The Bill of (Rights and) Obligations
When my boys were becoming young men and insisting they be able to make more and more decisions for themselves I told them they could have all the freedom they were willing to be responsible for. I pointed out they (our boys are twins) wanted to go wherever they wanted to go and do whatever they wanted to do with whoever they wanted to be with but they didn’t want to check in to get my approval.
Of course, they wanted to live in my house, eat my food, drive my cars and use up my gas while doing it. In other words, they wanted to have the authority to make all of the decisions without having to face the consequences of those decisions.
In short, they wanted freedom without responsibility. I had to, on more than one occasion, explain to my sons life doesn’t work that way. If you want freedom, you have to take responsibility. The two are tied together.
I thought about those conversations I used to have with my sons this week as I’ve watched all of the parades and events celebrating America’s freedom. There have been memorials for those men and women who paid the ultimate price for the freedom we live in everyday. There have been speeches reminding us of the history of our freedom we should be celebrating.
There have even been protests from those in our nation that think we still don’t have enough freedom. Some think our government has become too intrusive. Some think our economic system keeps people trapped. Whatever the reason, some people think we should still have more freedom.
Funny, I have never seen a parade demanding more responsibility. I have never seen any one marching for more accountability. More times than not, people are marching for the exact opposite. People, like my sons once did, want no limits on their freedom and no demands they be responsible for that freedom. We want to live the way want — drink what ever we want, smoke whatever we want, and eat whatever we want — and then, when our body breaks down, we want modern medicine to fix us no matter the cost. Of course, we want someone else to pay for it.
Our founders knew liberty and responsibility go hand in hand. We can’t have one without the other. The framers of our freedom assumed certain things about us as citizens. For one thing, they assumed we would be responsible with our freedom. They assumed we would not confuse liberty and license. They assumed we would stay in engaged in the process — that we would stay involved as citizens, understand the issues of our time and vote for the common good.
I’m afraid they thought too highly of us.
Most of us don’t vote. Fewer of us would consider running for public office. Only a handful serve on local boards that make the decisions that affect our quality of life. We complain about our schools, but not many of us would serve on a local school board. We complain about the pot holes, but we won’t run for mayor or the city commission.
We want the privileges of freedom. We want our liberty, but we want it all without responsibility.
Now, remember, it doesn’t have to be our fault to be our responsibility. We didn’t cause the homeless problem, but it may be our calling to fix it. We didn’t make the issues of public education, but it may be our responsibity to fix it.
The gospel begins with a mess. The good news begins where everything is broken. God, in Christ, takes the responsibity for what wasn’t His fault and begins to work to make all things new. As His followers, we’re invited to join Him in the process. The first thing He does in our redemption is set us free from our past so we can join Him in His future. Freedom is the gift that makes everything else possible. It’s the first step, not the last.
We are free to love as He loves. That means we’re privileged to bear burdens as he did. We’re invited to bear the burdens for problems that aren’t of our making. That’s what love does.
And in the gospel, we’re free to love even when it hurts to do so. That’s what freedom requires whether we’re talking about our nation or the kingdom. Liberty and responsibility go hand it hand.
We can have all the freedom we’re willing to be responsible for. In fact, being responsible is the only way we can have freedom at all. Live free. Live responsibly. Remember, we have to do both.
Happy Fourth of July!
This essay was first posted in Scot McKnight’s newsletter.
