In this sermon, the speaker discusses the concept of freedom and bondage in the context of Christianity. He emphasizes that true freedom comes from submission to God's will and surrendering to His word in obedience. The speaker warns against using freedom as an excuse to indulge in sinful behavior or to distance oneself from Christ. He also highlights the importance of understanding that as believers, we are connected to other believers and have a responsibility to portray the image of Christ in the world. The sermon encourages listeners, especially young people, to embrace true freedom through submission to God's will and to pursue the Christian life to its fullest.

Amen to that word, and maybe we should stop right here. Meditate on this a little bit. I found in my life, the more you have to do, the more you get done. I'm not suppressing you. We tend to procrastinate, spiritually and temporally. When there's nothing pressing in our spiritual lives, we tend to sit back and coast along. Nothing's pressing us temporally, we just do the bare necessities. So I think one, a good indicator of our spiritual health is our, the way we operate physically. I think that might be a good indicator, rather than saying that. So we have to certainly take this to heart. I definitely saw myself a few times, it's, the human being has that tendency, we can't get away from it. It seems like we always need something to keep us on track, keep us focused. Praise God, for the word. Some of the words that Grandpa said there are kind of relative to what I was going to say this morning. I tied in my message, if the Son shall make you free. Brothers and sisters, be made free. It's dependent upon who you are. And it also, before we really can understand what freedom is, I think we need to understand what bondage is. We need to understand what the opposite of freedom is. To a slave, as we all remember 100 years ago, 150, how the slave trade was going on in America, some countries still have it. To a slave, freedom means getting out from under that oppressive rule. It means not being merchandise anymore. And if there's anything throughout the history of Maine, anything that has dominated Maine's thinking, it's this one, freedom. Every single, and we're studying that in school, studying the history of countries and whatever. Always, always we see the same picture unfolding. Kings and rulers take over and oppress the people. Governments, dominions, and the people want freedom. And they fight for it. Blood has gotten shed of untold proportions for freedom. Just this past century, for freedom's sake, millions and millions have laid down their lives trying to get free, free from, that's just a physical freedom, a freedom to be able to make our own decisions, a freedom to, freedom of religion, freedom of thought, freedom of assembly, freedom to speak and to pursue happiness. That's just a physical freedom. And that's a freedom that Maine has longed for all throughout history. And it's not come easy. What we enjoy in this country is something that we take for granted often. To a sinner, what is freedom? Freedom from the shame and the guilt and the power of sin. To him, that's freedom. How about to someone who's a believer? For us here, who've been believers, some of us have been believers for many years, what does freedom mean to us? I think there's another freedom, which I'd like to talk about a little bit here today. Let's turn to John, John chapter 8, verse 31, John 8, 31. Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed, and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, we were never in bondage to any man. How sayest thou, ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, whosoever committed sin is a servant of sin. In other words, is a slave, he's in bondage. And the servant abideth not in the house forever, but the son abideth forever. If the son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. What a wonderful word. But he said first, you shall know the truth, and the truth makes you free. See what gives us freedom? Truth. That it should not be this way. Prove that this is not God's intention for mankind, to be a slave. Never intended to be a slave from the beginning, man was never intended to be a slave to some cruel master. He was never intended to be a slave to the devil. He was never intended to be a slave to his own passions and his lusts. That was not God's will all along. Not God's plan for mankind, but we're there, we're subject to it. People all over the world, they're not subject to oppressive rulers, they're subject, they're slaves to sin, slaves to themselves. What's that freedom that Jesus said here? He said, he shall make you free. If the son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. We need to go a little deeper here about this. In John 10 verse 9, Jesus said, I am the door, if by me any man enter in, he shall be saved and shall go in and out any fine pasture. He shall go in and out. That means Jesus sets us free, free of something. What did he mean here? Did he mean to set us free of the law? If that's so, doesn't it? Well, I've come to the realization that when Jesus gives a definition, it's always opposite to the way he maintains. He doesn't, his ways, as Brother Ben said, are as higher as the heavens are than ours, as he read there in Deuteronomy, or in Joshua, or