Love and Rights
How are Christians supposed to think about their ethical commitment of love and their rights as individuals? These two concepts often feel as if they exist in tension with one another, and they do. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 8 and 9, invites us into that tension. The Corinthian believers were struggling with pride and an ever-increasing sense of individualism that was leading to significant problems in the church. In chapter 8, Paul answers their question about eating meat sacrificed to idols while taking the opportunity to remind them of the larger and more important principle of honoring each other. And sometimes, in order to honor a fellow believer, we have to lay down something that is our right. Paul will continue this idea in chapter nine. When talking about the right to earn a living, he’ll say (vv.12-13), “Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ.” For Paul, our rights and freedoms as believers aren’t something to be demanded in community, but something that we are willing to give up in love so that other believers are able to grow in Christ and the lost will come to faith in Christ.[1] This idea of willingly and lovingly laying down our freedoms and rights for others is a tough pill to swallow. At best, it means that we have to deny ourselves, and at worst, it can leave us feeling like a doormat to be walked over. However, we must be reminded that for Paul, his model (and ours) is to be Christ. It was Christ who willingly and lovingly laid down his divine rights to become human, bear our sin, and give his life for us. Christ’s love and action were done with us in mind, and that is what drives Paul’s life and instruction. The theologian Karl Barth helps us to understand the nature of Christ’s love, and just like Paul, how believers are to think about their freedoms and rights in light of Christ’s example. He writes:
“In the self-giving of Jesus Christ fulfilled in His crucifixion, God Himself intervenes for man who cannot help himself, as God the Son obedient to the will of God the Father, as the Judge bearing the judgment for the judged. To this action of God there corresponds on man’s side the obedience of faith which accepts what is done. In the assumption of human nature by the incarnation of Jesus Christ God raises fallen man up again and exalts him to be a partner of His covenant and to new life in righteousness. To this action of God there corresponds on man’s side the obedience of love in which man, freed for right action, imitates in relation to God and neighbor that which God has done towards him and for him. This is described in the second part of the volume on reconciliation, from which we take the great comparison of agape and eros (love).
Christian love turns to the other purely for the sake of the other. It does not desire it for itself. It loves it simply because it is there as this other, with all its value or lack of value. It loves it freely. But it is more than this turning. In Christian love the loving subject gives to the other, the object of love, that which it has, which is its own, which belongs to it. It does so irrespective of the right or claim that it may have to it, or the further use that it might make of it. It does so in confirmation of the freedom in respect of itself which it has in its critical beginning. It does so with a radically unlimited liberality. Nor is this liberality confined to that which the loving subject “has.” For in Christian love the loving subject reaches back, as it were, behind itself to that which at the first it denies and from which it turns away, namely, itself: to give itself (for everything would lack if this final thing were lacking); to give itself away; to give up itself to the one to whom it turns for the sake of this object. To do this the loving man has given up control of himself to place himself under the control of the other, the object of his love. He is free to do this. It is in this freedom that the one who loves as a Christian loves. Where this movement is fulfilled in all its aspects and reaches its goal in this self-giving of the loving subject, there is Christian love. And this movement, together with faith (and hope, etc.) and inseparably and simultaneously fulfilled with them, is the life-act of the Christian both in detail and finally as a whole. Its fulfillment is the particular problem of Christian love.” [2]
It is interesting how Barth redefines the primary aim of our freedom in Christ as not to demand selfishness or self-preservation, but to freely and generously love one another. It is also interesting that Barth acknowledges that seeing this kind of love through is challenging (i.e., presents a problem).
We should feel a tension when we read the words of Paul, the thoughts of Barth, and look at the example of Jesus. This tension arises because in Christ we see something pure, noble, lovely, and true that we all desire. But it comes into conflict with our sinful nature. That is why the Corinthians were struggling, and unfortunately, they were giving into their sin nature over obedience and conformity to Christ. As Christians, we must remember and embody (through the Holy Spirit’s help) the truth that through Christ we have been served so that we might become servants. To freely and lovingly serve others is true freedom.
[1] It is important to note here that Paul is making this argument to believers about how they relate to one another in the church and in evangelism. This section isn’t an explicit argument for how citizens relate to a government. We can all see how the idea of being forced or coerced into “laying down rights” could quickly be abused in the context of government. We can also see how it is beneficial for a citizen to willingly lay down a right for the good of their neighbor in civic engagement (consider speed limits). We must read and understand this passage in context (church and evangelism) before we consider any possible civic implications.
[2] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, ed. and trans. Geoffrey William Bromiley, First American edition (London; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1994), 173–174.