July 03, 2007

America's Most Important Gift

 "So if the Son liberates you [makes you free men], then you are really and unquestionably free."

John 8:36 (Amplified Bible)

I believe that freedom is America's most important gift to the world.   

This is why; next to Thanksgiving Day, Independence Day (henceforth referred to in this blog as the 4th of July) is my favorite holiday.

As an African-American, I am not ashamed to be proud of my country. I believe America, for all its faults past and present, is still the greatest nation ever to exist on the face of the earth.  Even, Frederick Douglas, the great abolitionist, held out hope for an America in the midst of slavery.

 

As is so often is the case at this time of year, many speak of the personal liberties afforded to them in this county.  But few understand or mention the liberty that is in Christ. True freedom does not exist apart from God and His Word, the Bible. Jesus Christ came to this earth to set men free; free from the bondages of sin and their captivity to Satan. So as many are focused on earthly such as freedom of speech and property rights, they fail to see the danger of their eternal welfare.

 

So this 4th of July, take a moment to consider your spiritual life. Are you someone who is enslaved to some sin you are practicing? Well know this, Christ offers us real freedom; a freedom that He purchased with His own life and freely gives to all who would come to Him by faith.

We hold these truths to be self-evident:

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.

— from the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776

Posted by Brother Ron at 03:08:54 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |