Freedom!
Sunday, May 10, 2020 at 11:13PM
Before the lockdown I would often wonder whether we were a people who lost all respect for boundaries. We did what we wanted, when we wanted. My actions and behaviours were my choice and if you didn’t like what I did or thought, that was your problem. Our definition of ‘freedom’ included freedom from responsibility and consequence. As long as my actions/behaviours/attitudes were right by me, so be it. The NZ Government very quickly picked up on this behaviour and challenged us to think of others. For the last six weeks we have been encouraged to live a different way. We’ve been asked to be kind. We were asked to consider the risk to ourselves AND to consider how we might manage the risk of our behaviour on others.
While reading Galatians this morning I was reflecting on our recent reality. In Galatians 5:1 (ESV) Paul writes, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” In 5:13 he writes, “For you were called to freedom. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” In the last six weeks the New Zealand Government has called on all New Zealanders to practice our freedom with responsibility; with the understanding that our freedom has consequences for others. I wonder whether, with the impending move to level 2, we will remember what true freedom is, or whether we’ll return again to the yoke of slavery of self.
What do we fear?
"For the LORD spoke to me with his strong hand upon me, and warned me not to walk in the way of this people, saying, 'Do not call conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy, and do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. But the LORD of hosts, him you shall honor as holy. Let him be your fear, and let him be your dread." Isaiah 8:11-13 (ESV)
Isaiah wrote this over 2,700 years ago! We have either abaondoned God or replaced God with the image of humankind. We weep and lament for the injustices in our society but refuse to turn to the source of true justice. We want to administer justice from a place of anger and hatred. But justice must flow from righteousness, and none of us is righteous. (Romans 3:10)
"None is righeous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one. Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to decive. The venom of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes." Romans 3:10-18 (ESV)
Repentence before God must precede our journey towards justice. As long as there is one who believes that they are more right than another justice will not be served. We must repent and acknoweldge the source of justice that exists outside of ourselves.
Isaiah asks the question in 8:19: "Should not a people enquire of their God? We enquire of God by turning "to the teaching and to the testimony" (v.20). Jesus said that the teaching and the testimony were summed up in two commands: Love God with all your heart, soul and mind; and love your neighbour as yourself (see Matthew 22:37-39).
If God's word does not turn us towards loving God and others, we will continue to "pass through the land, greatly distressed and hungry." And being hungry (spiritually) we will "be enraged and will speak contemptuously against [our] king and [our] God" (Isaiah 8:21).
Eugene Peterson wrote in As Kingfishers Catch Fire: "Biblical prophets and contemporary biblically formed prophets are immersed in the present, what is going on in the present truly but maybe not obviously." If we can bring our focus to the present we may begin to understand what is needed for justice to be done. If we continue to look to the past and to humanity for justice, we very likely will continue to experience 'distress and darkness' and 'the gloom of anguish' (Isaiah 8:22).