Freedom in Christ

 Here’s a checklist of new-life freedom behaviors Paul gives in Romans 12:9-16:

• Hate evil — including TV shows, movies, and books that glorify evil.
• Cling to good and hang out with people who encourage you to do good.
• Be devoted to fellow Christianswith sincere love — regardless of their ethnicity or socioeconomic level.
• Honor others — even if it means they receive credit for what you do or benefit from privileges that you don’t share.
• Resist discouragement and disillusionment that may prevent you from serving God or serving others. Your goal is to glorify him.
• Remain hopeful — confident in God’s goodness and faithfulness.
• Put aside complaining in tough times. No one likes a whiner. Rejoice in the blessings that cannot be taken away from you.
• Pray about everything, asking God to reveal himself to you in every circumstance.
• Share the resources and skills God has given you with others, considering it a privilege to do so.
• Invite people into your homeand treat them like honored guests.
• Celebrate with those who celebrate.
• Grieve with those who grieve.
• Live in harmony with others,realizing that it is more important to be gracious than to be right.
• Practice humility — eliminate “I told you so” from your vocabulary.

The illusion of serving ourselves is a mirage Satan fabricated. We can choose to serve sin and chain ourselves to its addictive, destructive behaviors. Or we can choose to serve righteousness — to follow Jesus and become more like him with every act of obedience. It’s that freedom — the freedom to choose — that Christ gives us. It’s that freedom that shattered the chains of sin that once bound us.

That freedom also leads to the kind of contagious joy and recognizable holiness that Jesus was talking about when he said, “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). Peter must have listened carefully that day because he later wrote, “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Peter 2:12).

Paul ends Romans 6 with a reminder that just as there are only two masters, there are only two destinies: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord” (v. 23).

Why would we choose the bondage of slavery that propels us toward eternal death and reject the freedom of following Jesus to eternal life? Most, if not all, of those who read this post have chosen to follow Jesus. For us, the truly puzzling question is this: Why do we so often look back toward the path that leads to death, as if we were missing out on something?

Don’t allow Satan to deceive you. Keep your eyes on Jesus. He alone is the source of true freedom.

Have you found yourself looking back, as if you were missing out on something? Or have you fixed your eyes on your freedom in Christ?

The Jews who heard Jesus’s words were offended. They believed their ethnic heritage and moral performance afforded them freedom by right (v. 33). After all, they were Abraham’s children. They had the temple and the law. How could they not be free?

If you’ve grown up as a religious churchgoer, perhaps you can relate. Christians come from different cultural backgrounds and we have differing opinions about lots of issues—things like our kids’ education, the use of alcohol, and which political candidate to support. In the last few years, we’ve discovered we differ in our approaches to mask-wearing and vaccinations.

Sadly, these differences lead to division, and they often expose our pride and self-righteousness. For my own part, I’ve discovered the hardest time to avoid pride and smug feelings is when I have the moral high ground.

For my own part, I’ve discovered the hardest time to avoid pride and smug feelings is when I have the moral high ground.

It might begin with genuine concern for a friend whose decisions may cause them or others harm. But then if he doesn’t respond to what I’m saying in the way I hope or expect, I feel hurt. The anger starts to rise in my chest, and I’m tempted to type a four-paragraph Facebook post in my head.

It’s the sin within me. You see, self-righteous people like me can think moral behavior and religious performance sets them free. But Jesus knows better. He tells his Jewish followers a person can know sound doctrine and look perfectly upright but still be trapped. Why? Because “everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin” (v. 34).

Liberty Jesus Offers

But those who cling to Christ—who believe he’s the one the Father has sent—are set free from sin and death (John 6:29; 8:28) and into two beautiful new realities.

1. The freedom of a royal inheritance.

Even if a slave is brought up in the house, he can’t expect to live there long term; a son, however, is different (John 8:35). Jesus is the Son—the prince of heaven’s kingdom with a permanent place in the Father’s royal family. Yet the perfect Son came to earth and died for us. He took the guilt our pride and smugness incurs.

Jesus then rose and ascended back to his royal throne. In rising, he set the captives free. Now Christ shares his royal status with us. He gives those who trust him a certain future and glorious inheritance (John 1:12).

This freedom is for people who have never experienced free markets or governments. He gives it to those who don’t have the right family heritage or the best reputation. Even those trapped in Chinese labor camps and South African slums can possess it.

What God says about you as his beloved child is more important than what anyone else says or does. Knowing you belong to him even gives you the confidence to hear hurtful, maddening words from a careless friend without it threatening your identity. “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36).

2. The freedom to serve in love.

In many societies, you can pursue any job you want. If you acquire the degrees and skills necessary for a position, it can be yours. But in the ancient world, a son learned from his father. If dad was a fisherman, his son was too. If dad was a carpenter, his son learned the trade.

What God says about you as his beloved child is more important than what anyone else says or does.

Jesus had this in mind when he called Jewish leaders children of the devil (vv. 37–38). They looked like the devil’s apprentices. They’d believed his lies and had murderous hatred in their hearts. Before knowing Christ, we shared the same sinful identity (Eph. 2:1–3).

But in Christ, the opposite is true. We’re adopted as royal children who now imitate our loving Father. This doesn’t mean sinful anger won’t well up in our hearts sometimes. Sin remains until the resurrection. But Christ is with us too, and his Spirit within moves us to put our interests and emotions aside as we offer kindness to our neighbors.

Writing to Pope Leo, Luther had Jesus’s two-fold promise of freedom in mind. His tract began with this couplet:

A Christian is a lord of all, completely free of everything.

A Christian is a servant, completely attentive to the needs of all.

Have you been set free? In Christ, you’ll find a permanent inheritance as God’s royal child. You’ll possess true freedom while learning to imitate your Father in service and love. In a world of freedom substitutes, that’s good news.

Those who are followers of Christ are not free to do as we please. We are to become “slaves to righteousness” (Romans 6:18) and slaves of Christ (1 Corinthians 7:22), and even servants of one another (2 Corinthians 4:5). Clearly, our freedom is not an absolute freedom.

Freedom from Sin

At the same, in some sense a Christian is free in that they are “no longer a slave, but a child” of God (Galatians 4:7, similarly Romans 6:22). Jesus said that “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36). By this he meant that a free person will no longer be “a slave to sin” (verse 34).

But what is freedom from sin?

When Paul speaks of being freed from slavery to sin, he says that we should become “slaves to righteous living so that [we] will become holy” (Romans 6:19). So part of being freed from sin means that we will intentionally seek to live a righteous, holy life.

Another part of being “free from sin” is that we are freed from a consequence of sin, namely spiritual death (Romans 6:22-23). Instead, our freedom results in “eternal life” (verse 22).

Freedom from the “Veil”

In 2 Corinthians 3:17 Paul writes “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” The context of the verse indicates this freedom here means “the veil [of misunderstanding] is taken away” (verse 16). The result is that believers “have unveiled faces” and can truly “contemplate the Lord’s glory.” Moreover, just like being freed from slavery to sin, the result is that believers “are being transformed into his image” by the Spirit (verse 18).

Freedom from the Law

The other major emphasis we find in the Bible is that “the freedom we have in Christ” is a freedom from the Old Testament Law (Galatians 2:4). The result of this “freedom” is that Christians are not “obligated to keep the entire law” (5:1 & 3).

Throughout Galatians Paul is aiming to safeguard the reality that “in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith” (Galatians 3:26), rather than through the Law. By “the Law” he means the rites of Jewish religion and the practice of circumcision in particular (Galatians 2:3). Many preachers rightfully expand on this idea to say that we are free from the need to earn our salvation through religiosity, good works, or some other means.

Of course, this doesn’t mean we don’t need to obey God or that we can live however we please. With this concern in mind, Paul cautions his readers, “Don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature, Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love” (Galatians 5:13).

Freedom from the Law of Sin and Death

Within the context of another discussion of the Old Testament Law (Romans 7), Paul states “the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2). Being free from the “law of sin” means that sin is not our master. Instead, we are enabled to live “according to the Spirit” (8:3-9).

The result of this freedom from the Spirit is expansive, including things such as “life and peace” (verse 6) rather than “condemnation” (verse 1). These are things that the Law could not provide.

And being free from the “law of death” (Romans 8:2) means that, like Christ, believers will receive eternal life at the resurrection (verses 10-11 and 23, cf. 5:21). Given this, we can say that some aspects of the believer’s freedom are future, since we have yet to fully “obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (8:21).

The book of Hebrews connects freedom and death as well. There we read that Jesus Christ died in part to “free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Hebrews 2:15).

What then is Freedom in Christ?

When the Bible refers to the Christian’s freedom, it is referring to some aspects of our salvation. In summary, our freedom comes because of Christ’s saving work and the Spirit that he gave us. Through this, Christians are freed from:

• the Law—following religious rites to achieve salvation (notably, circumcision)
• the metaphorical veil that keeps us from grasping the truth of the Gospel
• slavery to sin or the law of sin
• the law of death—the eternal death that results from sin
• fear of death.

And, as a result of this freedom, the Bible emphasizes that Christians:

• are children of God
• have no condemnation
• become slaves of Christ
• become slaves to righteousness, leading to holiness as enabled by the Spirit
• receive other benefits from living according to the Spirit, such as life and peace
• will be resurrected to eternal life.

Praise the Lord!

What Else?

This is what the Bible emphasizes when it comes to freedom in Christ. Yet it would likely be fair for us to add to these lists. For example, we might justifiably say Christ sets us free from shame (Romans 10:11), even though the Bible never explicitly says this.

But we must be careful. For example, the Bible wouldn’t agree that our freedom in Christ means that we should only expect blissful days of happiness (John 16:33) or that we should expect freedom from all sickness (1 Timothy 5:23).

Nevertheless, I’m pretty sure we are safe to say that Christians are free to dance, and run, and sing.

First, freedom in Christ is seen in contrast to the bondage of sin. Romans 6:20-23 says, "For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." In other words, sin enslaves people for spiritual death and eternity apart from God. Knowing Christ provides freedom from the control of sin and eternal life with Him.

Second, freedom in Christ is seen as the only true form of freedom, because it provides lasting freedom beyond this life. John 8:36 notes, "If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed." We now know the truth that sets us free as believers (John 8:32).