Isaiah. So, if he sets us free from the law, isn't that a contradiction? How can we be free, and yet under a law? Well, we have to back up a little bit here. In, last week we touched a bit about the, or whatever that was, the covenants and agreements. We have to understand that an agreement and a law and a covenant are the same things. We live in a country here where we can do a lot of things freely. Because there are laws in place that allow us to do it. There are laws in place that prevent the government from becoming oppressive. There are laws in place that prevent certain individuals from doing things that would hinder us from pursuing our freedom and our happiness. The laws are in place. And when someone breaks them, the law kicks into effect. And that's the way it works with the new covenant and the old covenant. The old covenant, Jesus came to put it away. But before he put it away, he set up a new one. A new, established one upon better promises. So it has nothing to do with law. There is still law. There is still covenant. Freedom is not free from a law. Freedom is freedom from powers. Freedom from some kind of powers, whether they are physical powers or spiritual powers. And I think that's why many Christians, especially young Christians, don't quite understand what that freedom means. And how he sets us free. In 1500 during the Reformation time, when let's say Martin Luther started the Reformation. And he started that rebellion is what they called it. The Reformation. Many, many sided with him. And Martin Luther was a pretty level-headed guy. But those who sided with him, they just wanted freedom from the Roman Catholic Church. They really didn't understand what freedom meant. And they did worse things than the Roman Catholics did. They just went all out with their freedom. All out and forgot that a law still has to bind us. A law still has to hold us. And the new covenant, where the law gets written on our hearts and into our minds. Believers need to come to realize that we, true freedom means not freedom from a covenant. See there's three kinds of covenants which we discussed lately. There's the old covenant. There's the new covenant. And there's no covenant. Christians should not find ourselves under no covenant. We need to be under a certain covenant, a certain agreement. And that is the new one, in Christ Jesus. So what did Jesus mean by setting us free? Well, the Jews had to be free from the old covenant, it's clear. He had to set them free. For a Jew, freedom was getting free from the old covenant. For a sinner, it means getting free from the devil. Getting free from the devil and his power. Let's turn to Romans. Romans chapter 8. Romans 8 verse 2. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. See, two laws are in operation here. First, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made us free from the law of sin and death. What is the law of sin and death? The law of sin and death is, brothers and sisters, a law from the beginning. The cause of Adam's transgression, we are sinners. That's a law. That's a fact. We are sinners. The other part is, the old covenant could not make us right with God. That was a law. Could not make us right. For it says in Hebrews, for what the law could not do, it could not make us right with God. It could not remove the stain of sin. It could not remove the shame and the guilt. It could just cover it up. Let's say we sweep the floor, we just sweep it under the rug. The dirt is still all there. It's not removed. The law can never remove it. But the law said, we are sinners. That's what the law says. So what it could not do, Christ came and did. And what does he do? He sets us free. First of all, he has to set us free from the guilt and the shame and the condemnation of our sin. That's the first step that's gotta happen. He's gotta set us free from that. If we can't be set free from that shame of our sin, from the guilt, we're not even ready for the next step. That's what Jesus came to do. When the Son shall set you free, you shall be free indeed. But the thing is, it doesn't stop there. Then, he sets us free from the power and the effects of sin. He goes on, the next step. If he just wipes away my sin from last week or last month or last year, and he's not good enough to give me power over sin, he hasn't finished the work yet. We're just claiming the beginning work. If we just claim his forgiveness and his cleansing blood on our account, we're just at the beginning. He sets us free from the power and effect of sin. Finally, the last and the biggest step for a believer, he sets us free from the root of sin. Because the law said, man is inherently sinful. And Jesus came to deal with the root. It's to set us free from the sin that is lodged in the human heart. Not the sins we commit on the outside. The sins that are committed externally are only results from sins that are happening internally. 