THROUGH MOST OF HISTORY, human beings have treasured the idea of freedom. We love being unrestricted, at ease, and able to make our own choices. When our freedom is under attack, we may fight or even die to protect it. We detest being confined or controlled against our will. We always seek to be free.

Where does our passion for freedom come from? What is the origin of the widely-held view that people of all nations, languages, religions and political persuasions have an inalienable right to be free? The Bible’s opening chapter hints at the answer. It elegantly announces the profound truth that God created human beings in His own image (Gen 1:26-27). He made us to reflect His moral, rational, spiritual, interpersonal nature—and He made us to share in His freedom. Our vast capacity for freedom didn’t arise of its own accord, nor was it something that we discovered or merited. It was (and is) a gift from God, given to us freely in grace.

GOD IS FREE

Human freedom, then, bears testimony to the fact that God is free. Could it be any other way? God is sovereign LORD, the Maker (Ps 115:15; Eccl 11:5; Is 44:24; Jer 51:19) and Owner (Job 41:11; Ps 24:1) of the whole cosmos. Who can force the hand of the Almighty? All that He does, He does by choice. He is free.

But God is free not just because He is all-powerful; He is free because He is love (1 John 4:8,16). Love and freedom go together, for love is freely chosen (both in the giving and in the receiving), and it values the freedom of the other. The Bible reveals that God is a Community (Gen 1:26; see also Gen 3:22; 11:7; Is 6:8) whose Members—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—are freely set apart to one another in love. Accordingly, God is the perfect example of freedom:

• He is free to love without limit (1 Chron 16:34; Ps 31:21; 36:5; 57:10; 63:3; 86:13; 108:4; 115:1; 119:64; Jer 31:3; John 3:16; 15:13-14; 1 John 4:8-10,16).
• He is free to be holy without compromise (Lev 10:3; 11:44-45; 19:2; 20:26; 21:8; 22:32).
• He is free to have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and to have compassion on whom He will have compassion (Ex 33:19).

CREATED TO BE FREE

God likes the idea of human freedom at least as much as we do. He freely willed Adam and Eve into existence and gave them divine sanction to live in expansive freedom—to fill the earth, make use of it, rule over it (Gen 1:26,28), and feed on its seed-bearing produce (Gen 1:29). Their human freewill was so sacrosanct that not even God would override it: He provided a way for them to freely choose Him rather than be locked into a relationship with Him. In the middle of the garden, He planted a tree of special significance: the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They were free to eat from any other tree in the garden (Gen 2:16), but when they ate from that tree, they would certainly die (Gen 2:17). The choice was theirs: obey God and live in His love, or disobey God and be eternally separated from Him, their Life Source.

FREEDOM LOST

We know what happened next. A notorious serpent—the enemy of human freedom—sidled up to Eve in the garden and asked her a question: ‘Did God really say…?’ (Gen 3:1). He was manipulating her so that she would forget about her immense freedom in God’s embrace and focus on the one thing she didn’t have. Eating the prohibited fruit, the serpent claimed, would not bring death as God had forewarned (Gen 3:4). Don’t be silly! It would confer divine authority. For God ‘knew’ that when Eve and her husband ate the fruit, their eyes would be ‘opened’ and they would be masters of good and evil ‘like God’ (Gen 3:5). Thus they would be free of Him: no longer answerable to Him or in need of anything that only He could provide.

If the serpent’s words were true, God’s goodness was a myth. He wasn’t a doting Parent who had His children’s best interests at heart; He was a liar who was trying to keep them pinned under His giant thumb against their freewill. The forbidden fruit dangling in front of their noses appeared to hold the promise of divine knowledge—the very thing for which they now hungered—so they snaffled some and scoffed it down (Gen 3:6). God, it seemed, had tried to stop them from reaching their human potential. Hah! They had shown Him: they had thrown off the shackles of obedience in the name of self-rule. They were free!

Or were they? Their eyes had certainly been opened, but what they saw wasn’t enlightening; it was mortifying! Their craving to be godlike hadn’t been gratified; they were mere earthen vessels made to be filled with the God whose presence they had disdained. They didn’t feel wise, authoritative or complete in themselves; they felt defective, afraid, ashamed. Unable to face the truth of their earthy, ungodlike humanity, they hastily improvised some coverings for themselves (Gen 3:7-8). In days to come, a hardened selfishness in the human soul would give rise to jealousy, jealousy to rage, and rage to murder (Gen 4:8). The seed of that delinquent act (and myriad others) had been sown: human beings were sinners. Our innocence was lost. Our freedom was destroyed. Our fall was complete.

