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"Freedom Is Coming"
Galatians 5:1, 12-25.
A Sermon Preached by The Rev. Douglas M. Donley
July 1, 2001
University Baptist Church
Minneapolis, MN
Here we are on this Sunday before Independence Day and the Sunday after the ABC Biennial. I suppose it’s time to talk about freedom.
I spent a wonderful weekend last week in the home of Baptist freedom, Providence, RI where in 1638 Roger Williams founded the first Baptist Church of America in that colony which embraced freedom. Actually, Rhode Island was the Zurich of the New World. It was the one colony that didn’t have a state religion so all of the kooks and crazies gathered there starting their own religions. It was kind of like a 17th century version of California. Rhode Island was the one place where you could believe as you felt called, not conforming to some state religion. Baptists knew back then that their brand of Christianity was threatening to the powers that be. It was Baptists who would later ensure the freedom of religion in the Bill of Rights.
The best times of that weekend were spent within the walls of the First Baptist Church of America. On Saturday night at the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists (AWAB) worship service, I heard a fine sermon by Nancy Hastings Sehested in which she said that our salvation is not in denominations but in the healing presence of Jesus who calls us sons and daughters when all others would demean us. We thought Roger Williams would have been proud.
We were exercising our hard fought and heart felt Baptist freedom. There was great joy in that room as the 44 Welcoming and Affirming congregations were recognized by hundreds of freedom-loving Baptists. Throughout the week, the Rainbow choir sang hymns as delegates and visitors poured into the Convention center, greeting us with smiles, scowls and confusion. The favorite was God of Grace and God of Glory which we just sang earlier today.
But what we saw amongst some people was a sense of freedom when they embraced their God-given blessedness. The Apostle Paul said in Galatians 5, "For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand fast, therefore and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery."
Paul had been a Pharisee and as such had watched over the stoning of young Stephen, the first of many Christian martyrs, because Jesus' message of love, peace and equality was bound to shake up the fragile Jewish community. We know that Paul had a conversion experience on the road to Damascus as he was persecuting the Christians.
As a recovering Pharisee, as a recovering murderer, as a recovering exclusivist, as a recovering racist, as a recovering hypocrite, Paul became one of the most important and influential leaders of the early church. He never, as far as we know from scripture, became a recovering sexist or a recovering homophobe. Paul was far from perfect.
Paul had a different viewpoint of his life now that he embraced the freedom of Christ. He still loved his Hebrew Bible, but he interpreted it differently because of his conversion experience. We are the same way. We look at the world in a different way because we have been confounded and changed by the renewal of our minds. We now embrace the freedom to believe as we have been called to believe.
Paul supported letting anyone into the church as long as they sought to live a Christian lifestyle. He vehemently fought against those who would require that the males be circumcised in order to show salvation. Paul was not about to get into litmus-testing. You see, it was also about racism. He challenged the Jerusalem Church to believe the Great Commission: "Go ye into all the world and preach my Gospel to every creature." The Greeks were a different color, spoke a different language and were just plain dissimilar.
If Jesus’ message is to love God and to love our neighbors as ourselves, then we must not let petty differences divide us, especially when the dignity of fragile people is at stake. His main thrust is summed up in Galatians 5:1: "For freedom Christ has set us free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery."
The early Baptists saw the restrictions of the churches as the yoke of slavery. Like the early church they had to practice their freedom in Christ in secret because that freedom threatened so many people in power. They found that "official" church structures were not acceptable to them.
Baptist are about freedom. For freedom Christ has set us free. We are free from religious and political domination. We are also free to serve God and God’s people.
But with freedom comes responsibility. Too many Baptists nowadays have a twisted view of Baptist freedom. They believe their freedom includes the freedom to dismiss churches and people that threaten them. But this is antithetical to what true freedom in Christ is all about. Freedom in Christ is about rising above fear, bigotry, piety and cowardice. Ken Sehested once wrote: "What is sin, but fear? And what is grace but fearlessness? Freedom is fearlessness; and fearlessness is the eternal enemy of every form of fascism."
"For freedom, Christ has set you free. Stand fast, therefore and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery."
One cannot become a new person unless one is free to do so. When we restrict our freedoms or let a person or an institution restrict our freedom, then we run the risk of losing that freedom. Because the opposite of freedom is control. Control is domination. Control is slavery. Control is evil. Walter Shurden in his book, The Baptist Identity: Four fragile Freedoms puts it this way, "Freedom can be abdicated. Freedom can be stolen. Freedom-lovers have no choice but to be vigilant in the defense of freedom." (p.56)
As Baptists, we need to lift the veils and proclaim the freedom for all to live and love as they feel called by God to so do.
I say all of this because freedom is so vitally important.
The Apostle Paul juxtaposed freedom and slavery. He said that to adhere to the law of the Jewish people, for those who have never been Jews, was tantamount to slavery. Paul argued, against the church in Jerusalem that we must break free of the restrictive laws of Judaism and be free to worship God as we see fit.
Think about what binds you.
What holds you back?
What structure restricts your belief or your free expression of your faith?
If we are a true Baptist Church, then we need to find room for us to express them. We also have to have the courage to exercise our freedom and the trust that our freedom not be used against us. We need to be a community in which it is safe to risk being who we are. Believing as we do. And acting out a live-action faith which sets all people free.
For Freedom Christ has set you free. Stand fast, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery."
We believe in freedom, because we were slaves once, and we know that freedom is life-giving. We were once:
Slaves to traditionalism,
slaves to homophobia and compulsory heterosexuality,
slaves to misogyny,
slaves to judgmentalism,
Slaves to family rules and the exhortation to "not rock the boat",
slaves to our checkbooks and our datebooks,
slaves to our jobs,
slaves to this economy.
But Jesus has come and said, there is a bigger picture.
There is a grander scheme.
God's way is a way of freedom and liberation.
If you focus on that, this world will be a better place, and we will make a place for, grant salvation to, a world in need.
If Jesus were around today, creating new scripture, he might just say, "Be ye servants of God first and foremost, lest you be servants of this sin-sick world."
So I say we are free.
We are free from all that has bound us.
We are free from all of the rules which have held one over another.
We are free to interpret the scriptures as we may and govern our church the way we must.
We are free to be the children of God we are called to be.
But that freedom must be a freedom that makes others free and unbinds the bound. Otherwise it is not freedom but just another obsession.
So, my friends, my Baptist friends, it is for us that this church was made and it is for those who need to be freed that we live and love and serve.
For freedom Christ has set us free. Thank God.
The other song we sang was a South African freedom song called "Freedom is Coming." We sang it in joy. We sang it knowing that our freedom is not based upon the denomination, but by every time we break the bonds that bind us, we are set free. Every time we refuse to be locked in the prisons, we are set free. Every time we witness to the best of us, the inclusion, the justice, the peacemaking, the transformation and renewal which we all need. Then we can sing, "O freedom, O freedom, O freedom, freedom is coming O yes I know."
AMEN.