Freedom and Obedience

What it looked like when my friend started our fire

Like most red blooded American males, I love starting bonfires and burning stuff(legally!!).  The bigger the bonfire, the better.  One of my favorite memories is a big party I threw at my parents house in college and we had built a giant pile of wood and rubbish...then we doused it with gasoline....I know terrible idea...and my friend Matt did the honors of lighting it on fire.

He was being "safe" by lighting a long stick on fire and slowly getting it closer and closer to the gasoline soaked pile.  There was a moment of delay as he touched the burning end of the stick to the pile where nothing happened, and then...

WOOOSSSHHHHHHH

A giant fireball exploded AROUND Matt as the gasoline fumes and the pile all lit at the same time.  There was an audible boom that could be heard a few houses away.  Luckily Matt only lost some arm hair.  Do not try this at your own home though.

The woooosshhhh and the boom were the sounds of the oxygen being rapidly consumed from the surrounding area and the collapse of air to fill the void left by the hunger of the fire for air.

Which seems so contradictory on the surface.  If you ever tried to light a candle while a kid keeps blowing at it, you know that the air puts it out.  Yet, if you place a flame in an airless vacuum it will immediately die.

Air might seem like an enemy to fire, but without it, there is no fire.  It was actually one of the saddest discoveries of my youth that all the amazing explosions in Star Wars were completely fictional because there wouldn't be a fiery ball of death in the airless vacuum of space(not to mention no lightsabers possible either)

In the same way freedom only truly exists where it is balanced with obedience.

There is this idea that rules or standards are by definition limiting on freedom.  If you tell me "no" it is in some way directly conflicting with my autonomous free will and squashing my freedom.  So much of our western civilizations rot today is the outflow of the idea that my own personal feelings, desires, "truth", is all that matters and anyone who gets in the way of that is oppressive in some capacity.  When the truth is that doing whatever you want is the most oppressive life you could imagine.

Let me easily prove it.

Every choice that you make has intended and UNINTENDED consequences.  It doesn't matter what you intended, you can't help but be faced with the multiplying effect of unintended consequences of every choice you make.

Example 1:  I am "free" to jump off the top of a tall building.
Intended Consequence: I want to feel the thrill and rush of the wind.
Unintended Consequence:  I am now dead.  Freedom is completely gone

Example 2:  I am "free" to cheat in my math class
Intended Consequence:  I get a better grade
Unintended Consequence:  I either get caught and get kicked out/flunk, OR, I simply never learn the actual material and limit my future self from all that I could have been capable of.

Example 3:  I am "free" to steal something from you
Intended Consequence:  I get something for nothing
Unintended Consequence:  You got jail and lose a whole bunch of freedom.

While those might seem like overly simplistic examples, think about it just a bit.  When we operate in a way that doesn't take into account the world around us, often what feels initially like freedom becomes the swinging door of the jail cell we have constructed for ourselves.

To truly maximize freedom is not about doing as much as we could possibly imagine we should be "allowed" to do, but to instead understand the reality of the world in which we live and operate within the bounds of what is true.

In Galatians 5:1 we are told,

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.   

Perhaps you are tempted to say Jesus WANTS me to be FREE.  What is this all about obedience Adam??

When Paul closes this statement with, "a yoke of slavery", he isn't talking about people giving you rules.  He is talking about living a life for sin.  Jesus came to give us freedom, not to do whatever we can come up with, but to instead experience the freedom to do what we are actually made for in this life and for eternity.  When we live according to sin, in opposition to God's word, it often feels free at first, but it is ultimately a yoke of slavery that slowly removes the freedom from your life that you thought you were getting.

Jesus came to give us hope FOR obedience, and it is an obedience that provides FREEDOM.

James puts it this way in James 1:25

But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it--not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it--they will be blessed in what they do.

The LAW(God's word) GIVES freedom.  Not just the hearing of it, but in the DOING of God's word.  Without the oxygen of life that is breathed into us that is Godly obedience we are left with a false freedom, one that ultimately enslaves and takes away any hopes we might have to be truly free.

God's law is good.  And it isn't a bunch of arbitrary rules because God is a killjoy, but because God made you.  He knows you better than you know yourself.

And He knows that you are made for more than what you see in front of you today.

But the choices you make today impact not just tomorrow, but all your tomorrows.

Exercising your freedom in conflict with God's truth is like ignoring gravity because you think you deserve to feel the wind blow through your hair after jumping off a tall building.  It WILL be thrilling at first.

Yet that freedom ends in a fall that will end in a markedly unfree sort of way.

One of the joys of parenting is seeing this principle play out in small ways with children.  They often do not want to trust you when it comes to certain tasks or skills.  As if they, after 4 years of age, know much better what it takes to ride a bike then their ancient parent does.  They WANT to ride the bike, they want to have that fun.  And you want it for them too.

