Living No Longer For Ourselves

Dear DJAN Friends,

As you know, freedom is often understood in this society as the ability–power, right–to pursue one's own ends without external constraints. This, however, is not the biblical understanding. The following verses from Paul's Letter to the Galatians are frequently cited when discussing this topic.

For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery. . . . For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." If, however, you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another (Galatians 5:1, 13-15).

In Galatians 4 and 5, Paul insists that those who are "in Christ" have the freedom of adults who have come into their inheritance. But with adulthood comes obligation: to live as Christ commanded by loving our neighbors as ourselves (the summary of the Jewish law). When we act as if anything goes so long as it pleases us (self-indulgence), or when we "bite and devour one another" (as our nation seems to be doing now), we show that we are by no means free adults, but are still enslaved to the forces of the world.

To say this another way, for Paul and other biblical authors, freedom entails submission to the correct authority. Because God alone is sovereign, humans should not be subject to authoritarian rulers who demand our loyalty. But because Christ is Lord, we willingly submit to him by living no longer for ourselves but for other children of God. 

May God grant us understanding and commitment. 

—Rev. Dr. Michael Kinnamon