What does the word freedom mean to you? Well, think about it. Is it being able to do whatever you want, or is it more about being set free from the things that are holding you back?

 

A Revelation of Freedom

Most of us, I guess, would define freedom as being able to do whatever we want whenever we want, and that definition right there is what brings a whole world of pain crashing down on our lives. I don’t think there’s a single person on this planet who doesn’t want to be free. Do you want to be free? Well, of course you do; me too, but if freedom is that important to us, you have to ask yourself exactly what is it. Sure, there’s political freedom; freedom of speech; freedom of association; the freedom to gather; to protest; to live where you want to live; to marry who you want to marry; to choose to have children or not.

In this day and age, we live in a world that’s more and more fixated on our individual freedoms, our rights as individuals. After all, I’m entitled to enjoy my life. Right? So it doesn’t take too long to start imagining that freedom is being able to do whatever we want whenever we want. Anything that cuts across that is a restriction of our inalienable right to be free, and yet if you travel to any kind of place where that freedom is practised, what you discover is lawlessness and anarchy. There’s no safety; there’s no protection; there’s no security because that anything, anytime kind of freedom is a terrible thing. That’s what the rule of law is all about: To keep us safe and secure.

So when you think about it, what we actually need is a different definition of freedom: One that really works. Try this one on for size. Galatians 1:3-4:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins to set us free from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.

It seems that God takes our freedom so seriously that He sent Jesus to suffer and die to set us free. From what? Well, from our sin, and from this evil age. So according to God real freedom, the sort of freedom that Jesus purchased for you on that cross, is about setting you free from the devastating consequences of your sin, and the evil that pervades every nook and cranny of this age, so that you can live in grace and peace. Not such a bad definition when you think about it.

So here’s a question for you: What sin, what evil, is robbing you of the freedom that Jesus came to give you? Because that sin, that evil, is what God is calling you to hand over to Him today. His will for you is to be free to live in the grace and the peace of Jesus Christ, but that’s not always an easy thing to do. One of the things you discover when you set your heart on following Jesus is that the rest of the world is not going to be standing by and cheering you on. In fact, far from it.

Not long after I became a Christian, a few decades ago now, the IT consulting firm at which I was a partner had the opportunity to bid for a rather large government project in the developing world, but the simple reality was that unless you paid the bribes to the various officials, you were completely wasting your time in bidding. As you can imagine, as a brand-new Christian, I was faced with a real dilemma. And can I tell you, I came under quite some pressure to compromise?

It happens in every corner of our lives because when you decide to believe in Jesus, when you decide to follow Jesus, when you decide to live your life for Him, let me tell you, the world is not going to be all that happy with you. They’ll criticise you; laugh at you; persecute you, whatever fits best at the time. You see, those people want you to believe that their way is the way of freedom; of success; of enjoyment. The world wants you to believe that following Jesus somehow is going to rob you of your freedom.

What do you believe? Who are you trying to please; Jesus, or those naysayers around you? Paul the apostle made a very clear decision on that question in his life. Galatians 1:10:

Am I now seeking human approval, or God’s approval? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still pleasing people, I would not be a servant of Christ.

People are so fickle. Have you noticed? Jesus did. That’s why we’re told in John 2:23-25 that:

When He was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in His name – because they saw the signs that He was doing, but Jesus on His part would not entrust Himself to them, because He knew all people and needed no one to testify about anyone, for He Himself knew what was in everyone.

At some point, in every corner of our lives, every thought, every decision, every action, each one of us has to decide who we’re trying to please; people, or God. And the way it tends to work is that it’s not so much the big decisions that we make upfront that matter; it’s the little decisions that we make a hundred times a day, that together tell us who we’re really trying to please.

Come on. Who are you trying to please with your life? Because if you’re still seeking human approval, if you’re still trying to please people, you wouldn’t be a servant of Christ. Look. To experience freedom, real freedom, we need to stop focusing on the world. What we need is a spiritual revelation. The fact is that the freedom that only Jesus Christ can bring is a fantastic thing, but whilst the facts are incredibly important, you don’t find freedom in facts.

The apostle Paul was an interesting character. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, the ruling religious body in Jerusalem, and there’s a reason that he made it to the top of the pile. Philippians 3:4-6:

If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews. As to the Law, a Pharisee. As to zeal, a persecutor of the church. As to righteousness under the Law, blameless.

So Paul’s heritage, his breeding, his upbringing, ticked all the right boxes. He studied the Old Testament Law; he knew it from back to front; he worked hard at it. You know the sort of person. He had all the head-knowledge that you could ask for, all the discipline that you could ever expect of anybody. On-top of that, he was a Pharisee. Now, this sect took the idea of following the Law to incredible lengths. The very word Pharisee means to be a religious separatist. He was absolutely full-on, and yet the one thing he didn’t have was freedom, until one day on the road to Damascus, Jesus appeared to Him, and that encounter with Jesus was the turning-point of his life. This is what he writes years later, looking back on it. Galatians 1:11-12:

For I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin. For I did not receive it from a human source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

So it wasn’t something that he’d learned through years of study; it was a revelation. The original Greek word used there for revelation is the word ‘apocalypsis’. In other words, it was an apocalyptic revelation. Dramatic! Powerful! Completely life-changing, and it wasn’t a revelation about Jesus; it wasn’t words from a book. Come on, Paul knew all those words in the Old Testament books; he’d studied them for years; he’d made it to the top of the religious pile that way, but that’s not what changed his life. It wasn’t a revelation about Jesus; it was a revelation of Jesus, through a personal encounter with Him.

Have you had an apocalyptic revelation of the person of Jesus Christ? Have you had a dramatic, powerful, life-changing encounter with Jesus? No? Then get a revelation. Jesus is waiting for you, now. He wants to turn your life upside-down, now. All the head-knowledge in the world won’t do that for you. Only Jesus.

 

Freedom is a Tricky Thing

Freedom is a tricky thing. So often, we’re our own worst enemies: Our perspective; our thoughts; our behaviour … They all rob us of this elusive thing called freedom. Try as we might, we just can’t grasp it. You’ve had that experience. Right? You know what it’s like. There’s something in your makeup, an Achilles heel if you will, that’s constantly your undoing. For each one of us, it’s something different, but at the end of the day, it trips you up again and again and again. Mine is perfectionism, which has a tendency to fuel anger. Yours?

Well, you probably know what it is. Maybe it’s insecurity; gossiping; a lack of compassion; selfishness … Hey, the list runs as long as my arm, and then some. God has a simple name for it: He calls it sin. The devil loves to rub your nose in it, and just when you’re feeling weak or tired, emotionally spent, he pushes your button and there you go again.

For the apostle Paul, it was an obsessive hatred of the church. He, of course, was a Pharisee in the Jewish religion. Then Jesus came along and turned everything he’d ever believed in, everything he’d ever worked so hard for, completely upside-down. No wonder he hated Christians, but then … Then he met Jesus and something changed in him. People were talking about it. Galatians 1:23:

They heard it said, ‘The one who formerly was persecuting us is now proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy’, and they glorified God because of me.

