Free indeed
Sermon for the Commemoration of the Reformation
Bible reading: John 8:34-36
I think we all enjoy a good movie. Pastor David does, I know. He was recommending one to you last week.
Perhaps one of the most satisfying movie storyline for me is the escape from captivity movie. It’s especially satisfying when the prisoner is innocent of the crime he or she is doing time for. A favourite that comes to mind is The Shawshank Redemption.
The moment of escape from prison in this movie is about the sweetest thing ever. In his escape from Shawshank, Andy Dufresne, who has devised a brilliant plan of escape, has to finally crawl through the prison sewerage system to make his way clear. Gagging as he crawls at a snail’s pace, he is eventually spewed out into the night rain, which is heaven after the foul nauseating stench of the sewerage.
And surely none of us have experienced such a sweet escape as the likes of Andy Dufresne. But then again, maybe we have!
Freedom is sweet. Most of us take ours for granted. We live in a relatively free country for starters. Not many of us would know what it was like to live under communism or apartheid. And surely none of us have experienced such a sweet escape as the likes of Andy Dufresne.
But then again, maybe we have! Perhaps not in a civil sense, but on a deeper soul level, we have. We are actually experts on freedom, though as yet, we don’t quite see the enormous drama behind our story. If we could, we would surely possess an even greater appreciation of who we are, what we have been through and what Jesus Christ has done for us.
To be Christian is to be free – set free from the terrible prison of our sin that is. Unlike the characters in my favourite movies, we are not guilt free: for every one has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God
. Let’s not pretend otherwise. And the wages of sin is death.
But we have been released from this eternal sentence. Pardoned. By whom? By Jesus Christ – the one who said, If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed
. That’s what he came to earth to do. His essential work on earth was to step in and take the judgement sentence prepared for us. And he did this by going to his death.
So Christ has paid the price for us, brought us back, redeemed us, as Luther wrote so plainly and yet impressionably in his Small Catechism:
I believe that Jesus Christ…has redeemed me, a lost and condemned person, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil; not with gold or silver, but with his holy, precious blood and with his innocent suffering and death…
Do we ever pause to consider this amazing liberty?
Our baptism was a pretty ordinary and mundane event to look at. But in reality it was as dramatic as being spewed out of the sewer of our sins into the cleansing water of God’s amazing grace.
When we come to Holy Communion, do we pause to consider what we are eating and drinking? We share in God’s Son here, so we are no longer slaves, but sons and daughters of God – heirs of freedom and of the eternal life Christ Jesus delivered to all who believe.
It cost him much. It costs us nothing. He reaches in to your prison cell and asks, ‘Who wants to leave this death trap?’
Faith responds with a simple ‘Yes, I do Lord. Get me outa here.’
So we are freed from sin, death and the power of the devil. No doubt your lives are littered with evidence of these old enemies. But rest assured, they no longer have any claim on us. Christ has promised, If the Son sets you free, you shall be free indeed.
Total freedom, not just part of the way, with the rest being up to you. Our Lord has done it all. It is accomplished!
So what does this freedom mean for us?
One thing we must understand is that we are not free to blatantly go on sinning. Of course we sin, it is the struggle that we face until we die and enter heaven. But to use our freedom as a license to sin is like walking right back to the old cell again. For freedom Christ has set us free,
wrote St Paul. Do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.
He meant firstly that we shouldn’t think that we must earn our freedom by obedience to the laws of God. None of us could achieve that, no matter how earnest our efforts.
But Paul also stressed that we are not to abuse this freedom by recklessly living a life of sin. That path, he says, leads to death all over again.
So we are freed to follow now – no looking back – but seeking paths of right living. And because we know the death sentence of sin, we ought to be keen to help other prisoners who know deep down that even the most fulfilling life leaves one longing to rise up above the curse and be free.
This may sound like basic stuff, but you’d be surprised how many Christians have missed the whole point. They are still scratching away at the brittle mortar of their lives, thinking that one day their efforts will produce the ultimate reward. Don’t they know how thick these walls are? Do they not hear the words of our Lord who stands in the breech and bids them take the leap of childlike faith?
In chapter 8 of John, our Lord was head to head with the stubborn religious leaders of his time. They were hell-bent on rejecting him and refusing to acknowledge that he came from the Father to set people free from the arduous and impossible demands of the Old Covenant based on the LAW. They would surely have known the great promise in Jeremiah:
The days are coming (says the Lord) when I will make a new covenant with my people … I shall write my law on their hearts; and I will be their God and they will be my people … They shall all know me, from the least to the greatest … I shall forgive their iniquity and remember their sins no more.
Jesus called for them to believe. They took up stones to kill him. The greatest reformer ever was standing in their midst, and they preferred the familiar surrounds of their prison cells to a new life with God.
Over the years the very life and freedom Christ delivers has been the central message of the church. Occasionally this freedom has been muddied and distorted. The Reformation that took place in the early 16th century was God’s way of drawing the church’s attention back to the gospel’s sweet escape. We still mark this occasion annually. We firstly remember that we have been saved by grace alone through faith in Christ alone.
But we also celebrate the heroes of church history – the freedom fighters of yesteryear – those who stood in the docks because they knew the immeasurable worth of holding steadfast to this truth.
On the church wall of St Matthew, Stony Plain, there is a large painting depicting Luther at the Diet of Worms. I’ll never forget its impact. There is Luther, in front of all the officials, looking terribly outnumbered and on trial. Under the painting are his famous words, Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise. God help me!
There was drama in Luther’s life. He knew imprisonment. He knew captivity on both a spiritual and human level. Ironically, as the Holy Spirit showed him the freedom of the gospel, it cost him his freedom in the world. But that didn’t stop his resolve to help other inmates who were longing to break out. Maybe that’s how it will be with you too friends. Perhaps your message of living hope to others will be treated with ridicule or apathy. But stand by it. Don’t forget it. Remain in it. We are called by Christ to be freedom fighters with him, and to suffer with him for that cause if need be.
So let us who have tasted the sweet, fresh, clean air of life outside the dark dungeon of sin’s walls be ever encouraged and strengthened by the freedom we now walk in with our Lord. True freedom – freedom of the soul’s captivity to sin that comes simply through faith in the work and person of Jesus, and not by our works.
Let’s continue in the word and teaching of our Lord who wants us to know the truth that makes people free. Let’s read it thirstily, teach it to our children, sing of it in songs and hymns, gladly receive it as it is preached, taste and see it’s goodness in the bread and wine. Let the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ continue to carry us out of death into life so that we, and many more with us and after us, may know what it means to be free indeed.