Third, a person who has experienced true freedom in Christ is called to live as His servant. The apostle Paul was an example of this, as many of his letters began with the introduction of himself as a "servant of Christ Jesus" (Romans 1:1). We are set free to serve Christ. This seems like a paradox to the non-believer, yet the freedom found in Christ gives the believer a desire to live for Christ as a servant. This attitude reflects the attitude displayed by Jesus Himself during His time on earth (John 13:1-20; Philippians 2:5-11).

Fourth, those who find freedom in Christ also become His children. John 1:12 teaches, "But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God." As Galatians 4 also notes, we are now children and heirs of the inheritance of eternal life with Christ for eternity.

Yet this freedom does not mean sin is completely removed. Paul spoke of his ongoing struggle with sin (Romans 7:15-20), yet also noted that sin no longer controlled him (Romans 6:1-2). He was now a person who sought to live a transformed life because of his new life in Christ (Romans 12:1-2). This included putting off old habits and developing new patterns that honored God (Ephesians 4:22-32).

In short, we experience true freedom in Christ by knowing Him, walking in His ways, and engaging with the changes He makes in and through our lives as we focus on service to Him and to others. This freedom transcends the human freedoms desired in this world, providing peace in this life and freedom with Christ forevermore.

Freedom in Christ means the preservation of your ethnic or cultural identity as you follow Christ. In Galatians 2:3, the apostle Paul reminds his listeners that his non-Jewish traveling companion was not required to adopt the Jewish cultural marker of circumcision to be Christian: "But even Titus, who was with me, was not forced to be circumcised, though he was a Greek." Some had been teaching that becoming culturally Jewish was necessary to become a follower of Jesus, which Paul flatly refutes.  Even today, missionaries must faithfully teach Jesus' ethics, but not conflate them with cultural practices, leaving new converts free to maintain their ethnic and cultural identity. 

Secondly, freedom in Christ means salvation is a free gift of God to those who have faith, and not earned.  Galatians 2:16 explains that "a person is not justified [seen as righteous in God's sight] by works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ." Furthermore, subsequent activity by the Christian may deepen or improve their relationship with God, but it still never merits salvation or anything else. There is freedom in humbly accepting salvation as an unearned gift, liberating the soul from the bondage of attempting to labor to merit God's forgiveness. Psychologically, this results in relief, confidence, and comfort.

Now the caveats:

Freedom in Christ does not mean freedom from obeying God in every regard, including doing things you really don't want to do.  Jesus remarked that our obedience to Him serves as the true test of our love for Him.  Galatians 5:13 says, "For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another." Enabled by the Spirit, Christians are to deny themselves in order to take up their cross, love others as themselves, give sacrificially, exercise kindness and compassion, return good for evil, submit to authority, forgive wrongdoers, practice sexual integrity, refrain from gossip, and in every way live for God.  When you struggle in your heart over Jesus' commands, and we all struggle sometimes, the Christian repents of hardness of heart and follows the Lord.  Some have dangerously and mistakenly considered obedience to Christ as legalism, but to rebel against God's lordship is not freedom, and leads to spiritual bondage and slavery. 

Secondly, freedom in Christ does not mean freedom from exerting strenuous effort in your relationship with God.  Effort does not earn favor with God, but favor with God is often conditioned upon it.  Focused effort typically yields spiritual benefits.  For example, Galatians 6:1 says, "Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted."Expending effort to watch over yourself lessens the possibility of falling into temptation. Elsewhere in the Scriptures, Christians are urged to pray day and night, to be devoted to prayer, to draw near to God while resisting the devil, to struggle with all their energy, to strive to enter God's rest, to discipline their body, to repent, to fast and humble themselves, and more.   Putting energy into seeking God wholeheartedly blossoms into spiritual benefits including a rich, deep relationship with Him. Sadly, some misunderstand freedom in Christ as permission to pursue God lackadaisically, yielding spiritual weakness, fruitlessness, and bondage.

Praise God for the freedom we have in Christ!  We are free to fully identify with our culture, which, unsurprisingly, has contributed to Christianity thriving in a diverse collection of ethnicities and cultures in the world. Moreover, we have freedom from the anxiety of trying to measure up to standards we could never achieve.  The Sisyphean burden has been removed, so that we have full forgiveness through faith in Christ alone. 

We use our freedom in Christ to model good lives.

Look at 1 Peter 2:13 and 15: “Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution. … For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people.” Then he continues in verse 16: “Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.” Here’s the picture: As the result of what God has done in our lives through Jesus, we’re now free servants of his, which means we’re free to live, not as evil, but as good—doing good. 

When Peter talks about silencing the ignorance of foolish people, he’s talking about slanderous attacks against Christians by non-Christians in the culture around them. Peter is zealous, in a Matthew 5:13–16 kind of way, for Christians to be salt and light in the culture and country around them, so that non- Christians may see their good deeds and glorify God in heaven. 

So, we use our freedom in Christ, not in an evil or selfish way, but in a good, humble, selfless way, modeling the goodness of Christ in submission to the governing authorities over us. We use our freedom in Christ to model good lives. That should be the commentary on our lives in our country. We’re showing the goodness of God. 

We use our Christian freedoms to show God’s love.

If we look at 1 Peter 2:17, we see that Peter closes this passage with four short commands: “Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.” So how does God’s Word tell us specifically to show his love in the country around us? First, we honor everyone—especially our leaders. Notice, this command to honor starts and ends this verse, like bookends. So, the picture is of followers of Christ showing respect, attributing dignity, and assigning value to everyone without exception, even people who disagree with or oppose us. We are to honor them. They are made in God’s image and are therefore worthy of respect. 

This is why we as Christians must be known for honoring. The Word of God is why we honor babies in the womb. It is why we honor people of different ethnicities. The Word of God is why we honor the poor and oppressed. It is why we honor immigrants who have made their home in our country. The Word of God is why we honor children and their parents at our borders. And on and on. Again, I’m not advocating a particular policy or position here. There is room for so much discussion among followers of Christ on these issues. But what is driving all of us in those discussions is that we are concerned with showing God’s love by honoring all people. 

Did you catch how Peter closes this section? He included honoring the emperor! It’s like Peter is saying, “Especially him. Honor even this man who set himself as a god over you and leads a government that is persecuting you, for even he is a man made in the image of God and worthy of your honor.” What a word that we need to hear. God, in his Word, beckons us to honor our president and our government leaders, in the way we speak about them, in the way we pray for them. Obviously, we should realize that some presidents and some leaders are easier to honor for some people than they are for others, if we’re honest.

The freedom we have received through the blood of Jesus is a gift. Our freedom came at a cost. Jesus became the sacrifice needed to pay for our sin. He gave Himself at the altar so that we might live. He made this sacrifice voluntarily because He loves us, and He paid the price that we could never afford to pay ourselves. 

So as believers in Christ, what are we called to do? Because we have been set free from our many sins by His sacrifice on the cross, we are also called to be slaves of God, to put Him first and keep Him first in everything that we do. When we glorify Him in everything that we do, our actions lead us to holiness and a closer relationship with God. 

The road to heaven is narrow, as Christ said, while the way to destruction is wide (Matthew 7:13).  Many take the wide road to their own peril, knowing all the while that they are breaking the ordinances of God and deserving His wrath for doing so (Romans 1:32).  Some haven’t joined the narrow road because they haven’t yet heard the gospel of Christ.  Others are just stubborn, choosing to pursue an agenda that is free from the control of God.  They choose to live out an illusion of freedom, thinking they would rather be able to sin as they want to than have to succumb to the ordinances of God.  They have been fooled into thinking that they have true freedom, for they are prisoners of the law of sin and death in their members (Romans 8:2).  Rather than deal with the guilt of their sin before a righteous God, they would rather enjoy sin as much as they can until they have to meet God and be forced to bow their knees to Him (Philippians 2:10).
 
The appeal to be able to live as we want to with no accountability and no remorse is highly attractive to the flesh and the sinful nature.  Satan told Eve that God was keeping something good back from her by instituting a rule about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  He convinced her that she was a slave of an unfair God Who withheld pleasure from her.  She came to believe that true freedom could be found in exercising her free will against the will of God.  Adam and Eve found out the hard way that the freedom that they thought they would gain by eating of the tree was actually a curse that would lead to division, death, destruction, harm, suffering, and a loss of pleasure.  When we sin, we will experience the pleasures of sin for a while, but we must understand that its pleasures are passing (Hebrews 11:25).  The curious thing about sin is that it must be indulged more and more deeply in order for it to continue to bring the same level of pleasure.  Sin’s exploits must grow grander and grander until it eventually consumes us.  Its wage is death and the lake of fire.  Thus, sin provides us no advantage for the life to come, only misery, pain, and horror.  Its pleasure is most certainly bound to this life on earth, and even this pleasure is nothing compared to the joy of the Lord.

Satan’s way is always a way of bondage.  It is thievery because God’s pleasures are far better, more fulfilling, and longer lasting than the devil’s concoctions could ever be.  There will be an eternal bondage in hell for those who remain under the control of sin, Satan, and self.  True freedom can only be found when we are freed from our sinful ways, propensities, and natures.  Only the Spirit of God can give us rebirth and regeneration that will enable us to finally be who God has created us to be.  True freedom is found in submission to the truth, which alone sets us free (John 8:32).

Romans 6:17-18 says, “But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.”  There are two options for living. The first is to obey sin, and the second is to obey God.  Either way we are slaves, though one way leads to the freedom, life, and joy that we have always wanted.  Many people don’t want to enter into a relationship with Christ that will require them to follow after His commands.  They want to know that their sin is forgiven, but they don’t want to truly submit to the will of God for their lives.  Yet Christ calls us to surrender to Him as Savior and Lord (Romans 10:9-10).  In that sense, we become His slaves willingly.  He doesn’t force anyone to live for Him.  He simply tells us that His way brings life, fullness of joy, and pleasures forevermore (Psalm 16:11).  We must choose to honor Him as our Master if we want Him to honor us in the life to come.

So many think that they have freedom because they have chosen not to become slaves of God.  Following Christ might be hard.  It might cost us family or friends, but it is well worth it in light of eternity.  We can enjoy the pleasures of sin for a lifetime in theory, but we would be much better off forfeiting the passing pleasures of sin in exchange for joy and pleasure forever in Christ.  We can’t even fathom the riches of the life to come.

Let us remember that God’s ways are not cruel, unfair, or stealing something from us.  James 1:25 says, “But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does.”  The fact is that we can’t live apart from the eternal law of God and still experience the blessing of God.  Freedom is only found within the bounds of sinless living.  When we submit to our Lord, we remain free from the grasp of sin.  When we disobey our Master, we enslave ourselves.  The hope for the believer, however, is that God forgives us immediately when we confess our sins to Him and return to living according to His will and ways.