And he had been, too. He was a terrible persecutor of the church, until that day he met Jesus on the road to Damascus. You can read about it in the book of Acts, chapter 9.

Ok. So he met Jesus, but what happened to turn him from a man breathing threats against the early church to the guy who ultimately wrote almost half the books of the New Testament? That’s quite a turnaround, you’d have to admit. I’ll tell you what happened: Jesus changed his heart. You know and I know that when we have a change of heart, our thoughts and our actions flow out of that, just as God promised in the days of old through Ezekiel. Ezekiel 11:19-20:

I will give them one heart and put a new spirit within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh so that they may follow My statutes and keep My ordinances and obey them.

When you encounter Jesus on your road, when you draw close to Him, when His Spirit fills you to overflowing, He does what you were powerless to do. He changes your heart which, as it turns out, changes everything.

Sometimes though, it feels as though nothing’s happening. Nothing! So what; has God forgotten me now? Has He left me on the shelf? We all want to feel as though God has some great plan for our lives. So in those months (even years) when nothing much seems to be happening, it can be terribly disheartening.

Jesus: “I came to set the captives free”.

You: “Yeah, right. It feels like you’ve forgotten me!”

Other people, they seem to be powering on. You, on the other hand, feel as though there’s nothing really exciting ahead.

Saul is on the road to Damascus, off to persecute some more Christians; he meets Jesus along the way. That’s pretty exciting! But then, he loses his sight and for three days, he’s completely blind. Now that doesn’t sound like such a long time, unless you’ve been struck blind; in which case, it probably feels like an eternity. Adversity has a way of doing that, which is why when you feel as though you’ve been left on the shelf, it does seem like an eternity. Am I right? “Freedom – what’s that?” you ask yourself, in this prison of inactivity. When we get to that point, there’s something we need to be reminded of. It’s what Paul says himself in his letter to the church in Galatia. Galatians 1:15-17:

But when God, who had set me apart before I was born and called me through His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son to me so that I might proclaim Him among the Gentiles, I didn’t confer with any human being, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were already apostles before me. But I went away at once to Arabia, and afterwards I returned to Damascus.

In other words, God already had a plan for Paul, even before he was born. Along the way, people tried to kill the guy; they rioted against him; he was imprisoned; beaten; shipwrecked; bitten by a viper of all things, and eventually, he rotted out the remainder of his days in a Roman dungeon on death row. But that powerful encounter with Jesus, that incredible revelation of Christ Himself when he met Jesus on the road to Damascus, that changed everything. Because no matter how dire his circumstances became, he knew that God had a plan. So in the middle of those difficult circumstances, Paul had the freedom that Jesus promised.

You know, God still has a plan: A plan for today; for tomorrow; next month; next year, and indeed, for the rest of your time on this earth. God hasn’t forgotten you. He hasn’t lost the plot. God has a plan and that fact gives you freedom, even if you’ve been locked away in a dungeon or forgotten on a shelf, and that’s a promise that God wants you to take into your heart today. The only sort of hope the Bible talks about is certain hope, so may the Holy Spirit write that hope on your heart.

 

Overcoming the Old Ways

Ok, the subject for today is circumcision. I know it’s not exactly something you want to be thinking about, but stick with me. There’s an important point to be made, and what we’re really chatting about is freedom: Your freedom here, now, today. But first, let’s head back to first-century Jerusalem. You see, there’s a rocky transition underway for those who believe in Jesus from Judaism (the religion of their forefathers) to Christianity; from the life lived under a complex set of religious rules to a life of freedom in Christ. A lot of the things that seem pretty obvious to us today had to be nutted out back then; it wasn’t easy. One of them was male circumcision, which to this point had been part of God’s Law for His people. Let’s take a look at how the apostle Paul puts it in Galatians 2:3-5:

But even Titus, who was with me, was not compelled to be circumcised, though he was a Greek. But because of false believers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy on the freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might enslave us. We did not submit to them even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might always remain with you.

You see, there’s a tussle here between the old traditionalists who didn’t believe in this whole nonsense about grace through Jesus, and Paul to whom the gospel of grace (the fantastic news of God’s unmerited favour towards us) had been revealed by Jesus Himself. Circumcision was just the flashpoint. The real debate was between the slavery of living under the set of rules, and the freedom that we have through our faith in Christ, and it’s a struggle that continues to this day in the heart of many-a believer because grace is so radical; so counter-intuitive.

We live in a ‘dog-eat-dog’ world, and there seems to be plenty of dog to go around, yet along comes Jesus and says in effect, “Look, it’s not about following a bunch of rules. It’s about experiencing My love and so that you can, I’m going to pay the price on a cross for all the things that you’ve done wrong in your life.”

The reason Paul takes this so seriously is that it strikes at the very heart of the gospel of grace; the truth. Besides, have you noticed? It’s pretty much impossible to follow the rules anyway. We all fall short. That’s why we need Jesus, so if you’ve been struggling under a bunch of rules, do yourself a favour. Ditch them. Go to Jesus instead. Start having a rich, dynamic relationship with Him, and your unbounded freedom will flow out of that relationship. Don’t let rules enslave you.

And you and I, we aren’t the only ones that suffer from this problem. Take Peter, the apostle. We think of Peter as one of the New Testament’s ‘A’-list, yet he made quite a few mistakes along the way, not the least of which was political correctness. This age of rampant political correctness isn’t something new in the twenty-first century. It turns out that there’s nothing new under the sun.

Now look. It’s absolutely a good idea that we shouldn’t deliberately go out there to say or do things that’ll hurt others, but it’s a very bad idea to take that to the ridiculous Nth degree to the point where we curtail our freedoms in order to appease those with an agenda, and that’s exactly what was going on in the first century as Christianity was being birthed out of Judaism. There was a tussle between the two. There were difficult issues to work through.

For instance, most Jews believed that the God of the Old Testament was for them and them alone. Many of the apostles stayed in Jerusalem for that very reason, but Paul was called to be an apostle to the Gentiles, to take the good news of salvation in Jesus to people whom the Jews referred to as dogs, so Peter is happy to dine with the Gentiles until some other legalistic old-school Jews show up, at which point he does the politically correct thing – retreating, only to eat with Jews again. Well, at this point, Paul pretty much has a pink fit. Galatians 2:11-13:

But when Cephas” (that’s Peter’s other name) “came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face because he stood self-condemned. For until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles, but after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction, and the other Jews joined him in this hypocrisy so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy

To the extent that you believe in Jesus, you are free in Christ to live out your faith. Sure; in this age of political correctness, in this age of pluralism, you will be derided for it; you’ll be laughed at for it; you’ll even be persecuted for it, but let Peter’s mistake be a lesson to us all. Let’s not be hypocrites. Let’s not compromise our freedom in Christ to appease the sinners of this world. Sure; the issues today are different, but the principle remains the same. People will disagree with you because you believe in Jesus. They just will. There’s nothing new in any of that … Live out your faith in Jesus anyhow. Don’t let the fear of what others will think or say or do rob you of the freedom that you have in Christ. Don’t let your life compromise the truth of the gospel of grace.

