First Reading: Revelation 14:6-7
6I saw another angel flying directly overhead, with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people. 7And he said with a loud voice, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come, and worship him who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water.”
Psalm 46
1God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. 2Therefore we will not fear, though the earth be moved, and though the mountains be toppled into the depths of the sea; 3Though its waters rage and foam, and though the mountains tremble at its tumult. 4The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold. 5There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High. 6God is in the midst of her; she shall not be overthrown; God shall help her at the break of day. 7The nations make much ado, and the kingdoms are shaken; God has spoken, and the earth shall melt away. 8The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold. 9Come now and look upon the works of the Lord, what awesome things he has done on earth. 10It is he who makes war to cease in all the world; he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear, and burns the shields with fire. 11“Be still, then, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth.” 12The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold.
Second Reading: Romans 3:19-28
19Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. 20For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. 21But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it — 22the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: 23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. 26It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. 27Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. 28For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
Gospel: John 8:31-36
31Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 33They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?” 34Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. 35The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. 36So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
Bound to Sin or Righteousness
“If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36b). Freedom, it’s a word that’s often used today, but what is freedom? The notion of freedom is not only a rallying cry for our current society, it’s a defining value of American culture. The Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776, and the Revolutionary War was fought against England for the sake of freedom. The bloodiest and costliest war in our nation’s history, the Civil War, was fought for State’s rights and for freedom of slaves. The American culture has seen a proliferation of “rights” and, if you violate one of them, you’re likely to be publicly ridiculed, brought to court, or even physically harmed.
Here in the US, we aggressively defend the rights and freedoms we’re granted in the appropriately named “Bill of Rights”, such as Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, the separation of church and state, and so forth. And anytime someone tries to curtail these rights and freedoms, inevitably someone will quote the Preamble of the Declaration of Independence, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Even one of the most divisive debates that continues to rage in our society today, the debate over abortion, has been defined and cast in terms of personal freedom. For decades, those who describe themselves as “pro-life” and those who were “pro-choice” defined the debate. However, the debate has now changed. Those in the “pro-life” camp now speak directly to the American obsession with personal freedom and personal choice. The “pro-life” side have now decided that it’s better to describe their position in a way that’s more in synch with the reigning American orthodoxy of personal freedom. They now say that they’re in favor of freedom of “choice,” too. Only they say that they “choose life” instead of abortion.
One of the most important books in sociology and culture in the last generation, Robert Bellah’s Habits of the Heart, describes American culture in a similar way. Bellah and his fellow authors show that the single most important and defining value of American society and culture is “individualism.” The most important things in life are those that contribute to one’s individual freedom, self-expression, and success.
John was a typical American teenager, who has just graduated from high school. Since John had just graduated, and was planning to attend college in the fall, his parents decided that it was time for John to do some growing up. He had to get ready to live more independently at college. So, they decided that it was time to end all his curfews. They weren’t going to be with him at college to tuck him in at night. So, they decided to allow him to stay out as late as he wanted any night of the week. No more curfews! John was thrilled. At last freedom!
Of course, the first night of his newfound freedom, John decided to stay out late. Normally he had to be in by 11 p.m. on a weeknight, but tonight he was going to enjoy his freedom. The clock passed midnight. It soon became 1 a.m. and still no John. His parents were concerned. The parents were still awake at 2 a.m. when John stumbled in. They stared at each other. No words were spoken. After all, the parents had given John this new freedom. No reference to the previous night was made at the breakfast table either, as John rushed off to be at his new summer job at 8 a.m.
The next night, John stayed out even later — 2 a.m. became 3 a.m. His parents kept their vigil, unable to sleep. Finally, at 4 a.m. the door rattled. The lock opened and in walked John. Bleary-eyed, they stared at John. He smiled nervously. But again, no words were spoken here or at the breakfast table the next morning. After all, this freedom thing had been their idea. He was just expressing himself.
By the third night they had hoped that John had enough of his new freedom. But he didn’t. 2 a.m. became 4 a.m. became 6 a.m. The sun was even beginning to come up over the horizon and still no John. They were worried. But at 6:30 a.m., the door rattled and in walked John. What a night it must have been. John’s eyes were red. He was exhausted. He was so tired he could hardly stand. So were his parents. And he had to be at work in less than an hour. But again, no comment was made about John’s late hours. That brought the fourth night. But this night, things were different.
When John got home from work, he was so tired that he showered, ate, and immediately went to bed. So did his parents, thankfully. For the rest of the summer John was home every work night and in bed by 11 p.m. Even on the weekends, when he stayed out a little later, he always made sure he called his parents and told them when he was coming home. John had learned an important lesson about freedom. There is no such thing as absolute freedom. Our culture’s promotion of absolute freedom and self-expression is a lie. There are always consequences. There are always limits. There are always responsibilities. As the axiom goes, “The piper must be paid.”
St. Paul makes a similar point in Romans chapter 6. Paul, too, insists that there is no such thing as unfettered freedom. We are all enslaved to someone or something. We all obey a master, and Paul reminds us that we all serve either sin or righteousness. We are owned by either God or our sinfulness. Starting in verse 16 we read, “Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness” (vss. 16-19).
Here Paul assumes an understanding of sin that contradicts our cultural optimism and its conviction that we are free to choose our own individual destiny. Even many pious and church going Christians are uncomfortable with Paul’s radical understanding of sin. Many in our culture believe that sin is essentially a “choice.” Our society’s insistence on individualism and personal freedom assumes that humans inhabit some sort of morally neutral place. We sit on a fence and have a choice as to which side of the fence we’ll come down on. One side is sin, and the other is righteousness. We claim we have the choice as to which side we land on. This point of view supposes that sin is a choice of breaking the rules or commandments.
