Featured School teaches kids “the government gives us rights

Try living in a country with few if any rights and see where they come from ... or do not come from.

 

What does that have to do with the price of tea in Iran?

 

You're 50% correct. The government doesn't give what was ours to begin with; but they can restrict and take away.

 

Would somebody please list what our "God given rights" are?

I've got:
The right to choose our faith. (Calvinists would disagree.)
The right to not be owned by someone else.
The right to have a distinctive, unique personality.

What else is there?

 

Well, according to the founding fathers, who atrributed this to the Creator, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

 

Yes, these would be the same founding fathers that gave us their Bill of Rights. I'm looking for something from the Bible.

 

There is a document that has been out there for a little while called the Declaration of the Independence. If you will read that you will be caught up enough to be able to have a discussion in this thread.

 

The Bible ? The only right the Bible gives us is to an eternity in Hell.

 

Yes, the Declaration of Independence says there are "God-given rights". The Declaration of Independence is not inspired. I was hoping to hear from some source with divine authority on the matter, and not men, ergo, the Bible. So where in the Bible does it say we have the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness?

 

See Romans 10:13.

 

Saved from what ?

 

Saved from Hell, from condemnation. Seems that God gives you the right to be saved if you call on Him.

John 1:12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:

 

It's grace, man. No "rights" about it. Salvation is a gift. Without that gift, we get what we deserve.

 

Rather….


….I get what I deserve….

 

Yes, it's grace. Undeserved favor. But John 1:12 definitely says if we receive that grace we have the "right" to become a child of God.

 

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness

Where Did These Truths Come From?

We know that our democratic republican form of government has its origins in Athens and Rome and various other Western democratic experiments. But where did this vision for the dignity and freedom of all human beings come from? Jerusalem — by which I mean the Bible.

Yes, Greek philosophy was influential too. But the men who constructed the United States and crafted all of our founding documents and took such great personal risks (like committing capital treason) in order to launch a nation built on the foundations of these truths were indelibly shaped by the Bible, whether or not they personally believed its claims.

Creator: It was the Bible that gave our founders their general consensus of Judeo-Christian monotheism (Deuteronomy 6:4).

All Men: It was the Bible that gave them such a strong sense of the importance of the individual — every individual (Isaiah 45:23, Philippians 2:10).

Life: It was the Bible that taught them the sacredness of human life (Leviticus 24:17, Psalm 139:13–16).

Liberty: It was the Bible that ingrained in them deeply the emancipatory theme of “liberty for the captives” (Luke 4:18) that runs through the whole of redemptive history.

Pursuit of Happiness: And it was the Bible that taught them that the ultimate pursuit of an individual’s life is to find joy (Psalm 16:11, Psalm 37:4, Psalm 73:25–26, Matthew 13:44, John 10:10, John 15:11, Philippians 1:21, Philippians 3:8).

http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness

 

All fine points, so now I'm trying to bring this around to the OP and I suppose I'm just not seeing what the problem is with school telling kids about rights. Somebody help me, I'm tired and just don't get it tonight.

 

ITL, I disagree with you totally. It's not a "right", but unmerited favor. I guess we could beat that horse forever, but…..


And what of the unsaved ? What is their collective right ?

 

The concern is not about telling kids about their rights but telling them that our rights come from our government.