Isn’t it funny how our old ways keep coming back to haunt us? Peter spent three-and-a-half years with Jesus! He saw the miracles; he heard the sermons; he experienced the radically different way that the Son of God approached things. Jesus wasn’t afraid of upsetting religious leaders. Jesus wasn’t afraid of offending people, yet still Peter falls back into his old ways. No wonder Paul took him on! It’s a good thing and as I said, it’s a sobering lesson to you and me about the power of the old ways to rob us of the freedoms that Jesus came to give us. Jesus said that if He sets us free, then we are free indeed. Don’t throw that freedom away so easily.

All too many people start off believing in the free favour of God through Jesus Christ, but … you know, as time goes on, we end up falling back into our old ways. We end up right back in that old idea that you have to work your way into God’s favour. And what a terrible mistake that is!

 

A New Way to Freedom

Have you ever tried to work yourself into God’s favour? You try and you try to do the right thing, but still, you just mess it up. Well, if you’ve been there, you’re not alone.

There’s a fine line between responding to God’s grace, and falling into the trap of trying to work your way into His favour. Here’s how it happens:

At some point, you realise what an amazing thing God did for you, by sending Jesus to die for you on that cross. Amazing! And so you turn your life over to Him – lock, stock and barrel. There’s a joy, a euphoria almost.

But then life gets back to normal. You go back to your day-to-day business and you slip back into your old habits. The sin that’s been robbing you of joy and peace for most of your life creeps back … and guilt sets in.

So, you say to yourself, “Self, you have to do something about this. There are standards here. There are rules. I shouldn’t be doing this … I shouldn’t be doing that.” You start to work at it, harder and harder and harder, and before you know it, you’re pedalling so hard that it’s just about killing you. Yet still that old sin just keeps on tripping you up. My hunch is, you know exactly what I’m talking about.

Jesus promised you freedom, but this doesn’t feel like freedom. That’s because it’s not. Have a listen to what the Apostle Paul writes about trying to follow a set of rules. Galatians chapter 2, verses 15 and 16:

We know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law.

I am my father’s son not because I followed a bunch of rules, and worked my way into that position. No, I am my father’s son because he’s my dad and I’m his son. And as I grew up in that relationship, my behaviour matured and improved as a response to his love. Not because I was good at following rules – which by the way, I wasn’t.

The moment that you and I put our faith in Jesus, God becomes our Father. And the more we grow in that relationship, the closer we get to Him, the more we experience His love, and the more our behaviour changes.

It’s not about following a bunch of rules. It’s about trusting Jesus, and as we experience His love first-hand, allowing His love, His grace, His mercy to change us, to set us free in a way that following a bunch of rules never, ever will. It turns out that living in freedom has everything to do with Jesus. A Scripture that’s really familiar to many people is this one:

It’s no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

But as familiar as that may be to many, I wonder whether we truly realise what it means. Freedom is such an elusive concept for us. We want it, we chase it, but very few ever really experience it. And I mean that especially for people who believe in Jesus.

Because deep down inside, most of us have this nagging sense that we’re simply not good enough. In fact, the more you grow in your relationship with Jesus, the more you see your own weaknesses and failings. That’s just how it happens.n The closer you draw in a rich, dynamic relationship with Jesus, the more aware you become, the more sensitive your spirit becomes to the things that break that fellowship. And sin … sin always disrupts the closeness, the intimacy between you and God, right? I believe that God wants to deal with this in your life today. Galatians chapter 2, verses 19 to 21:

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing.

So, what’s God saying to us today through His Word? Quite simply this: The moment you accepted Jesus into your life, the old you has died. The old you was nailed to a cross – that’s the effect of making Jesus your Saviour and the Lord of your life.

The whole point of Jesus suffering there for you on that Cross was and is to set you free from the old you – and give you a new life. A radically, completely, abundantly new life. So in God’s eyes, it’s no longer the old you who lives but Christ who lives in you.

If you believe in Jesus, you have a complete and perfect right standing with God not because of what you’ve done, but because of what Jesus has done for you, despite what you’ve done. In fact, because of what you’ve done – that’s why Jesus died for you.

That’s the whole point. That’s why they call this the good news. You and I, in and of ourselves, will never, ever be good enough to stand before God. If we were, who’d need Jesus? If we were, then Jesus died for nothing. But as it is, we’re not. And what’s more we never will be. But that’s completely irrelevant. Because it’s no longer you or I who live – that old person is dead and gone – but Christ who lives in us.

So let me challenge you today about some of the old habits that may be robbing you of that freedom that Christ came to give you. The older I get, the more I realise what a creature of habit I am. We all have routines, little rituals that play themselves out day after day.

In the morning when I get up, I always shave before I clean my teeth. It’s never the other way around. I never clean my teeth first and then shave. I couldn’t imagine doing it that way. Why? Its habit, it’s routine.n I’m sure that you have silly little rituals as well. We all do. And one of the habits we want to fall back into, is believing that the only way we can be in God’s favour is to work hard at it.

Now if you’ve believed in Jesus for any length of time, you’ll have heard sermon after sermon after sermon about God’s grace. What’s grace? The free, unmerited favour of God. I’m guessing you’ve heard that definition on more than one occasion. And grace is such a great concept. The theory of it is so … elegant, so simple. In fact, deep down, we suspect it’s just too good to be true.

I was staying with a man recently, a real man of God, who shared something with me of his past. Something he regretted. Something he was ashamed of and I could tell, in his heart of hearts, he still wasn’t over it. He still hadn’t really forgiven himself for it … and I’m guessing that in his heart of hearts, he believed that it was still an issue for God too.n You get that right? Well, check this out. This is the Apostle Paul’s reaction, his response to that old habit. Galatians chapter 3, verses 1 to 5:

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly exhibited as crucified! The only thing I want to learn from you is this: Did you receive the Spirit by doing the works of the law or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? Having started with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh? Did you experience so much for nothing — if really it was for nothing? Well then, does God supply you with the Spirit and work miracles among you by doing the works of the law, or by believing what you’ve heard?

See? They had the same problem as you and me. They were always wanting to fall back to the old ways of working their way into God’s favour through what they did, rather than knowing for sure, deep in their hearts that they were already in God’s favour because of what they believed. Knowing absolutely one hundred percent that God had completely forgiven them absolutely!

Listen to me. If you believe in Jesus, then you are drenched in the grace of God. In the free, unmerited favour of God. Today … and for all eternity.

 

The Conflict Between Law and Grace

If I were to ask you, “Are you living under a curse?” what would your answer be? I guess perhaps if you’re going through some tough times you might be tempted to say ‘yes’. But just for a moment, set your circumstances aside, forget what’s going on around you.

In your relationship with God, are you living under a curse? Now that may seem like rather an odd question. But actually, a good many people who say they believe in Jesus, are doing exactly that. They’re living under a curse. A curse that God wants to remove from your life, today. Galatians chapter 3, verses 10 and 13:

For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who does not observe and obey all the things written in the book of the law’ … [but] Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us — for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree’.

