Gems in the Gospel of John
Part 37 - John 8:32
Freedom in Christ
As we move on through this chapter things get very difficult. In verse 31 John refers to “the Jews who had believed Jesus”. That simple statement is very difficult because these same Jews seem to have been his discussion partners through the rest of the chapter and they are very antagonistic to Jesus to the point where they tried to stone him! Perhaps John means something like ‘Jews who had expressed some interest in what he was saying and doing’. After all there were probably people then, as there are now, who are keen to get alongside the latest celebrity, which Jesus will have been.
Then Jesus said, ““If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” That is alright but their response wasn’t. They said “we have never been enslaved to anyone” which must be high in the list of the most untrue things in the Bible. They had been slaves, at one time or another, of the Egyptians, the Philistines, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks and the Romans. We might well wonder what they can possibly have meant by claiming they had never been slaves – which takes us straight into thinking about what is meant by freedom. Nelson Mandela, the famous South African politician, is the clue. He spent 27 years in two of South Africa’s most notorious prisons, which would seem to be a very definite for of slavery, but when he was finally released it was clear that his mind and spirit were unaffected. He became the countries president but he took no steps to hold anyone to account for his lone imprisonment. His mind and spirit had clearly remained free even when his body was held in dire slavery. He was an outstanding example of how some can rise above their immediate surroundings and remain free.
The other problem we all have is that of sin. Sin, which can so easily become a habit or even an addiction haunts all of us. Paul recognized that when he said. “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God”. He went on to compare sin to slavery and the life of the Christian living in acceptance by God to freedom just as Jesus does here.
Jesus tells us what the solution to this otherwise unsolvable human dilemma is. He says, “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” The first bit is easy to understand: it is the age old difference between being a slave lacking all security in where you live and control over what you do and a son who is the heir to the house, the estate and the family riches. The second bit is much more difficult. We may well ask, ‘why should being set free by the son, even if the son is Jesus, set us free.’ The answer to that puzzle is in Romans chapter 6 where we read, “all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
How difficult that is to understand depends on what culture you come from. If, like me, you come from a Western culture with its extreme individuality you will find it very difficult to understand how you can truly be involved in the life and death of another person even if that person is the Son of God. If, however, you come from a culture where individuality takes second place to a corporate group, be that family, work group, church, or anything else you will find it much easier to accept that because good things happen to the Lord, you are united with the Lord, and therefore the same good things happen to you.
Think that one over very carefully. If you have set out to follow Jesus, he is the Son, he has set you free, therefore – and what an enormous therefore that is – you are free indeed because you are in Him
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