Christian Freedom, 14th March, Rev Joanna Naish
Christian Freedom 1 Peter
As servants of God, live as free people, yet do not use your freedom as a pretext for evil.
Ah ... Freedom! Perhaps it is Friday, the weekend has begun and you or I sink into a chair with the evening stretching before us. We could write a letter to the newspaper objecting to the editorial, watch a television programme where several politicians of different persuasions argue animatedly with each other. And if we wish, we can leave the house when we choose to; we can do just as we wish.
There are so many ways in which we express what we consider to be our freedom – and we recognise that this is not a privilege shared by all in our world. We consider that we are living as free people.
What is the essence of freedom? The reading from 1 Peter opens with a paradox; "As servants of God, live as free people." The Greek word used is not servant but "slave" – "slaves of God" is more accurate.
The author of the Epistle was writing at a time when the early church was finding its identity in a world where to be Christian was neither popular, nor culturally acceptable. Believers were then often forced to negotiate between positions of resistance and rejection on the one hand, and acculturation on the other. In such circumstances, living as a Christian could evoke abuse and harassment; people might be tempted to either water down their affiliation to a faith community or to join in cultural practice that is incompatible with their belief.
Yet is our society today so different ? As part of our Lenten reflections on Tuesday evenings we have been examining what it means to live freely and fully as Christians in today's world with its celebrity culture, advertising campaigns and rampant commercialism. Freedom is not just a question of personal preferences, but demands that we resist temptations that might ensnare us. Now leisure pursuits are wonderful – I am not referring to these - but only to things that harm us. An unhealthy obsession or an addiction can claim our total devotion and stunt our growth as individuals. This also limits our freedom to serve God. So we need to choose what will do us good if we are to stay free.
Let us consider the current trend for celebrity culture. The obsession shown by some fans of let's say David Beckham, is not just a manifestation of a desire to play football at a high level but to gain the accoutrements, idolisation and income that this fame has brought. We can see that although there are many good things that emanate from this, there is also a very real danger of allowing a false sense of self to develop. If we all aim at being the new David Beckham we may miss out on being the very person God created us to be and follow practices that will lead us into selfishness and idolatry.
People confuse freedom with individualism, where egos jostle in to impress and justify. A thousand egos all shouting loudly just creates an inharmonious discord. We need some framework, yet it is ironic that the more "free" we wish to be – the more rules we sometimes create in order to preserve our freedom.
God realises that we need guidelines.
Where do we find these guidelines ?
There is a wonderful cartoon of Moses at the top of the mountain talking to God. God has just given Moses the commandments written on a stone tablet. The tablet reads "Love God. Be nice to each other. That's it."
But Moses is scratching his head and says "Er ... God.... I think my lot will need a bit more detail than that!"
Now God wants us to be free. He wants us to have what we truly need, not to be enslaved by what we merely want. The idea of a rule of life is one that many Christians find helpful. These vows or promises are designed not to limit, but to free people from following demands that are unhelpful to us. Talking to a friend of mine who has taken final vows to a religious order she beamed and me and said "But the vow of poverty frees me from the incessant quest for possessions."
How exactly can being a slave to God mean that we live freely? Well, we never ask to be free from the good things of life but only from the bad – those that inhibit us. Living in God frees us from bondage to sin. In our baptismal promises we declare that we turn to Christ and reject evil. As we die to sin and embrace this new life in Christ, the fragmentation of the ego is brought into the wholeness of life in God.
In Christ we are shown the fullest example of both freedom and obedience to God especially as the reading shows, through Christ's suffering. Next week as we hear the story of Christ's passion we see how tempting it could have been for Jesus the man to rebel against the events leading up to his death. Yet in his passion He does none of this ... he listens; and freely accepts God's will and follows the road to the cross. Jesus did not ignore the world, defy the world but freely forgave and embraced the world – from the cross of the world's making.
So we too are told not to reject the world, but to live within the rules, with Christ as our example. We know that binding ourselves in community can often make the powerless into something extraordinary, quite wonderful. The Christian soldier may be weak, but the Christian army as a body is strong. And we become examples to the world.
And when we remove the insistent noise of all the temptations that we simply do not need ... we pray that the cacophony of selfish desire falls still... and in the calm we are free to listen to God's voice. In putting our trust in God, the source of all goodness and in following and serving him, we are each released to be the very person that God created. Who could want greater freedom that that? Amen.
Rev Joanna Naish