India is celebrating 65th Independence Day marking the freedom we earned from British rule. The longing for freedom is there in the blood of every human being and freedom never comes without a cost, it is always achieved by protracted struggle and at enormous cost of many precious human lives. But do we have true freedom. If we take a look around the world, the struggle for freedom goes on. People still long and fight for freedom of one type or other, it may be for equality of gender, against religious or racial discriminations, social inequities, for economic equalities, or against oppressive rulers.
The tendency of oppression and enslavement could be seen in all areas, and spiritual world is no exception as we see the Kuwait Marthomites are struggling against the dictatorial policies of the church leadership. As we see in Ezekiel, when true freedom comes justice and righteousness will flow like a river. Then the question arises, how could we achieve real freedom and what is true freedom from a Christian perspective.
We are not free so long we are slaves. Bible teaches everyone who sins is a slave of sin and nobody is right, everyone is sinned. Adam sinned and through this one man every one is sinned and the punishment for sin is death. So thru one man sin and death came to all his descendants on earth. God created Adam in his own image, he was part of the family of God , his position was that of a member in God’s family. When he sinned he became a slave and a slave is not entitled to the rights and honour of a son. To bring him back to God’s family, he had to be freed from the slavery of sin. That required a price.
Now let us see how God orchestrated his amazing plan to break the slavery of sin and bring the man back to his family with rights of the children. This freedom plan was a long drawn plan that must have been conceived by God from the moment man drifted away from god. And the plan is revealed when God make his promise to Abraham that all nations will be blessed because of him. This promise was given to him when he was old and had no children. And Abraham blindly believed the promise, that was a faith in something which was impossible to happen if a man thinks logically. Bible says god justified Abraham because of this faith. So the most important element of the saving plan was FAITH. And this started with Abraham and he is therefore called the father of the faithful.
Now let us see how the promise to Abraham is executed. Every one who has faith will become children of Abraham and to fulfill this promise, God sent his son, Jesus as a descendant of Abraham, as his promised son. God set a time for sending his son to earth to pay the price for the sin of man. Till the time of arrival of promised son, Jesus, the Laws of Moses were given as a teacher to lead people to God till the time we had faith in Jesus. Once a person has learnt to have faith there is no more need to have a teacher. The Law of Moses says everyone who doest not obey everything in the Law is under a curse or slavery . Some one had to break this curse and that was possible only by a faultless person who will subject himself to all the Laws. Since no man was perfect to do this , God himself had to descend on the earth to pay the price and break the curse and slavery. The scripture says every one who is nailed to a tree is under a curse, Jesus broke this curse by allowing himself to be crucified on a cross. As the sin and death come thru one man, thru another man come the freedom and everlasting life. God fulfilled his promise, everyone who has faith in Jesus is free from the slavery of sin and will have eternal life. Jesus came as the way, the truth and life. In John chap 8:32 Jesus said, “ If You keep on obeying what I have said, you truly are my disciples . You will know the truth and truth will set you free.’’
To give us freedom from the sin Jesus paid the price by giving His life and those who have faith in Him, the son of God , they become children of God , or brother/sister in Christ. That is why Jesus called his disciples brothers. This is how we are reinstated to be part of family of God. In Galatians chap3:28 and 29 we see ‘’ Faith in Christ Jesus is what makes each one of us equal with each other , whether you are a Jew or a Greek, a slave of a free person, a man or a woman. That makes us eligible to stand along with Jesus and call God, Abba, OUR Father. So if you belong to Christ, you are now part of Abraham’s family and become eligible for the promise given to Abraham. Just as God’s spirit was in Jesus, He sent the spirit of His son into our hearts and His spirit tells us that God is our father and we are no longer salves. As prophesied thru Ezekiel chap 37:14 God promises” My spirit will give you breath and you will live again. They will be raised, the weak and ugly bodies will be transformed to spiritual bodies. That is how we are free and victorious in Christ. Then we can shout ‘’ Death has lost the battle! Where is its victory? Where is its Sting?
As we pay homage to those who paid the price for achieving freedom from foreign rule, how many of us remember the one who has broken the slavery of sin and gave us the true freedom and victory over death. Just as our forefathers paid the price to give us political freedom, Jesus paid the price by giving his life and this is free by faith in Him and not by our merits or acts or KARMA. That is why it iscalled Grace. It is now our choice to accept this by faith in Him and obeying Him to be saved to enjoy the everlasting life or reject and embrace the eternal death.
The glorious God is the only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords who could give perfect freedom and equality. In Revelations Chap 1:5 says Jesus was the 1st to conquer death, and he is the ruler of all earthly kings. Christ loves us and by his blood he sets us free form our sins.
God Bless and enable everyone to enjoy this true and everlasting freedom.
Sajan