Freedom, A Biblical Understanding of Christian Liberty

Christian freedom and spiritual adoption go hand-in-hand in God’s plan of salvation. Through the adopting grace of God, we are redeemed from our previous enslavement to sin so that we can become free members of God’s household. Our status as sons in God’s family frees us from the power of sin, the persuasion of Satan, and the penalty for our rebellion. In addition to the protective aspects of freedom that release us from the bonds these of dangerous realities, God’s children also enjoy the positive privileges of being liberated.

We have been liberated:

• free to come to our Heavenly Father in prayer;

• free to cast our anxieties on our Father because he cares for us;

• free to study God’s word with the illuminating help of the Spirit so that we can understand it.

In short, we have been liberated from spiritual bondage so that we can enjoy all the freedoms of God’s family. Because our adoption into God’s family liberates us, it is crucial for us to understand what this newfound freedom means for our lives. People frequently speak about Christian freedom as if they are trying to figure out exactly how much they can get away with and still be a part of God’s family. To put it another way, sometimes, when people talk about Christian freedom, they are trying to justify their own questionable actions. They might say something like, “I have the freedom to do this,” or, “you can’t hinder my freedom to do this.” We need to be careful about the subject of Christian liberty because there is a kind of “freedom” that is really just another form of enslavement. The world defines freedom as the opportunity to do whatever you feel like without any consequences or conviction. This a distortion of genuine biblical freedom that inevitably leads to enslavement, sin, and perpetual despair. A self-focused, sin-saturated life is literally the most miserable bondage in which you could ever find yourself. The Bible warns us about the dangers of pursuing sensual freedom:

These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. For, speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. (2 Peter 2:17–19, ESV)

We need to guard our hearts from the fake freedom that is offered to us by worldly influences so that we can realize the true spiritual freedom we have as children of God. This is the very thing that Paul wanted for his readers; he wanted them to know the freedom they possessed in Christ as adopted sons in God’s household.

Faux Freedoms

If we are going to rightly understand the spiritual freedom that we have been granted through, adoption we need to recognize what the Bible has to say about our freedom. It is deceptively easy to import a cultural understanding of an issue into our theological understanding of that subject. Nowhere is this more evident than the subject of Christian freedom. There are some very common misconceptions about spiritual freedom that do not come from the Bible:

• Biblical freedom is not a Pelagian freedom: biblical freedom does not mean that you have the moral ability to choose salvation apart from the regenerating grace of God.

• Biblical freedom is not a political freedom: the Bible never promises that we will live in a free society, in fact, most believers throughout church history have not.

• Biblical freedom is not a psychological freedom: biblical freedom doesn’t mean you will never feel guilty or convicted about anything you have done.

• Biblical freedom is not a promiscuous freedom: biblical freedom is not a license to gratify whatever physical desire you have.

• Biblical freedom is not a privatized freedom: biblical freedom doesn’t mean you get to live as if your decisions don’t affect others, or apart from the influence of fellow believers.

• Biblical freedom is not a personal freedom - biblical freedom doesn’t mean you get to worship, think, and feel whatever you want.

Negatively, the Bible identifies a number of possible freedoms that, in reality, are not freedoms at all. Thankfully, however, the Bible is also quite clear about the genuine substance of our adoptive liberties.

True Freedoms

The freedom that we have through our adoption provides us with some very specific benefits to enjoy within the context of God’s household. Some of these benefits include the following:

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us to approach God as sons without fear of condemnation (Romans 8:1).

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us with the comfort of knowing that our position in God’s family is based on his grace not our works (Romans 8:26-30).

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us with a new opportunity grow in righteousness and experience the joy that comes through holiness. (1 Peter 2:16)

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us from the lies that Satan uses to control the world. (2 Corinthians 4:4)

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us from the power of death so that we are no longer enslaved by the fear of death. (Hebrews 2:14–15)

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us from self because in Christ we are freed from the bondage of selfish, self-focused lives. (Galatians 2:20)

• The freedom that we have through adoption liberates us from fear of man since in Christ we see the folly of living for the praise of men. (Proverbs 29:25)

The freedom that we possess through adoption is at the very heart of the Gospel, which makes Christian freedom far more significant than how we work out our own individual preferences.