2 Corinthians 3:17 says, “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”  If we want true freedom and the promise of true pleasures that will endure forever, we have but one choice.  We must submit to the will of God and allow the Spirit of God to lead us into all truth.  When we give up what we think this world could give us in exchange for what only Christ can give, we will find true pleasure and freedom.

In Paul’s letter to the church at Galatia, he said: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.” (Gal 5:1)Before Jesus died on a cross, God’s people lived under a detailed system of laws that served as a moral compass to guide their lives. The Law pointed the way to Jesus Christ (Gal 3:19-24), but by itself was powerless to grant salvation or produce true freedom. Through His sacrificial death, Jesus Christ fulfilled the Law, setting believers free from the law of sin and death. God’s laws are now written in our hearts through the Spirit of God, and we are free to follow and serve Christ in ways that please and glorify Him (Rom 8:2–8). This is the definition of Christian freedom.

The devil is a crafty one, who uses half-truths that sound right, but are off just enough to lead us down the road to hell (which is wide). That’s why today’s Scripture ends with a warning: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.” (Gal 5:1) Jesus came to free us from the chains to sin, which is death; satan has a different outcome in mind. “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10)

Jesus gave us a promise: “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free…Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.” (John 8:31-32, 36) The key is to abide in Him and to walk in the Spirit. “I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” (Gal 5:16) So if you truly want to be free from the chains of sin which lead to eternal death, abide on the vine (John 15:1-17).

And instead of entangling ourselves again with satan’s sinful yoke of bondage, Jesus is ready to carry our burdens with us: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” (Matt 11:28-30) It’s a pretty easy choice, choose to serve One who loves you exactly as you are but wants the best for you–an abundant and fulfilling life–or serve satan who wants to destroy you. There’s no fence sitting on this choice, and your choice will affect you for eternity. If you don’t know Jesus, learn more about it here: Know Jesus!

We are CREATED in His image – “So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God.” -Genesis 1:27 CSB

We are FORGIVEN in Christ – “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” -1 John 1:9 CSB

We are CHOSEN by God – “For he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in love before him.” -Ephesians 1:4 CSB

We are LOVED unconditionally – “and walk in love, as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God.” -Ephesians 5:2 CSB

We are REDEEMED – “He saved them from the power of the adversary; he redeemed them from the power of the enemy.” -Psalms 106:10 CSB

When we read those words, we need to truly believe them. They hold the power and honesty of God. His words are always true and can/should be trusted. Read them over and over until they stick if you have to. Just don’t stop believing them.

Beautiful Release

In order to truly seek the freedom we have in Christ, we have to let go of our burdens (fear, shame, guilt, etc.) and inability to forgive ourselves and others.

It starts with conversation with our Father.

Once we’ve asked for forgiveness, we’re always forgiven. It’s good however to release any quilt we may be carrying about our mistakes. God not only will take it from us, but He truly wants to take it from us.

“Cast all your cares on him, because he cares about you.” -1 Peter 5:7

When we hand it over to Him, it’s a beautiful release of the power of sin over us. It’s in those moments we truly experience what freedom in Christ really means. We step out of our darkness and into God’s radiant light.

Don’t allow your sins to weigh on you. The enemy likes to use your wrongdoings to make you feel less than and pull you away from God. God, however, wants you to draw near to Him and allow Him to carry you through it.

No Longer Slaves

We are children of God and we were created not only in His own image, but to serve Him and bring glory to His name.

“God, be exalted above the heavens; let your glory be over the whole earth.” -Psalms 57:11 CSB

That doesn’t equate to us being perfect like God. We can’t because we were born in a broken and imperfect world.

We mess up and will continue to do so…a LOT. That doesn’t make God loves us any less and it doesn’t take away the purpose He’s given to each one of us.

When we shed ourselves of guilt, fear and shame, we let go of the bondage our sins have on us. We are no longer slaves to it, but we are servants of the Lord instead. We seek to serve Him and don’t allow our sins to cloud our view of who He is and who we are in Him.

When we stop allowing ourselves to be slaves of sin, we start allowing ourselves to be enslaved to God and righteousness. He is the only One we should serve, and we should toil and work hard our whole lives for Him.

“Don’t work only while being watched, as people-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, do God’s will from your heart.” -Ephesians 6:6 CSB

Bought to be Free

Whatever sins are holding you back from experiencing the true freedom in Christ, it’s time to release them. Just let go of their grip on you.

Give them over to your Father.

God “bought” us at a price. That price was the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus. Jesus paid the ultimate price for each one of us.

He bought us for a purpose, so that we could be eternally free from our sins and death.

“For you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.”            -1 Corinthians 6:20 CSB

It’s time for us to step out of our past and present guilt and shame and step into the light of God’s freedom. In His arms, we find our true meaning and purpose.

How do we find freedom from the penalty and power of sin? That comes through accepting Jesus Christ’s death on the Cross as the payment for our sin. As we submit to Christ, sin loses its power — Christ’s power takes over. As we choose to trust and follow Him, our sinful habits, thoughts and attitudes lose their control. Guilt disappears, and peace of mind dominates. Right habits become the norm. That’s freedom — true freedom!

The following activities and discussions are designed to help you guide your child toward a biblical understanding of freedom. As you explore this important topic with your child, may you both find joy in the freedom that comes from Christ.

Then Jesus said to them, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am [He], and [that] I do nothing of Myself; but as My Father taught Me, I speak these things. “And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him.” As He spoke these words, many believed in Him. Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How [can] You say, ‘You will be made free’?” Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. “And a slave does not abide in the house forever, [but] a son abides forever. “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.”
(John 8:28-36 NKJV)

 But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. For the wages of sin [is] death, but the gift of God [is] eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
(Romans 6:22-23 NKJV)

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery,” the Apostle Paul begins the fifth chapter in his letter to the Galatians (Galatians 5:1, NIV).

Imagine him standing, fist raised before a crowd, bellowing these powerful words. Yet as Christians, we know Paul’s words aren’t some rally cry for a skirmish but rather about the freedom we all have in the Lord.

What sort of freedom is Paul referring to? And how has the freedom in Christ he writes about in Galatians 5:1 set us free?

What Does 'It Is for Freedom Christ Has Set Us Free'Mean?

Paul was writing in Greek to Gentiles living in Galatia. The word he uses, eleutheria, means “liberty” or “freedom,” according to the New American Standard Bible. Eleutheriacomes from the Greek word eleutheros, which according to Strong’s Concordance means “free, i.e., not a slave or not under restraint.”

As Paul goes on in that passage to indicate we should stand firm and not allow ourselves to be burdened by the yoke of slavery, this meaning appears to be clear.

In Christ, Paul is saying, in essence, we have freedom, so we should never again be bound or chained by the ropes or other structures that once held us tight.

What Is This ‘Yoke of Slavery’?

But what is Paul referring to by “yoke of slavery”? The word “yoke” in Greek is zugos, which is used to describe the means by which oxen or other work animals were bound together and forced to carry heavy loads.

Farmers and other livestock workers often put a wooden pole over two work animals, usually curved to fit around their necks, so the two could be fashioned into one unit, unified so together they could pull their loads evenly and efficiently.

In Scripture, the term “yoke” is often used as a metaphor for any bondage God’s people endured. For instance, in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, and elsewhere in the Old Testament, God reminds His people He has delivered them from their former captors, the Egyptians.

The Egyptians had placed a yoke upon them, but they are not yoked together anymore. As God proclaims in in Leviticus 26:13, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt so that you would no longer be slaves to the Egyptians; I broke the bars of your yoke and enabled you to walk with heads held high.”

But in the New Testament, this yoke of slavery typically refers to the bondage God’s people were in before Jesus Christ came and laid the path to salvation through His death on the cross — the bondage of sin and God’s Law.

Why Is God’s Law a ‘Yoke of Slavery’?

God’s Law is not bad — nothing of God is bad, wrong, or evil. But as the apostles point out numerous times, people are imperfect and not able to achieve salvation on their own by following God’s Law to the letter.

Before Christ, God’s Law was essentially a form of slavery, an oppressive structure they could not possibly rise to meet or overcome. Sin was bad, but the solution offered — full adherence to God’s Law — was insurmountable.

As the NIV Study Bible explains, the Law was a burden of “rigorous demands,” an “intolerable burden for sinful humanity.”

But Christ came and offered a new way: A path to God through Him. As Jesus told the disciples, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

God’s Law was given to His people in the days they were liberated from Egypt. When the people were in the wilderness, Moses went to the top of Mount Sinai, where he was given a special covenant from God — the Ten Commandments.

God also prescribed all the ways His people were to live in a manner that would be pleasing to Him, from what they should and shouldn’t do (such as worship false idols, lie, or commit murder) to how they should build God’s tabernacle and approach Him in holy worship.

This covenant agreement is outlined throughout Exodus and Leviticus. But as we see throughout the Old Testament, even those most beloved by God couldn’t live up to these standards.

God knew this. So much later, after the people knew in their hearts that they could never achieve salvation on their own, God sent salvation in the form of His own son, Jesus, “that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

Jesus stood in our place and paid our sin debt. His final words on the cross, “It is finished” (John 19:30), cements this. In those days, those words were typically uttered when a debt was paid in full, and that seems to be precisely what Jesus was saying just before He took His last breath on the cross.

Jesus paid our debt by dying for us, thereby liberating us from the old way and forging a new path that would enable us to have salvation with God in heaven forevermore.

Various Scripture verses echo this: “You were bought with a price,” we’re told in 1 Corinthians 6:20a, and in Galatians 3:13a, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.”

And in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus reminds us, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). He bought our freedom with His own life.

What Freedom Do We Have in Christ?

Because of Christ, the old way of living — avoiding the penalty of sin by living in full accordance with God’s Law — is abolished in favor of a new way: Salvation through faith. When we believe in Jesus, we become a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

We die to sin and our old ways, and we get a new pair of clothes to wear: The clothing that is Jesus. We are delivered from the bondage of sin and its punishment, death, and have new life in Christ. That is the freedom we are promised.

The freedom we have in Christ is the freedom to live in faith, to put all our hope and trust that God welcomes us through His Son into His holy kingdom.

That is the freedom we must hold onto. As Paul writes, “Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery,” meaning keep the faith. Stay true to your beliefs.

