Having freedom to recover and pursue – The Robesonian

Freedom is a tough word these days. It seems that it means so many things to so many different people. So many of the arguments that we seem to have in culture these days are about freedom and what it means to various people and how those freedoms bump up against each other.

The issue is that there are really two kinds of freedom. There is freedom from and freedom to. In our culture these days freedom from is the more dominant of the two. It shows a lack of restraint, a word not all that popular these days.

Someone who is pursuing this kind of freedom might sound like this: Im free from restraint and rules. I dont have to mediate my passions, impulses, or appetites because I am free from all external control, whether it be social, legal or moral.

In the process of this pursuit all too often people become enslaved to something else. I have seen this most poignantly in my own life with friends and acquaintances that suffer from addiction. All too often they use the language of freedom to justify their drug use or their drinking when in reality they are just slaves to the bottle or the needle or promiscuous sex or whatever passion, impulse or appetite to which they have given control of their lives.

Opposite of this, and what I would offer is the biblical ideal of freedom, is the freedom to pursue something noble and good. In biblical terms, we would think about this as freedom to pursue God. When the Apostle Paul states, in Galatians 5:1 For freedom Christ set us free. Stand firm, then, and dont submit again to a yoke of slavery, this is the kind of freedom that he is talking about. This is not a kind of freedom for the members of the church to go and do whatever they want. This is freedom from sin that allows them the freedom to pursue God and his design for their lives.

At the beginning of this little series several weeks ago we talked about the perfect design that God has for us and for the world and how our sin has led to brokenness and a falling away from Gods good and perfect design. We then looked at the gospel and how the gospel is the good news that God has taken care of this brokenness in the miraculous birth, sinless life, substitutionary death, and death-killing resurrection of the Son Jesus.

But the full context of this good news, of the gospel, is freedom. The work of Christ has set us free from our slavery to sin and death and gives us the freedom to recover and pursue Gods design for us. There are several things that one might call this journey to recover and pursue Gods design. We might call it the pursuit of holiness or sanctification. Ultimately what it is the desire of the disciple to become like the master.

The journey of the Christian does not end with the profession of faith and the decision to follow Jesus. Rather, that is but the beginning of the Christian journey. It is a journey, however, that we cannot start until God, in His grace, sets us free. It is also the journey of a lifetime.

This freedom to recover and pursue Gods design is not something that we will get correct from the beginning, because even though we will have been set free from the power of sin and death, we still live in a broken and fallen world. So, every day, we are on a journey to follow God more closely, to align ourselves more directly with His will, and to more completely pursue his design for ourselves, our families, our churches and our communities.

Points to consider:

1) How have you seen an unbiblical idea of freedom cause havoc in your own life or in the lives around you?

2) What does it mean to you that we have been set free, in Christ, to recover and pursue Gods good and perfect design for us?

3) What are some ways, this week, that you can work to follow God more closely?

S. Carter McNeese lives in Fairmont, NC with his wife, son, and various pets. He is pastor at Fairmont First Baptist Church. You can reach him at [emailprotected]

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Having freedom to recover and pursue - The Robesonian