Set Free to be a Servant

On Wednesday we will celebrate this nation's Independence Day – a day to lift up the ideal of freedom – and none of us believe in it. That's what I think in my darker moments. A nation built on the ideal of freedom, and yet it seems that we have an anemic idea of what freedom is, what it entails, what it means. And so I wonder sometimes if any of us truly believe in it. Oh, we believe in a right to privacy. We believe in the freedom of the individual to choose what is best for him or herself. But do we really believe in freedom?

What I mean is – I question whether we believe in freedom for anything in particular. We believe in freedom from all kinds of things – freedom from oppression, freedom from the terror of unelected rulers, freedom from those who would tell us how to pray or think or assemble. Just look at the Virginia flag with that seal in the center: The figure of a woman with a spear standing over an overthrown despot and the words sic semper tyrannius - “Thus always to tyrants.” No, we don't have a lot of patience with those who would deny us freedom. But the question I want to ask today is – What are we free for? And that's the question that's harder to answer because I'm not sure we believe in that kind of freedom.

Most of us have our roots and citizenship here in the United States, though I'm aware that today we've got folks in this congregation who claim roots in many different parts of the world – Portugal, Chile, Mexico, Spain. That's one of the things that I love about this place. We are connected around the world. But this week we have a chance to think about what it means to be American. And we have a lot to be thankful for this week, even as we realize that we are a nation at war.

In our long history we have produced people like James Madison, Sojourner Truth, Cesar Chavez and Martin Luther King, Jr. who have opened our eyes to the power of a place where people were liberated from bondage. Despite its failings, this country still offers opportunity and hope and people still come here looking for something that is too often missing in their own land – freedom. If we are divided right now it is because we are struggling ourselves with the notion of what it means to protect freedom, to hold up freedom as a model, and to represent freedom around the world.

But there is a way that we have misunderstood our freedom. We have misunderstood our freedom and too often we have taken it to mean a freedom for individuals to do whatever they want. That's not what freedom is all about. Freedom from slavery or tyranny does not mean freedom from responsibility or from community. But we’re prone to this error as Americans.

It’s not recent. It has always been with us. The pioneers went West for new opportunities, but many of them also liked the idea of being able to get away from everybody. They were loners by choice. There's a great quote from a diary written by a settler in Michigan in the 1840's who was angry because people were moving in and there was now a house within eight miles of his home! Michigan was getting overcrowded and he was thinking about moving on.

We have always sought to break away and to get away. We’ve got this Thelma and Louise streak in us. It's how we define our freedom. But it can be a very empty freedom.
D.H. Lawrence, the British author, spent a lot of time on the move. In the early twentieth century he wrote the book Lady Chatterley's Lover, which was a scandalous book. He spent many years in a kind of self-exile. You could say that he was someone who tested freedom and lived a “free” life. But he recognized something of the loneliness of this kind of freedom. And after spending some time in the U.S. he said this in 1924 in a book on American literature:

Men are free when they are in a living homeland, not when they are straying and breaking away. Men are free when they are obeying some deep, inward voice of religious belief. Obeying from within. Men are free when they belong to a living, organic, believing community, active in fulfilling some unfulfilled, perhaps unrealized purpose. Not when they are escaping to some wild west. The most unfree souls go west, and shout of freedom. Men are freest when they are most unconscious of freedom. The shout is a rattling of chains, always was.[i]

So what it is that constitutes real freedom? The apostle Paul gives us a hint in the passage we read from Galatians this morning. The church that Paul was writing to in Galatia was obviously a congregation with many members who believed that the only way to be a Christian was to follow every part of the old Jewish law. But Paul told them that Christ changed everything. This new freedom must have been a little scary for the Galatians. If you're used to following the book there is a certain kind of certainty in knowing where you stand. Suddenly Paul is saying that you don't walk on the same ground, you walk by faith.

So Paul is dealing with these scared Galatians and telling them, "For freedom Christ has set you free". But then the obvious questions come up - If Christ has really set me free, then what's to stop me from doing something horrible? If Christ has really set me free, what's to stop me from determining my own rules, establishing my own law, starting my own Church? These are the kind of questions that Americans tend to ask in different ways. We have been trained to think that we have the power to interpret Scripture as well as anybody - so what's to stop us from justifying everything we do? What’s the purpose of Christian community if believing is enough?

But Paul says to the Galatians, and to us, "No, no, no. Yes, you were called to freedom, but it's not a freedom of opportunity for self-indulgence - it's a freedom to become slaves of one another."

Now this is hard to understand, but there it is - Paul says - You're free, don't be a slave anymore. And then he says you are free to be a slave - but not a slave to sin, not a slave to those things that oppress you, not a slave to abuse and degradation, not a slave to discrimination, but you are free to be a slave to one another.

