Freedom

"1Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.

13For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another...

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against these there is no law."

-Galatians 5:1,13,22

Freedom. Like William Wallace in Braveheart cried over his people, ""Fight and you may die. Run and you will live at least awhile. And dying in your bed many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance, to come back here as young men and tell our enemies that they may take our lives but they will never take our freedom!"

So why is freedom in this text from Galatians highlighted here? 

Well we have here freedom from something and freedom for something. 

"1Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage..."

So we are to stand fast, to stand grounded in the liberty which CHRIST, who gave us this liberty, has made us free. So what is this saying? Stay free. From what? From bondage.

For the Galatians as it can often be for us this bondage is being a slave once again to the Law, to legalism, to earning God's love and grace and favor. 

Do you know what Paul says earlier in Galatians about the Law? He says: 

"24 Let me put it another way. The law was our guardian until Christ came; it has protected us until we could be made right with God through faith. 25 And now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian." 

-Galatians 3:24-25 NLT

So the freedom Christ gave us is freedom from any further bondage to the law. To needing to abide by the Old Testament laws to be made right with God. 

Now through Christ we have been made right with God! That is freedom. 

So we know what this freedom was against, freedom from bondage, now what do we do with this freedom? What is it for?

13For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another...

So freedom from the law doesn't mean doing whatever our flesh desires, but this freedom does what? It gives us the freedom through LOVE to serve one another. 

Wow. So we were given freedom to love one another. Freedom to serve one another in love. So it's not to serve ourselves? No, no it says right here this freedom isn't for our flesh and it isn't for just us. It's for us to use in love. 

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against these there is no law."

-Galatians 5:1,13,22

Love is first and all-encompassing in the listing of the fruit of the Spirit. And what does it say at the end there? Against these there is no law. 

The fruit of living and walking in the Spirit, which Paul talks about two verses later, is so loving, so free that there is no law against them. There is no limit on the use and practice of any and all of these. Good thing too or Jesus would have been in trouble! 

So why do I take time this morning to go through these verses? 

Because if I don't remind myself daily that I am free, free from bondage and free to love, then I begin to live like I am still in chains. Whether that's being enslaved to legalism, to what my flesh desires, to a gloomy look on life, it's easy to slip back into those chains if you're not reminded, if we're not reminded: we are free. 

So walk in the freedom that Christ purchased for you now, this morning, today.