I have been thinking about freedom lately especially after reading 1 Peter 2:16 “Live as free men, but do
not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God.’
Scripture talks of us being free but also of being slaves of Christ (Ephesians 6:6) or servants of God. We know we have been slaves of sin (Romans 6:17,20) but it appears that the freedom we have in Christ is not freedom from any mastery over us but simply a change of master.Freedom then cannot be defined as the absence of rules or control by someone or something. We might better define it as having the correct master (or rules/boundaries) rather than the incorrect one. If we accept the notion that we are made by God but born into sin then we were first of all destined to live under God’s authority as his created beings (freedom) but because of Adam’s sin, we live under the control of Satan (captivity). Freedom then is living under righteous authority rather than living under unrighteous authority.
The Scriptures never seem to assume that freedom means living under our own authority – or at least if we do seem to do that we are not then under God’s authority and therefore we are not free. Many people think of freedom as autonomy from authority but the Scripture implies that is an impossibility.
In a sense then, we are all slaves. It only matters to whom we are enslaved – God or Satan.
phillipnash52 