Freedom By Choice

So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.  John 8:36 NASB

Free – Consider the strangeness of this statement.  Oh, you might have heard it so often that it doesn’t seem strange to you anymore, but pause just long enough to notice the verb eleutheróō.  It means “to set free.”  The apostle uses the verb in a special sense.  “The NT sees that the retreat into inwardness does not in fact bring freedom. Existence is inwardly defective, so that to take oneself in hand is simply to grasp a defective existence. Faced with a lost existence, we can come to ourselves only by subjecting our own will to the will of another.”^[1]  Perhaps now you see the strange quality of this statement.  How can anyone else really set you free?  Oh, someone else may release your physical or legal bonds, but does that make you free?  Many are enslaved to habit, addiction, and mental condition without any observable restraints.  How does someone else free you from these?  The typical answer is that the Messiah makes us free, that is, free from the consequences of sin.  We are rescued from eternal punishment through his act of obedience.  But does that make you free?  Perhaps so, technically.  The bill of obligation has been removed.  But are you free?

Well, that depends on your definition of freedom.  If you mean unencumbered by obligation, able to do precisely what you wish, then the act of the Messiah does not make you free.  That kind of freedom portends anarchy.  It implies that everyone else is your slave ready to do your bidding.  The Bible calls this idea of “freedom” sin.  Biblical freedom is something entirely different.  “Since it is the other person to whom we are responsible, our choices regarding our neighbors will eventually define the visibility or invisibility of our consciousness to ourselves.  It is not choice itself that satisfies our consciousness’s need for freedom, but the choice to obey the obligations to pursue another’s good.”[2]  In other words, my freedom is my ability to act with love toward you.  The biblical definition of freedom is not about me at all.  It is about my service to another.  I am not free for myself.  I am free only with regard to my commitment to another.  When the Messiah’s faithfulness sets you free, his act does not free you to do whatever you wish.  His act frees you to act as he did, selflessly giving for the other.

The Greek idea of freedom, an idea that dominates Western culture, finds its meaning in opposition to slavery.  To be free in the Greek sense is to be guaranteed exemption from political slavery.

This freedom is freedom within the law, which establishes and secures it. As an embodiment of the claim of the politeía, law protects freedom against the caprice of the tyrant or the mass. But freedom means alternation of government as free people both rule and are subjects. Democracy achieves this best by allowing the same rights to all citizens (cf. Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus). It implies equality of voice, honor, dignity, and power. It comes vividly to expression in freedom of speech. As Demosthenes says, there is no greater misfortune for free citizens than to lose this. Yet the concept of freedom in Attic democracy contains the seeds of its own decay, for by promoting individual development it undermines the law on which it rests. Freedom becomes the freedom to do as one likes. The law of the self replaces the law of the politeía.Plato perceives this clearly (Laws 3.701b/c). It leads to the rise of demagogues and opens the door to tyranny.^[3]

Today we find this tension in the constant debate over individual “rights,” as if freedom should guarantee that everyone has the right to pursue whatever he wishes.  The biblical idea turns this entire program upside down.  Biblical freedom is my willingness to serve the other, to forego my desires in order to fulfill the needs of the other.  Biblical freedom is communal.  Greek freedom is individual.  If the son sets you free, he enables you to let go of your mistaken idea of individual rights and commit yourself to the good of the community of God’s children.  When he sets you free, you willingly become a slave.

Topical Index: set free, eleutheróō, slavery, rights, freedom, John 8:36

^[1] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (p. 225). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

[2] Ira F. Stone, in Moses Hayyim Luzzatto, Mesillat Yesharim: The Path of the Upright, p. 6.

^[3] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Abridged in One Volume (p. 224). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.