What it means to be Free
John 8:32-36
Imagine spending 23 hours a day in a cement enclosure the size of a bathroom. Now imagine sitting in that small room nearly all day, every day without respite, for a year, five years, even 10 years. How long before you start pacing and talking to yourself? How long before you lose your mind? This is the life of a condemned prisoner on death row. See in your mind's eye living in the confinement of a 60-square-foot cell awaiting the inevitable execution of the sentence that has been imposed upon you.
The futility and frustration of those who are prisoners condemned waiting the carrying out of their sentences is seen in a poem entitled “Journey to Nowhere” written by Ramon Rogers as he sat on death row in a 4 X 9 cell in San Quentin Prison:
I pace back and forth in a straight line,
Thinking of nothing, trying to burn Time.
The soles of my shoes grow thinner each day,
Black hairs on my head are turning to gray.
My sight starts to blur, my eyes are quite sore,
Pacing repeatedly across this hard floor.
A thousand miles have already been paved,
But there's no destination this side of the grave.
Envision yourself longing, hoping for a stay of execution, knowing that at any moment you might be cast into the blackness of eternity. Think what it is like being a condemned prisoner with no hope. Can you, by some miracle, ever be set free?
Imagine, if you can, being bought, traded and sold like an animal, regarded as a "thing," not a person, with no rights or possessions. Envision having the possibility at anytime of being sold off to a distant land and separated from your family. Imagine being bound in chains hand and foot; and unable to successfully struggle against misfortune, punishment, degradation, or to be able to help yourself or free yourself from the ever tightening chains. Picture, being a slave, a prisoner for life, wishing and hoping this torment would someday end. Imagine, being a possession of a master who does not have your interest at heart and has the power to do anything to you. Is there anyone who can unshackle the chains of slavery that keep you from being a freeman or freewoman?
Imagine if you will, waking up not wanting to open your eyes yet because the light hurts them, unable to remember what day it is with a head that is throbbing and mouth that tastes foul, You have no recollection of what was said last night. You can’t remember what. You want to quit because your habit is killing you. But you can’t quit. It seems the harder you try the stronger the habit’s tentacles wrap themselves around you. You win one battle one day only to be defeated the next. You’re life is a major roller coaster. The moment you think you have risen your addiction pulls you back down. Picture yourself as an addict, wanting help but so controlled by your addiction that you deny needing help. Deep inside you long to be free but how can you stop your addiction from having dominion over you? Is there anyone who can set me free from this cruel master?
The condemned prisoner, the slave, and the addict all hopelessly longing for freedom are pictures of each of us when we were without Jesus Christ. But Christ came to set us free. Listen to His words in Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight of the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
I. Condemned Prisoners
A. The Bible declares that because of our sins we stand before a Holy God condemned.
B. John 3:19 “And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
C. Understand that we bring the condemnation upon ourselves by voluntarily breaking the law.
D. Romans 3:19, 23 “Now we know that what things so ever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God... For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”
E. In Paul's letter to the Galatians, Paul addresses our imprisonment. In 3:22, He states that the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner because of sin. As prisoners the law condemns us and is our jailer that locks us up. (3:23)
F. Galatians 3:13 “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us.”
G. In Christ Jesus, we are free from the condemnation of the law. We have been pardoned by His vicarious sacrifice for us.
H. Romans 8:1 “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit”
I. Psalms 34:22 “The LORD redeems the soul of His servants, and none of those who trust in Him shall be condemned.”
II. Slaves
A. In Galatians 4:3 the Bible declares that without Christ we are slaves under the law bound by chains of sin to the elements of this world
B. A slave is a tool, a total servant, a possession. Being a possession, a slave is required to total obedience to a master who has the power to do anything to a slave.
C. 2 Timothy 2:26 “And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will.”
D. People are not used to considering themselves as slaves. Man is in the habit of thinking that they could take up sin, or lay it down, at their will - that they were its masters. Christ, however, has shown us that it is not so; but that, every time we yield to sin, we increase its hold over us, and become more deeply enthralled under its tyrannous power, so that we are compelled to obey its commands, however cruel or malignant they may be. "He that commits sin is the servant of sin." - adapted
E. Hebrews 2: 14-15 “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.”
F. The liberating, redemptive act of Christ in His death on the Cross sets us free. In Him, we are free from the demands of the law as an impersonal system for approaching God. We can have a relationship with God based on love not on law.
G. Galatians 5:1 “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”
H. Romans 6:18 “Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity (leading to more) iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
I. Galatians 5:13 “For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”
III. Addicts
A. The Bible declares that the natural man, without Christ is an addict, controlled by sin. The sin nature has domination of a person's life without Christ.
B. We are unable to keep the law. We are unable to break the chains that bind us.
C. The futility of self reformation is seen in Luke 11:24-26.
D. Luke 11:24-26 “When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walks through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I will return unto my house whence I came out. And when he cometh, he finds it swept and garnished. Then goes he, and takes to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first.”
E. The human will is not capable of overcoming sin. Paul expresses this futility in Romans.
F. Romans 7:14-19 “For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am made out of flesh, sold into sin's power. For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not practice what I want to do, but I do what I hate. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree with the law that it is good. So now I am no longer the one doing it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. For the desire to do what is good is with me, but there is no ability to do it. For I do not do the good that I want to do, but I practice the evil that I do not want to do.”
G. But in Christ one can find victory over the domination of sin.
H. Romans 6:14 “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.”
I. The Apostle John under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit makes a profound statement that whosoever is born of God does not go on in a life of sin and does not habitually commit the same sin under its power.
J. 1 John 3:9 “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remains in him and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.”
Conclusion:
• To the prisoner justly condemned – Christ offers freedom from the penalty of sin having borne the penalty for you.
• To the slave chained by Satan – Christ offers freedom to serve God not under the constraints of the law but under new ownership with a loving Master, Lord and Friend, Jesus Christ
• To the addict controlled by sin’s grasp – Christ offers freedom from the power of sin infilling you with the Spirit of His power.
John 8:36 “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed”
