Jesus proclaimed to the Jewish crowd that was following Him, “Disciples of Mine shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free (Jn. 8:32). He followed that with, “When the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed” (Jn. 8:36), thus identifying Himself as the truth that would set mankind free. “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn. 14:6), He told His disciples as He prepared to go to the cross and die. Jesus is the reality/truth (Greek word alethia) that can make mankind free to be human as God intended when He created human beings. Otherwise, we are held captive by the devil and relegated to dysfunctionality.
Paul explained, “It was for freedom that Christ set us free” (Gal. 5:1,13). It is important to note that the freedom Christ-ones have “in Christ,” is both freedom from that which enslaves us, as well as freedom to be what God intends us to be. Christian freedom is freedom from sin (Rom. 6:7,18,20,22), freedom from the law (Acts 13:39: Rom. 7:3; 8:2), and freedom from the world (I Cor. 2:12), freedom from love of money (I Tim. 3:3; Heb. 13:5. Christian freedom is freedom to enjoy our liberty, freedom to live in righteousness (Rom. 6:18,20), freedom to be human as God intended human to be, free to love the unlovely, free to pay back insults with loving kindness (II Cor. 12:10). Notice that the title refers to being “free to BE…”. This is not a freedom to DO what you could not do when you were not a Christ-one, but the freedom to Be the Christ-one that you have become with all the godly manifestations of the character of Jesus evidenced in our behavior as Christ-ones. The freedom of truly functional humanity is realized in allowing the living Lord Jesus to live out through us, loving one another. The freedom from is for the most part objective realities gains by Christ’s death on the cross, whereas the freedom to BE involves the subjective ramifications of the free expression of Jesus’ life and character. ~ Jim Fowler
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