That word … ‘curse’ … is a very strong word. If someone says to you, “I curse you” that’s pretty offensive. You’d take that pretty seriously. There’s a venom, a sense of evil, a sense of fear and foreboding in that word ‘curse’.

Well, now listen to this very carefully: God is saying to you today, that if you’re living your life under the lie that you can only be in His favour, if you perform, if you deliver the goods, if you follow the rules – if that’s how you’re living your life, God is saying to you today that you are living under a curse. That’s very strong. And the reason I’m being so blunt, so direct with you on this, is that God is making a powerful point to you and me today.

But with the bad news, comes the good news. They call it ‘the good news’ but frankly, I think it’s stunningly good news. It’s fantastic news. It’s sensational news. Jesus took that curse on His shoulders when He died for you. He became a curse for you as He hung on that cross, so that you could be set free.

Listen to me. Stop living under the curse of trying to follow the rules and start enjoying the freedom that you have in Christ. Start enjoying the fact that God has put His Holy Spirit in you. Start enjoying the fact that you’re forgiven, that God has a plan for your life, a good plan. Back in the Old Testament it says that ‘the joy of the Lord is your strength’. Have you heard the Good News today? Then enter into that joy. Experience that joy. Live in that joy. The curse has been removed. You are forgiven. You are free. That’s fantastic news. And yet, we still struggle with this whole grace thing, don’t we?

Grace, God’s grace, is such a difficult concept to wrap your heart around. Even if you can wrap your mind around it, wrapping your heart around it, believing in the grace of God is so hard, because we don’t live in a world of grace. We live in a world that measures you on your performance. A world that says if you’re wealthy, if you have a good job, if you live in a big house, if you drive a nice car – then you’re successful. Then you have value. Then you have worth.

And the flip side of that coin is true too. If you don’t measure up, if you don’t deliver, if you don’t fit into the world’s mould of success, if you’re not good looking and well dressed, then you don’t have much worth at all. In fact, all too often, if you can’t do something for people, they just discard you, pass you by, throw you on the trash heap. So we have a performance mindset. We’ve been taught to equate performance, measured by the world’s scale, with value. That’s the basic lie we live with.

And can I say, even as Christians, we kind of have this belief that what comes first in the Bible is the law of the Old Testament, the rule book if you will. And it was only later that this idea of God’s grace, made active in our lives through faith, came about. Law first … then grace. But actually that’s not true. That’s putting the cart before the horse. Have a listen. The Apostle Paul – Galatians chapter 3, verses 6 to 8:

Just as Abraham ‘believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness,’ so, you see, those who believe are the descendants of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, declared the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘All the Gentiles shall be blessed in you.’ For this reason, those who believe are blessed with Abraham who believed.

Now, the point that Paul makes a few verses later in that chapter is that this whole ‘Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness’ thing happened a full four hundred and thirty years before the Old Testament law was given to God’s people through Moses.

So let’s get the horse before the cart. Grace through faith in what God says always came first. Always. Grace. The free, unmerited favour of God. It’s just who God is. It’s born out of the incredible love He has for you and me. The world wants you to perform, to deliver, to be measured by its ruler of ‘success’. And frankly, religion is about performing and delivering too. But what God has for you today is His grace. And grace always, always comes first.

So, let me ask you: If God is the God of grace – and when you see what Jesus did for us on the cross, there can be no doubt about that – then why did He introduce the Old Testament law? Why did God even entertain a bunch of rules that, at the end of the day, His people would simply be incapable of keeping? It’s an important question to know the answer to, because it’s all too easy to slip back into that old way of thinking that following Jesus is all about adhering to a set of rules. So, here’s God’s answer, through the Apostle Paul. Galatians chapter 3, verses 19 and 23 to 26:

Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring would come to whom the promise had been made … Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.

So the Old Testament Law was only ever put there as a temporary measure, until God was ready to reveal His grace through faith, in the coming of Jesus Christ. It was put there to keep people in line, I guess, until God was ready to reveal Jesus. And when you look back at the history of Israel throughout the Old Testament, from beginning to end, the thing that stands out, is that God’s people couldn’t seem to keep the law for very long at all.

In fact, the very name Israel, means ‘to struggle with God’. The whole story of the Old Testament is about Israel struggling to keep the law, struggling in their relationship with God. God sent them prophet after prophet to call them back to Himself. He punished them over and over again, to bring them to their senses. And, for a little while that would work, until they wandered off again. If you asked me, “What’s the central theme, the central point of the Old Testament?” My answer would simply be this, “That try as they might, God’s people couldn’t stick to the rules.”

We can’t follow the law. We will never be able to put ourselves into a right relationship with God, simply by following the rules. The whole of the Old Testament screams out at us, “This isn’t working! There has to be another way!”  And there is … that’s why God sent Jesus. That was always the plan. The whole point of that Old Testament struggle, for you and me today, is to teach us beyond any shadow of a doubt, that following the rules simply doesn’t work. What’s more, it never will. And that’s why we need Jesus.

 

A Word of Encouragement

I just want to finish up today with a word of encouragement. Because the world … well, the world wants to cut you down to size all too often. But as we’ve seen on the program today, God is in the grace business. I remember when I entered the Army as a young man, those first six weeks of basic training were incredibly tough. I mean, they were brutal. Quite a few guys fell by the wayside in those first few weeks.

Looking back on it, you could see what they were trying to do. These young men had come from all different walks of life. Some from wealthy and privileged families, born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Others from much poorer circumstances. Basic training was about cutting everyone down to the same size. Yep, those first six weeks were a great leveller. But where the military wanted to cut us down to size, God wants to do the complete opposite.

When we come into the kingdom of God you and I, when we accept Jesus as our Saviour and make Him the Lord of our lives, what God wants to do is … well, to lift us up to size, if that makes sense. Here’s what I’m talking about – Galatians chapter 3, verses 27 to 29:

As many of you as were baptised into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.

There are some sharp distinctions there. The Jews looked down on the Greeks – in fact, they were referred to as dogs. Of course, there was a huge gap between a free person and a slave. And in that patriarchal society, women were pretty much chattels. They couldn’t earn an income or own property. Without a man, they were poor and destitute.

But what God is saying here to you and me, is that our heritage, our circumstances, our past, our socio-economic standing, our ethnicity … none of those matter. They’re completely irrelevant. Because when we put our trust in Christ, we all become one. We all become heirs – in fact elsewhere, he writes that we become co-heirs, joint heirs, with Christ.

Maybe you look at who you are, where you’ve come from, what you have, what society thinks of you, what other people say about you … and you think to yourself, “What can I ever be in the kingdom of God? Who am I to imagine that God would ever think all that much of me?”

Hmm. Well today, let me tell you who you really are. You are one of His beloved children. An heir of God’s promises, a joint–heir with Christ, of the riches of His inheritance. That’s who you really are and He wants you to live in that truth, today … and for the rest of your days on this earth. So be encouraged. Yeah, it’s a tough, brutal world out there. It’s a world of knocks and bruises. It’s a world where people want to pull you down, and cut you down to size. And if perhaps you’re not feeling the love so much at the moment, then … well, let me pray for you right now.