We no longer have to worry about what will happen when we fall short of God’s expectations. We just have to believe, do our best to live a life worthy of Jesus, and know that a better tomorrow is awaiting us. What freedom that is!

When we read this passage in Galatians 5:1, do we fully understand the meaning of being “set free”? Does it mean that we are free to do anything we like since Christ has died for our sins and because He paid the price, meaning we are free to do anything without consequence? What does being set free actually mean? To understand this passage correctly, we need to look at the context and surrounding passages.

Galatians 5:1 stands as a key verse that transitions to the next section of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. At the same time, it summarises everything Paul explained earlier in the letter. In Galatians 1:11 to 2:21, Paul starts by defending his apostleship then goes on to defend the gospel, explaining that we are saved by grace alone, not by works, and we are saved and freed from the curse of the law and are now in a right relationship with God (Galatians 3:1-4:31). 

Throughout the previous chapters, Paul argues that the people of God were slaves to sin and death under the old covenant (Galatians 3:21-29; 4:1-7, 21-31). Now that we are in the new covenant, we are “set free”. The work of Jesus Christ achieves this freedom through His life, death, and resurrection; He was the sacrifice for sin and fulfilled all righteousness. (Galatians 3:10-14).

When Paul wrote this letter, the Jews frequently spoke about the “yoke of the law” (Acts 15:7-11, Galatians 5:1). The yoke of the law was a burden no one could withstand. It was impossible to fulfil because of its requirement. Even Jesus speaks about taking on the yoke of Christ instead. Jesus says in Matthew 11:29-30 saying, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

In other words, the Law cannot grant salvation and free us from sin and death. But what the Law does is to point the way to Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:19-24). Through His sacrifice, Christ fulfilled all the Law and achieved salvation for all who are appointed to believe in Him. So, Paul says in Galatians 5:2-4, “Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.”

Paul is not just condemning the act of circumcision itself; instead, he criticises its “theology “. In other words, he is condemning “works” as a necessary attribute for salvation where the focus is on the external acts rather than a spiritual transformation. So what Paul was explaining to the Galatian church is that if they choose circumcision, they are choosing legalism. If you do that, you are returning to take on the full weight of the law and not just circumcision itself. The root of the issue is “works versus grace” or, in other words, “flesh versus Spirit.” Ephesians 2:8-9 says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

It does not mean that God expects any less of us in terms of the law, and that His Law is done away with, no longer applying to our life. What it does mean is that we can never achieve salvation through the Law or by our works. Galatians 1:14 says, “For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The “freedom of Christ” means that we are free from the Law condemning us from the penalty of sin and likewise that we are also free from the power of sin (Romans 6:14). Amen! This is why John 8:36 says, “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

So what does this freedom look like? Does it mean that you can do any sinful activity and there are no consequences to it? No, Galatians 5:13 says, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” True Christian freedom means that you are willing to become a slave of Christ because of your relationship and love for Him. Romans 6:17-18 says, “But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.”

So, freedom in Christ is “not a licence to sin,” and do not use it as an opportunity for the flesh, instead through love, serve one another. You can only do this by keeping in step with the Spirit. Galatians 5:16-17 says, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.”

The critical fact here is that if your flesh is leading you to indulge in the things of the flesh, then you are not being led by the Spirit, and you are under the law. The works of the flesh are sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. The flesh rather than the Spirit is leading those who do such things. They are still under the law and will not inherit the kingdom of God (Galatians 5:18-21).

In contrast, if the Spirit leads you, then you are not under the law, and the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, and against such things, there is no law. If you belong to Christ, you are free from the desires of the flesh because you have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. So if we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-25).

In conclusion, the meaning of “for freedom Christ has set us free” is freedom from the law of sin and death. Instead, we are led by the Holy Spirit, producing the fruit of the Spirit through a love relationship with Jesus Christ for His glory. The Old Testament Law served as a moral compass to guide and point to Jesus Christ. It had no power to grant salvation. (Galatians 3:19-24). But Christ set us free from the law of sin and death through His sacrificial death. He fulfilled all the requirements of the Law. We are now free to serve Christ and fulfil all His good purposes for the glory of God (Romans 8:2-8). Amen!

“I find then a law; that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” Romans 7:21–25

The lament of Romans 7:24 is the cry of no less than the great Apostle Paul, who groans, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” He says that his situation makes him “wretched,” and sadly many Christians live in this condition day after day, and even year after year. The word wretched is translated from the Greek word talaiporos, which has the idea of bearing a trial and can be rendered “miserable.” But the question at the end of the lament does not go unanswered. Verse 25 begins, “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” So no Christian needs to live in the wretched, miserable state described in Romans seven. He has a Deliverer, and it is Jesus Christ! This is clear from the context.

I clearly remember the first time I read Romans chapter seven as a believer. I was new in the faith and very new at reading the Bible. That day I was shocked that the words I found in verses 18 through 23 were actually in the Bible! They gave an exact description (it seemed to me) of my own unhappy experience as a Christian trying to live the Christian life. I just couldn’t do it with any consistency. What I did not want to do I did, and what I wanted to do for Christ I was somehow often unable to do. It was as if verse 24 were the conclusion of the chapter. Somehow I missed the impact of verse 25. Who shall deliver me from the power of my sinful human nature? Jesus will do it.

Romans 7:24 is about three-quarters of the way through the section of the book of Romans that teaches about our deliverance from the power of sin. Romans 1 through 5 explains in exquisite detail how Christ has delivered us from the penalty of our sin. Then Romans 6:1 through 8:15 (and perhaps through verse 27) reveals how Christ has also delivered us from the power of our sin. In Romans 8 we are taught the certainty of the eventual deliverance believers in Christ will have from the presence of sin (when we are glorified). So the context of Romans 7 indicates that we are not left to live and struggle in the wretched state described there. Christians can overcome sin.

When this Biblical truth is taught, sometimes good people worry that the doctrine of sinless perfection is being preached. This is not the case for Baptist fundamentalists. I do not know of any Baptist today who teaches the Wesleyan doctrine of sinless perfection. A. J. Gordon, the great Baptist preacher of the late nineteenth century, said appropriately that although he rejected sinless perfection, he did not advocate the opposite extreme. He wrote, “If we regard the doctrine of sinless perfection as a heresy, we regard contentment with sinful imperfection as a greater heresy” (emphasis his). The truth that Christ delivers us from our flesh and from sin is a clear Bible doctrine and does not mean that there is anyone on earth who actually never sins any more. This truth simply gives us the right approach to doing battle with the sin that so easily besets us.

The wretched state bemoaned in verse 24 arises from the conflict in a man’s life between two laws: the law of God (which is in his mind because he has learned it, and has been his delight ever since he was regenerated—verses 22 and 23) and the law of sin (which dwells in him, in his flesh, in the body he inherited from Adam—verses 17–20 and 23–24). The laws are contrary to each other and exert great influence on him all the time. One cannot be fulfilled without the other being violated, leaving the man frustrated, defeated, and wretched.

What he needs is deliverance from his own body. Somehow it is in the body that the sinful nature resulting from the fall of man has been passed down from Adam to each of us. Sin is in us, in our very body, in our flesh. We find ourselves in the predicament summarized at the very end of chapter 7: “So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” What Christian does not know this predicament? What we need is deliverance from the flesh.

Throughout the Bible, we find that God is our Deliverer. Think about it. He delivered Noah from the flood, Jacob from the famine, Joseph from the prison, Israel from Egypt, David from the giant, the Hebrew children from the furnace, and Daniel from the lions. Deliverance is a great theme of the Bible, and God is the Deliverer. Jesus taught us to pray every day, “Deliver us from evil.” We need deliverance every day even from ourselves, from this body, which is a body of death. Thankfully, Jesus Christ has provided this deliverance for every person He has saved.

Salvation (deliverance) from the power of sin comes by two great works of Christ:

1. The Work of Christ on the Cross

This is what Romans 6 and about half of chapter 7 is about. When Christ died for us, we died with Him. When He rose again, we rose with Him to walk in newness of life. When we believe this truth (as mysterious as it is) and yield to God at the moment of temptation, we experience practical deliverance from sin.

Romans 6:14 says, “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” Twice in Romans 6, God says that believers in Christ are “free from sin” (see verses 18 and 22). We are not free of sin, but we definitely are free from sin. The chains are broken. “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John 8:36). 

Trusting in Christ is the way to victory while trying harder is the way to defeat. Romans 7 opens by saying that we are free from the law through the sacrifice of Christ. The way of bondage through seeking to please God by measuring up to His standard is no longer the way of the Christian. He is free from both sin and the law, and by reckoning this to be true and by yielding to God instead of sin when temptation comes, he experiences deliverance (study Romans 6 and 7 again).

2. The Work of Christ in Sending Us the Holy Spirit

In Romans chapters one through seven the Spirit of God is only mentioned twice (in 1:4 and 5:5). Then in chapter eight, the Holy Spirit is named nineteen times! The Christian life is to be lived in the victory of Christ on the cross and through the power of the Spirit within us.

Jesus asked the Father to send us the Spirit in order to give us deliverance from our flesh and empower us to live holy lives (see John 14:15–17). Romans 8:2 says that this deliverance happens by one law overruling another: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.”

Jesus taught us that He would send the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter (helper) to aid us in obeying His commandments. By depending on His strength instead of our weakness, we can see our flesh overcome by the Spirit, and succeed in living right by His power! “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16) really works! And it’s the only thing that does. If we try to live the Christian life by determination and self-discipline only, we will fail. But we will experience victory when we start depending on the Holy Spirit to supply that victory.

Overcoming is by faith alone, faith in Jesus Christ (1 John 5:3–4). Let’s recognize that victory over sin is to be had by the work of Christ. It is the victory described in Galatians 2:20 and we can have it today!

“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20

Being free from the law does not mean we now go steal, lie, murder and cheat on our spouses. I hate sin and the way the enemy lures people into it so he can steal, kill and destroy their lives. I am against sin. Do I make myself clear? So anyone who starts saying “that lady who writes in the Bargain Hunter says we can just go live in sin” is making things up because that is not how I feel.

Jesus has already paid for your forgiveness when you sin, but please stay as far away from sin as you can because it opens up doors to the enemy, and we don’t want to do anything to help that rotten snake out. Plus, as I mentioned before, it is not who you are anymore if you have received Jesus. You are no longer a sinner but a saint, so why would you want to be someone you are not?

