Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness

#Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness free#

We must pray for our Christian family in hard countries and ask God to grant them some of the freedoms we enjoy and advocate for these freedoms wherever we can.

Yes, God has allowed this governing authority to exist too for purposes we donвЂ™t understand, just like he allowed NeroвЂ™s oppressive and bloody regime when Paul wrote Romans 13. What our brothers and sisters endure there is heartbreaking. I recently shared lunch with a Christian leader who lives in a country that is among the most difficult and dangerous in the world to be a Christian. Even with its defects, sometimes tragic defects, we should never be so critical and cynical of our government that we lose sight of the historically unprecedented freedoms we enjoy, especially the freedom we have to worship according to our conscience. And in view of some horrible national injustices and disgraces, we have cause to be humble.Д«ut we should be deeply thankful to God for the United States, вЂњfor there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by GodвЂќ (Romans 13:1). If we sing, вЂњ IвЂ™m proud to be an American,вЂќ while invoking GodвЂ™s blessing on the USA, we must remember that вЂњGod opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humbleвЂќ (James 4:6).

#Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness free#

The socio-political freedoms we enjoy donвЂ™t set us free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2). The Declaration of Independence and its self-evident truths is not the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Christians are citizens of a вЂњbetter country, that is a heavenly oneвЂќ (Hebrews 11:16). The United States of America is not the kingdom of God.

Thank God for the United States of America Pursuit of Happiness: And it was the Bible that taught them that the ultimate pursuit of an individualвЂ™s life is to find joy (Psalm 16:11, Psalm 37:4, Psalm 73:25вЂ“26, Matthew 13:44, John 10:10, John 15:11, Philippians 1:21, Philippians 3:8). Liberty: It was the Bible that ingrained in them deeply the emancipatory theme of вЂњliberty for the captivesвЂќ (Luke 4:18) that runs through the whole of redemptive history. Life: It was the Bible that taught them the sacredness of human life (Leviticus 24:17, Psalm 139:13вЂ“16). But the men who constructed the United States and crafted all of our founding documents and took such great personal risks (like committing capital treason) in order to launch a nation built on the foundations of these truths were indelibly shaped by the Bible, whether or not they personally believed its claims.Д¬reator: It was the Bible that gave our founders their general consensus of Judeo-Christian monotheism (Deuteronomy 6:4).ДЄll Men: It was the Bible that gave them such a strong sense of the importance of the individual - every individual (Isaiah 45:23, Philippians 2:10). Yes, Greek philosophy was influential too. But where did this vision for the dignity and freedom of all human beings come from? Jerusalem - by which I mean the Bible. We know that our democratic republican form of government has its origins in Athens and Rome and various other Western democratic experiments. May God grant that it helps fuel the overcoming of 41 years of legalized violation of the unalienable right to life of unborn men and women. So powerful is this statement that it has, over time and through blood, sweat, and tears, fueled (and is still fueling) the overcoming of various kinds of racial, gender, and economic injustices in the nation itself. In the annals of history, it truly is a revolutionary statement: every human being has God-given rights to live, be free, and pursue their happiness. It is among the greatest sentences ever written regarding what a civil government exists to preserve and protect. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. What was it that drove our national founders to seek independence? What was the Big Idea behind the United States? I think it is captured in the first sentence of paragraph two of the Declaration: This might be a good summer to read 1776 by David McCullough. Looking back over 238 years, with America now an affluent global superpower, itвЂ™s hard for Americans to get a sense for just how unlikely (humanly speaking) it was that the 13 United States of America defeated Great Britain in a war and survived as an independent nation. Regardless, it was a bold, very risky move for the signers of the Declaration. People still debate over whether or not BritainвЂ™s offenses warranted colonial secession and war.

July 4th is the day we commemorate the Continental CongressвЂ™s declaration of independence from the nation of Great Britain.