Religion & Politics

So at church this past week we were having a discussion regarding politics. We discussed at one point how liberty, independence, and freedom are gifts from God. I was noting how it is sad how so often people tend to forget this. So often people separate the idea of freedom and the idea of God.

This is wrong-headed and, I believe, disrespectful.

I think of it like this: imagine you were able to visit heaven for just one day. You also get to bring along several of your friends. Now imagine it's the end of your one day in heaven and Jesus brings you into the giftshop. Rather than selling you something, he gives each of the guests a special gift, something straight from Jesus' hands. I'm not sure about everyone else but if I had a gift from Jesus I would treasure it. I think of when I was a kid on vacation and getting something from the gift shop's at Disney World. Us kids wouldn't let our stupid little toys from the gift shop out of our sights....Now back to Jesus giving you something.

Here you have a gift from Jesus, he created all things and he chose to give YOU something specifically. Would you not treasure it? Would you not fight for it if someone tried to steal it?

This is freedom. God gave us this fantastic thing called freedom and what do we do with it? We allow others to take it away. Worse, most of us take it from our neighbors; even WORSE, most of those taking from their neighbors then attempt to justify the theft as being altruistic or charitable. Go back to the example of having your friends in Jesus' gift shop with you. Would you feel proud to steal your friend's gift? Would it be ok so long as you were able to convince all of your other friends that the one friend didn't actually "need" the gift God gave him? Would it be ok so long as you gave that gift to someone who "needed" it more than your friend (provided of course that you take a nominal 15% handling fee)? No, of course not, this is all wrong! It has to be a slap in God's face when he see's not only what we do to each other but also our lack of passion and caring for what He gave to us.

It is shameful the way that everyone (myself as well, on occasion) trample on another person's free will. It is likewise just as shameful that we don't stand up and take pride in God's gift to us.