99.9% of the time. He sets us free. And if he hasn't set us free on the inside, we are not free yet. We need to enter in more into the Christian life, into the promises where he said, if the Son shall make you free. And I was just wondering this weekend, pondering, what are we setting free from? What do we need to be set free from? As believers. As unbelievers we know we need to be set free from the devil. We need to be forgiven. Shame and the guilt needs to be removed. Wonderful. That's happened, I trust, in most of us. Now as children of God, as believers, what's the next thing we need to be removed from? Set free from? The things in the human heart. Deep inside, where it all starts. Anger. Attitudes. Depression. Negative outlooks. All these, the selfishness, this comes from the human heart. Pride comes from inside. Hypocrisy. They manifest themselves only outside. But they're in there. Bitterness is there. Lust is there. Love of money is there. Partiality is in our hearts. Favoritism. Critical attitudes. Fault finding. The list could go on and on. It's deep inside, lodged there. And Jesus came to set us free. Not only from the effects of sin, from the power of sin. And finally, I believe with all my heart, He can deal with the root of sin. He can deal with the root deep inside us. So that the inclination is not even there. If we would truly enter in, as Brother Ben said, truly go out, lay hold, claim it. And not make maybe excuses, or try to explain away some of His promises and some of His wonderful words. We can't do that. I think it's very important that we say, if He said it, it must be true. If He said it, we can claim it. And it can be ours. Let's turn to a verse here in 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians 7. 1 Corinthians 7, 18. Here Paul evidently was having a problem with the Corinthians about that very topic. Some were thinking that freedom meant just free to do what I please and freely. Some were bound by certain things and thought you had to do this or you had to do that. And Paul comes on here and says, is any man called being circumcised? Let him not become uncircumcised. Is any man called in circumcision? Let him not be circumcised. Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing. But the keeping of the commandments of God. Let every man abide in the same calling, wherein he is called. Our God called being a servant, care not for it, but if thou mayest be made free, use it rather. You see what Paul is saying here? He's saying that true freedom does not depend on outward circumstances. True freedom depends on inward condition. For he that is called in the Lord being a servant is the Lord's free man. Likewise also he that is called being free is Christ's servant. You are bought with a price, being not the servants of men. Brethren, let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God. What I get out of that picture is that Christians many times mistake what freedom really means. And we've seen it and we've heard of it and it's happened many times in history where believers come to the Lord and they think they are now free. And what actually happens there is they get caught in bondage. What actually happens when believers think that because we are free in Christ, nobody tells me what to do, nobody shows me where to go. I am free, I can live my own life. Well, you go try that on the highway out there and we'll see how long we go. There's a covenant that's governing the nation and we know it's an ungodly nation. I'm just using it as an illustration. We can't go far. And the other thing is no man liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself. None of us are hermits living out in the middle of a desert somewhere. We are physically and closely and spiritually connected to other believers. And for that very reason we have to understand that true freedom actually comes from submission to God's will. Freedom is not something that I go out and grasp and lay hold of and then run with it. It is something that happens, that is given when we submit to the covenant, to the agreement. When we submit to all the laws of the land, we never have to worry about the policeman. Never have to worry about getting caught or whatever. When we submit ourselves to God's will, surrender to his word and obedience, true freedom is the result. It's an automatic result. And when the Son shall make us free, we shall be free. And this is the kind of freedom we talk about. God doesn't give us the freedom to do as we please. Get up when we want to, go to bed when we want to, come to work when we want to. He doesn't give us that kind of freedom. Because people are around us. We have a responsibility to portray the image of Christ in this world. And our freedom can become bondage. And I know many Christians who have come out of the deep religious systems and bondage and they were suddenly free in Christ and two, three years later I won't pay five cents for it. Freedom brought bondage again. Some Christians have used their freedom to such an extent that they became free from Christ. That's not the kind of freedom we want. We want to be free in Christ. And that submitting ourselves to God's will, submitting ourselves to Christ, brings us a rest and a peace and freedom to freely not only claim all his promises, but to pursue the Christian life. To its fullest. And young people need to understand that. It is very important to understand that true freedom comes from submission. And I know, especially for young people, the word submission doesn't have a sweet taste to it. It doesn't have that good, it doesn't taste like candy, I know that. But you better understand, it is, it brings wonderful results later in life. If not immediately, it brings them later. And that's one of the things that Jesus