But the way we stay out of sin, contrary to what many may think, is not by being under the law. The law is a yoke of bondage (Galatians 5:1) that made sin actually come alive in us. The law was perfect — don’t get me wrong — but God didn’t give the law so people could follow it perfectly, in turn making them perfect and justified in his sight. No, rather it was to do the opposite.

The law was given to bring out the sin in people to make them see their own humanity and weaknesses; it was to break them down to a point so they could see their need for a Savior.

Romans 3:19-20 says, “Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.”

The law actually stirred up sin. It didn’t help in the fight against it. First Corinthians 15:25 says, “The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.”

Galatians 3:24-25 says, “Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.”

The law was meant to break us down and beat us up to the point that we stop relying on self and start having faith in the only one that could make us right with God: Jesus. Once we receive Jesus, we are not to be under that old system anymore because the law was not made for a righteous person (1 Timothy 1:9), and those who receive Jesus are now righteous.

Romans 7:6 says, “But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.”

Let me tell you, as long as you are under the law, sin will continue to have dominion over you because it will always point out your weakness, the one thing you lack and what you have to try to do in your own strength to overcome.

Romans 6:14 says, “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”

Being under the law does not change hearts or free us from sin; it is only through Jesus and his grace that hearts are changed and actions then follow. The law was about behavior modification. Jesus is about inward transformation that causes outward change. Our focus should now be on Jesus living in us, making us righteous and free, rather than the law, which drove us to a dependence upon self and our own performance.

“But we all, with unveiled face, beholding in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” — 2 Corinthians 3:18.

I want to encourage you all to lay down your dependence on self to perform and just start beholding Jesus and how he has performed in your place. It will transform you into his image in a way that was never possible through the law.

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free: The fact is that Jesus has made us free. If we live in bondage to a legal relationship with God, it isn’t because God wills it. God pleads with us to take His strength and walk in that freedom, and to not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.

i. Significantly, it is Christwho has made us free. We don’t make ourselves free. Freedom is a gift of Jesus, given to us and received by faith. When we struggle to free ourselves, we just become more entangled again with a yoke of bondage.

ii. Paul also made it emphatic: the liberty. Today, people live in the headlong pursuit of “freedom,” which they think of as doing whatever they want to do, and never denying any desire. This is a kind of liberty, a false liberty; but it is not the liberty. The liberty is our freedom from the tyranny of having to earn our own way to God, the freedom from sin and guilt and condemnation, freedom from the penalty and the power and eventually freedom from the presence of sin.

b. Stand fast means that it takes effort to stay in this place of liberty. Someone who is legally made free in Jesus can still live in bondage; they can be deceived into placing themselves back into slavery.

i. The great evangelist D. L. Moody illustrated this point by quoting an old former slave woman in the South following the Civil War. Being a former slave, she was confused about her status and asked: Now is I free, or been I not? When I go to my old master he says I ain’t free, and when I go to my own people they say I is, and I don’t know whether I’m free or not. Some people told me that Abraham Lincoln signed a proclamation, but master says he didn’t; he didn’t have any right to. Many Christians are confused on the same point. Jesus Christ has given them an “Emancipation Proclamation,” but their “old master” tells them they are still slaves to a legal relationship with God. They live in bondage because their “old master” has deceived them.

c. Yoke of bondage: This phrase reminds us of what Peter said in Acts 15:10 about those who would bring the Gentiles under the law: Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? The Jews themselves were not able to justify themselves before God by the law, so they shouldn’t put that heavy, burdensome yoke on the Gentiles.

i. Certain Jewish teachers of that day spoke of the Law of Moses as a yoke, but they used the term in a favorable light. Paul saw a legal relationship as a yoke, but as a yoke of bondage. It is related to slavery, not liberty. This yoke of bondage does nothing but entangle us. We try hard to pull God’s plow, but the yoke of bondageleaves us tangled, restricted, and frustrated.

ii. It certainly was bondage. Jewish teachers counted up 613 commandments to keep in the Law of Moses. “Even to remember them all was a burden, and to keep them bordered on the impossible. Small wonder that Paul referred to subjecting oneself to them all as entering into slavery.” (Morris)

2. (2-4) The danger of embracing the law as a way to walk with God.

Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing. And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.

a. If you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing: When we embrace the law as our rule of walking with God, we must let go of Jesus. He is no longer our righteousness; we attempt to earn it ourselves. For the Galatians in this context, to receive circumcision – the ritual that testified that a Gentile was coming under the law – meant that he no longer trusted in Jesus as His righteousness, but trusted in himself instead. So Paul could say “Christ will profit you nothing.”

i. The legalists among the Galatians wanted them to think that they could have both Jesus and a law-relationship with God. Paul tells them that this is not an option open to them – the system of grace and the system of law are incompatible. “Whoever wants to have a half-Christ loses the whole.” (Calvin)

ii. “Circumcision is the seal of the law. He who willingly and deliberately undergoes circumcision, enters upon a compact to fulfill the law. To fulfill it therefore he is bound, and he cannot plead the grace of Christ; for he has entered on another mode of justification.” (Lightfoot)

iii. How tragic! Jesus, dying on the cross, pouring out His blood, His life, His soul, His agony, His love for us – and it will profit you nothing! Two men died with Jesus; for the one who put his trust in Jesus, it was eternal life. For the one who trusted in himself, it profited him nothing.

iv. This point was so important to Paul that he mustered all the strength he could in a personal appeal: he began with Indeed I, Paul. When he continued on and wrote I testify, Paul remembered his former training as a lawyer – and was deadly serious. “Tongue cannot express, nor heart conceive what a terrible thing it is to make Christ worthless.” (Luther)

b. Every man who becomes circumcised… is a debtor to keep the whole law: When we embrace the law as our rule of walking with God, we must embrace the whole law. We become debtors to keep the whole law, and that is a heavy debt.

i. Again, the legalists among the Galatians wanted them to think they could observe some aspects of the law without coming under the entire law. But when we choose to walk by law, we must walk by the whole law.

ii. If we come to God on the basis of our own law keeping we must keep the whole lawand our law-keeping must be perfect. No amount of obedience makes up for one act of disobedience; if you are pulled over for speeding, it will do no good to protest that you are a faithful husband, a good taxpayer, and have obeyed the speed limit many times. All of that is irrelevant. You have still broken the speeding law and are guilty under it.

iii. This does not mean that the mere act of being circumcised means that someone is under a legal relationship with God, and must keep the whole law for salvation. Paul spoke to the Gentile Christians among the Galatians, who were being drawn to circumcision as adults, as evidence that they had come under the Law of Moses as the “first step” to salvation. We will later see that Paul didn’t care one way or another about circumcision (Galatians 5:6). What he detested was the theology of circumcision as presented by the legalists.

c. You have fallen from grace: When we embrace the law as our rule of walking with God, we depart from Jesus and His grace. We are then estranged from Christ, separated from Him and His saving grace.

i. The danger of falling from grace is real, but it is often misunderstood. Most people think of “falling away” in terms of immoral conduct, but we are not saved by our conduct. However, we are saved by our continuing reliance by faith on the grace of God. Someone may fall from grace and be damned without ever falling into grossly immoral conduct.

ii. Boice on you have fallen from grace: “The phrase does not mean that if a Christian sins, he falls from grace and thereby loses his salvation. There is a sense in which to sin is to fall into grace, if one is repentant. But to fall from grace, as seen by this context, is to fall into legalism… Or to put it another way, to choose legalism is to relinquish grace as the principle by which one desires to be related to God.”

iii. Literally, Paul wrote, “you have fallen out of grace,” which is not the same as the colloquial English phrase “you have fallen from grace.”

3. (5-6) The answer of faith to the legalist.

For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.

a. For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith: Those walking in the Spirit wait for righteousness by faith; they are not trying to earn it by performing good works. No one is a legalist through the Spirit.

i. Wuest on eagerly wait: “The word speaks of an attitude of intense yearning and an eager waiting for something. Here it refers to the believer’s intense desire for and eager expectation of a practical righteousness which will be constantly produced in his life by the Holy Spirit as he yields himself to Him.”

b. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love: Those walking in the Spirit know that being circumcised or uncircumcised means nothing. What matters is faith working through love, both of which were conspicuously absent in the legalists.

i. Each aspect of this verse is precious. It sets us in a place: in Christ Jesus. Morris on in Christ: “Paul never defines what the expression means, but it clearly points to the closest of unities.”

ii. In that place, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything – neither one matters at all. You aren’t better if you are circumcised or uncircumcised. You aren’t worse if you are circumcised or uncircumcised. The only harm is trusting in something that is completely irrelevant.

iii. This verse also tells us what does matter in this place: faith working through love. You have faith? Wonderful; but it must be faith working through love. If your faith doesn’t work, it isn’t real faith. If it doesn’t work through love, it isn’t real faith. But your lovealone isn’t enough; your lovemust also have faith: an abiding trust in Jesus and what He did for us.

iv. Faith must work through love. Herod had faith that John the Baptist was a true prophet, but there was no faith working through love, and he had John the Baptist murdered. Real faith, saving faith, will work through love.

4. (7-12) A final confrontation.

