How do you free someone who thinks they are already free? It is a little like opening a birdcage door, only to watch the bird sit happily on its perch, or watch as it flies around a wee bit and then lands contentedly back on the perch. The temptation is to shout out, “Fly away, you fool!” But, as with Jesus’ hearers, so with the caged bird, the response may well be, “We have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?” (John 8:33).
Now, the freedom of which Jesus speaks is not the freedom of which citizens of the USA speak. I am reminded of that reality every 4th of July, when Facebook is filled with biblical quotes that include the word freedom, as if the original context was politically centered in colonial geo-politics. (There is always a clergy person somewhere on Facebook who spends their entire 4th correcting this misunderstanding, post by post.) So, what is biblical freedom? I would argue that it largely consists of two ‘freedom froms,’ and one ‘freedom to be.’
The Lutheran liturgy, in the rite of Confession and Forgiveness, states, “We confess that we are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves” (ELW page 94). This puts it rather well, I think. On the one hand, sin can feel like imprisonment; the self-knowledge that one’s life is controlled by another thing, person, or system, and that our ability to choose one thing over another has been taken away. But sin can also disguise itself, and hide its consequences, giving the illusion of the freedom to choose and the liberty to act. Either way, freedom is there for the taking, yet we cry out (metaphorically), “What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?” To illustrate this point, consider this story taken from The Guardian Newspaper:
… In his book, Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig…
describes the old South Indian Monkey Trap. The trap consists of a hollowed-out
coconut, chained to a stake. The coconut has some rice inside which can be
grabbed through a small hole. The monkey’s hand fits through the hole, but his
clenched fist can’t fit back out. The monkey is suddenly trapped. But not by
anything physical. He’s trapped by an idea, unable to see that a principle that
served him well – “when you see rice, hold on tight!” – has become lethal.
Once the captivity of sin is acknowledged, humans tend to make another mistake: We think we can save (free) ourselves. If we just get the formula of life correct, if we pull ourselves up by our bootstraps1 , we can make ourselves right with God. Lutherans give this error a name, the opinio legis – literally the opinion of the law – the argument that God’s law has the final word in salvation. Believing this, the Christian constantly looks to themselves for salvation, and coming up continually short, enters into despair (as Luther can personally testify!). This is what St. Augustine describes as a life lived Incurvatus in se (turned or curved inward on oneself). Realizing the impossibility of the task, the Christian (finally!) turns to God, and finds the Gospel’s promise of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, not through one’s own efforts (or, as Romans 3:20 puts it, not “by deeds prescribed by the law.”)
Having been freed from sin, from saving oneself, from a life lived inwardly, the Christian now discovers that they are free to be a child of God, and a righteous neighbor. Now the believer can look to Jesus, and to his unconditional love and gift (grace), for the life they cannot find anywhere else. And, having found that life, that freedom, the Christian now begins to live into the calling of Leviticus 19:18 quoted repeatedly in the Gospels, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” This is the freedom of the Christian, to quote Luther’s great treatise of 1520 (Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen). This life of service to others is a righteous good work (as opposed to “works righteousness” which is the error of thinking that one’s good works can save one) – for as Luther himself states, “God does not need your good works, but your neighbor does!”
On Reformation Sunday, we move into God’s future (“continue in his word,” as John 8:31 puts it), looking backwards only to pay heartfelt tribute to those on whose shoulders we stand. Yet Christians – like those who plow fields (see Luke 9:62) – cannot fulfill their calling by looking backwards, only forwards. And so, our Reformation prayer must mirror that found in the Rite of Ordination, “Almighty God, who has given you the will to do these things, graciously give you the strength and compassion to perform them.”
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1 From the Nineteenth Century to the 1920s, this phrase represented a ludicrously impossible task. In the
1930s it gradually came to represent the noble and attainable goal of self-improvement through effort.
The irony was completely lost.
