Tomorrow is the 4th of July, Independence Day, in the USA, the anniversary of when our country's founds signed the Declaration of Independence. It is a day that many people celebrate their freedom by blowing stuff up, cooking on a grill and possibly parading down a street waving flags. But it is also a good day to remind ourselves that true freedom does not come from the government but from Christ.
And it is almost like the Revised Common Lectionary thought this too as many of our readings refer to freedom, especially Romans 7:15-25a and Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30.
Enjoy both the sermon and your 4th of July weekend, but most importantly, enjoy your freedom in Christ.
What is freedom? What does it mean to be free? We will hear a lot about freedom this week as our country celebrates Independence Day. So maybe that is an idea, that freedom is about being independent from other’s control. And as we have already started the process for the next presidential election even though it is almost a year and a half away, we will hear people talk about freedom of the press, freedom of speech and freedom of religion. So we often think that freedom means that we are able to write, say or worship as we would like.
But everyone who has ever taken even a high school civics class can tell you, even in American were we boast about our freedoms, we aren’t really free, we are still limited in some ways that hinder our freedom. You are not allowed to yell fire in a crowded theater and claim you did so out of freedom of speech. Newspapers, magazines and even blogs are not allowed to right blatant lies about a person just because they are protected by the freedom of the press. Even religious freedoms are infringed upon. Utah was only made a state because the Mormon church gave up the practice of polygamy.
And those are just the legal examples. Personally people are judged for much more. People who are born in America often feel they can say whatever they want and yet they give looks of disgust to a couple speaking Spanish, their native language, in the supermarket. Teenagers post mean comments and gossip about classmates on Facebook and Twitter even if they are known to be untrue. We boast to be a country founded on the idea of religious freedom as the Puritans and other groups came from Europe to practice their sect of Christianity, yet we give weary looks to the person walking down the street in headscarf or sari, because they practice a religion that is unfamiliar to us.
We do have wonderful freedoms in this country, and for that I am grateful, but no government can truly make us free. Instead it is Christ who makes us free. But Christ doesn’t make us free to say, write or worship as we will, instead Jesus, through his death on the cross, has set us free from the law, Jesus has set us free from sin and death.
In our tongue twisting text from Roman’s today, Paul is saying that regardless of how much he tries he still ends up doing the things that he knows that he shouldn’t do and he doesn’t do the things that he knows that he should do. How often have you reached for the second helping of food, or the dessert, or another bottle of beer even when you are trying to diet or cut back on your drinking? How often have you lashed out towards someone because you are truly upset because of work or another circumstance that has nothing to do with them? Why is it that we can never keep a New Year’s Resolution? Why is it that one day we can be the perfect spouse, parent, employee, child or pastor, and the next it seems like we can’t get anything right? This is all because of human nature, sin, that keeps us from God. And the law, the how we are to act part, is what is suppose to help us become closer to God, but regardless of how hard we try, we just can’t seem to do everything right.
Well it is Christ who frees us from this cycle. It is Christ who allows us to break free from constantly trying to do what is right, and yet constantly failing.
In the gospel today, Jesus says that John the Baptist fasted and people thought he was crazy and yet Jesus feasted with many people and he was called a drunkard. That no matter what they did, they could not please the crowd. Well that is how it is with the law. You could stay in your seat confessing all of your sins and eventually you would come to confessing that you were not able to care for the sick, the orphaned, the naked, the imprisoned, that you neglected your family and your friends because you were too busy sitting here confessing your other sins.
We can never be free of this cycle, except because of Jesus who sets us free from the law, from sin, from death. Yes we are still subjects to the law, both civil and religious, I can’t murder someone and expect to not have to go to jail or not be judged by God because of it. And in the same way, even though we are free from sin and death we will still sin and we will all someday die. We are not set free from sin and death but we are set free from the fear of sin and death. Jesus has set us free from that cycle of constantly trying to do what is right and yet constantly failing. Again Christ has not set us free from failure itself but free from the fear of failure. True freedom through Christ is the ability to trust that even if we fail, we are doing God’s will.
So what does this mean for us, as individuals and as a congregation? Well just like great political leaders have admitted that they failed, and great religious leaders have been humbled enough to say that their failures were their doing and their successes were God’s. In the same way, great congregations are ones who realize that they are set free from failure through Jesus’ death on the cross. Therefore great congregations are ones that try new things knowing they may fail and still do them with the hope that as a result more people will hear about God. Knowing we are free means not living in fear of failure, it means that we risk new things, new ways of reaching out to the community, new ways of worshiping Christ, new ways of seeing God in our lives. And we realize that even if it doesn’t catch on, even if it doesn’t work for us, we are beloved children of God who are not bounded by our failures, instead we have been set free.
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