paint our front door, when we have to prove a need to carry a firearm to defend ourselves, when half or more of our earnings end up in the government’s hands, then we are no longer free persons; we are indistinguishable from slaves. Do slaves make decisions about what is theirs? Are slaves armed? Do slaves get to keep what they earn?

The good news is that we can use (what’s left of) our God-ordained liberty to stop the slide to servitude. Vote for leaders who love liberty above all. Life and happiness follow when our inalienable right to choose our destiny is respected by government.