In sin we stop giving and take. Since taking can never satisfy then we are condemned to always keep on taking; thus, sin: greed, hate, selfishness and abuse. To claim one’s right, or to even claim to have a right that is ‘self evident’ is only to perpetuate the lie that we can provide for ourselves the happiness that we want. In fact one of our ‘inalienable rights’ according to the Declaration of Indepedence is happiness. In this way the idea of rights becomes a tool to wield for one’s own benefit. We see the abuse of power and say that it is wrong, that it violates peoples’ rights, and yet those in power claim that they are exercising their right to protect authority or freedom. (Now for the sake of order and justice in secular government certainly one can say that individuals have rights as stated in the law, but these are not the ‘self evident’ truths that the Declaration of Independence speaks of. In fact these rights are not for people to claim at all, rather they are given by the state as God’s authority to keep peace and render justice.)

In Christ however this cycle of sin is broken. For Jesus comes as a man and truly gives. He gives fully and without reserve–to the last drop of his blood, pouring out divine life! No rights did he claim, for he knew that in order for the bondage of self-seeking sin to be broken, man must reject the self and its so-called rights. He thus poured out all that he had, he gave all that was perfect and selfless so that in uniting people to this one sinless man and his sinless sacrifice they too might once again have the power to give. The cycle was broken; love has dawned anew. What he is is now given to us by faith and we are no longer under the power of the insatiable self and its endless passions. We are no longer compelled to claim any right for ourselves, for all life and true freedom are given freely in Christ; we have a freedom unlike any other: we have the freedom to give ourselves away. This is what is proclaimed in Galatians 4:

In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.

This law that it speaks of is that law which condemns the sinfulness and shows how helpless we are to escape our own selves. But it no longer condemns those who are in Christ for he has adopted us and given us the right to call him Father. We are sons and daughters of him because we have received his spirit, and this spirit is one of sacrificial love.

And this is our right, not one to be taken, but one to be given away. We have the right to sacrifice all that we are for another because all that there is in God is now poured into us. This is the message we have for the oppressed and the abused. Not a new political or economic solution that only covers up the problem with another layer of self righteous pomp, but the only right that will ever bring freedom from the bondage to the same spirit of sin in themselves that was in those who persecuted them.

This leaves an incredible burden on the church. As an institution the church has failed miserably in being Christ to the world because much of the church does not even know him. But we need not be overcome, for he who is in us is greater than he who is in the world. We are the church, you and me. For those who embrace the sacrifice of Christ as their own by faith and leave the life of self-serving sin, you are the church, the true church, and there is yet salvation for the oppressed and the oppressor alike.