You ran well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion does not come from Him who calls you. A little leaven leavens the whole lump. I have confidence in you, in the Lord, that you will have no other mind; but he who troubles you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased. I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off!

a. You ran well: Paul remembered their good start in the faith, but he also knows that it isn’t enough to start well. They were still in danger of falling from grace.

b. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? Paul knew that the false teaching came from a person (who hindered you); but it didn’t come from Jesus (This persuasion does not come from Him who calls you).

i. At the root of it all, the Galatians were leaving Jesus to pursue the false and empty teachings of man, in this case legalism.

ii. Lightfoot on hindered: “A metaphor derived from military operations. The word signifies ‘to break up a road’… so as to render it impassable, and is therefore the opposite of… ‘to clear a way.’” The Galatians were doing well until someone broke up the road they ran on.

c. A little leaven leavens the whole lump: The warning is driven home – the corrupting influence of legalism and other doctrines that diminish Jesus are like leaven in a lump of dough. A little bit will soon corrupt the whole lump.

i. In the Jewish way of thinking, leaven almost always stood for evil influence. Paul is saying that the legalistic commitment they have right now may be small, but it is so dangerous that it can corrupt everything.

d. I have confidence in you: Wanting to leave the confrontation on a positive note, Paul expressed his confidence in the Galatians (which was really a confidence in the Lord who is able to keep them). Yet, Paul was equally confident that judgment awaits those who lead them astray and away from Jesus (he who troubles you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is).

i. Remember Jesus’ solemn warning against those who would lead one of these little ones astray (Matthew 18:6-7). The judgment is sure, whoever he is. “It does not matter who he is; he may be highly acclaimed in the community where he teaches, but if he is perverting the gospel he is a guilty person and his rank and reputation will not shield him.” (Morris)

e. If I still preach circumcision: Paul makes it clear that he no longer preaches the necessity of circumcision. The fact that he is persecuted by the legalists is evidence enough of this. Instead, Paul proudly bears the offense of the cross.

i. Someone might accuse Paul of preaching circumcision because he asked Timothy to be circumcised (Acts 16:1-3). But Paul didn’t have Timothy circumcised so Timothy could be saved or “more saved.” He did it so Timothy could more freely evangelize among unsaved Jewish people.

ii. Legalism can’t handle the offense of the cross. The whole point of Jesus dying on the cross was to say, “You can’t save yourself. I must die in your place or you have absolutely no hope at all.” When we trust in legalism, we believe that we can, at least in part, save ourselves. This takes away the offense of the cross, which should always offend the nature of fallen man. In this sense, the offense of the cross is really the glory of the cross, and legalism takes this glory away.

f. I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off! Finally, Paul wished that those who demanded circumcision among the Gentiles would go all the way themselves, and amputate their genitalia altogether and not merely their foreskins.

i. Sacred castration was known to citizens of the ancient world; it was frequently practiced by pagan priests of the cults in the region of Galatia. Paul’s idea here is something like this: “If cutting will make you righteous, why don’t you do like the pagan priests, go all the way and castrate yourself?” Morris rightly observes, “This was a dreadful thing to wish, but then the teaching was a dreadful thing to inflict on young Christians.”

ii. “This word was habitually used to describe the practice of mutilation which was so prevalent in the Phrygian worship of Cybele. The Galatians were necessarily familiar with it, and it can hardly bear any other sense.” (Rendall)

iii. In writing this, Paul also wished that these legalists would be cut off from the congregation of the Lord as required by Deuteronomy 23:1: He who is emasculated by crushing or mutilation shall not enter the assembly of the LORD.

iv. With such a dramatic conclusion to this point, Paul has made one thing clear: legalism is no little thing. It takes away our liberty and puts us into bondage. It makes Jesus and His work of no profit to us. It puts us under obligation to the whole law. It violates the work of the Spirit of God. It makes us focus on things that are irrelevant. It keeps us from running the race Jesus set before us. It isn’t from Jesus. A little bit will infect an entire church. Those who promote it will face certain judgment, no matter who they are. Legalism tries to take away some of the glory of the cross. In light of how serious all this is, it is no wonder that Paul says he wishes they would even cut themselves off!

B. How to live in the liberty of Jesus.

1. (13-15) Using liberty to love each other

For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” But if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another!

a. For you, brethren, have been called to liberty: Paul has made the point over and over again – the Christian life is a life of liberty. Jesus came to set the captives free, not to keep them in bondage or put them in bondage all over again. It is worth asking if people see us as people of freedom and liberty. Often, Christians are seen as people more bound up and hung up than anyone else is.

i. “He is not saying that a certain measure of liberty was grudgingly accorded believers. He is saying that freedom is of the essence of being Christian; it is the fundamental basis of all Christian living.” (Morris)

b. Only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh: The great fear of the legalist is that liberty will be used as an opportunity for the flesh. The idea is that people will just go out and sin as they please, then say to a spineless God, “I’m sorry, please forgive me,” and then go on doing whatever they want again. Paul recognized the danger of this attitude, so he warned against it here.

i. First, Paul writes to brethren. These are those who are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus(Galatians 3:26). These are those who were baptized into Christ and have put on Christ(Galatians 3:27).

ii. These ones have been called to liberty. As Paul put it earlier in the chapter, they have been made free by Jesus Christ, now they are called to stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free(Galatians 5:1). They have been set free; now the question is, “How will they use their liberty?”

iii. Do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh: Clearly, we can choose to use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh. That option – that danger – is open to us. We can take the glorious freedom Jesus has given us, spin it, and use it as a way to please ourselves at the expense of others. Because the context focuses on the way we treat one another, Paul has in mind using our freedom in a way that tramples on the toes of others.

iv. Rendall on opportunity: “This term was applied in military language to a base of operations, and generally to any starting-point for action.” We are tempted to use our liberty in Jesus as a “base of operations” for selfish sin.

The Son would be "lifted up"—lifted up on a cross, exposed in public shame, hanging between heaven and earth, under the judgment of God against our sins—so that those who believed in Him should not perish but have everlasting life (John 12:32; 3:16).

Jesus Christ is able to set us free because He has dealt with the sin that enslaves us.

We can never atone for our own sin. We can never break its power. We can never come to God and say, "God, surely what I have done is enough to compensate for my sins." Nothing we can do can possibly compensate. But God sent His own Son—think of it, His own Son—who stood in for us, in our place. He lived a perfect life. Since He had no sins of His own to atone for, He was qualified to make a sacrifice for our sins. No sacrifice we could make could ever be adequate to atone for sin. But He was able and willing to do it. Because of that, we can be set free from guilt and from the bondage it creates.

Christ also sets us free in another way: through the truth about God—and about ourselves—that He reveals. If we believe in Him, we will come to know the truth, and the truth will set us free (John 8:32). That is His promise.

I have met some exceptionally intelligent people who cannot understand the Christian gospel. They hear its message as if it were a lecture on morality. Yet the gospel is not difficult to understand. The problem lies within us—in our spiritual blindness. If there is resistance in the heart to loving God, there will be resistance in the mind to knowing God—and therefore to listening to and seeking God. Only the truth can set us free.

Later on in John's Gospel, Jesus spoke about sending the Holy Spirit to His disciples. He would be like a great spotlight shining into their minds, illumining them so that they could begin to see and understand Jesus and what He had done. The Spirit would remove spiritual deception, transform the spiritually dead, and glorify Christ.

So Jesus is able to set us free because of who He is and because of what He shows us.

As a result, we now may dare to call God "Father."

This is the most obvious difference between a "religious" person and a Christian. A religious person is likely to address God—especially in a crisis—as "O God," not as "O Father." There is a simple reason for this. Unless you know God as your Father, you never cry out to Him in your need as "Abba, Father" (Rom. 8:15–16).

God has done three wonderful things to make us perfectly righteous in His sight: (1) He has ended our old life in Adam. (2) He has given us a new life in Christ. (3) He has given Christ to us as our righteousness.

To put it simply, God gets rid of all that we are and gives us Christ as our righteousness. Let us see how God does this.

God has ended our old life in Adam.

Through the blood of Christ, God has removed our sins from us forever. He has cleared us of all charges against us. He has justified us freely by His grace. 

But we have a deeper problem—our sinful self. The Bible calls it "the old man." The "old man" is all that we were in Adam.

The old man in Adam is a "sin factory"! The Lord Jesus told us what is in the heart of men. He said,

"From within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornication, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness." Mark 7:21-22

God's way was not to "change" the "old man," but to put an end to him. God puts us in Christ on the cross. The Bible says,

"Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him [Christ]…" Romans 6:6

God wants us to know that our old life in Adam ended on the cross. We died with Christ. Not only did we die with Him, but we were buried with Him.

What does burial signify? It signifies removal from God's sight. God says to us, "I ended your old life on the cross. I have removed that old life from My sight by your burial with Christ."

God has given us a new life in Christ.

Having ended our old life by our death and burial with Christ, God says to us, "I am now creating you as a new person in Christ." The Bible says,

"For we are his workmanship, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works that God prepared beforehand so we may do them." (Ephesians 2:10 NET Bible)

We have a new life in Christ! Our new life began with the resurrection of Christ. "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature."

God is saying to us, "You who have believed are now new creatures in Christ, for I have created you in Him. Your place and standing before Me is the same as Christ's place, for you arein Christ forever."

God has given Christ to us as our perfect righteousness.

In ourselves we are not righteous, but God has made us perfectly righteous in His sight. How did God do this? He put us in Christ; we are made "the righteousness of God in Him." The Bible says,

"For He has made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." 2 Corinthians 5:21

This verse says that we are "made the righteousness of God in Him." Just as God looks at Christ and sees Him perfectly righteous, so He looks at us and sees perfectly righteous because we are in Him.

When we think about ourselves and our failings, it is hard for us to believe that we have been made perfectly righteous in Christ. But this is true. We know it is true because we have the clear statements of God's Word.

If Gabriel, the mighty angel who stands in the very presence of God were to appear before us, our thought would likely be, "He is righteous and holy, but I am not." But this would be entirely wrong! God has given Christ to you as your righteousness. You are made "the righteousness of God in Him."

The Prodigal Son was given "the best robe"

When the prodigal son came back to his father, he was penniless, dirty, and in rags. How did his father receive him? He ran to meet him, threw his arms around him, and covered him with his kisses. At that moment the son knew that his father had forgiven him of all his sins.

This is a picture of how God receives the repentant sinner. He "runs" to meet him, He "throws His arms around him and covers him with His kisses." God forgives us of all our sins and enfolds us in His arms and covers us with His love.

But even though he knew that he was forgiven, the prodigal son, in his dirt and rags, would not have felt at ease in his father's house.

What did the father do? He told his servants, "Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him." It was not just a beautiful robe, but "the best robe." It is called "the best robe" because there could be no better. The father gave the prodigal the very best that he had so that his son could feel at home in his house.

The "best robe" not only made the son suitable to his father, but it made him conscious of his acceptance with the father. The son did not say, "But I am not worthy of this." He honoured his father by joyfully receiving what his father provided for him.

"The Best Robe" is Christ

This story has a deep, heavenly meaning. The Lord Jesus wants us to know what the Father has done to make us conscious of our acceptance. He has clothed us with "the best robe."

What is "the best robe"? The best robe is Christ! God has given Christ to us to be our righteousness.

God's perfect delight and satisfaction is in His Son, and God has given Him to us to be our righteousness. Nothing could possibly make me more suitable to God than having Christ as my righteousness. He is "the best robe"that God could give to us. God wants us to be perfectly suitable to Him and He wants us to be conscious of our acceptance.

Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves...To this, you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in His steps...

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life... Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.

But now He has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in His sight, without blemish and free from accusation— if you continue in your faith, established and firm, and do not move from the hope held out in the gospel.