Father God, I pray for anyone who needs to experience your grace today. That’s pretty much all of us, but really Lord for anyone who needs a special touch of your grace and your love today. I pray that through your Word, that we’ve heard from you today, you will touch that person’s heart deep inside with a revelation of the grace, the mercy, the extreme love that you have for them in Jesus Christ. I pray that through your Holy Spirit, you would fill them with a joy unspeakable at the knowledge of the love that you have for them – a love through which you will make them all that you created them to be. In Jesus’ mighty name we pray. Amen.

Amen, amen. May the Lord truly bless you today.

 

It’s pretty obvious, but let me say it anyway. You and I were not made in order to be slaves; you and I were made in order to be free, so why is it then that so many people are intent on living their lives as slaves these days?

 

From Slaves to Heirs in Christ

Official figures tell us that there are around twenty-one million slaves on the earth today. That’s a shock, isn’t it? “Isn’t slavery a thing of the past? Surely!” Well, actually, no it’s not, and unofficial figures put it much higher at more like one hundred million slaves on the earth today. It’s shocking to think of it, but it’s true. There are that many people in slavery. You might be thinking, “Surely not!” but the facts speak for themselves.

But let me bring this even closer to home. I wonder whether you would consider yourself as someone who, to some extent at least, is a person in slavery: A Person in bondage. Have a listen to this interesting exchange between Jesus and some Jews, God’s own people, men and women who considered themselves to be free. John 8:31-36:

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in Him, ‘If you continue in My Word, you are truly My disciples. And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’

They answered Him, ‘We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do You mean by saying, you will be made free?’

Jesus answered them, ‘Very truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there for ever, so if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.’

Perhaps you’ve heard part of that quoted before: That Jesus came to set you free, but it’s interesting how the Jews of the day (in a sense) took offence at what Jesus said. “We’re not slaves!” They responded indignantly. “Sure you are,” said Jesus. “You are slaves to sin and that … That’s what I’ve come to set you free from.”

Jesus came to set us – you, me, everyone else who puts their trust in Him, free from the slavery to sin that robs us not just of our lives here on this earth, but of a permanent place in the household of God. I wonder what sin is robbing you, enslaving you, keeping you from being all that you can be: All that God made you to be. Come on, what sin has put you in the shackles of slavery? Because it’s that very sin, that very slavery, that Jesus came to set you free from.

Is it really worth it – the anger that’s swirling around in your heart; the resentment; the dishonesty; the sexual sin; whatever it is in your life; whatever your Achilles heel happens to be? Whatever sin you’re hanging onto, is it really, really worth it? Would you like to be set free? Because let me tell you, if Jesus sets you free, you’ll be free indeed.

A few years after that, Paul the apostle continued on with this whole metaphor, this whole discussion about slavery. So here’s a question: Would you rather be a slave in your master’s household or one of his children? I mean, come on. Wind the clock back to the first century when the apostle Paul posed that question to his friends in Galatia. Galatians 4:1-7:

My point is this. Heirs, as long as they are minors, are no better than slaves, though they are the owners of all the property, but they remain under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father. So it is with us.

While we were minors, we were enslaved to the elemental spirits of the world, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law in order to redeem those who were under the Law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father.’ So you are no longer a slave, but a child; and if a child, then also an heir through God.

Ok. What’s Paul’s point? There was a time when we were acting as minors. You know how kids are. They don’t want to listen to their parents; they think they know better. When they become teenagers, they roll their eyes in the back of their head when Mum or Dad tells them to do something. You’ve been there? Me too, and at that point, children are no better than slaves. They remain under guardianship, under a bunch of rules and regulations, almost like slaves in a sense. They’re not free.

When you’re a child, whether at home or at school, you’re told to do something and you have to do it, and that’s what religion is all about. It’s about following a bunch of rules that, quite simply, is not freedom, but then God sent Jesus to redeem us from those rules. The idea of redeeming a slave was to pay the price to his or her master to set them free: To buy them out of their slavery. In a very real sense, that’s exactly what Jesus did. That’s why He’s able to say, “If I set you free, you will be free indeed.”

So many people today believe in Jesus, but they aren’t living in the freedom that He purchased for them. I wonder: Are you one of those? Are you still trying to follow a bunch of rules, kicking and bucking against them, wondering why you constantly fall short. Or do you wake up each morning, open your eyes, and remember in your heart that you are a child of the living God because Jesus set you free? Because that’s exactly what He did. He set you free from the rules and from your inability to keep those rules.

Look, this isn’t some theory lesson; this is real. It’s about the sort of life that you’re living. It’s about how you feel each morning when you wake up. It’s about whether you look forward to the next day with a sense of anticipation, or a sense of foreboding. You were made to live in freedom, and Jesus came to set you free.

 

The Reality of Freedom

A good friend will always tell you the truth. In fact, I love the saying that a friend always stabs you in the front. There are plenty of people out there who will tell you nice things to your face, and then go behind your back and whisper things about you. Right? You have those people in your life; I have those people in my life, but a true friend is someone who stabs you in the front – someone who tells you how things really are. We don’t always like it. None of us likes criticism, but as you read in Proverbs 27:17:

Just as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.

I have just a handful of people who do that for me in my life. I trust them. I know they have a good heart. I know they have my interests at heart, and so when they come to me and they have something difficult to say, as much as I’m like the next person, as much as I don’t really like criticism all that much either, I sit down, I listen, I evaluate, and I take to heart what they have to say to me. That’s the sort of relationship that the apostle Paul had with the church in Galatia, back there in the first century AD. Friend, he loved those guys.

He’d been there at the beginning. He’d been the one who told them about the amazing grace of God through Jesus Christ, but it wasn’t long until some Jewish Christians came along (while Paul was away elsewhere) to convince the Galatians that this whole idea of grace was a nonsense. After all, all these freedoms that Paul had taught them about lead to loose living.

No, no. Go back to the old Jewish Law; to circumcision; to tithing; to all the things you have to do to appease God. After all, in many respects, you look around at all the other religions in the world and they’re all about appeasing one or more gods, so Paul writes this to them. Galatians 4:8-11:

Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to beings that by nature are not gods. Now however that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits? How can you want to be enslaved to them again? You are observing special days and months and seasons and years. I am afraid that my work for you may have been wasted.

Let me hit you right between the eyes. Is that what you’re doing? Having heard about the grace you have in Jesus Christ, have you returned back to the old ways of following a bunch of rules? Because if you have, the work of Jesus Christ on that cross for you is being wasted. Completely wasted.

When you think about it, what the apostle Paul is trying to do is to get his friends in Galatia to wake up to the truth. There is such power in the truth, and today I want to share something incredibly important with you about the truth – the truth. You see, in this world, people don’t often want to hear the truth. The truth often is incredibly inconvenient. It cuts across vested interests. We all struggle with the truth. We all want to sweep things under the carpet. The problem is that that doesn’t solve anything. In fact, often, it just makes things worse.

