Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.
1 Peter 2: 16
This statement brings to mind two possible responses. The first is that I already do that; I vote, express my political views, go to church, choose my own friends, shop where and when I want, and basically don’t live under any particular compulsions. The second is that freedom is not something that I can even begin to imagine; I am held down by my financial situation, education, health, social status, where I live, who my parents were; so, multiple factors that are out of my control keep me constrained and confine the horizons of my life.
God tells us that both thought processes are flawed, for both focus on a type of image of freedom that has nothing to do with the heart of living free. One of the central purposes that Christ brought to His life among people was to define, demonstrate, and perfect access to real, God-centric freedom. Freedom means that I can escape the need to find my sense of worth in wealth, education, position, power, control, worldly success, fame, and dominance. Freedom says to my mind that I am not held down or back by who I know, where I live, what I do, my parentage, my bank account, my health, my past, and my fears. Freedom is the voice of the Spirit of God speaking to my heart of my potential and my worth, and it is God, Himself, showing me what He wants me to do and why this matters to Him.
Freedom should be embraced and celebrated every day of the year and in every aspect of living, for in Christ, every person has the ability to be totally free. Whether in a palace or a prison, living in a cardboard shack or on a mountain top, and in the finest of physical condition or while drawing those last breaths of this life, all people can be bathed in the freedom that flows from God’s spring and that is Christ’s gift to all who will receive it.
Be free; worship the freedom; pray to receive it more fully; open your heart to its giver; and use the freedom as an act of service to Christ.