For society, sin is making bad choices. Sin is doing “naughty” things. To that point, St. Paul would shout a resounding “No.” “Naughty” actions, breaking the rules, making bad choices are only the symptoms, only the consequences, only the fruits of a condition that is far worse. For Paul, sin is bondage. Sin entraps us. Our Confession each week address this clearly, “We are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. We have sinned in our thoughts, words, and deeds, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.” There is no mythical, moral neutrality. By nature, we are prone to focus on our own selfish desires. We’ve talked about this before, so Paul’s claim shouldn’t come as a total surprise. St. Augustine described it as curved in on oneself.
Even though the cultural orthodoxy of our day promotes our insistence of personal freedom, there are minority voices that sound a different opinion, an opinion we don’t like to hear. The minority voices remind us that we can never be totally free. Like it or not, there are certain things that influence our decisions: our sinful nature, our upbringing, our education, our economic situation. And while these do not determine who we are or how we’ll behave, they have a definite influence.
This understanding of sin as bondage and not just as bad choices is what I try to teach when I teach on the Ten Commandments … and especially Luther’s interpretation of them in his catechism. Over the years, in teaching confirmation classes, I’ve discovered how difficult it is to teach this understanding of sin. For example, I teach that one important use of the Commandments is the “mirror.” Like a mirror, the Decalogue show us what we really look like — that there is always the struggle between sinner and saint, thus we’re always in need of God’s forgiveness in Jesus. As ones that are curved in on ourselves, we want to minimize the demands of God’s commandments in order to blunt their criticism and turn them into some friendly moral instruction. Luther makes a similar point in his explanation of the First Commandment in his Large Catechism.
In the Large Catechism, Luther reminds us of our bondage, of our slavery, of our inescapable compulsion to always “have a god.” It’s the very nature of human life to have a god, to have someone or something that gives our lives meaning and purpose, someone or something that we love and are terrified of losing. We have no choice but to live our lives bound to something or someone. It’s foolish to think that anyone could be an agnostic or atheist and still be a human being. We must have a god. And our gods enslave us. Our gods demand that we worship them and appease them. Whether that god is money, our job, our family, our body, or whatever else, we are never free of its demands. There is no other way to be a human being. Thus, the notion of personal freedom is a lie.
The church has traditionally described this bondage and slavery as “original sin.” From the moment of our conception, we are shaped by this “inherited sin” just as we are shaped by our genes. There is no choice in the matter. We are owned. Luther too recognized this bondage in his book, The Bondage of the Will. In this work, Luther recognizes that God has given us Free Will to make our own choices. However, our will, because of Original Sin, is bent toward evil. Without the aid of the Holy Spirit, we cannot help but remain focused on our own self-interests and what satisfies the self. St. Paul also speaks to this as well.
Paul in Romans chapter 6 speaks of another kind of ownership. We can also be owned, enslaved, obedient to another Master. We can be slaves of sin … or, with God’s help, we can be slaves of righteousness, slaves of God. We must allow one master to drive out the other. That is precisely what happens when the gospel of God’s love in Jesus Christ is proclaimed and we are moved by the power of the Holy Spirit to trust it.
The story of Jesus of Nazareth, His death and resurrection, proclaims a glorious message to all of us who are trapped and enslaved to sin. Because of what God did in Jesus Christ and continues to do every time the gospel is proclaimed, we are free! Our slavery to original sin is broken. God forgives us our sin and breaks the hold of those fears, anxieties, and false gods on our souls. This is what St. John is telling us in our gospel lesson for this morning: “So if the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.” In Christ, we are no longer slaves to sin, we are free to become slaves of righteousness.
This is a great irony that comes with being set free in Christ. We are still enslaved! We are still owned. But instead of being slaves to sin, we become slaves to righteousness. Instead of being owned by sin and evil, we are owned by God. And being owned by God is true freedom. We find ourselves serving righteousness. We find ourselves wanting to do what’s right and just and moral not because we “have to” but because we “want to.”
Several years ago, a friend came over to upgrade my computer. He said he would bring over the software I needed and install it. I asked him how much that would cost me. He hesitated and then said that he could copy it and give it for me for nothing. It wasn’t exactly legal, but everyone does it. Then he hesitated again and said, “But I supposed that since you’re a Christian, you’re not supposed to do things that way. You can’t do that, can you?”
Before he went any further, I stopped him and said, “you’ve got it wrong. I want to pay for that software. I want to do what’s right. I want to be honest.” What kept running through my head was a passage from Luke chapter 16, “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much” (vs. 36). As Christians, this is the way we get to live.
As slaves of righteousness, we are free to serve God and the guy who sells the software and justly deserves to make a profit. Luther described it well in his 1523 treatise On the Freedom of the Christian. In this work Luther repeats what St. Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, “I am perfectly free, subject to no one. At the same time, I am a slave, subject to everyone” (1 Corinthians 9:19).
The truth is, everyone is a slave to someone or something, there is no other option. So, the choice is before us, will we be slaves to our own sinful self-passions, or will we allow the Holy Spirit to work in our lives so that we become slaves to righteousness? There is no middle ground. In Christ Jesus we can know what true freedom is, in Jesus we are free. Because of Jesus, we are free to be slaves of God and His righteousness and free to serve our neighbors. The choice is ours. We must choose one or the other.
Amen