August 15, 1905
RELIGION is “the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it.”
Liberty is “the state of being exempt from the domination of others, or from restraining circumstances. In ethics and philosophy, the power in any rational agent to make his choices and decide his conduct for himself, spontaneously and voluntarily, in accordance with reasons or motives.”
Religious liberty, therefore, is man’s exemption from the domination of others, or from restricting circumstances: man’s freedom to make his choices and decide his conduct for himself, spontaneously and voluntarily: in his duty to his Creator, and in the manor of discharging that duty.
Since God has created man, in the nature of things the first of all relationships is that to God; and the first of all duties could be nothing but duty to God.
Suppose a time when there was only one intelligent creature in the universe. He was created: and his relationship to his Creator, his duty to his Creator, is the only one that could possibly be. That is the first of all relationships that can possibly be. Therefore it is written that “the first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord: and Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength.” All there is of any soul is first due to God; because it all came from God. This, therefore, is the first of all commandments, not because it is the first one that was ever given by spoken word, or that was ever written out; but because it is the first that could possibly be; and this because it is the expression of the first principle of the existence of any intelligent creature. The principle was there, inherent in the existence of the first intelligent creature, in the first moment of his existence.
Now, though that is the first of all possible relationships, and the first of all duties; though that relationship and duty are inherent in the very existence of intelligent creatures; yet even in that inherent obligation, God has created every intelligent creature free—free to recognize that obligation or not, free to discharge that duty or not, just as he chooses.
Accordingly it is written: “Choose you this day whom ye will serve.” “Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” Thus it is absolutely true that in religion—in the duty which we owe to our Creator and the manner of discharging it—God has created man entirely “exempt from the domination of others and from restricting circumstances;” has made him free “to make his choice, and decide his conduct for himself, spontaneously and voluntarily.” Thus religious liberty is the gift of God, inherent in the gift of rational existence itself.
Any service as to God that is not freely chosen by him who renders it is not service to God. There can be no virtue in it; there can be none of God in it. Any service rendered as to God that is not freely chosen on the part of him who renders it cannot be of God; because “God is love”: and love and compulsion, love and force, love and oppression, never can go together. Therefore any duty, any obligation, anything, offered or rendered as to God that is not of the individual’s own freely chosen choice, can neither be of God nor to God. Accordingly when the Lord created whatever creature—angel or man—in order that that creature should be happy in the service of God, and in order that there should be virtue in rendering service or worship to God, He created him free to choose to do so.
And freedom to choose to do so carries with it, and in it, freedom to choose not to do so. Therefore, when God says to all creatures, “Choose you this day whom ye will serve,” it is left to each creature in the universe to decide for himself in his own freedom what he will do; whether he will serve God or not. And when in that freedom he makes a wrong use of his choice, and chooses not to serve God, then, even then, mark it—even then, God, being God, does not persecute him, does not set him at naught, does not hunt him; he does seek him; yet not to pursue him, but, as it is stated in the parable of the one sheep that was lost away on the mountain alone, he goes to find him, and seeks him to bring him back.
Therefore note this truth: When God has made every creature perfectly free to choose to serve him, and in that, free to choose not to serve him—when that creature exercises his choice in the way not to serve God, even then God only loves him: for God is only love. The only disposition that God has toward him is to love him, and by every possible means to win him yet to the choice to love him and serve him. That is God, and that is religious liberty. A. T. JONES. SOWA August 15, 1905
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“Religious Liberty No. 2”
ATJ
ALL that was said in the preceding article of God’s disposition only to love, and not to condemn or oppress, one of his children who has made a wrong use of his freedom to choose, and has chosen not to honor God, is fully expressed in that proclamation and revelation which God made of himself, of what he is, when in the mount, as Moses was there with him, God promised to make all his goodness to pass before him, and to make him acquainted with himself. Then in this revelation of himself, the Lord passed by before Moses and proclaimed: “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.” This is what he is, not what he does—as if he could do something else. No, this is what he is; and in this he is God. He cannot cease to be God; and therefore cannot cease to be what is here said, for this is what he is.
What is it, then, that he is?—Merciful—full of mercy. Mercy is the disposition, the very heart’s life, to treat people better than they deserve. That is himself, and he never treats anybody, he never will treat anybody, he never can treat anybody, in any other way than better than he deserves; because merciful is what he is. Therefore, when one, in his freedom of choice which is essential to virtue, which is essential to happiness, and to the true worship of God—when in the exercise of that freedom, any person exercises it the wrong way and makes the wrong choice, makes the wrong use of it, God is ever merciful to him, treating him better than he deserves, in order that he may be brought to reverse his choice and put it on the right side.
Next he is gracious. Gracious is favorable, extending, holding forth favor. And this God does to all creatures, whatever their condition or position may be. God being God, being gracious, he is gracious to every creature, whatsoever the creature may be and whatsoever his condition may be. Consequently when any one exercises his choice in the wrong way, makes a wrong use of it, instead of God abandoning him, threatening him, throwing him over, persecuting him, blotting him out of existence, he is ever gracious, holding forth to him favor, not in any sanction or approval of his wrong course, but in order that if by any possibility he may reverse his choice and use it on the right side.
God is not only merciful and gracious, but long-suffering. The definition of God’s long-suffering is “salvation”: “The long-suffering of our Lord is salvation.” Then when one makes the wrong use of his freedom, turns his choice to the wrong side, and goes the wrong way, all the disposition that God has toward him, all that God has for that person, all that he holds out to him is mercy and grace and salvation, seeking to save him from that wrong course, to win him from the wrong use of his choice, to awaken him to himself and to God that he may choose to make the right use of his freedom of choice and choose to recognize and serve his Creator.
By the way, I just now used the expression, “Awake the person to himself,” —awake him to himself and God. This recalls the word that Jesus spoke in the parable of the prodigal son. That parable tells this whole story. There was that son, who chose to leave his father’s house and go off for himself; but he made the wrong choice when he started. He was free to choose to do just as he did, but he made the wrong choice, and things did not go well with him.
When he made the choice to live outside his father’s house, and away from his father, he went down and down and down, until he reached such a point of deprivation that he fain would have picked up the husks and wrung some more substance from them after they had been abandoned by the swine. When he reached that point,—remember the record is in the words of Jesus—“he came to himself.” And the next thing in the record is, when he came to himself, he thought of his father. And the next thing is that he said, “I will arise and go to my father.”
Note the moment he came to himself, the first thought was of his father. And what, all this time, was the father’s attitude toward him? While that son was away, wasting his father’s substance and degrading himself in riotous living, thus lost to himself and to his father by his wrong choice, his father was still thinking of him, was still waiting for him, was still longing that he would come to himself, and come home. And when at last this son did come to himself, and think of his father’s house, and said to himself, “I will arise and go to my father,” even when “he was yet a great way off, his father saw him,” and when he saw him he “ran” to meet him with joyous welcome, caresses, and kisses.
What is that parable for? What does it tell?—It tells the heavenly Father’s attitude toward those who make a wrong use of the freedom which he has given to every soul. It tells the divine story of religious liberty. Otherwise, there would be no such thing as freedom. If it were not so, if God treated any creature otherwise than just that way, the word freedom would not express it, for it would not be freedom; for then the service might be of constraint, not willing, and so have the taint of bondage not the fragrance of freedom. Bear in mind that the freedom of which God is the Author and Giver is freedom indeed. Absolutely, infinitely, and eternally it is so. A. T. JONES. SOWA August 22, 1905
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