From the Pastor |
On July 4th, we celebrated Independence Day… the day we set aside every year to remember and celebrate how 13 colonies banded together to fight for their freedom from the British Empire. In fact, after securing their independence our founding fathers established our new, sovereign nation by first guaranteeing many “freedoms” for its citizens. Freedoms that are important, even priceless, but so easily taken for granted.
1st we were granted the FREEDOM OF RELIGION… which guarantees to all Americans the right to practice any religion they choose, or to practice no religion at all. Congress is forbidden from establishing any one religion as our national religion. Even though so many frequently declare that we are a “Christian” nation… We are not… and we certainly do not act like one most of the time… but I’ll come back to that in a minute. We are granted the FREEDOM OF SPEECH… The right to express our ideas and opinions freely… about anything… We can even openly criticize our government without fear of imprisonment. The FREEDOM OF THE PRESS is similar to freedom of speech, this is where we have the freedom to express our ideas and opinions in writing as well as the freedom to read what others have written. We have the FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY… of PETITION… the freedom or right to BEAR ARMS and OWN PRIVATE PROPERTY… We have the Freedom to live or travel anywhere in our nation… Freedom to work at any job for we are qualified to work… Freedom to marry and raise a family… Freedom to receive an education in public schools… Freedom to join a political party, a union, and other legal groups… We are certainly not a perfect nation, but, thankfully, we have many freedoms offered to us… Yet are we truly FREE? The idea of freedom did not begin here in 1776… Throughout history and all around the world, human beings have, as the inscription of the Statue of Liberty reads, yearned to “breathe free.” Thousands of years before Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, the Hebrew people suffered as slaves in Egypt. They yearned for freedom. God sent a man named Moses who demanded of Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” Pharaoh refused, and yet God delivered them to freedom. A thousand years later, the people of Israel were again oppressed by the tyranny of the Roman Empire. God sent Jesus, who announced that he had been anointed by the Holy Spirit “to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives… to let the oppressed go free.” Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free… So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” But this time… freedom took on a different form. For many of us, freedom has become synonymous with personal independence; the ability to make our own decisions and choose our own path in life, to do whatever we want, whenever we want. But this is not the freedom that Jesus promised. Jesus did not end Roman Imperial rule… he did not drive out the enemy… the nation of Israel did not enjoy a happily ever after… Yet Jesus came to bring True Freedom. Jesus was not setting us free to do whatever we wanted; He was freeing us to do what we ought to do. Jesus came to free us from the strangle-hold sin has upon us. He was liberating us to walk in a good relationship with God and to be the kind of people God created us to be. This is what Paul was trying to tell the church in Galatia. The church was divided. There were those who believed that freedom in Christ meant they could do whatever they pleased. Since they were saved, it did not matter if they sinned or not. It is amazing how things do NOT change very much. Our society seems to believe freedom means “I can do whatever I want, whenever I want to.” We grasp onto our constitutional freedoms, such as freedom of speech, regardless of how it affects others. But what that misses is that there are always consequences to our actions and choices. Pure self-indulgence never results in real freedom. Paul knew this when he wrote: “You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.” Do not use your freedom to satisfy your own selfish desires… use your freedom to “serve one another humbly in love.” Paul reminds the people of Galatia, and us here today, that Christ has broken our chains of sin and death… he has set us free from the oppression they bring, and we are to respond to a loving and graceful God by loving our neighbor as ourselves. We are free not simply to be at liberty, but we are free to be more freely loving; and if we are more freely loving, we will be a people who seek a more just and supportive society in which people no longer bite and devour one another. That is what I meant when I said before that we certainly do NOT act like a Christian nation. We have certainly NOT heeded Paul’s words: “If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.” We are a nation that is so divided we are destroying each other. It is hard to see love in action… even among those people called Christians. To be truly free, to experience the freedom Christ brings, is to be able to move beyond the self… beyond the idea of me, me, me… and instead to focus on love and service to others. To be free is to be free for responsibility, not from responsibility. That is where we find true freedom and that is where we too often fail. As Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” The truth of Christ’s teachings were to share love, light and life with others… to Love God and Neighbor and one another and even the enemy… because the only thing that matters is faith working in love. I believe one of America's greatest gifts to the world is the notion of religious freedom. Every citizen is free to worship whomever and however they wish or not at all… it is our right, our freedom to choose. The government cannot dictate our faith to us… just as we cannot dictate the faith for others… But that does not mean that people of faith do not have a crucial role to play in the life of our nation. As Disciples of Christ, we should be working every day to create a society that is marked by concern for the common good. We need to be listening for the voices of those who are not being heard. We must speak out against greed, injustice, violence and hatred… combating evil with LOVE! We are called to be a servant people, bringing good news to the oppressed, modeling justice, proclaiming liberty to the captives. We have just celebrated our nation’s history of freedom… now as Christians we need to take the responsibility we have for the freedom we have been offered through Christ. Can you even think of a time that called for moral leadership more than these days? Oh, what an opportunity we have, what a responsibility we have to strive to put aside our divisions… and instead work to repair, to raise up, to bring justice and peace, and to offer hope for all those who suffer in our midst and beyond our shores. The true meaning of love is found in the freedom that comes from Christ. True freedom is what you get when you live your life in loving service to others. The only way to truly find freedom is to give yourself away in love. For “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free…. [so] serve one another humbly in love” utilizing the “fruit of the Spirit… love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
0 Comments
|
Yeon Shin
|