No Rights.

"you have no rights."

Granny shook her finger at me while I sat fuming over something trivial that seemed unjust at the moment. I had given her my argument, huffed and puffed, sulked a good deal, and knocked my pillow once or twice. maybe I wasn't mad at her, but she got to hear it since no one else would listen. whatever happened, it just wasn't fair. how could they treat me like that? don't I deserve some kind of respect?

"you have no rights. I have no rights, they don't have any rights, you have no rights."

but I think I do. most American Christians do, too. it's our right, you can't take away our rights, this is rightly mine, blah, blah, blah. when really, we deserve nothing.

well actually, we do deserve something.

"Woe to the wicked! It will go badly with him, for what he deserves will be done to him." Isaiah 3:11 (NASB).

"How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and has insulted the Spirit of grace?" Hebrews 10:29 (NASB).

of course, this talk of punishment or "judgment" might seem a little vague in these verses. the Bible, however, is painfully clear on what all humans born into this world deserve. Jude urges,

 "Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once and for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels, who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire." Jude 5-7 (NASB).

isn't that a tough one to read? most so-called "Christians" today would refuse to believe a God that would destroy everyone who does not believe. their god is rational, urges people to come to him, and when they refuse him, he weeps.

in your dreams.

the truth of the Bible is: yes, "God so loved the world" and urges believers to spread the gospel and pray for the salvation of the lost, but God is a jealous God. 

"You shall not make yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindess to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments." Exodus 20:4-6 (NASB).

when God says He visits the iniquities of the fathers on the children, He implies that all people are guilty, since every child is born into the world with the sin of their fathers (or, Adam and Eve, the first man and woman who sinned against God) and will be punished for not only their fathers' sin, but their own. and so on through the generations.


people today are under this false pretense that God loves everyone and gives everyone a second chance. and that humans themselves somehow deserve it. in fact, they get angry if you simply suggest that maybe they don't deserve heaven and an eternity with God. practically livid. how dare you suggest that I don't deserve heaven? I'm a Christian, aren't I? I have rights!


"you have no rights."

Granny smiled a little, because she knew I knew what she was talking about. "Granny, that is not the point, it simply isn't fair--"

"nooo, what isn't fair is that Jesus died for you. and that God's grace was extended to you. and that now you have a hope after death that no other religion promises. a true hope. you don't deserve that. it doesn't belong to you. you have no rights."

and like most grandmothers, she's right. I have no rights to boast of. just the grace and mercy of God.

"'But let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,' declares the Lord." Jeremiah 9:24 (NASB).

"But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." Galatians 6:14 (NASB).

 "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them." Ephesians 2:8-10 (NASB).