said, it's like for young people to, in submission to their parents and authority, is the first commandment with promise. And Jesus did not abolish that one in the New Covenant. He did not. It's written again and again in the New Covenant as well. That this is the first commandment with promise, which means that it may be well with you. And thou mayest live long on the earth. Wow. It may be well with you. Let's understand how significant it is. Like when Paul was, I think it's in Corinthians 2, when Paul spoke to a Jew, I became a Jew, that I might win the Jews. Just before that he said, though I be free from all men. See, Paul was not bound to any church or to any people. He was free from all men. He willingly made himself a servant for the gospel sake, for the sake of truth. He submitted himself to Christ and here Lord, if you can use my life, if you can use me for something, here I am. I became a servant to all, that I might glorify Christ, that I might win more to Jesus. And that can happen in our circle here. We can win our young people to Christ. We can convict a brother or a sister of some of his ways just by simply submitting ourselves to Christ and not resisting our circumstances. Resisting the things, the pressure sometimes that God puts us in. Because true freedom is not dependent on that, as it says. It's not dependent on where we are. He says, the one who came to Christ as a slave is the Lord's free man. That's a contradiction. And the one who is free and becomes a Christian is the Lord's slave, servant. By this we understand that this true freedom is brought to us simply by our inward condition. How our heart condition is towards everything. So how can we enter it? How can we have it? I'd just like to share a little bit. How can we have this true freedom in here? Instead of just pointing out the problem. What is it that robs us from it? And what is it that can give it to us? I think the first thing is, freedom comes from knowing to whom we belong. Having that assurance, that we know who our Lord is and Master. And that we are assured and know that He knows us. The other thing is, is knowing that He's got everything in control. He is the potter, we are the clay. Knowing that brings us true rest and freedom. Being assured of our Father's love and acceptance. Knowing He is pleased with us. Knowing that He loves us and cares for us. Just like any father with his son and his daughters. He loves them, He cares for them and He only wants the best for them. And realizing there is a purpose in everything that happens to me, with me and around me. Realizing that God never says oops. He don't make mistakes. He is just and holy and righteous. Recognizing this gives us the grace to enter into that life, as He said. Will nothing affect us anymore? Yes, many things will still affect us. As the one we are experiencing right now. With Paul and Melissa and little Jasmine. We're experiencing that right now. Grief, hurt. But are we His sons and His daughters? That's the bottom line. And we should be able to see that He does not make mistakes. Though He chastens us, though He sometimes hurts us. Just like I do with my children. I don't get a kick out of it, I'm telling you that much. I don't get any joy out of it. But I as a father know that it's necessary and you as fathers and mothers know it too. How necessary it is for us, for them, for their sake. We still love them, we love them with all our hearts. And our Heavenly Father, His infinite wisdom has designed and woven our life together. I believe before we were born. We may think sometimes that hey I brought this on or this is something that could have been avoided. But God who is all-knowing and all-powerful and all-seeing. Has already taken our mistakes, our failures, our infirmities, our personalities. And has woven them together in a beautiful fashion to bring forth gold and pure raiment. Just a vessel of honor for Him. And if that doesn't give us comfort, I don't know what does. It's very comforting for me that He knows and has my future planned. And everything that I've ever gone through, am I sorry for it today? No. I can remember several times when I was angry with God. And wondering what He was trying to do. But I now look back and know there was a definite plan in motion. A definite purpose to everything that He's put me through. This can bring us freedom. Freedom from anxiety, from being depressed and downhearted and stricken. Freedom. This can give us the true sense of belonging into the family of God. It's Him. Heavenly family. And can wipe away our tears. And can wipe away our miserable feelings. Knowing that He is in control. And we can find true rest in Him. True peace. True freedom. We can go in and out and find pasture. It's not impossible. It's just that from my own experience I know that we don't understand sometimes. Just as my children don't understand why. And they ask me, why? It's natural, it's normal for us to do that. To ask why. But not ask why in a rebellious way. Why do I have to do that? Why is that required of me? No, just why Lord, I want to know. I want to understand your heart. That's got to be our desire. And our longing and what we press towards. And that will give us that true sense of belonging. A true sense of freedom. And I think freedom and rest in Christ are very closely tied together. Very closely.