Friday, January 7, 2011

The Law’s of Nature and of Nature's God

I have spent most of my life in total oblivion to what our country really stood for. Like most American’s I was busy raising a family, working on a career and just trying to get through life one challenge at a time. I believed in America and what she stands for but I never really understood what that meant until a few years ago. Then one day the Lord removed the scales from my eyes. It was more that he ripped off the blinders and I was staring into a bright light and I thought, “Holy moly, how did we get here?” at that moment I began to pay attention. I started reading everything I could get my hands on and tried to learn what this country is really about. I regret it took me so long to wake up, but I’m grateful that I have finally awakened.

What I don’t know still out weighs what I have recently learned but I’m moving forward. I believe one of the most important facts we as Americans’ should learn is about "The Laws of Nature and Nature’s God". This phrase first appeared to me in the Declaration of Independence. The beginning reads as follows: “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.”

The Law’s of Nature and of Nature’s God. So what exactly does that mean? To me it means that there is a God and He is the God of all Nature and that there are certain laws that can only come from Him.

The Declaration of Independence continues with: “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.”

Let’s look at this sentence. “We hold these truths to be sefl-evident”. So the truth is self-evident, this would mean that first, it’s true and second it doesn’t need further explaination. It is containing its own evidence or proof without need of further demonstration.

“That all men are created equal”-from the moment we are born, we are all equal. We are not guaranteed equal opportunities or circumstances but if you are born an American you have all the same rights under the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God. This was especially important to the colonist because England was under a monarchy system. Your place in life was determined by who your parents were. You could be a prince or a pauper and there was very little you could do to change your station in life. America was about to change that.

“That they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”-That they, meaning all men and women, are given from the Creator certain unalienable rights. Unalienable: Rights that are not transferable to another or capable of being repudiated.

“That among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Life, no one can take our life without consequence. Liberty, the government doesn’t make us free, we are born free and that can not be taken away. And last, Happiness. The original text said property instead of happiness, but because of slavery, the founders changed it to Happiness. The founders understood that slavery was wrong and would one day be abolished so they did what they could at the time to eleminate the advancement of slavery.

There is an excellent video on youtube by a gentelman name Craig Seibert called "Understanding the Declaration of Independence."
You can find it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS-tshQ9sys

As he explains in the video when we think of Happiness today it’s more of a hedonistic view: which means the doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the highest good. But in the time of our founding, Happiness had a deeper meaning which was, according to Mr. Seibert, “that the individual would have the freedom to use their time, talent and recourses to pursue the directions in life that they believed would bring them the most satisfaction and would benefit their family, friends and fellow man and future generations the most.”

It was about individual responsibility and individual rights. Once we understand that those rights come from “Nature’s God” we can begin to understand that it does not come from government. The problem with getting our rights from the government is this, if they can give them to us, they can take them away. The rights offered in the Declaration of Independence come from “Nature’s God” and are unalienable. Just as a reminder according to the dictionary, unalienable means rights that are not transferable to another or capable of being repudiated. I can’t give you my rights and you can’t take mine to use for yourself. They have been given to each of us by God. Only in America can we choose how we will use or abuse the “Laws of Nature and of Natures God”.