Now I say this is the freedom we don't believe in because it is so contrary to what we think we want freedom to be. I have spent the last week at the beach and I think I learned again the lesson about what we think freedom is supposed to be like. On vacation we think, “Hey, on vacation anything goes. I am freed from my regular schedule so I can do anything I want. Eat anything I want. Drink what I want.” And at a place like the Outer Banks there are any number of places to help you pursue the list that Paul spells out as works of the flesh. Drunkenness, carousing, fornication, debauchery – I think there are even some places to help you pursue idolatry and sorcery. And you don't have to go to tourist towns to find the means to these. They're here on the Eastern Shore.

I used to be a campus minister in Charlottesville and I know that they were there, too. One of the great temptations for young people leaving home for the first time is to see college as the place where they can throw off all the things that seemed like restraints before. I couldn't drink before; now there's no one to tell me I can't. I couldn't stay up all night before; now there's no one to tell me when to go to bed. There are all these folks who live by such different moral codes; maybe I could try theirs. And half a semester later I would find students who were sleep-deprived, developing some really unhealthy habits and making some decisions they had come to regret. You college students can tell me if things have changed, but managing your freedom is one of the great life lessons of leaving home. There are innumerable ways that we can get it wrong. Freedom can end up making us a slave to our bad choices.

But, listen, there is something more to it than this. It's not just about the “temptations of the flesh.” It's not that freedom in Christ means that I now have to beware of all the ways I can go off the rails. There is the danger that we will use our freedom to turn in ourselves and that we will follow illusions of what the good life is instead of staying on the path that leads us to a truly good life. We can get our freedom and choose our misguided passions instead of choosing to follow the God who gives us life. But there is a promise contained in this passage, a promise that is more than a command. There is a promise that we will discover what true freedom is. There is a promise that if we stop accepting a libertine lifestyle as a pitifully poor substitute for true life that we will be able to get in touch with the deepest desires of our heart. There is the promise that we can finally become really human...finally, the people we were meant to be.

What is it that Jesus told us was the greatest commandment? When he was asked by someone what a person must do to inherit eternal life, to get into the kingdom, Jesus referred the man who asked him back to the Ten Commandments but then he went on to sum up the entire law in two simple clauses. Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. It's the second clause that Paul quotes here in Galatians. “The whole Law is fulfilled in one commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself.”

This is not just a command; to me it seems also a promise. It's not just “You SHALL love your neighbor as yourself” but “You shall!” You shall! You think all the dissensions and divisions of human community are the final destiny for us? No. If we have found new life in Christ, the promise is that we shall love our neighbors. Can there be any deeper desire of our hearts? Most of us do a pretty good job of trying to love ourselves. We think we're showering ourselves with happiness by giving ourselves over to the things that give us momentary pleasure, but the drink, the rich meal, the extramarital fling are not the ends for which we were made and they can't bring us the thing we really want, which is the ability to truly love. To quote those great 60s philosophers, Lennon and McCartney, “Money can't buy me love.”

This is the freedom that comes from being a servant: When we put ourselves in the service of others, when we spend ourselves in the pursuit of creating a better community, when we learn the ways of love, we will know the freedom that Christ intends for us all. Freedom is not served by walls that divide us. Freedom is not served by violence and hatred. Freedom is served by following the example of the one who knelt at his disciples’ feet and washed them.

Lech Walesa, the leader of the Solidarity movement that brought down the communist government of Poland in the 1980s, a man who was known as being the author of freedom in his country, took his first trip to the West in 1988 and his observation was, “You have riches and freedom here but I feel no sense of faith or direction. You have so many computers, why don't you use them in the search for love?”[ii] I don't think he was talking about eharmony.com either. We are a free people, but what are we free for?

What are you free for? Where is God calling you to be a servant, not so that you can be burdened with responsibilities you didn't ask for, but so that you can claim the promise that we are made to love? What are those habits of the flesh that are still keeping you from being all that you can be? Where are you wasting your gifts on things that are not worthy of them? What do you need to be released from in order to serve? Whatever it is that is holding you back, bring it to the table this morning. Lay those things down. Let them go. Because the host at the communion table is our brother Jesus who passed through death to bring us life. The host at this table is a servant who was the freest man who ever lived. And when you open your eyes you will find that you are at a table with a lot of others who are struggling just like you to be free. And in the strength of this meal, in the strength of the Spirit, you will be free to love them. That's a promise. Thanks be to God.

Galatians 5:1, 13-25
For freedom Christ has set us free. So stand and do not be loaded down again with the yoke of slavery.
For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters! Not to the freedom of opportunity for self-indulgence, but rather, through love, to become slaves of one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one commandment - "Love your neighbor as yourself". But if you bite and tear one another to pieces, see that you do not devour one another.
So, I say, walk by the Spirit and do not satisfy the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh, because these two are in opposition to each other in order that you might not do what you will. But if you allow yourself to be led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.
Now the works of the flesh are clear - fornication, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, selfish ambition, dissension, factionalism, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, just as I said before: those who do such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God!
But the works of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, humility, and self-control; against such things there is no law.
Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with all of its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.

[i] D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930), British author. Studies in Classic American Literature, ch. 1 (1924). "Men are not free when they are doing just what they like," added Lawrence. "The moment you can do just what you like, there is nothing you care about doing."
[ii] Daily Telegraph (London, 14 Dec. 1988)