True Liberty—False Liberty

True Liberty—False Liberty. “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32.

From what shall we be made free?

1) From the darkness of lying and ignorance that we live in as natural human beings before we accept the truth.

Among other things, the truth is that not only Jesus shall be righteous, holy, and overcome all sin, but that we also, as His fellow brothers, shall partake of this life with Him by overcoming all sin, in spite of our lost state according to our nature.

2) Furthermore, we are set free from the power of sin, of the flesh, and of the world in the sense that they do not exercise control over us; but that we, in the power of the Holy Spirit, keep it crucified and say “No” to (sin) temptation.

This has the effect that we can do God’s work unhindered and free to the extent that we have light. This does not mean that we are freed from temptations as long as we are in this world; neither does it mean that we are free from subsequent battles and sufferings. But the battle results in victory, and victory results in more liberty, rest, joy, tranquility, and security.

We are not set free from indwelling sin to which Satan appeals when he tempts us, but we gain the victory over it and put it to death as we see it. Our faith is the victory that overcomes the world; the world is present, but we fight and overcome it.

This is the great difficulty; and it is why Jesus says in John 8:36: “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.” Yes, if He is able to do the following: if He can lead the soul into a consistent life of abasing himself, into a consistent humble acknowledgment of the stronger light that shines; if that person is increasingly willing to follow Jesus in His humiliation, to bear His reproach, not to draw back from sufferings, but meekly and without protestation go into what God has determined for us—we must be set free to be able to do all this. Can Jesus free us? Can He lead us so that we are consistently faithful to Him, to hungering and thirsting for more righteousness and all goodness? If He is able to do that, then we are free indeed. Otherwise it is just some kind of false liberty, of which there is much in these days.

People say, “Jesus is my righteousness; Jesus has done everything; we shall do nothing. We are not going to help Jesus with salvation, are we?”

This is what you hear, and it sounds nice and true to the person without understanding because they use the word: “Therefore, if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.” Thanks and praise! But from what have they really been set free? They are free from executing justice and righteousness; they have committed that to Jesus alone. They are free from being meek and longsuffering, patient, gentle, and good. They think it is haughtiness if you believe it is possible to overcome sin; they think it is taking the honor away from God. They neither believe nor do they know words like, “Therefore, to you who believe belongs the honor,” and, “By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit . . . .” They say, “Thanks and praise, it is so easy; we have no battles to fight, everything just goes by itself.” But where is the fruit, where is obedience and faithfulness to God?

People say that you should not look for these things; all you have to do is look unto Jesus, who has done everything. Of course the truth is that Jesus has done everything, so it is somewhat difficult to distinguish; but the fact is that He did everything so that we could do it after Him.

He did not do everything so that we can avoid doing good but rather that we would be able to do it.

On this point, most of God’s people are completely confused, stumbling around in false liberty, working incessantly to get as many as possible into that same false liberty. They seek comfort in the fact that they are numerous, and this reassures their conscience.

They don’t believe the Word when it says that the gate is strait and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it!

They use the Word and know it by heart, but do not believe that it will have an effect. They don’t believe the word that the Son is to make them free indeed; they even hate and condemn and excommunicate those who believe it. However, false liberty pleases people’s flesh; that is why it is dangerously easy for all impressionable souls to be deceived by the enjoyment of fleshly lusts, especially since believers generally do not distinguish between flesh and spirit.

The fruit of false liberty is all kinds of sin and defeat, and many fall completely away from God.

The fruit of true liberty is love. If someone does evil to you, you can do good in return. If something goes against your grain, you can still be glad. If everything around you is in an uproar, you can have a blessed peace in your heart, etc., together with longsuffering, goodness, patience, faithfulness, meekness, temperance, and godliness with contentment, besides a victory celebration, with your enemies scattered on the ground around you.