What Does the Bible Say about Freedom?
Happy Independence Day week! The 4th of July is always a day of fun celebrating the freedoms we enjoy and those who secure and maintain those freedoms for us. Every July 4th evening, after we’ve sat around a table with friends eating the homemade ice cream we all took turns churning, it becomes clear to me that my life as an American and as a Christian actually has very little to
do with independence. It’s more about inter-dependence. At its heart, Christianity is about acknowledging we need help. That we need each other. That we need a Savior. Our faith—and our country—is founded on the idea that life is most abundant when individuals and groups work cooperatively with one another to achieve a way of living that honors everyone.
But even though independence isn’t necessarily a biblical principle, freedom definitely is. In fact, freedom is central to the bible. And there are two major stories in the bible which help us think about freedom. The first story is the story of the Exodus, which we’ll tell y’all with a little help from the Jesus Storybook Bible:
So, God’s people—the Israelites—were in slavery down in Egypt. That’s obviously a problem, so Moses went to Pharaoh and said, “Let my people go!” But he wouldn’t. So God sent 9 plagues. Frogs and flies and sickness and hail and locusts to persuade Pharaoh to free the people. But Pharaoh still wouldn’t let the people go free. So finally, Moses warned Pharaoh. He said, “Look… you better obey or God will have to send the worst thing of all.” But Pharaoh just laughed it off. So God did it. God sent a 10th plague—the worst of them all. God sent death over the Egyptian households. God told God’s people to take their best lamb, to kill it and to put some of its blood on their front doors so that when death passed through town, it would pass over the Israelites’ homes. That night everything happened just as God said it would and Pharaoh’s oldest son died. And at last Pharaoh did what God demanded. “You and your people get out!” Pharaoh shouted to Moses. “Just go!” And so that night, Moses and God’s people fled out of Egypt and out of slavery. They were free at last! God’s people would always remember this great rescue and call it “Passover.”
That’s the story of how the Israelites gained their freedom from Egypt. It wasn’t everyone fending for themselves. God fought for them, and God didn’t quit until every single man, woman, and child was free. And neither did Moses. We could all learn something from God and Moses on that… fighting for one another’s freedom.
But that’s only the beginning of the story of the Israelites’ lives of freedom. When God freed the Israelites from the Egyptians, God didn’t say to the Israelites, “That’s it. You’re free now. So get out there and make up for lost time. Do whatever you want. Sin big.” What actually happened is once the Israelites made it safely through the Red Sea and into the wilderness, God gave the Israelites Commandments to live by. Rules to follow to love God and one another while enjoying their freedom. We can sum these commandments up with three short commands: “Do good. Do no harm. And stay in love with God.” You do those three things and you’ll enjoy your freedom faithfully.
We grew up in the 2900 block of Locust St. here in West Des Moines and we played outside all the time. Water gun fights, soccer in the back yard, shooting cans with rubber band guns, wrestling the neighbor kid, basketball in the driveway, climbing the maple tree in the front yard. Everything we needed to have a good time was right there on that little two tenths of an acre plot. Until… we got bikes. Once we got our first bikes, we wanted to be able to see more of the neighborhood than just our yard. Because riding your bike in circles in your driveway is fun for about one second. When we first got our bikes, we were allowed to ride 3 houses down in either direction of our house. Sometimes when we were feeling really adventurous, we’d ask if we could ride 5 houses down. We enjoyed hours of fun riding back and forth, in and out of those 7 driveways. We must have done that hundreds of times every summer. But eventually we wanted more. We wanted the freedom to be able to explore the neighborhood. We wanted to be able to ride the half mile downhill to Fairmeadows park, and to our buddy Max’s house 2 blocks in the opposite direction. We wanted to be able to ride our bikes to school. And we got to that point eventually, but getting there required something of us. The freedom we wanted required trust that we would use our freedom responsibly and make good decisions.
That’s what freedom required when the Israelites were in the wilderness; that’s what it required when we were kids and later when we were in high school; and that’s what it still requires… that we acknowledge it as a gift and enjoy it responsibly, making good decisions along the way. So… What does responsible use of freedom look like? Being free doesn’t mean you and I get to do whatever we want. That’s what the Corinthians thought it meant. They thought being recipients of God’s grace meant they could do anything they wanted. 1 Corinthians 6:12… “You say, ‘I have the right to do anything,’ but not everything is beneficial.” Being free doesn’t mean we can do whatever we want and treat people however we want. The simplest way to put this is, “Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.” The freedom we all enjoy comes along with some moral requirements to do good; to do no harm; and to stay in love with God.
“Do good; do no harm; stay in love with God”
Many years after God freed the people from Egypt, God freed the people again, but on a much bigger scale. The greatest freedom we have is the freedom from our sins, won for us by Jesus. It’s a freedom that supersedes all other freedoms; and it’s a freedom we enjoy because of grace. Our responsibility as Christians is to remember grace isn’t a free pass to do harm. It’s a reason to do good.
Every 4th of July we have an occasion to look into the past to remember our nation’s history and who it was freed from. But EVERY day should be an occasion for us to look into the future to imagine what our freedom in Christ will be for. What is the freedom you have through Jesus Christ and his cross for? For sharing the Gospel? For doing good? For keeping you in love with God? Whatever it is, today we give thanks for our freedom from sin and for Jesus who gives us that freedom.
