Something to Strive For

Galatians 5:1-15

Freedom is a tricky thing. Just because we are free to do something doesn’t mean we should. I think we’d all agree on that. I may be free to eat four cartons of ice cream at one sitting, but that would be stupid. I love ice cream, but I’m lactose intolerant so it would make me horribly ill. That’s a pretty limited illustration, but think about the first time you got to drive a car by yourself—no adults with you, just you. What a feeling of freedom! And yet, there were places you should not go, things you should not do, and there were always limits on how fast you were to drive and how the car was to be operated. The sense of freedom did not come with permission to be reckless or irresponsible. The tricky part about freedom, then, is learning how best to use it, and were to draw the line.

Paul was concerned about the members of the Galatians church abusing the freedom of the gospel. Just because they were no loner under the law did not mean they were no longer responsible for what they did. “For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters;” Paul writes, “only don’t use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another” (Galatians 5:13). If you want to use your freedom to its best advantage, Paul is saying, give it away. Concentrate on the needs of others, care for those in your community as though you were a slave in their household. Do this and you run less risk of going astray.

It was probably not what Paul’s readers wanted to hear. To have tasted some sort of freedom and then be asked to give it up—why would they do that? But the point is this: it was in freedom that Jesus Christ died for our sins that we might be saved from death and sin. As disciples of Jesus we must strive to live as he did, not looking out for ourselves, not taking advantage of others even if we have the freedom to do so, but by serving one another in true love and community. Come to think of it, that may not be what we want to hear Paul saying, either. But the truth is that in Jesus Christ we are free to be what God created us to be, which is a loving, compassionate, merciful people. And that is something to strive for.

Prayer: Lord, help us to live our lives, not wrapped up in our own needs, but devoted to the needs of others, so that together we might live in a community of love. Amen.