Interesting article on Personal Sovereignty. http://www.huna.org/html/perssov.html As we celebrate this 4th of July it is good to remember what it is all about. The colonies were finding that they were being treated by the King as servants with no inherent rights. Whatever the sovereign King said they had to do. At this point in history there had developed a lot of theory and discussion about free will/personal sovereignty and how to best govern in light of that. As the colonies suffered under varying oppressions they protested but the government/King made it clear even protesting was no longer ok.
As the leaders of the colonies met to discuss this and develop a new government, personal sovereignty was forefront in their discussion. How to govern yet respect the rights of individual sovereigns was a delicate procedure. Essentially what was developed in our constitution was a government of the people, by the people and for the people that recognized individual sovereigns have complete freedom of life and being to the extent it did not infringe upon the freedom of life and being of other individuals. Basically my rights end where yours begin.
These concepts were tremendous for this time in history. Primarily through out the history of society governmental structure was designed around royal sovereigns and non-sovereigns(serfs, peasants, peons, servants, slaves). Although this was pioneering work in self will/ free will and was history making the people involved were still human and subject to self delusion. What is interesting is that the documents that were developed eventually led to freedom for even those that the founders left in a state of slavery. The statements made in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution are so self evidently true they have stood the test of time and created the oldest existing government to this day.
A quick religious note regarding free will: I am very attached to free will and freedom from a spiritual, biblical perspective. Looking into free will in the bible we only have to go back to the very beginning and then forward to the very end. Adam and Eve were granted free will in the garden and this is amazing because it means the rolling back of God's complete sovereignty to allow humans to thwart His will. This is a significant gift! Move forward to Jesus on the cross and we see that rather than take away free will that we so clearly demonstrated we can't handle Jesus died on the cross to pay the price for all of our sins - past, present and future. The removal of free will/ personal sovereignty would have eliminated sin and the need for Jesus' death on the cross. Redemption is only needed for those that can fall - those with the freedom to fall. If freedom is that important for God to maintain in our lives it seems we should fight to maintain freedom as much as possible keeping the primary mission of sharing Jesus' redemption with others in mind. Greatest use of free will is seen when we are told to use it in every way to reach others with the Gospel - not forced to rather asked to freely choose to do for the good of all.
Enemies of freedom: Any philosophy that would remove personal sovereignty. From the victim claim of the christian claiming a sovereign God chooses their every action to a governmental form that enforces by threat of harm or imprisonment the sharing of gains from personal endeavors. I have heard many times from christians that socialism as a governmental structure should be the goal of all christians because we see it practiced in the early church. There is a huge difference between the early church people freely sharing of all they had so that none were in need and a government or church forcing the sharing of all we have against our free will. Another interesting phenomenon seen in Acts and any time in history socialism or communism are used is that eventually productivity drops to dangerous levels. The early church addressed this when the churches were instructed that if you don't work you don't eat unless the inability to work was clearly demonstrated. Russia was a classic illustration of the demise that enforced sharing brings to a people. Enemies of freedom are any group that would take away a persons freedom to choose their own path in life and freely make their own choices so long as they do not prevent others from exercising that same freedom.
This Independence Day celebrate the freedom that you have to celebrate! Take an honest look at the direction of our country and decide if you will stand for freedom or the promises of a free ride that ultimately can't be kept!
