FREE AT LAST!
John 8:31-36.
JOHN 8:31. “Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed.”
The sense here is, ‘If you TRULY are my disciples, then you will continue in my word.’
Conversely Jesus might have said, ‘You are not truly my disciples UNLESS ye continue in my word.’ It would appear from the outset that some would soon be easily put off.
If we profess faith then the onus is upon us to “continue” in the faith.
JOHN 8:32. “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
Having started in the word of Jesus, continuing in the word of Jesus will bring us into a deeper knowledge of the truth. And having a greater understanding of the truth, we will experience the liberating effect of the truth.
JOHN 8:33. “They answered Him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man; how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?”
Already, you see, having professed belief in Jesus, these people were disbelieving what Jesus was saying, and slipping back into their sense of pedigree.
Angry people soon forget their own history, and say silly things. Had they forgotten Israel’s slavery in Egypt, and captivity in Babylon? Were they unaware of the fact that, even after the exile, they had been successively under the rule of Persia, then Greece, and were still subject to the Romans?
It is as if somebody of a certain nationality should proudly boast, ‘I come from a Christian country, therefore I must be a Christian!’
JOHN 8:34. “Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.”
That is what they were missing: their bondage to sin. None of us likes to hear it. Our flesh rebels against the very suggestion. But these were the words of Jesus, which they were rejecting.
The word “committeth” speaks of habitually and continually living the life of sin. This stands in stark contrast with the “continuing in my word” of John 8:31.
JOHN 8:35. “And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever.”
“The servant” represents Moses. ‘Moses was faithful as a servant; But Christ was faithful as a son over His own house’ (Hebrews 3:5-6).
With the coming of Jesus, who abides for ever, the era of enslavement to the law of Moses is over.
JOHN 8:36. “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”
Jesus sets the captive free (Luke 4:18), having paid the full price of our redemption.
In Him we are free from condemnation, and consequently free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:1-2).
If the Son thus makes us free, we shall be free indeed. Free from the dominion of sin, free from the burden of sin, and free from the eternal consequences of sin.