When you think about it, Jesus was in the business of telling the truth. He told the religious leaders about their hypocrisy in no uncertain terms, and to common, ordinary folk, he spoke about a truth that is all about setting us free. Sounds odd, doesn’t it? Have a listen to the way Jesus puts it. John 8:31-32:

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in Him, ‘If you continue in My Word, you are truly My disciples. And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’

A number of times, Jesus makes the point that He came to set us free, and the place where you find that freedom is in the truth; in hearing His Word, knowing His Word, and taking it into our hearts as the truth. Here’s the thing. You and I, we’re masters of self-delusion. We’re all too ready to criticise others. Come on, we are, but we want to cut ourselves plenty of slack. We want to make excuses for ourselves when deep-down, we know that what we’re thinking or saying or doing is wrong.

And when we get into that guilt trap, then all of a sudden, we find ourselves caught up in that whole cycle again of feeling unworthy, so we pedal harder to do better, and there you have it. There you have it. You’re living a life trying to appease God by following a bunch of rules. Jesus died a gruesome death on a cross so that you and I wouldn’t have to do that. Jesus paid the price of all our sins and mistakes. Colossians 1:13-14:

He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

I receive so many Emails from people around the world who watch or listen to the programmes that we produce here at ChristianityWorks and one of the most common things I hear, over and over again, is that people don’t feel that they’re forgiven. They’re not experiencing God’s forgiveness, and so they can’t forgive themselves for the things that they’ve done wrong. What an incredible burden to carry around all your life, and it’s that burden that Jesus came to set you free from. That’s the truth.

But the question is, how do we actually lay hold of that freedom? Well, as well as the Word of God, there’s the Spirit of God. Freedom is such a precious thing. I talk about it a lot because so many people are caught up in the yoke of slavery: Slavery to their old ways; slavery to their sins; slavery to the things of this world; slavery to the expectations of success; slavery to that sense that, “I’m just not good enough, and what’s more, I never will be”; slavery to … Well, to just about anything, and yes, the truth is important. That’s why Jesus said that if we continue in His Word (if we believe what He says) that we will know the truth, and that truth will set us free.

There you have it. Freedom. Great, but have you ever read those words in the Bible and thought to yourself, “Well, I see the words on the page; I can read them; I can even repeat them over and over again, but somehow, they’re not real for me. They’re not penetrating my heart. I want to be free; I want to believe, but it’s just not happening.” Have you ever felt that? Well, you wouldn’t be alone. The apostle Paul was writing to his friends in Corinth this one time about this very thing. People (he said) were getting caught up in the letter of the Law, but they weren’t experiencing what God was doing for them. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image, from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

Where do you find freedom? In the Spirit of God. In the Holy Spirit, who is given to each person who believes in Jesus. Listen up. If you believe in Jesus, then the Holy Spirit dwells in you and where the Spirit of the Lord is there, right there in you, is freedom.

Father God, I pray that Your Holy Spirit would bring that freedom to life in each one of us. Lord, we know the theory, but we long, we hunger, we yearn to experience Your freedom. Dear Holy Spirit, make that sense of freedom real in our lives. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

I’m believing with all my heart that God is about to do a mighty work in you: A work of freedom; a work of revealing to you, deep in your heart of hearts, the freedom that you have in Christ. Freedom isn’t a concept; it’s not a theory; it’s a reality. Jesus died to purchase that freedom for you. He rose again so that you can live out that freedom in your new life, in Him.

 

Living the Life

Ok, so Jesus came to set the captives free. That’s what He said of Himself. Luke 4:18-19:

The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favour.

Hey, that sounds a lot like freedom to me. That’s the promise that Jesus holds out to you and to me. That’s great, but a lot of people who believe in Him don’t experience that kind of freedom. So, either He was lying when He said that (I’d give that option a fairly low probability), or those people are doing something wrong (a much higher probability, you’d have to say).

There’s a battle going on inside each one of us between living for Jesus and living for ourselves. You and I are essentially pretty selfish individuals and, if you’re anything like me, we have a propensity to go wandering off, living our lives for ourselves rather than for Jesus. It’s almost as though we’ve been given freedom, but we decide to head straight back into a prison again. So compelling is this desire of ours to botch up our lives that we need some help. Fortunately, that’s no surprise to God, and it’s something that He’s already given us in the form of the Holy Spirit. Galatians 5:16-17:

Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh. For these are opposed to each other to prevent you from doing what you want.

There’s the battle: Between what the Holy Spirit would do in our lives, and what we would do of our own accord, and here’s what I’ve discovered: The things that I want to do end up robbing me of the freedom that Jesus wants to give me – the freedom in fact that He’s already given me, and let’s face it. Those things, by and large, are not good things. Galatians 5:19-21:

Now the works of the flesh are obvious: Fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I’m warning you, as I warned you before: Those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Not a very salubrious list, is it? I mean, really, come on. God only tells us not to do the things that are going to hurt us; the things that are going to rob us of the freedom that Christ came to bring us. Listen to the Holy Spirit, and He’ll keep you away from those things. He just will.

Do you know what I’ve noticed? The more I make a point of spending some quiet time with Jesus each and every day, the easier it is to avoid sin. Most days, first thing in the morning (I’m a morning person, you see; I always have been), I just spend a quiet half an hour or so with the door of my study closed and my Bible open; sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less. Now often, there are things on my mind: Stresses, pressures, this isn’t going quite the way I’d like, there’s a struggle in a relationship over there … Whatever.

It can get you down, can’t it? The burden; the load; the pressure, and when you’re carrying that sort of stuff around, you start behaving badly. You do. You get cranky; agitated; resentful; there’s bitterness in your heart perhaps, and man, on those days, the devil is going to have an absolute field day with you. But somehow, in that quiet time with Jesus, He stills my heart. Invariably, I end up walking away and starting my day with an incredible peace; with this joy in my heart, and it’s much, much harder for the devil to attack me and to tempt me. Have you experienced that too?

You see, I think that what’s going on there is that the Holy Spirit is doing His work in us; lifting God’s Word off the page; etching it into our hearts so that it becomes part of who we are, and that … That bears fruit in your life, as opposed to the rubbish that you and I are prone to carry on with. Paul goes on in Galatians 5:22-25. He says:

By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. There is no law against such things. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.

That fruit of God’s goodness just naturally grows out of those times with the Lord each day. I think … I think that’s what it is to walk in the Spirit. Look, I’ve tried doing it the other way; just racing off and doing it all by myself, but each and every time, the devil trips me up. Each and every time, he robs me of my peace and my joy. Each and every time, I end up bound up in my old sinful ways again, instead of living out the freedom that Jesus died and rose again to give me. Jesus didn’t just do the whole cross and empty tomb thing for us two thousand years ago. He also sent His Spirit to live in us to make those things real; to make the freedom real.

The question you have to ask yourself is, why do we imagine that we can go it alone? Why do we rush into our day and try to do things in our own strength when we know, I mean we know one hundred percent, that we’re going to fall flat on our faces; that the devil is going to attack us from every direction, because he knows that our flesh is weak? Why do we do that? I don’t know, but we do. People do it over and over again, and then they wonder why they’re not experiencing the freedom that Jesus promised.

