On Christian Freedom
- Pastor Jared
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
August is approaching and thus this will be my last blog until September. [I know there is one more Friday in July, but cut me a bit of slack please]
I've been spending a lot of time in old books lately. I find that books by dead guys often give me more to chew on both theologically and practically than anything by undead guys. But I digress.
Today I want to share some thoughts on Christian freedom from one of the dead guys
I've been reading. In order to hear his wisdom properly we need to understand two typical approaches to Christian freedom that need to be rejected.
Legalism – the building of a neat religious box of regulations without biblical justification and the enforcing of others to fit inside the same box. It is performance based religion, ‘I perform such and such and God loves and accepts me because of it.’
Antinomianism – literally means ‘against law’; it is the rejection of legalism with the accompanying attitude that the Christian is free to do whatever he/she wants. It is pleasure based religion, ‘I pursue whatever pleases me and God still accepts me.’ Or to put it another way it is Christian freedom based on the axiom, 'God loves to forgive, I love to sin, what a great relationship!'
So how do we navigate between these two unbiblical extremes? I’m going to allow the esteemed Princeton theologian of the 1800's A.A. Hodge to direct us toward the necessary wisdom:
God alone is Lord of the human, conscience, which is responsible only to his authority.
God has authoritatively addressed the human conscience only in his law, the only perfect revelation of which in this world is the inspired Scriptures. Hence God himself has set the human conscience free from all obligation to believe or obey any such doctrines or commandments of men as are either contrary to or aside from the teachings of that Word.
Hence to believe such doctrines, or to obey such commandments as a matter of conscience, is to be guilty of the sin of betraying the liberty of conscience and its loyalty to its only Lord; and to require such an obedience of others is to be guilty of the sin of usurping the prerogative of God and attempting to destroy the most precious liberties of men.
This Christian liberty is not, however, absolute. It has its distinct end and limits. Its end, is that every person, without hindrance of his fellow-men, should have opportunity to serve God according to his will. The limits of this liberty are of two kinds: (a.) The authority of God, the Lord of conscience. (b.) The equal liberties and rights of our fellow-men. . .
He goes on to write the following (this is somewhat paraphrased for our time, but it accurately reflects his thought):
God has given only one, and that a perfect, rule of faith and practice in spiritual matters in the inspired Scriptures, and that he has hence set free the human conscience from all obligation to believe or obey any such doctrines or commandments of men as are contrary to or aside from the teachings of that Word.
. . . Scripture is at once a complete and perspicuous rule of faith and practice, and the supreme judge of all controversies. It hence follows self-evidently – (1) That nothing contrary to Scripture can be true; (2) That nothing in addition to what is revealed or commanded in Scripture can be binding upon the conscience; and (3) That, since the Scriptures are perspicuous, every believer is personally responsible for interpreting Scripture and judging of all human doctrines and commandments by Scripture for
himself.
This means that:
Against the legalist – it is a great sin, involving at the same time sacrilege, and treason to the human race, for any man or set of men to arrogate the prerogative of God and to attempt to bind the consciences of their fellow-men by any obligation not certainly imposed by God and revealed in his Word. At the same time it is a sin of disloyalty to God, and a violation of our own nature as moral and rational beings, to yield to any such imposition, and to accept as a matter truly binding the conscience anything not authoritatively taught and imposed in the Scriptures.
Against the antinomian – Christian liberty is not an absolute liberty to do as we choose, but a regulated liberty to obey God without hindrance from man. It is a freedom from usurped authority, in order that we may be the more perfectly subject to the only legitimate authority. It is hence absurd, as well as wicked, for a man to make his Christian liberty to obey only God a plea to disobey God, as he does whenever he violates any of the principles of natural right or of revealed truth which express at once the unchangeable nature and the all-perfect will of God. There can be no liberty which sets a man independent of that will; and this is always the will of God concerning us, even our sanctification.
Christian liberty is also further limited by the mutual duties we owe one another. The eating of meat offered to idols is in itself a thing indifferent, because not either
commanded or forbidden. The Christian, therefore, is at liberty either to eat or not to eat. But Paul commands the Corinthians to “take heed lest by any means this liberty of theirs become a stumbling block to them that are weak.” (1 Corinthians 8:9; cf. Romans 14). To allow this would be a sin. The Christian, therefore, may be at liberty to eat or not to eat, but he is not at all at liberty so to use his liberty that his fellow-man is injured thereby. The liberty ceases to be liberty, and becomes licentiousness, when it transcends the law of God or infringes upon the rights of our fellows.
Let me try to explain what Hodge is saying in somewhat practical terms.
There is much in our world which falls into areas of grey. There are many things in our world which Scripture does not directly address. Thus, we must apply biblical theology and wisdom in order to decide whether or not we should participate in the activity or not. Our music and movie choices would be a clear example.
Christians must make their decisions regarding what to watch or listen to because of the witness of Scripture, on biblical and theological grounds, and not on the basis of “self-made religion” (Colossians 2:23), or man-made rules that we think will determine our level of sanctification and acceptance before God (cf Colossians 2:20-23). This is the basic principle of Christian freedom.
So, on the one hand, if you reject a movie or song simply because you think it makes you a better Christian, or because ‘Christians don’t participate in that kind of filth’ you are in danger of becoming a legalist.* [In my younger days, heavy metal music was seen this way. Christians do not listen to hard rock. It's the devils tool. End of discussion. For the record, I ignored such drivel.]
On the other hand, if you suggest that the Christian is free in Christ and can watch or listen to whatever he wants no matter what it is you are an antinomian.
On the other, other hand, if your decision about what you watch or listen to is based on solid exegesis of Scripture, consistent biblical theology that has arisen from good and necessary consequence from Scripture, and you have applied appropriate biblical wisdom, AND you allow others to decide for themselves on these things, AND you do not lead others to participate in these activities against their consciences, THEN you are embracing Christian freedom (cf Romans 14; 1 Corinthians 8; Colossians 2:6-23; Galatians 3, 5).
This kind of Christian freedom extricates us from legalism, protects us from antinomianism, and instead embraces the authority of God in his Word and the gospel of Christ.
I think it is safe to say, along with Calvin, that “if the subject [of Christian freedom] be not understood, neither Christ, nor the truth of the Gospel, nor the inward peace of the soul is properly known.” I hope this short blog has helped your understanding a little bit.
*Scripture presents some ways of speaking, activities, attitudes, dispositions etc, as things that we need to avoid, but sometimes the application of these principles can get a bit fuzzy. [For example, what constitutes bad language] Further, there are a host of things that we must deal with, such as the aforementioned entertainment choices, which are not spoken about directly in Scripture for which we need to use our biblical wisdom. It is these kinds of things that I am referring to when I speak of ‘grey areas.’ When I used the term ‘grey areas’ above I did not mean to suggest that Christians need to embrace an attitude of toleration toward other believers if toleration means, “the conditional acceptance of or non-interference with beliefs, actions or practices that one considers to be wrong but still “tolerable,” such that they should not be prohibited or constrained.” (Standard Encyclopedia of Philosophy) As Christians living within the community of the church we need to constantly challenge each other in our understanding of Scripture and in our application of Scripture to these ‘grey areas’ without embracing either legalism or antinomianism. But this is a blog for another day.
Soli Deo Gloria