This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven... Through Him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses...

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.”

Galatians 5:1,13; 1 Peter 2:16,21; Romans 6:22; Colossians 1:21-23; Acts 13:39; Romans 8:1-2

Bible verses about freedom in Christ

Pay attention daughter, Jesus is “...Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood...” Revelation 1:6.

Notice the verb tense.

Love is ongoing forever but freed is done.

You are free.

You have been set free.

Any slavery you experience is your choice.

Don’t allow the enemy to steal this gift.

Yes, to live in the world, there are laws to follow to keep your physical freedom.

Your soul and your spirit are free.

Embrace and cherish this freedom you have been graced with.

Begin or continue with even more confidence in living free in Christ.

Memorize and then practice the following, “In Him and through faith in Him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.” Ephesians 3:12

In celebration child come and pray, “May Your unfailing love come to me, LORD, Your salvation, according to Your promise; then I can answer anyone who taunts me, for I trust in Your word.

Never take Your word of truth from my mouth, for I have put my hope in Your laws. I will always obey Your law, forever and ever. I will walk about in freedom, for I have sought out Your precepts.

And, I will speak of Your statutes before kings and will not be put to shame, for I delight in Your commands because I love them. I reach out for Your commands, which I love, that I may meditate on Your decrees.”

Psalm 119:41-48

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom...Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free... So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

2 Corinthians 3:17; John 8:32, 36

Before we were saved, we were slaves to the fear of the destructive power of sin in our life (Romans 8:15).  But through the cross, Christ has set us free from the guilt and condemnation of sin.  “For by the death of Christ we are set free… our sins are forgiven (Ephesians 1:7).”  When we were still lawless and rebels to God, we were enslaved to sin.  But through His death, Christ freed us from this power of sin.  “We know that our old self was crucified with Him so that our sinful nature might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin (Romans 6:6).”  When we were still unbelievers, many of us were afraid of physically dying.  But, even as believers, many of us are still afraid of sin’s power; wrongly believing we are still captive to sin.  However, by His death, Jesus has freed us from this fear of death and sin’s stranglehold.  “So that by His death He might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil – and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death (Hebrews 2:14-15)”

   Therefore, by Christ’s death on the cross, we have been forever freed from the fear of sin’s dominion and the fear of death.  It is crucial for us to know that sin is no longer master over us and death no longer has dominion over us.  “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death (Roman 8:1).” Why?  Because the Bible says that through Christ’s death we have been “brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God… for you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba!  Father! (Romans 8:15; 21).”  Before we were born of the Spirit, we were enemies of God.  But by His Son’s death on the cross, God has set us free to be His bondslaves.  How did God deliver us from the power of sin and produce this miraculous change of heart in us – from godless, rebellious sinners to devoted bondslaves of God?   The way God accomplished this glorious liberation for us was simply profound and powerful: Since we were born into sin, God freed us from sin’s captivity by including us in His Son’s death so we could be born into life (Romans 6:3-5).  “He who has died has been freed from sin… we have died with Christ (Romans 6:7-8).”  This operation of the cross was like a divine heart transplant.  When Jesus Christ died on the cross, God exchanged our terminally sin-sick heart with His Son’s divine holy heart.  We were once sons of disobedience and children of wrath (Ephesians 2:1-2), but now that God has removed our sinful nature and put the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, we have become sons of obedience (Romans 6:6-20; Galatians 4:6; Colossians 2:11).

   Since Christ has set us free from the kingdom of darkness, should we continue to practice sin?  Absolutely not!  “For you were called to be free, my brethren; only do not use your freedom to indulge sinful desires (Galatians 5:13).”  Jesus Christ has set us free from sin for the very purpose that we would practice holiness (sanctification).  “For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but to sanctification (1 Thessalonians 4:7).”  The Bible says we have been freed from sin and have become enslaved to God (Romans 6:22).  Many Christians think they can continue to willfully practice sin and still receive the benefits of salvation.  Other Christians think that holiness is too strict a standard to keep.  Still other Christians think that spiritual freedom means you can do whatever you please, living lawlessly, and still be covered by the blood of Jesus.  None of these are true.  The apostle Paul said, “Should we sin because we are under grace?  God forbid! (Romans 6:15).”  And the apostle Peter said, “Act as free men and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil but use it as bondslaves for God (1 Peter 2:16).”  Paul also wrote, “Keep yourself free from sin (1 Timothy 5:22).”  Even though we may be under grace,  God has never changed His standard of holiness.  Here is the divine truth: You are either a slave to sin or slave to God.  “Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness? (Romans 6:16).” Practicing obedience to God is essential because the Bible says “without sanctification no one will see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14).”  Unless we walk by faith in this freedom from sin purchased by Christ’s blood, we cannot know   the Lord.  The apostle John taught, “Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness.  But you know that He appeared so that He might take away our sins.  And in Him is no sin.  No one who lives in Him keeps on sinning.  No one who continues to sin has either seen Him or known Him (1 John 3:4-6).”  

   Jesus Christ died on the cross to set us free from the power of sin and death.  If we do not use this priceless freedom to serve God as His bondslaves, then Christ will have died needlessly for us.  If we are not enslaved to God, we cannot be sanctified. And without sanctification, we cannot know God nor can we inherit eternal life (Romans 6:22).

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” 2 Corinthians 3:17  “It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore, keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.”  Galatians 5:1

John 8:31-32 says, “So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’”  Those who truly believe in Christ for salvation will have fruit to demonstrate the authenticity of their faith.  They will become increasingly convinced of the truth as they study the truth of the Scripture, and in so doing, they will be increasingly set free from deception, wrong behavior, and any other sin that might hold them back from increased fruitfulness.  The truth of the gospel sets a person free from bondage to the devil, for before we know Christ we are indeed his captives held to do his will rather than God’s (2 Timothy 2:26).  But when we die to sin by faith in Christ, we are made new and are no longer slaves to sin but slaves of God (2 Corinthians 5:17, Romans 6:4-7).  Our slavery to God is our freedom because we are kept by Him by His power and grace so that we are enabled and empowered to do His will.  It is His ownership of us and the fact that He is our Master that keeps us free from Satan ever regaining total control over us.  We can become deceived and think that we cannot escape sin or evil, but the chains have been broken for good if we are in Christ.  We are not bound to the devil no matter our predicament if Christ is in us.  There are no more chains, and we don’t have to continue in sin. This is freedom, the ability in Christ by His grace to do His will and to never be chained down to sin and to the devil.  Even our flesh does not have mastery over us, for it is Christ Who has set us free from the law of sin and of death (Romans 8:2).  Will we struggle at times?  Sadly, yes.  Will we do things we despise sometimes?  Unfortunately, even Christians stumble.  But never are we bound inextricably to sin and to the devil. 

The call then for believers given that we are free in Christ is not to use our freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.  Galatians 5:13 says, “For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”  1 Peter 2:16 says, “Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves of God.”  Even as believers, we can still live as if we are children of the devil by making poor choices.  God has not turned us into robots which are incapable of sin and thus equally incapable of obedience and worship.  Rather, He has made it possible for us to willingly and delightedly choose to worship and obey as we yield to His presence and power working in our hearts.  Our freedom should not be used as a means to suppress the Spirit within us (Ephesians 4:30), but it should be used to allow the Spirit to fill us (Ephesians 5:18), empower us, teach us, lead us, and motivate us onward to do good works.  We are bondslaves of God, after all, and thus it is our calling and responsibility to present our members as members of righteousness (Romans 6:13).  This does not mean that this is a joyless drudgery of going through some religious motions or trying to keep some behavioral law imposed on us by another professing Christian.  We are free in Christ to make God-honoring choices before Him, not because someone else has told us that we must but because Jesus within us brings us joy when we do.  God desires a willing spirit (Matthew 26:41), and the love of Him within us controls us (2 Corinthians 5:14) and compels us to do what is good, right, and pure and to hate evil and grieve over what is corrupt.  The battle between the flesh and the spirit is won as we believe God’s promises and goodness to us and remember that a rejection of Him leads only to sorrow and emptiness.  We don’t need a list of external behavioral rules to make us obey, for our flesh will not be removed of its power by more restrictions.  Rather, we need to use our freedom in Christ to make good, God-honoring decisions, walking circumspectly and being careful to make wise choices.  In Christ, we have this ability if we have faith by God’s grace.

When we are saved, Christ comes to live in our hearts, for He gives us new hearts that can delight in Him and have God-honoring desires (Ezekiel 36:26).  Some Christians live constantly in fear of their hearts, and some distrust emotions altogether.  Perhaps they believe that it is an external code of rules that will keep them from succumbing to evil.  But a thorough reading of the Bible shows men and women of God who were filled with passion and zeal for truth and for righteousness within their hearts.  They were not stoic robots who were afraid that a little release of emotion, passion, or excitement would corrupt them.  A dark dragon does not dwell in our hearts if we are in Christ, but Jesus Himself does.  He gives us the desires of our hearts as we delight in Him (Psalm 37:4).  He makes our hearts pure and clean in Jesus’ blood (Psalm 24:3-5).  We cannot afford to lose our zeal, for, in Revelation 3:19, God rebuked the Laodicean church for losing its zeal.  Titus also said that we are to be zealous for good works (Titus 2:14).  Christians get themselves in trouble when they start getting zealous for certain preferences or rituals such as a certain way of singing, a certain modality of music, a certain style of preaching, a certain pattern of vocal inflections, and a certain liturgy of worship.  Add to this a certain prescription of dress, conversation, scheduling, approved or not-approved this and that, and so on, and zeal for God gets displaced by zeal for impressing others by adhering to legislated preferences of man.  Christians cannot exchange Christian liberty with an imposed, external moral code and still expect to experience Christianity in its fullest sense.  Sure, there is a time to limit one’s freedom of conscience for the sake of the weaker brother whose conscience will be defiled by a certain activity (1 Corinthians 8:10-12), but establishing universal spiritual boundaries of conscience for everybody takes away from a person’s ability to walk before God and choose righteousness simply because it is right.  Freedom is not consistent with an environment that mandates complicity and conformity beyond what Scripture has already asked of us, nor does freedom thrive within a system where we look to others within the system for their approval in order to make sure we are advancing.  Rather, as we become freer, that is, more controlled by the Spirit rather than by a system, we are living out the totality of Christian experience.  Passion and freedom go hand in hand as we seek out only the approval of God rather than that of man (John 12:43) and solely obedience to His Word rather than concerning ourselves with other people’s preferences and imposed morality.  We must listen to our own conscience and do our best not to defile the conscience of another believer.  But let us not make matters of personal conscience into expectations, written or unwritten, of corporate “sanctification.”

