Galatians 5:13. For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
Truly living requires both freedom and love. Since God’s desire is for you to live, He offers both freedom and love through Jesus Christ. God Himself lives in both freedom and love. He is perfectly free, and He loves perfectly. The freedom that this life of love requires is ultimately found in the indwelling life of Christ. We are free in Christ. Free from sin. Free from condemnation. Free from law-keeping. Free from the elemental principles of the world. Free from self-absorption and self-promotion. But we are not just free from bad things; we are also free to good things. Free to experience the love of Jesus. Free to trust Him. Free to love Him. Free to serve Him. Free to submit our lives to His control.
Paul tells us what freedom and love conjoined will look like—service. Selfless, humble, Christ-like service. Service made possible by faith in the hope that Christ offers through His indwelling life. Do you want to know if you are truly free? Look at your service.
If this all sounds strange or even contradictory to what you’d expect, well, that’s because it is an extremely radical concept. This is why Paul must remind us not to “use [our] freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.” In Paul’s day, the Greco-Roman belief was that freedom was the by-product of power, and power the by-product of freedom (not love). If you were free, you were to exert your power over those who were not. This power was considered the highest virtue. It was natural law. To use your freedom to serve others violated the very laws of nature and the gods.
In our Western culture, freedom is joined to self-actualization to create what philosopher Charles Taylor calls “expressive individualism” (again, not love). We are free primarily to love ourselves, to become who we were meant to be—not a servant, but an authentic human being (which should be a self-sacrificing, loving servant according to Scripture). Like the Israelites exiting Egypt, we are set free to become servants of God, and thus of one another. We were NOT set free to exert power over each other, nor were we set free to become our “true selves.” We were set free to live like Jesus, love like Jesus, and serve like Jesus.
You: How do you use your freedom? For power? For self-authentication?
You in Christ: How does being in Christ create the freedom we need to serve?
Christ in you: Is there a specific way that Christ in you is asking you to serve others? Do you need to create some more margin in your life for serving?
Pray: Father, You have set me free, and You have loved me with a perfect love. Let this combination motivate my loving service of others too. Amen.