Sometimes, we fall into the trap of thinking that our freedom is dictated by our circumstances. But, like the Apostle Paul, you can be locked up in a dungeon on death row, and yet still experience the freedom that you have in Jesus Christ. That’s the incredible power … of the freedom that God has ready and waiting for you.

 

Your Freedom is Secure

This probably isn’t going to be any shock to you, but your enemy the devil does not want you to be experiencing the freedom that Jesus came to bring you. Now, let’s not get confused about this. He’s happy for you to know about that freedom, in a vague sort of way, he’s even happy for you to see other people living in God’s freedom. That’s not a bad thing from his perspective. But he definitely … definitely does not want you experiencing God’s freedom.

Because, you see, here’s the thing: if freedom, God’s freedom, is something out there, something that’s a great theory, something that preachers preach about, something that a handful of super–Christians out there can maybe have, but something that is quite simply, completely and utterly unattainable for you, then he knows, he has you.

And let me tell you, there are a lot of so–called Christians in that very boat. They know about freedom, they’ve seen others apparently living in freedom … but it just doesn’t seem as though it’s ever going to happen in their lives. 1 Peter chapter 5, verse 8:

Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.

It’s a powerful picture isn’t it – and deliberately so. In the book of Job we’re told in Job chapter 1, verse 7:

The Lord said to Satan, ‘Where have you come from?’ Satan answered the Lord, ‘From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.’

So there he is, prowling around, walking up and down, just waiting to attack someone who is weak in their faith. Someone who doubts the promises of God. Someone who has come to the conclusion that the freedom they’ve heard about, probably isn’t for them. It’s just never going to happen.

Just like the lions in the wild, he’ll pick on the weakest victim and take them down to devour them. But … and this is a big but … this is what God says about that, 1 John chapter 3, verse 8:

The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.

So when you feel powerless, when you feel weak, when you feel as though the devil is on your case … man have I got some good news for you today! This Jesus in whom you believe is right there, next to you, in fact in you, to destroy the works of the devil on your behalf.

In your weakness, in your doubt, in your failings, all you need to do is to turn to Him, to ask Him, to look at Him and He will, He will send the devil packing. He will breathe His freedom into your heart by His Spirit. He will stand for you, He will protect you. It’s just what Jesus does.

I have some good news for you today. You need never, ever, ever be afraid of the devil. To be sure, there is a battle going on in the spiritual realm for your soul. Jesus came to save you, and the devil wants to snatch that gift of eternal life, that gift of grace, that gift of freedom right out of your hands. That is absolutely true. There is a battle going on! This is how Jesus puts it, John chapter 10, verse 10. He says:

The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I have come that you may have life, and have it abundantly.

Someone asked me once: What does it mean to have an abundant life? Well, let me first say, that the word Jesus used there, literally means ‘super-abundant’, it’s just that we don’t have an English equivalent for that. Suffice to say, it’s a really strong word, it’s a word that’s really over the top.

So the question should be: What does it mean to have a super-abundant life? It’s a life of freedom. If you read the rest of the parable in that chapter, Jesus talks about His sheep being able to come in and go out, in safety, in protection, in freedom. John chapter 10, verse 9:

I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.

That’s a great picture, it’s a picture of that abundant life. It’s a picture of freedom and safety, to come in and to go out and to find pasture.

But this battle Jesus is talking about here between the thief and the true shepherd, it isn’t a battle of two equal and opposite forces – one of evil and one of good. Don’t for one moment imagine that. Jesus goes on to make the point – He’s not some hired hand who runs away at the first sign of trouble – no. John chapter 10, verse 11. He says:

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

And so He did – He died and rose again to set you free. We go looking for freedom in all sorts of different places. Sometimes we let the devil lead us by the nose, being tempted into this or that. Sin always tarts itself up to look good. Otherwise it wouldn’t be tempting.

But Jesus … Jesus is the true shepherd and His sheep know His voice. I’m certain you can hear Him speak as I share His Words with you today. And because He is the good shepherd, because He laid down His life for you, because He was raised again to give you a new life … you need never, ever fear the devil. Your freedom is secure. That’s the good news.

Maybe that’s still a bit difficult for you to believe. Well, let’s think about it this way: Let’s imagine that God loves you every bit as much as He tells you. After all, the evidence for that is pretty strong. John chapter 3, verse 16:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

If that’s true, do you think He’d allow the devil to rob you of the freedom that Jesus purchased for you on that cross? Do you imagine for one moment, that God would allow that incredible act of sacrificial love to go to waste? There are people who believe in Jesus with all their hearts and yet, they’re afraid that something they’ve done or something they might do one day … will rob them of their freedom.

Come on – you haven’t found yourself wondering at some point, I wonder “… if, I’m in … or not. You know, I wonder if God’s really forgiven me. I wonder if, when I finally stand before Him, I’ll pass the judgement.” And can I tell you, the devil loves that. Because if he can get a toe-hold in your mind, he’ll work a way to undermine your faith. And truly, that’s why I believe God has brought us together today. Because He is not going to allow that to happen. Jesus said that if you continue in my word, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. So let’s do a bit of continuing, a bit of knowing, to set you free from any doubt. Romans chapter 8, verses 31 to 39:

What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not even withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else?

Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is going to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor anything present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Hey, that is powerful stuff isn’t it? Nothing whatsoever can separate you from the love of God in Christ. That means your freedom, your salvation, are absolutely secure.

 

Freedom in Practice

It’s amazing, just over my lifetime, how many changes have taken place, as oppressive regimes have fallen. The Berlin wall came down in 1989. The Soviet Union came apart in 1991. Apartheid ended in South Africa in 1994.

Of course there are still plenty of oppressive regimes around the world, there are still more than enough conflicts and wars, but there has been a lot of change, even in my short lifetime. And hopefully we’ll see a lot more. The good change happens, when countries move from oppression towards freedom. When, instead of looking after a privileged few through oppressive power structures, governments and leaders start to look after their people.

The bottom line is that you and I were created to be free. To be equal. To be able to live out who we’ve been made to be – of course, within the rule of law – but then without that, there can be no real freedom. And yet, as individuals, we all too often squander that freedom. We all too often throw it away, through our own tyranny, our own selfishness, our own tendency to want to look after ourselves, at the cost of everyone else.

The Apostle Paul makes an interesting, almost blindingly, glimpsingly obvious point, about freedom. Galatians chapter 5, verse 1. He says:

For freedom Christ has set you free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

In other words, wake up, get a revelation! This isn’t just talk this thing about freedom, there’s a point – God actually wants you to be free! Jesus put it slightly differently in John chapter 8, verse 36. He said:

So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.

I love that – free indeed. Really, truly, free from the slavery of sin. This is every bit as amazing as the Berlin Wall coming down, as the Soviet Union and communism coming to an end, as apartheid coming to an end – even more so because this freedom is available to every last human being on planet Earth.