We humans have done something horrible: we have taken the freedom that God freely gave us and exercised it against Him. We have wilfully detached ourselves from our heavenly Father—the Architect and Wellspring of human freedom—and reached for a ‘freedom’ that supposedly lies beyond Him. The shocking result: we have undone our freedom! We have freely marched ourselves into a darkened cell on death row, locked the door, and thrown away the key. As a consequence, we are innately captive to sin: murderous sentiments, covetous desires, self-righteous attitudes, unwholesome speech, unscrupulous deeds, indifference toward God and neighbour—and the list goes on. The effects of humanity’s sin are seen globally as war, poverty, tyranny and injustice, and felt personally as anxiety, pain, rejection, hopelessness, worthlessness, emptiness, anger, regret. Without help from someone who is free, we are enslaved to sin (John 8:34; Rom 3:9-18; 7:14,25) and under a curse of death (Gen 3:19; Rom 6:23).

FREEDOM RESTORED

But here’s the good news: God has come to free us! He has sent His divine Son, Jesus Christ, into our midst to (in His own words) ‘proclaim freedom for the prisoners and … set the oppressed free’ (Luke 4:18; see also Ps 146:7; Is 42:7,9; 51:14; 61:1; Zech 9:11). How Jesus achieved this is breathtaking: He willingly expended the precious currency of His own lifeblood to purchase us out of slavery for God (Rev 5:9; see also Acts 20:28; 1 Cor 6:19-20; 7:23; Rev 1:5). Though He was (and is) everlastingly free, He put Himself in our place of captivity and absorbed into His own body the righteous sentence of death that had befallen us due to our rebellion. But death wouldn’t confine Him for long. On the third day, God freed Him (and all believers with Him) from death by raising Him to eternal life.

As a result, we who trust in Jesus as our Saviour from sin now belong exclusively to God; we have been freed from every obligation to serve sin as our master. More than that, we have been freed from the everlasting guilt and death that sin once produced in us. As we come to God in prayer, His Spirit reassures us of His forgiveness. He passionately wants us to know in our daily living the freedom from sin and its dreadful consequences that His Son has won for us in eternity. Sin has no rightful claim upon anyone who puts their hope in Jesus. We have been set free from sin, guilt and death forever. Our chains have been broken! We have been released! Thank you Lord Jesus!

FREEDOM IS SLIPPERY

As we ponder our freedom, though, a question arises: Now that we have been freed from sin, how can we ensure that we stay that way? Many prisoners who are released after a long stint behind bars find that freedom holds some unexpected challenges. Quite a number of ex-prisoners end up back behind bars. A similar thing can very easily happen to us, for we have each been in a prison cell at one time or another (and may still be there). After we’ve been freed from a sinful habit, tendency or addiction, it tries hard to claim us back. If we are not careful, we are soon enslaved to it again and making up for lost time (see Matt 12:43-45).

Our personal battle to stay free is made all the more challenging because we live in a world that is always generating noise about freedom—noise that doesn’t square with biblical truth. Public figures tell us that we are free because we are a democracy. Marketers tell us that we are free if we buy the right product or wear the right label. Self-help gurus tell us that we are free if we subscribe to their psycho-spiritual formula. Lifestyle experts tell us that we are free if we redecorate our living space or go on an overseas holiday. Popular culture tells us that we are free if we fulfil our every whim without limit or obligation to others. Freedom, the world insists, is to be obtained our own way without deference to anyone greater than ourselves. If we can put ourselves first, we are free.

FREEDOM IN CHRIST

It is an eminently believable lie. If we would stop and listen to the message of God’s word, we would understand that, in ourselves, we humans are not free at all. Life is not about us and our self-seeking idea of freedom; it is about God and His glory. We humans rejected God because we wrongly perceived Him as standing in the way of our freedom, but in actuality He was the only Source of our freedom. When we cut ourselves adrift from Him, we left the only place of human freedom that has ever existed: a safe and obedient relationship with God as our Father. Through Jesus Christ, and only through Jesus Christ, is this relationship restored.

When we repent of our sin and ask Jesus to live within us, He frees us from the need to serve sin and the tyrannical ‘god’ of Self, so that we are able to serve the true, humble, living God. Jesus is able to do this work within us because, as the eternal Son, He is free indeed and in no way a slave; as such, He has freedom in Himself to give (John 8:34-36). Come to Jesus today, therefore, and begin living a life of real freedom—freedom not merely from sin, but freedom in Christ. Jesus doesn’t just want to be your ticket out of prison; surrender to Him as your Lord and begin serving, obeying and following Him in love. If you do this, you will enter the grand reality of God the Father’s freedom-filled life—a life of love, holiness, mercy and compassion. ‘If you hold to My teaching,’ Jesus said, ‘you are really My disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free’ (John 8:31-32).

How free are you today?