For Sunday, June 30 – Galatians 5:1, 13-25
“For freedom Christ has set us free.” This week will mark the 237th birthday of the United States. (Happy birthday, old friend!) Imagine with me, a country built on a dream of freedom for all. A vision of promise and hope and opportunity—but opportunity for what? To be a servant of the world, or its guardian? To amass personal fortunes or share out of our bounty? To welcome the ‘other’ or to barricade against them? What is the freedom for?
That might have been one of the questions Paul was addressing when he says, “Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love, become servants of one another.” It might be worth asking, on our 237th birthday, are we maturing toward that kind of freedom?
Of course, Paul is not talking about devotion to country. He is calling us beyond small identities—as separate nations, separate races and classes and genders and religions—into a new citizenship where we know ourselves as one across all boundaries. The fruit of this new community will be sweet to those who seek to humbly serve one another as Christ. The new community yields love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control—not the usual characteristics that most nations are seeking.
What if we were different? To be a world leader in the practice of freedom, does it not mean to bear a different kind of fruit in the world? “If you bite and devour one another,” Paul warns, “take care that you are not consumed by one another.” What will our story be? We get to decide. We can even yet grow into true freedom—beyond our small identities, individually, communally and nationally—the freedom to be servant leaders in the world.
