Paul opens the fifth chapter of the book of Galatians with this bold statement: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” (Galatians 5:1). There is no other reason why we have been set free, except to be free! The sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Son of God on the cross did more to us than our brains could ever grasp. Christ died so that we would no longer live lives of slavery but of freedom in Him. What a wonderful news! We have been given the option; we have been offered an alternative: freedom from sin. Our Father in heaven must truly be hallowed and revered because He has thought of every aspect of this salvation work. He desired to save us but not just so that we would have eternal life and escape His righteous judgement but also so that we would live freely. In our world, this is something any man desires, seeks and is ready to die for. Sadly, it is also something that man usurps a lot from another man. It’s difficult to comprehend why that is but one is thing is for sure our quest for power often leaves us at the mercy of slavery to power. We were created for God, and we can only be truly satisfied in Him. As St. Augustine would say “our hearts are restless until they find rest in you”. However, because of the sin in our lives, we often look for our satisfaction including our freedom in many other things that tend to enslave us instead of brining us that peace. One such thing is the love of self. As appealing as it is to our flesh, the love of self is destructive to everything we have and are. In my readings this week, I was struck by the stark contrast we find in the bible when it comes to the love of self. As you continue reading, my goal is to remind you to not love yourself and to not be enslaved by your love for yourself.
In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul’s theme has been service and sacrifice. He told the Corinthians to love one another by putting the other person’s need first and he ensured they understood what real love was. He also told the Corinthians to aspire or seek the common good. For example, when it comes to living as a Christian, Paul exhorts us to look for what is beneficial to my brother or sister that Christ died for. Therefore, Paul would always encourage the Corinthians to desire the spiritual gifts that build the body of Christ, the gifts that edify the body rather than the ones that edify the single person. Moreover, Paul, would instruct the churches to come to the financial aid of one another; brethren were called to care for one another in that regard. In fact, Paul commended the Macedonian churches in particular that always helped him out in his missionary journey although they were quite poor (2 Corinthians 8:1-6). The point was that they lived for the good of others, their aim was to see the gospel advance. This is an example of putting the needs of others before your very own and it is only possible when the life of freedom Christ has given us is fully embraced. Literally, everywhere we turn in the bible, we are called to serve, and I believe it is because this is the remedy to loving yourself. When you begin to serve, you learn to care for others and quite frankly, you start forgetting about yourself and all you want to do is give yourself out to bless your neighbour. This is contrary to the ways of this world, but it is what we Christians are called to. We are to imitate our Lord and Saviour who said, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom to many.” (Mark 10:45). When you follow after such a model, is it any surprise that you deny yourself for others? Paul’s words and the words of other apostles did not originate from them, what they did was reiterate the original message of Christ using examples that would speak more to their audience as they contextualized the message. It seems our priorities are not aligned with the truth of God’s words anymore, we forget that we are from the world but not of the world; we forget that our citizenship is in heaven; we forget that our allegiance is to our new master and king Jesus; indeed, we forget many things. The result can be seen in the way we treat our bodies, the way we treat one another, the way we treat our families, the way we manage our finances, the way we spend our leisure time, the way we work, the way we do family planning, the way we feed ourselves, etc., these in turn enslave us and we end up not living the life of freedom that Christ has set for us.
Paul was very clear that because of our new position in Christ, we have freedom, yet we ought not to be enslaved by anything. He said: “‘Everything is permissible’ – but not everything is beneficial. ‘Everything is permissible’ – but not everything is constructive. Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others.” (1 Corinthians 10:23-24). To live in our freedom means to know what enslaves us and continually stay away from such things; it means to not have worries in this world; it means to set our eyes and affections on Christ alone; it means to not condemn ourselves of anything; it means to be open-minded and expectant to the many ways in which God works; it means to run into the arms of the Father at all times and in all occasions knowing that we will be accepted; it means to live a life filled with the Spirit – a life marked by: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23). It is simple and quite straightforward, but it is also very difficult to do. But that is why, our good Father did not leave us on our own to attempt to live this life of freedom, His Son left us with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit enables us to live this life of freedom come what may, no matter the circumstances and situations we find ourselves in. I was thinking about what Jesus said about being first, he said “whoever wants to be first must be the slave of all” (Mark 10:44) and how countercultural and counterintuitive this saying is for us living in the 21st century world. However, the command has not changed, we are still called to live a life of freedom in the 21st century, which entails service to others. We must expect friction with the world, we must expect to be the odd ones out, we must expect hatred from the world, and this is not in the outrageous way we often picture but we must expect it subtly – disguised in laws and policies contrary to the bible. Sadly, because our view of freedom has been distorted, we have conformed to the worldly definition of freedom, pursuing whatever our desires would bring us and we have come to believe that restraining ourselves from what is harmful is not freedom. Indeed, there is so much we need to grasp again, like Paul said to Corinthians, “we are still children needing milk when we ought to eat solid food by now” (1 Corinthians 3:2).
I suspect our love for self has made us numb to the Spirit and the things that please the Lord. This manifests itself in the way we want to receive love from others; the way we fear to speak to them about Christ – how we overthink things; the way we are afraid of standing up for our biblical values; the way we value not offending others instead of speaking the truth to them. Honestly, given how bad we are, and how inefficient we have become as the bride of Christ in this world, we ought to be on our knees daily, confessing to the Lord and pleading for His mercy and help. We ought to recognize that we are failures apart from Him and that we can do nothing without Him. The least the bride of Christ can do these days is to come together in systematic prayers. We need to realize that the Lord is our fortress, our strength, the One who will and does fight our battles regardless of what they are. May the Lord help us to have a true appreciation of who we really are, may humility be our portion so that we can live the life of freedom we have been given. Amen!
A Word Aptly Spoken 