Isaiah 61:6 says, “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, Because the LORD has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives And freedom to prisoners.”  This verse was quoted by Christ at the launch of His earthly ministry as a sort of declaration and purpose statement of why He came.  He came to bring the gospel to the hurting to set them free from their sin.  He came to encourage those who were without hope with the hope of being set free from sin and being given eternal life.  He came to show people the liberty found in Christ even if they were behind bars on earth.   Freedom of conscience and of the soul leading to eternal freedom is indeed a great reward, for before we come to Christ, we are all behind Satan’s prison bars.  To keep in line with Christ’s purpose, we cannot go backwards and start conforming to a system of law-keeping and man-made expectation.  Galatians 5:1 says, “It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.”  We cannot afford to put on the yoke of legalism and performing to earn favor as opposed to enjoying the favor of God given to us in Christ.  Christ came to set us free, and His yoke is easy and His burden light (Matthew 11:30).  His way is the freedom to decide and discern God’s will for ourselves before God and to be able to approach the throne of grace without having to go through another person.  It is the freedom to be who God made us in Christ and to serve as He leads us to serve.  It is the freedom to not have to worry about making other people feel good by adhering to their preferences.  It is being released to have to make difficult decisions on our own without somebody telling us what the “right” answer is.  Most of all, freedom in Christ is no longer having to keep succumbing to sin after sin, for as 2 Peter 2:19 says, “For by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved.”   As Christians, there is nothing that has the power to totally overcome us such that Christ’s power cannot keep us free.  Romans 6:22 says, “But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.”  A context and condition of freedom and liberty in Christ alone is the prerequisite for sanctification, not a return to a Pharisaical, oppressive, rule-keeping, people-pleasing, externally-judged, performance-based system.  Even the flesh can conform to a man-made code of behavior, but only a willing spirit can make God-honoring choices when nobody is looking.  

We are free, and we should live that way, following our conscience and being led of the Spirit in our hearts.  “So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36).

What is this freedom that Christ won for us?

♦  Freedom from the law — The law was given to Moses to serve as a guide for how God’s people were to live. Yet no one could uphold the law completely. A Savior was needed. The Messiah came as prophesied, completely fulfilling the law. Christ’s perfect sacrifice atoned for the sins of all mankind forever. We now no longer live under the law… we live under His grace.

“In Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set you free from the law of sin and death.” – Romans 8:2

♦  Freedom from bondage to sin — Before Christ, we were held captive by sin. Now sin no longer wields control over us for we have been set free. Our Almighty Lord has broken our chains of bondage. We no longer need to give in to sin. His Spirit within us gives us power to resist sin and live for Him.

♦  Freedom from sin’s penalty — All mankind is deserving of death for we all fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). Only One without sin could pay the ransom price to save us. The Lamb of God gave His perfect life in exchange for our lives. He took upon Himself our sins and gave us His righteousness. Death for us is now just a doorway into life eternal with our Savior.

“True and absolute freedom is only found in the presence of God.” – A.W. Tozer

♦  Freedom from God’s judgment — Since our Heavenly Father reigns in absolute holiness, He cannot live in the presence of sin. Through Christ, we have been made holy. We no longer live under condemnation for our sins. We have no need to fear God’s judgment. For God sees us as He sees His Son… pure and righteous and holy.

♦  Freedom from evil — Jesus has rescued us from the power of this present evil age. The Victorious One has already won the war. We are saved from a world ruled by Satan… a world with temptation, deception and evil. We rise above all evil by the power of Christ that dwells in us. As children of God, we shine as lights in a corrupt world (Philippians 2:15).

“Christian liberty is freedom from sin, not freedom to sin.” – A.W. Tozer

♦  Freedom to live for God — Christ came to set us free. Not as a license to go our own way… to do whatever we want… for that would lead us back into slavery to our selfish desires. Jesus gave us freedom so that, by His power, we can do what was impossible before… to live rightly and unselfishly. To live as Jesus lived… a life of grace and compassion.

♦  Freedom to serve our living Lord — Freedom is a privilege. In thankfulness to the One who gave us new life, we use our freedom to serve Him. To reach out with His love to a lost and needy world. To glorify Him. For our Lord came not to be served, but to serve (Matthew 20:28). We are to do the same.

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” – Galatians 5:1

Jesus has set us free. In faith, we now choose to walk in this newfound freedom. We tap into His love, His grace and His power to live according to His will for us. We stand strong against the lure of the world and its yoke of slavery. For God’s gracious gift to us, salvation and freedom through His Son, is complete and eternal. And if the Son has set us free, we are free indeed (John 8:36).

But when the fulness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, MADE of a woman, MADE under the law. Galatians 4:4.

“And the Word was MADE flesh and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only Begotten of the Father) full of grace and truth:” John 1:14.

“But we see Jesus, Who was MADE a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour that He by the grace of God should taste death for every man.” Hebrews 2:9.

“Who is MADE, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life.” Hebrews 7:16.

“Wherefore in all things it behooved Him to be MADE like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation, for the sins of the people:’ Hebrews 2:17.

“Concerning His Son Jesus Christ, our Lord, which was MADE of the seed of David according to the flesh:” Romans 1:3.

“For He hath MADE Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin; that we might be MADE the righteousness of God in Him.” II Corinthians 5:21.

WHAT BELIEVERS ARE MADE IN CHRIST

“For He hath MADE Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin; that we might be MADE the righteousness of God in Him.” II Corinthians 5:21.

“For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of One shall many be MADE righteous.” Romans 5:19.

“But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, Who of God is MADE unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.” I Corinthians 1:30.

“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath MADE me free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:2.

“But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are MADE nigh by the blood of Christ.” Ephesians 2:13.

“Giving thanks unto the Father, Which hath MADE us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints.” Colossians 1:12.

“To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath MADE us acceptable in the Beloved.” Ephesians 1:6.

“For now being MADE free from sin, and become servants of God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.” Romans 6:22.

“And hath raised us up together, and MADE us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:6.

Yes, one of God’s most important gifts in salvation is freedom. Jesus came “To proclaim liberty to the captives” (Luke 4:18; cf. Is. 61:1). He summarized the gospel this way: “Whoever commits sin is a slave to sin…if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed” (John 8:34, 36). Paul too, charges believers to live freely. “For you, brethren, have been called to liberty” (Gal. 5:13). “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free” (v. 1). Christian freedom was so important to Paul that the Corinthians might have adapted the motto—all things are lawful for me—from Paul’s own ministry (see Acts 18:13). Christians truly have much freedom in Christ. Those who are inheriting the earth (Matt. 5:5; cf. 1 Cor. 10:26, 28; Ps. 24:1) must start with the principle of freedom, not restriction. 

So Paul qualifies rather than cancels the Corinthian motto. He simply charges Christians to use freedom wisely, suggesting three tests Christian liberty will pass if it is genuine. 

1 Is My Use of Liberty Legal?

Paul first quotes the Corinthian motto (1 Cor. 6:12) after having warned them against the consequences of radical depravity (vv. 9–10). Is he anticipating the Corinthian rebuttal that all things, even sexual sin, are lawful for those who have washed, sanctified, and justified? (v. 11).

The Corinthians were well aware of the freedom Christ gives believers in the New Covenant. Jesus boldly cancelled dietary restrictions: “There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man” (Mark 7:15). If Christians can eat food that was formerly unclean, might they not also engage in sexual activities that were formerly unclean? After all, we are not under law but under grace (Rom. 6:14) and God’s mercy is greater than our sin (Rom. 5:20).

But Paul actually rejects the permissibility of immoral actions by invoking Christian freedom. “You were bought at a price,” Christ has freed you from slavery to sin by offering his precious blood on the altar of God’s justice, “therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Cor. 6:20; cf. 1 Peter 1:17–19). Do not use your liberty as an opportunity for the flesh (Gal. 5:13). The gift of gracious justification gives us freedom from sin, not freedom to sin. 

2. Is My Use of Liberty Edifying?

Not all morally neutral actions are helpful (1 Cor. 6:12; 10:23) or build up others (v. 23). Our freedom to act in morally neutral ways is qualified by the fact that we live in community. Christians should refuse to allow their consciences to be enslaved by the opinions of others (v. 29). Still, Christians honor the fact that we don’t live to ourselves (Rom. 14:7). 

The context of Paul’s second reference to the Corinthian motto concerns meat sacrificed to idols (1 Cor. 10:25–30). Eat such meet freely unless your eating troubles the conscience of another. Love motivates us to be sensitive to others’ concerns, to care about how our actions affect others. Our freedom with regard to things indifferent is important, but less important than the cause of the gospel and the peace of the church. This is why Paul often freely relinquished his rights. He didn’t seek his own profit but the profit of many (1 Cor. 10:33). In this, he says, “Imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1).

3. Is My Use of Liberty Liberating?

Otherwise innocent desires and actions can be enslaving: “All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any” (1 Cor. 6:12). Those who say “I could quit anytime”—but don’t—might be deceiving themselves. Is there anything that rules you? Social media? Food? Alcohol? Chemical addictions? Money? Fitness? Work? We identify idols by the feelings that arise at the prospect of giving them up. Even God-given pleasures can become idols, competing masters, when we need them for comfort. We should use our liberty to make ourselves and others more, not less, free in Christ. 

All moral considerations bring us back to Jesus. Christian liberty is a testimony to Christ. He freed us from bondage to sin, paying for our freedom with his own blood. He has delivered us from hell and cleansed our consciences from the fear of hell. His Spirit tunes our wills to God’s so that we can freely serve him with integrity. We honor Christ by living as free people. 

Our salvation is a testimony to God’s care for those who had forfeited all rights to his love. God had the liberty not to save sinners (Rom. 3:19, 23; 6:23). But God practiced the principle the Spirit now teaches us: “Let no one seek his own, but each one the other’s well-being” (1 Cor. 10:24; cf. Phil. 2:4). God’s eternal Son might have exercised his freedom to retain all the benefits of deity, but Christ didn’t prize his rights; he didn’t overvalue his comfort. We honor Christ by freely denying our rights when appropriate. Christians have great liberty in Christ. Use that liberty so that “whatever you do,” you “do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31).