You can be a prisoner in a dungeon on death row, as in fact the Apostle Paul was when he wrote many of the books of the New Testament, and still be free indeed. You can be in the middle of the worst imaginable circumstances of your life and yet, in Christ, still … be free indeed.  This is not just a theory lesson. It is for freedom that Christ has set you free. He means for you to be free. Free indeed. Free from the sin that has ravaged your life. Free from the shackles of bondage. And given the price He was prepared to pay for your freedom, with all my heart, I believe that He doesn’t want you to settle for anything less in your life than being … free indeed.  But exactly what does that look like?

The freedom that Jesus purchased for you and me on that Cross is something that we can never earn for ourselves. Now, many Christians know that in their heads, but only a few live out that truth out in their hearts. I want to come back for a moment to one of my favourite verses about freedom in the Bible. Galatians chapter 5, verse 6:

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that counts is faith working through love.

In other words, none of the rules in the old rule book (in this case the rule if circumcision) count for anything. The only thing that counts in the Kingdom of God, is your faith working through love. Now there’s a powerful truth here about actually living out the freedom that we have in Jesus Christ. There is an incredibly powerful truth here about how to lay hold of this freedom, how to experience this freedom firsthand in our lives.

The first part is faith. I’m a simple guy … and you know what, God’s Word says that Jesus died for me and because of that I am set free from my sin, and because of that I have the gift of eternal life. I am going to believe in Jesus for my salvation. I am going to believe in Jesus for my freedom. And I am going to believe, just as the Bible tells me to, that these are the free gifts from God, through the sacrifice of Jesus. Full stop, end of story. I believe. How about you? But then … then God wants us to put that faith to work … in love. And the sort of love He’s talking about here, is sacrificial, unconditional love – the very sort of love that Jesus showed towards you and me on that Cross. Agape love.

Look, without work and exercise, your muscles are going to waste away. If you sit there on the couch you’ll just become weaker and weaker. And without works, faith is dead. Unless we take our faith out for a walk, unless we exercise our faith in sacrificial, unconditional love, it becomes empty, hollow … dead. I think you know what I’m talking about here.

What does freedom look like? How do we lay hold of God’s freedom? By having faith in what God says, and by living out that faith, day by day, by showing the same unconditional, sacrificial love that Jesus showed towards us on that cross.

It’s by living that sort of a life that you experience freedom. A sense of freedom that we’re all so desperately looking for, comes when we surrender our lives to God, believing in Him, trusting in Him, and working out that faith by loving others in Him. Rules? Nah. The only thing that counts is faith working through love. And when we live like that, other people’s failings and weaknesses will no longer rob us of our freedom.

All too often we set out at the beginning of a day, with all good intentions of living in God’s joy and God’s peace. Living in the freedom that Jesus came to give us. After all, as the Apostle Paul writes, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. That’s why God sent Jesus – to give us that freedom.

But then, it’s almost as though the devil deliberately wants to rob you of your sense of freedom. Someone comes along and argues with you, to fight with you, to be angry with you, to stab you in the back, to … right? And it’s like, in an instant, your sense of freedom, your peace, your joy, they just disappear. In an instant you go from living in victory, to being a victim. Freedom – great! What happened to that?

But God has an answer to that. He has a solution for that. Because He doesn’t want anyone or anything robbing you of your freedom. Again, the Apostle Paul, Galatians chapter 6, verses 1 and 9:

My friends, if anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness. … So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up.

Did you catch that? Instead of adopting a victim mentality, instead of going on the back-foot, get out there on the front-foot by exercising your faith through unconditional love. Look, when they came to arrest Jesus, when they tried Him, beat Him, spat on Him, when they nailed Him to a Cross, not at any point in that process did He adopt a victim mentality. He knew what He was about. He knew what He was called to – to save us through sacrificial, unconditional love. In fact, at one point He even said, in John chapter 10, verse 18:

No one takes my life from me but I lay it down of my own accord. I have the power to lay it down and I have the power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.

There is freedom of choice. There is faith working through sacrificial love. So, when people come against you, don’t throw in the towel, don’t become the victim. Don’t grow weary in doing what is right, don’t let them rob you of your victory, your peace, your joy and your freedom. Don’t grow weary of doing what is right. Love them, correct them, admonish them, sure. But do it in love. Whenever you have the opportunity, show unconditional, sacrificial love.

Will it hurt some days? Absolutely. Going to the cross always hurts. But you will reap that harvest … at harvest time. That’s freedom.

 

Freedom is Not an Excuse for Sin

Whenever you hear some guy like me talking about the freedom that you have in Jesus Christ, it’s very easy to get the wrong idea. Yes, through Jesus we have been set free from the obligation to follow a bunch of rules, the way God’s people had to in Old Testament times. The check list of six hundred and thirteen do’s and don’ts in the Old Testament law doesn’t apply to you or me anymore. That’s great news, because neither you nor I are all that good at keeping a bunch of rules anyway.

But at the same time, the freedom that we have in Jesus, isn’t our excuse to go and live the life of Reilly. It’s not our excuse to say, well you know, I can do anything I want. You start using your newfound freedom in Christ that way, and any sense that you may have had of freedom evaporates just about as quickly as the steam coming off a hot cup of coffee. It’s there one minute and gone the next. That’s what happens to the joy we get from our sense of freedom, if we start using it for the wrong things. Galatians chapter 5, verses 13 to 15:

For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ If, however, you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by each other.

It’s a good point. Freedom doesn’t really become freedom, until you and I use it to love others. Can I tell you, one of the greatest revelations that I had when I became a Christian twenty something years ago, is that serving other people, using your gifts and abilities to bless others in love – that’s where the freedom is. That’s where the contentment is. That’s where the joy, that you’ve always been looking for, is.

I always thought it came from getting the things I wanted … no wonder, in that old life, I never found what I was looking for. Do yourself a favour. Don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do the wrong thing. That attitude: Oh, it’s okay, God’s going to forgive me anyway, that’s is going to rob you of your freedom quicker than I can say Jack Robinson. So:

As servants of God, live as free people, yet do not use your freedom as a pretext for evil. (1 Peter 2:16)

It’s amazing how we allow the little foxes to come in and spoil the vine. We justify them to ourselves and to others … but one day you’ll wake up, and not only has the vine stopped bearing fruit, it’s dying. Don’t squander your freedom.

Instead, live in it with great joy, with a complete surrender of your life to Jesus, to go out and to serve others, with the incredible gifts, the abilities that God has given you. You are so special. You have abilities and insights that are completely unique. You’re one of a kind. And the joy, the satisfaction that comes from spending your gifts and your abilities, your time and your resources, on other people, on pouring God’s love and grace and mercy out on those other people is absolutely incredible!

Maybe you already know that … but isn’t it so easy to lose sight of what God put you on this earth for, when the mundane things of life, the basic busyness of making it through each day, takes over? It is, isn’t it? I just feel that God wants to give you a nudge today, a reminder today. If the joy of living your freedom in Christ has kind of, well … evaporated, it’s time for a reality check.

What little foxes have crept in and started spoiling your vine? Hmm? What sin do you need to deal with and repent of? And what opportunities has God set before you to use your gifts, your abilities, to pour His love out to a lost and hurting world? What people has God placed around you, who desperately need to experience His love … through you, hmm?