But they struggle with trusting you.  Just like we struggle with trusting God.  They struggle believing you.  Like we struggle believing God.

And then, they accept your help and they do things the right way, they follow the steps.  And you can see the joy that overtakes them when they whip down the driveway the first time on their own and realize a whole new world of freedom has opened up before them.

Too bad they don't remember that life lesson the next time you are trying to help them with something difficult ;)

Our freedom as people, image bearers of God, is like that.  We want to resist God's truth.  We say, no, that can't be freedom, that sounds too restrictive, too overbearing.  Yet, when we truly and fully let God have his way and trust him, a whole new world of freedom opens up before us.

There is no fire without oxygen.

There is no freedom without obedience.

Exhausted by Holiness, or, Why Can't I Do Enough

Actual footage of me trying to save myself

Have you ever felt your value is measured in what you do, or, what you can produce?  That every relationship you have is in some way transactional?  If you do "this", then you will be valued, if you can behave just a little bit better than you will receive the love/care/respect/etc that you desperately are desiring?  

To add to that, there is also the powerful sense that we are in a "what have you done for me lately" world.  Maybe I was valued yesterday because I did great that day, but today, I didn't do so hot, so I am no longer someone worthy.  

Exhausting.

Human history is shaped by this constant grasping after feeling "ok" knowing that at any moment we will still mess up, fall short, and be cast out.  Even when you observe religion you see a list of tasks that must be perfectly completed or you will be out! 

And this religious impulse through history is even put into practice in all our new modes of "religion" today.  Think about all the social movements that exist.  Whether BLM, Me Too, Political parties, Eco Justice, etc.  It doesn't take long for the group that you desperately tried to be accepted by to turn on you because all your previous good work is cast aside when you mess up on one area.  

Your best is never going to be good enough.  

Our spiritual struggle is the deeply internal acknowledgement that something is wrong.  Wrong with the world around us, wrong in our relationships, wrong in ourselves.  Even at our best, there are the hidden parts of ourselves(and sometimes not so hidden) that shout out, "This is not ok, this is not right, there is something wrong".  

Most of the time we are quite capable of stringing together enough obvious "good" in our lives that we can hold at bay the thoughts of inadequacy.  In the West, we are almost experts at this.  We can fill our lives with so much entertainment and comfort that we can stave off these feelings almost indefinitely.  But it always comes due at some point.  

It shouldn't come as a surprise that in an era of the greatest prosperity and material comfort and "ethical" living we have an ever increasing, at record levels, mental health issues of depression, anxiety and hopelessness.  

How is this possible?  The external world is improving, yet our internal lives are falling apart.  

It IS possible because we are a people desperate for absolution.  And all our comforts and self-pleasing behaviors offer no such thing as forgiveness and absolution. We intrinsically see that our internal and external realities are at war with the state and condition with reality.  The Apostle Paul points out in Romans chapter 2 that even those who claim there is not God, fall short of their own standards.  Entertainment and distraction just shoves the problems down deeper where they fester and rot. 

And when we fall short of what we hope for and there is no hope for absolution, we are left anxious and depressed.  

We pursue an exhausting form of "holiness".  The rules are constantly changing, the judges are arbitrary and often capricious in their verdicts. 

But why is this so?  

In God's Word we see where it started, but are also pointed to where it is going.

Genesis lays out our ultimate issue that started in the garden.  Adam and Eve did not just want to disobey God, they wanted to be the ones calling the shots.(to be God ourselves free of consequence-Gen 3:4-5).  At that moment in history the heart of all of our issues that we struggle with today are painted in stark fashion.

We are made for God.

We are made with a purpose.

We rebel and break the vertical relationship with our creator and it ricochets to destroy our horizontal relationships with each other and the rest of creation.(Genesis 3:12-19)

And we are incapable of truly fixing it all.  

So we get on the hamster wheel and think if we can just run a bit farther, a bit faster, a bit more passionately, then, then we can see and feel our desperately desired absolution.  And we are tired as we see as much as we have worked, we are still in the same spot.

But God.

But God, loves us.  He created us for Himself, with a purpose, to have a relationship with Him. 

When Jesus, God the Son, saw His people tired, beat up, worn down, he looked at them with compassion.(Matthew 9:36)

When Jesus went to the Cross his compassion was an active work of healing and restoring as he declared "It is Finished"(John 19:30)

Not, lets get started, here is all the work to do.  It. Is. Finished.  

But Adam(this is you talking here)..But Adam, if it is finished, what are we supposed to be doing to make sure we are loved by God???  Are you saying we can do whatever we want??????

