More… Freedom Series

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FREEDOM

"How can we experience true freedom in Christ?"

Everyone seeks freedom. Especially in the US, freedom is the highest virtue, and it is sought after by all who are, or consider themselves to be, oppressed.

But freedom in Christ is not the same as political or economic freedom. In fact, some of the most harshly oppressed people in history have had complete freedom in Christ.

The Bible tells us that, spiritually speaking, no one is free.

In Romans 6, Paul explains that we are all slaves. We are either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. Romans 6:15-18

15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! 16 Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. 18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.

Those who are slaves to sin cannot free themselves from it, but once we are freed from the penalty and power of sin through the cross, we become a different kind of slave, and in that slavery we find complete peace and true freedom.

Although it seems like a contradiction, the only true freedom in Christ comes to those who are His slaves…

Slavery has come to mean degradation, hardship, and inequality. But the biblical model is the true freedom of the slave of Christ who experiences joy and peace, the products of the only true freedom we will ever know in this life.

There are 124 occurrences in the New Testament of the word… which means “someone who belongs to another” or “bondslave with no ownership rights of his own.”

Unfortunately, most modern Bible versions, as well as the King James Version, most often translate it as “servant” or “bond-servant.”

But a servant is one who works for wages, and who, by benefit of his work, is owed something from his master.

The Christian, on the other hand, has nothing to offer the Lord in payment for his forgiveness, and he or she is totally owned by the Master who bought him with His shed blood on the cross.

Christians are purchased by that blood and are the possession of their Lord and Savior. We are not hired by Him; we belong to Him

Romans 8:9

9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not BELONG to Christ.

So “slave” is really the only proper translation of the word.

Now here is the meat of it all…it is not being oppressed, the slave of Christ is truly free.

We have been set free from sin by the Son of God who said, “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36).

Isn’t it amazing that we can find freedom through the one whom we should be slave too?

Too often we become slaves to the things of this world instead of slaves to the one who can truly set us free…

C.S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity

“All that we call human history--money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery--[is] the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”

In this time of pandemic where we see people protesting against government mandated shelter in place and the church is on that seems to be leading the charge…I find it sad…that in a time when people are consuming g more filth and drugs and alcohol than ever that the church is more worried about our constitutional rights rather than our own members slavery to those things that will perish rather than slaves to the one whom died for their eternal salvation….

While it is true that some government officials would love to tear down the church the reality is most just want to keep people alive longer…

The law that we should be focused on is not the law of man but the law of the spirit…if we focus on it then we can honestly say as Christians…

“Through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).

We now know the truth and that truth has set us free (John 8:32).

This goes beyond our natural way of thinking, through our bondage to Christ, we have also become sons and heirs of the Most High God