Jesus said to the people who believed in him, “You are truly my disciples if you remain faithful to my teachings. And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
“But we are descendants of Abraham,” they said. “We have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean, ‘You will be set free’?”
Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave of sin. A slave is not a permanent member of the family, but a son is part of the family forever. So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free. (8.31-34)
Jesus tells them he has come to offer them freedom. They respond, “What do you mean, Jesus? What do you mean to say that we need to be set free? You see, they failed to see the kind of freedom they really needed. And so when he offered them freedom, they didn’t understand what he was talking about.
Our generation has the same problem. We don’t understand the kind of freedom that we truly need. The prophets of our age tell us that freedom is found by looking within ourselves and “following your heart.” That is our generation’s recipe for freedom: “Follow your heart.” It is the theme of movie after movie after movie and television show after television show. The worst crime in today’s culture is to not be “true to yourself.” Find yourself. Be yourself. Then, you will be free.
Let me tell you something. You want to be free? Good. It’s good to be free. Being free is a wonderful thing. But you’re not. Jesus pronounces the verdict that all of humanity is enslaved to sin.
Sin is not just missing the mark; it is living in a fundamentally different way than you were made to live. It is like trying to put milk into a car to make it go. Cars were made to run on gasoline. We were made to run on God, and the way we try to run on everything else besides God shows how deep our un-free-ness really lies.
You see, freedom is not simply “doing whatever you want to do”. If a girl can do whatever she wants – but what she wants is to keep shooting heroin up her arm – is she truly free? She is not. She is an addict and her slavery goes so much deeper than simply “doing what she wants”. What she wants is destroying her; what she wants is the problem.
Our problem is that not that we can’t do the things we want to do; our problem is that we don’t want the things we should want. We don’t want the things that are truly good for us. We don’t long to see the things that are truly beautiful. We don’t desire the things that are truly desirable. We are free to do what we want; but we are not free to want the things that we ought to want – the things that will truly give us life. The problem is we want to keep drinking poison because it tastes so good.
And only Jesus can set us free.
Lord, set me free, and I will be truly free. Amen.
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