Paul's Declaration Of Independence

Title: How’s your Master treating you?

Text: Romans 6:6 - 18

FCF: You will always be a slave to something. Thank God Christ is much kinder Master than Sin.

Point – Even the Founding Fathers knew that there were laws you could never escape. (Anarchy is never a good thing.) The question isn’t “If” we will live under laws, but whose. Christ is a much better master.

Time – Dec of Independence = 5 minutes (as abridged)

Rest of the text = 10 minutes (minus reading the scripture.)

Note: This is a July 4th Sermon, and my first. Since it actually falls on the date, I feel some obligation to make it a bit patriotic.

Note also – When it comes time for the Scripture reading, say:

“I’m actually going to read the scripture in the middle of my sermon. So, instead of the scripture right here, I’d like to read you a little story I came across:

Johnny and his sister Sally were visiting his grandparents on their farm. He was given a slingshot to play with out in the woods. He practiced in the woods, but he could never hit the target. Getting a little discouraged, he headed back for dinner.

As he was walking back he saw Grandma’s pet duck. Just out of impulse, he let the slingshot fly, hit the duck square in the head, and killed it. He was shocked and grieved. In a panic, he hid the dead duck in the wood pile, only to see his sister watching. Sally had seen it all, but she said nothing.

After lunch the next day Grandma said, "Sally, let’s wash the dishes." But Sally said, "Grandma, Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen. Then she whispered to him, "Remember the duck?" So Johnny did the dishes.

Later that day, Grandpa asked if the children wanted to go fishing and Grandma said, "I’m sorry but I need Sally to help make supper." Sally just smiled and said, "Well, that’s all right because Johnny told me he wanted to help. She whispered again, "Remember the duck?"

So Sally went fishing and Johnny stayed to help.

After several days of Johnny doing both his chores and Sally’s he finally couldn’t stand it any longer.

He came to Grandma and confessed the he had killed the duck.

Grandma knelt down, gave him a hug, and said, "Sweetheart, I know. You see, I was standing at the window and I saw the whole thing. But because I love you, I forgave you. I was just wondering how long you would let Sally make a slave of you."

If you head out of here down Route 50 towards Washington, when you get to 28 and look north, you’ll see Sully Plantation. That house was built by Richard Henry Lee in 1794. Eighteen years earlier, on June 28th, 1776, he put forward a resolution – the first resolution by the Continental Congress that decided we needed to be independent. On July 2nd, that resolution was passed, and another Virginian – the one lived down 29 in Charlottesville, was charged with the duty of writing up the reasoning behind that resolution. Two days after that, on July 4th, the draft document was approved, and beginning in August and lasting for the next three months, 55 men would sign this document.

Many of them hang for this. As they proceeded to sign, one signer joked, “I’m luckier than you. This is surely our own death warrant we sign. But you see, you are far lighter than me. When I hang, I shall fall quickly. But as for you, light as you, you will no doubt merely dangle!”

As each man signed, they no doubt thought back to a year earlier when yet another Virginian, Patrick Henry declared in the Virginia House:

Gentlemen may cry, Peace! Peace! But there is no peace. Is life so dear or peace so sweet that it must be purchased with the chains of slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, Give me liberty, or give me death!

As far as Jefferson was concerned, King George III was an overbearing tyrant, enslaving his colonists to his will. Only 100 years before, when King Charles I behaved the exact same way, his countrymen beheaded him. The eleven years that followed were so bad that country had to beg his son Charles II to come back and be king. Thomas Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry – these patriots all knew that “no law” just meant a really just another bad law. So, Lee, Jefferson, and some others got together and decided that it was time to throw off a bad master, and choose a good law. It being July 4th, today, I think it would be appropriate to take a few minutes here and read what Jefferson wrote: