A Tale of Two Freedoms (Part 2)
Americans love our freedom. We demand our freedom; we claim we’ll die for our freedom. We insist that our freedom stands as the bedrock of everything our nation represents, and will go to sometimes terrible extremes to defend our right to do what we choose.
But what do we mean by “freedom”?
Fittingly, much time and effort seems to have been spent discussing this very question, as a quick search reveals a slew of articles wrestling with what Americans mean when we invoke, celebrate, and demand our freedom. Each discussion on the term focuses on different aspects of America’s understanding of freedom. As I’m writing this on a Sunday, some might say they use their freedom as they express themselves in worship. I use our nation’s definition of freedom to write this very blog. Some Americans believed they were exercising their freedom on one of our nation’s darker days: January 6th, 2021.
Whatever the particular expression, Americans agree on one aspect of our country’s definition of freedom: its individuality. The United States was founded on the principle that individuals could do what they deemed best for themselves. I want to acknowledge this for what it was: a profound statement of trust in the American people. The founders—despite a lack of historical examples suggesting this would work—chose to trust Americans with the ability to make decisions for themselves. Our young nation was so committed to these individual liberties that several of the original states refused to ratify the U.S. Constitution until it included protections for our personal freedoms. For almost three centuries, the United States has claimed to defend the individual liberties of its citizens, even at times going around the globe to protect the freedoms of others. If there’s one word the globe would consistently associate with the United States, it’s freedom. Individual, personal freedom.
But what do we do with that freedom?
The short answer is something of a mixed bag. A cursory look at most online communities shows we are often not using that freedom for good. The fact that nearly a dozen organizations had to form just in early 2017 to combat pervasive online hate speech does not speak highly for how Americans use our individual liberty. At the same time, my life includes multitudes of people making choices to bless and care for others. While hardly a scorching hot take, I think the United States has just as many examples of people using their freedom for good as for evil, and so many more living somewhere in the middle.
The trouble, though, is that the people of God cannot be satisfied with living out a mixed-bag lifestyle. 1 John 2:6 sets a clear, blunt standard for this: Anyone who claims to live for God must “live as Jesus did.” No equivocating, no half measures–the people of God are supposed to live like Jesus. God’s infinite grace is there when we fail to meet this standard, but the standard itself doesn’t change.
If that is the standard by which the people of God are to live, then frankly I think Christians should find America’s definition of freedom unacceptable. American liberty will never expect us to be holy; it will never press us to actually live like Jesus. America can only evaluate us on whether or not we are living out our individual liberty, whether each of us is acting in the manner we deem best for ourselves.
As with most of what I will post, I hope this doesn’t come across as particularly shocking. After all, Scripture has a pretty clear idea on what to call it when people do whatever they want, whenever they want: sin. When left to our own devices for long enough, Scripture shows that humans often find themselves fulfilling the words of Genesis 6:5, which describe when “every inclination of the human heart was only evil all the time.” The time of the Judges makes this even clearer. One of the most brutal, violent, self-destructive periods of Israel’s history comes at a time when Judges 21:25 tells us that “everyone did as they saw fit.” In other words, everyone exercised their individual liberty. My years of teaching history bear out this pattern to be true: let humans do what they want, how they want, for a long enough time, and you end up with some degree of pain.
Thankfully, Jesus followers are not stuck devoting ourselves to an ultimately fruitless, often sinful definition of freedom. God’s definition of freedom stands in stark contrast to that of the United States. America can only call us to do whatever we consider best. As we’ll see in my next post, God’s people have the opportunity to embrace a biblical concept of freedom that can take us so far beyond our personal standard of right and wrong. If we are truly willing to follow Jesus, we’ll never be free as America understands it, but we will be eternally liberated in ways we can’t fully comprehend this side of the Kingdom of God. God’s idea of freedom is so very different—and so much better—than anything dreamed up by the founders of our nation.