Are you free… really, truly free? Do you even know what real freedom is? Have you ever really experienced total freedom? How much would you be willing to give up for your freedom? How valuable is your freedom? I’m afraid, for most Americans, their freedom is way too cheap!
What is cheap freedom
John Adams wrote in a letter to his wife, Abigail, on April 26, 1777 “Posterity! You will never know, how much it cost the present generation, to preserve your freedom! I hope you will make a good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in Heaven, that I ever took half the pains to preserve it.”
John wrote this letter to his wife during the Revolutionary war. There was a desperate need for more soldiers but the states were not providing the men to fight. In fact, in the same letter, Adams said that he would be ashamed of his countrymen if they didn’t fight to preserve the freedom they had just been granted. John Adams hated cheap freedom!
You don’t deserve what you are not willing to fight for-
There is something that turns my stomach every time I hear someone say “I support our troops but I don’t support the war in Afghanistan” or “I’m really proud of our troops but I don’t want my son or daughter to go fight that war.” These statements define someone who is not willing to sacrifice for their freedom. They describe someone who expects others to sacrifice for them.
Your cheap freedom is actually no freedom at all. What you are not willing to fight and die for – someone else must fight and die to provide you. Therefore, in order for you to remain free, you are dependent on someone else to provide or maintain your freedom. The moment that you become dependent- you are no longer free. Thus, cheap freedom leads to the shackles of dependence on someone else.
You can’t earn what was done for you in Christ
Perhaps this is the idea that Jesus had in mind during his discussion of freedom in John Chapter 8. Clearly, his listeners didn’t understand the context that Jesus was talking about. In fact, they argued with him about their freedom.
In John 8:31 Jesus said that only he can set you free. The crowd’s response was, “What do you mean Jesus- we are already free?” To which Jesus corrected them. Jesus said that we are all slaves to sin in John 8:34-35. He made it very plain in these verses that you cannot become free from slavery on your own. A price must be paid to purchase you back (Romans 6:23). That price was paid in blood (Hebrews 9:26). So, someone had to die in order for you to be free from sin. Our sin is so terrible that it cost God’s Son his life to purchase our freedom.
That’s why Jesus could look at this crowd of so called free men and women and say, “You have never really been set free, until you found freedom in me!”
So, I want to ask you again, are you free… really, truly free?
