True Independence

We are coming upon the holiday where our nation celebrates its freedom from those that would have wanted to have control.  Often times we determine that freedom is the freedom from anything or anyone controlling us.  But this is not the case.  In our nation's independence we did not overthrow the idea of being governed, but we changed it to be governed by self-appointed individuals.  Now many might like to replace those that govern us presently.  Freedom is often like that.  We are not truly free in the sense that we can do anything we want.  We cannot fly to the moon, gravity holds us down.  We cannot teleport to China, our molecules don't break apart like that.  When we hold on to the idea that we need to be free, we actually fail to realize how enslaved we really are.  We tend to do this when it comes to our relationship with God as well. 

We think that we are free apart from God because we don't want God to be in control.  However when we are thinking we are free, we are really enslaved to our own lusts, our own desires, and the sin that so easily entangles us.  In the illusion of freedom we serve a master whose only goal is our destruction.  John 8 talks about this.  In verse 34 Jesus reminds those listening that, ". . .everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin."  We think we are free apart from God but that could not be farther from the truth.  This is why earlier in the chapter he said we should know truth because truth leads to freedom.

When we know the truth about who is really enslaving us we have our path to freedom.  But not in the sense that we get total freedom, we simply replace our master with another.  The good news of teh gospel is that when God is our master He does not treat us as a slave, but as an adopted child.  We get the rights and privileges of being an heir.  And in this there is real freedom.  A freedom that we should readily surrender to the God who gave it because of all that He has done for us!