A Perilous Gift

It is a dangerous thing to be free.

Freedom is a beautiful thing, to be sure, that I wish for everyone on this broken globe; a chance to make your own decisions, to go where you will, to worship as you wish. But there is a strong element of danger to those who have the opportunity to go their own way. The slave never has to wonder what to do from day to day. Someone else tells them, and they must do it. There is a kind of security in that, a bit of laziness that will likely settle on a man, till they are content or even pleased to shuffle along under someone else’s orders. It means you never have to think for yourself. You never have the regret of wondering if you should have done something differently. It isn’t up to you, after all.

The freeman has a different scenario. Peter lays it out for us beautifully in his first epistle:

“For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: as free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God. Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.” (1Pe 2:15-17)

Just in passing, let me comment, Peter has a great deal to say leading up to this statement. I encourage you to go read the whole of the book to get a better understanding of how he reaches this conclusion. But I would rather not write a treatise, only a blog post, so I am focusing on these few verses.

You are free now, Christian. You are set at liberty from your sins, from the carnality of the flesh which used to bind you fast. Back then, before Christ sought us out, we didn’t think much about who we served or what we did. We thought we were free. Probably, if we thought of it at all, we thought we were freer than the Christian. But read through scripture, and look back on your own life, and you will know better. There is no ability to truly serve God without the change He brings in our hearts. "So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God." (Rom 8:18) And if we cannot serve God, we must serve another.

“Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” (Rom 6:16)

Don’t kid yourself. If you cannot serve one, you are a slave to the other. Sin held us in thrall before Christ. But now…now we have freedom. Liberty has come on our souls. We see clearly what is right and wrong, and we have a desire fueled by the Spirit of God within us to follow the right, in order to please our merciful Lord. But here is the crux.

Now that we are free, we are no longer slaves. Seems an obvious statement, I know, but let me take it a step farther. If we are no longer slaves, we have the opportunity to choose. Oh dear. We have to actually make decisions for ourselves. Thank God we are not left entirely up to ourselves, we have the Spirit’s guidance, and God’s words always to hand. But still, we suddenly find ourselves in a position we have never actually been in. Freedom means we suddenly have to think for ourselves. We have options and questions now. We are faced with choices every day. Usually they are small enough. Will I yell at the noisy kid to shut up so I can rest, or will I lovingly tell them to take the noise elsewhere? Will I sing over the opportunity to serve my family by doing the dishes, or by going to work every morning, or will I do it with a grumble and grump? The choices seem small. But they add up quickly.

Freedom brings responsibility, as well as blessings.

Peter points out the obvious weakness of every human heart. “You’re free now,” says he, “but watch it so you don’t use that liberty to hide malicious sins behind a cloak of God’s love for you.” The verse just before the Romans 6 verse quoted above, Paul does the same thing. “By the way, some of you are asking, should we sin because we are not under the law anymore but under God’s grace? God forbid!” concludes Paul, and it is the best outbreak of righteous indignation we can give on the subject. But don’t you think there is a reason both these apostles have to add in those little clauses? Every human heart is wired for duplicity after the fall. We all want the easy way out, we don’t want to fight it when urges suddenly pop into our hearts. Sometimes it is plain maliciousness. Wanting to do the evil, likely in order to hurt someone else; maybe God Himself. Sometimes it’s selfishness that strikes in and makes us whine for what we want like two-year-olds. More often, at least with me, it’s plain laziness.

It takes work to be good, people. It’s a constant job to stand up in front of the world, with the lion raging at us every second, and do what we’re supposed to. But that is what freedom calls us to. Now we are free. Now that we can do good, we are to do good; because we have the choice. We are able to choose between right and wrong. God has renewed our hearts and minds, given us His own Spirit, pointed us in the right direction, and even taken our hands to walk beside us on this pilgrimage. But just because it’s good, doesn’t mean the walk is easy. It doesn’t mean the everyday choices are easy. But now that we are free, we have the obligation to choose what’s right.

It’s a bit like voting in America. If we don’t get out and do it, voting for the right people to lead our country the right way, then we are deliberately allowing the wrong people in. By exercising our freedom in not voting, we condone the evil by pure laziness.

When we choose not to do what’s right in our own lives, we take a step back into the chains that held us before Christ, and we do it to spite Him. It is a choice, all our own. We now have that freedom. Don’t use it. Use your freedom to be a shining light for the Lord Who has made you new and walks beside you. The world is watching. They know you are a Christian, and Who you’re supposed to be serving. Don’t give your Father a bad name, adopted child. You have the freedom to be a little stinker. Don’t use that freedom. Instead, use your liberty to take solid step after solid step toward the end of the race. Keep on your way up the path, Christian. You never know who is watching. Satan was watching Job, so was God, and all of heaven. Obviously his friends were too. You are hardly unobserved as you go through this life. You are a freeman, with the dangerous opportunity to live as you want to. Take care, Christian! Live for the King who granted you your freedom.

“Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.”