July 4

Yesterday was Independence Day and I had a wonderful day with my family. We all rode bikes together around the neighborhood and to the park where they were having a big July 4th festival. There were booths of food and bounce houses. Our church had a booth with snow cones and a bounce house. We just had a great day being together. I past a banner on the way to take Korey, my daughter, to the restroom that said "Thank our troops for giving us Freedom." You know, our freedom does come at a high price. The obvious price of soldiers losing their lives is the one that most of us think of, but with all the controversy over the war in Iraq right now, I thought about the other prices of freedom, like the cost of free speech and free press. It seems like a good thing until we stop being responsible for what we say.

Politicians are so focused on winning elections, that they don't think about how their negative talk on the war could be effecting our troops right now. Newspapers choose to print what is sensational and don't seem to care if that's not the whole story. It is so easy to get angry at the media and the politicians, but this attitude didn't start with them, it is because of all of us. We have become a society of people who want freedom without responsibility. We want to say what we want, do what we want and feel how we want, but we don't want the consequences of any of those actions. We have sex, but don't want babies so we say abortion is OK. We drink, drive and kill people, but blame it on the "disease" of alcoholism. We will get angry at our spouse or children and say wicked and hurtful things, and blame it on our anger.

I believe it is not OK to have freedom with responsibility. The bible says we have freedom in Christ, that we are forgiven from our sins, so yes, technically, we can sin all day long and we will still go to heaven. But I don't want my reward to just be going to heaven. I want to live the life that God designed me to live and that means taking responsibility for my actions. It means, not just apologizing for angry words, but learning to control my temper. It means that if I don't want to hurt people by drinking and driving that I shouldn't drive in the first place. It means that as a politician, the lives of the soldiers should be just as important as winning an election in which that politician is supposed to be representing that very soldier.

The bible says that to whom much is given, much is required. God has given me so much by giving me the gift of freedom through Christ. How can I do anything less than be responsible with that freedom?