What Does It Mean To Be "Free In Christ"?

There are millions of Jesus-loving Christians around the world serving God. They live and love and eat and sleep and die for God each day around the globe. Each one has their own set of strengths and weaknesses, failure and flaws, sins and successes. According to Romans 3:23, they have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of our amazing God.

In my 20+ years of walking with Jesus, serving as worship leader or on the worship team in numerous churches, as well as several hundred

concert events, ministering in music for the brothers and sisters of God’s great Church, I have met thousands of wonderful Christians in many states and from many countries. They each have been called by God and equipped to do His work and I know many of them love Jesus more than me. I have noticed over the years that it seems like the Christians I have served with serve Jesus for one of two main reasons – They either serve Jesus because they believe that is how they keep favor with God, or they serve because they know they have already found favor with Him, just because He called them, and are eternally safe and secure in His arms. These also know that when the gift of salvation is given by God it can NEVER be taken away by anyone on Earth – including the one who has been blessed with that gift. Understand that this is not about salvation. Both of these types of believers know Jesus and will see Him in Heaven. It's a matter of whether we live our lives on Earth with liberty or in a religious bondage of our own making.

Two years ago God allowed me to see through some unsound doctrine that I had been taught in more than a few churches, doctrine that bound me to a system of sin management and religious rules, instead of the liberty Jesus promises. This moved me solidly in to the second group. It seemed that the ones who felt obligated to please God by their behavior and ever-increasing holiness always seemed tired, they often felt guilty, and made others feel guilty too. They would repent of the same sins over and over, and run to the altar every time there was an altar call. They would sometimes become almost neurotic in their behavior toward their sin and would often isolate themselves from non-Christians to such an extent that they spent almost no time with anyone outside the Church, and even when they were at work in their secular jobs they would keep their distance, not wanted to be sullied by the non-believers around them. There was very little freedom or liberty in their lives, and they served mostly out of fear, because how could they REALLY know how good is good enough, or how ‘holy’ did they really have to be. Most of the time when they were not working they felt guilty for not doing more.

Whenever we make the love of God dependent upon our performance, when failure and sin come, and they ALWAYS do, the natural tendency is for us to run from Jesus instead of to Him.

The other group smiles more. They dance more. They sing more. They are more fun at parties because they know the fate of the world doesn’t hang on their shoulders because it already hung on a cross for them. They understand, and don’t deny their inherent sin nature, before and after salvation, and they understand that they will always be sinful until they see Jesus face to face. They get it, that no matter how hard they work they will never be worthy of standing in God’s presence on their own. They know that the love God has for them is because of Him and Him alone and their behavior has nothing to do with His approval. He knew them and called them before the foundations of the Earth were in place, and than came to die for them because He knew they were way too weak to do it on their own.

Please understand something here - This paradigm shift in the lives of my family over the past few years has revealed the love and grace of God and of the Gospel in a new and awesome way, and has brought us freedom and liberty in a way we never imagined in our wildest dreams before. We no longer have the cart before the horse. We don’t serve to please God – we serve because we know He is already pleased. We don’t serve to secure the favor of God – we serve because the very love we receive from Him overflows from us, and it is a love that works to secure others in the hope found in Him alone because THAT is what His love does. We manipulate less (both others and ourselves) and love more naturally. We usually get better, but we don't get better because we have made it the primary focus of our Christian faith – We get better (sometimes) because we know we are loved completely in spite of ourselves, not because of our selves. We get better, precisely because we no getting better isn't even the point. We no longer have to live up to any standard, or be obsessive-compulsive about our struggles, or spend our lives trying to manage our sin, and then when we fail at that, to hide it. We can just be real, with nothing to prove. We can be the frail flawed sinners in need of a savior that God made us to be and just go out and love someone in His name. I love the way my friend Steve Brown says it – “we are just one beggar telling other beggars where we found bread.” 

Remember this, God's children, His grace is sufficient for you because if the Son shall set you free - you WILL be free indeed. Now deal with it! Amen.