So let me double down with what Paul says in Galatians 3

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. 2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? 3 Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh? 4 Have you experienced so much in vain—if it really was in vain? 5 So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard? 6 So also Abraham “believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

What Paul is dealing with is that after starting off their relationship with God based on the love of Christ and His finished work, they are now trying to reverse engineer their salvation and absolution of sins through all the works they can do to look good enough.

Stop it.

Jesus said IT IS FINISHED.  He meant it.

So what DO we do about sins in our lives and in the lives of the people we love.

This is how John puts it in 1 John 3

2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. 3 All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

What makes us like Christ according to John?  What purifies us?  

John doesn't say, "you will be like Christ and purified when you start doing the right stuff".  He says when you place your hope in Christ and look upon Him and truly see and know him THAT will be what changes us.

So here is the false bill of goods we are often sold that is directly contrasted from what God's Word actually says.

FALSE NARRATIVE:

1- There is a problem in you and the world

2- You better do do do do to fix it or carry around guilt

3-  If you do enough good stuff you MIGHT be ok, hopefully

4- And if you want to be right with God in all of this don't forget all of those rules too

GOD'S TRUTH

1- There is a problem in you and the world

2- You can't do better by doing more, God will take away your guilt and shame

3- When you experience that and look to Him in hope you WILL be ok

4- Because you are right with God already, your natural behavior changes because of God in you as your place your hope in Him as you look upon Him in truth

Stop trying to make yourself ok.  Lay down your burdens and look on a savior who perfectly did for you what you could never truly accomplish.  Give up the exhausting lie that you can absolve yourself and achieve holiness.  You will never be holy.  But Christ is.  And he calls you to enjoy Him forever.  

Who's The Boss, or, the Heart of Sin

This is the snake my son saw, can someone
identify it exactly??

As many of you know, I am an avid indoorsmen.  Do not let my rugged features and unkempt beard fool you.  My comfort with literature and feelings is significantly greater than my skills with tools and a trek through the woods. 

Recently the family and I went on a nature walk at a park by the Maumee river and my 10 year old discovered a very large snake in a large pile of rocks.  As most 10 year old boys would be he was very excited and could not wait to GRAB AN UNIDENTIFIED SNAKE THAT WAS 6 FT LONG!!!!!!!! 

This created quite a fun little argument between us.  As previously mentioned, I am not someone who is well versed in the things of nature, let alone which snakes are friendly and love being picked up by 10 year olds and which snakes will kill you with venom.  Firmly I told him to not try to poke him with a stick so that it would move close enough to grab.  He did not appreciate me "babying" him.  Because, obviously, at 10 years of age he is an expert on snakes and totally knows he will be fine.  I asked him to name the snake with 100% certainty and to tell me about its bite and venom. 

He could not.....

Teaching moments abound with children and their choices.  When you can't be certain about the danger of something, the risk of dying, or being seriously injured is far too great to just do whatever you want to do I told him.  Like most kids, he did not respond well to my wisdom. 

In the end I forced him to move on and he spent the rest of the day being angry that I just wouldn't "trust him".  I had taken a picture of  the snake and later was able to identify it as a poisonous snake that COULD HAVE KILLED HIM.  He was slightly apologetic. 

My sons reaction that day was a microcosm of our human condition.  Specifically, that we want to be the lords of our own lives and we want to believe that doing so will be consequence free.  In Genesis chapter 3 the serpent entices Eve with two powerful and attractive lies:

1- You do not need to listen to God and His standards, you can know for YOURSELF what is good and bad

2- You will not die(suffer consequences for rebellion)

Our world is in the constant state of pain and destruction that believing those two lies.  Each of us wants to believe that we know better than God.  I know what is true for ME.  God, my creator and sustainer, is WRONG.  We have set our eyes on such narrow and limited pleasures and hopes.  God has created us for much more than we can even see, yet we turn our backs on Him and scream "MINE". 

And then as pain and shame and guilt pile up we act surprised.  The response to rebelling against God and His word was shame and destruction and a distance between themselves and God,

"The woman was convinced.  She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious and she wanted the wisdom it would give her.  So she took some of fruit and ate it.  Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he at it too.  At that moment their eyes were opened and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness"- Genesis 3:6-7

It looks so good when we are staring longingly at the idea of being our own personal god.  To be wise.  To be in control.  To shake our fist at the world and demand it conform to our own will.  We reach out to pluck it from its branch to indulge our self-centerdness with the hope and expectation that this will finally be the answer to all our questions. 

And then we know shame.

And guilt.

And separation. 

There is a quote from Ravi Zaccharias that I think on often as I struggle with my own propensity to demand that my will is greater than Gods remind me of the truth that lies try to hide.

“Sin will take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay. –”

― R Zaccharias

You can claim all you want that the snake won't bite.  But it will. 

Trust God.  He alone is good.  And even when it is hard.  He is the only one who knows what you truly need.