What is True Freedom/Liberty?
by Tara Lang Chapman
June 2009, Roman calendar
Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. ~2 Cor. 3:17b
(Note: "Freedom" and "liberty" will often be used interchangeably. Also, I reiterate the only way to have true freedom very heavily throughout the article, so be prepared.)
This is a very important question, especially for those who are citizens of the United States, since we pride ourselves on having a nation of liberty and being "land of the free." Most unfortunately, nearly every person on the planet Earth, including most U.S. residents, don't know what TRUE freedom/liberty is. In order to understand how the people on this planet can all have true freedom, a person must understand how the Earth's Creator designed things to work.
To help you understand this, let's imagine a fellow--Jack--designed and built a model toy village for children--"Jack's World." He doesn't just have it go on a toy shelf in a store without any instructions and other vital information. No, Jack includes an instruction manual to explain what things are, who the people are, and how to properly care for the people, animals, plants, land, etc. Depending on what materials the people and other things are made of, such as wood, metal, etc.--the rules and number of rules for care will vary. The way the people, animals, and other things, including the model of the "world" itself operate will also determine rules of care.
Jack will also include a warranty so that an item(s) can be repaired or replaced, but the warranty will be conditional. If there's evidence of deliberate abuse or neglect, nothing will be done. If Jack made a mistake--there turns out to be a flaw with anything he made--he will repair or replace the item at no charge, or if something didn't hold up during an accidental misuse, Jack will repair or replace an item. If it continually happens to the same individual and not to a significant number of other purchasers, the repairs and replacements will cease, because it will become obvious that individual is careless.
On the other hand, an individual who strictly follows the manual will thoroughly enjoy "Jack's World" and have total freedom enjoying it as it was meant to be, without having to worry about premature harm or aging to "Jack's World" or anything in it. It will be as perfect as a man-made toy world can be, and the owner will be happy; the people and animals in "Jack's World" will also be happy (with a little imagination, of course).
Several nights ago, my beloved husband and I were talking, and I was describing how the world would be if everyone had true freedom. As I paused, he said, "What you're describing isn't freedom, but perfection. You are describing a perfect world."
But, you see, TRUE freedom would be what people would have in a perfect world. True liberty is based on truth: Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is the truth (Psalm 119:142, bold added). True freedom is based on the law of liberty: But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed (James 1:25, bold emphasis added).
Now, it's true that if a person hated God's perfect Law, then it wouldn't be his or her definition of freedom, but this kind of person is selfish and twisted. If a person desires to be "free" to commit adultery, robbery, rape, fornication, child molestation, sodomy, burglary, murder, shoplifting, kidnapping, fetal homicide (abortion), bombing, vandalism, destruction, arson, drunkenness and abuse of other intoxicating substances, gluttony, rioting, fighting, fraud, generalized mischief, talebearing, prostitution, idolatry, witchcraft, unclean sacrifices, unclean dieting, sex with a menstruous woman, lying, cheating, oppressing the poor, and other various abominations; then that person violates others' freedom/liberty. That person does not love God, nor his neighbors, does not respect God's property, nor his neighbors' properties (that with which God blessed them). And quite truthfully, though that kind of person may disagree, he (or she) doesn't really love himself, either.
Now most agree that in a perfect world, everyone would love each other and would get along and respect others' properties. So, the kind of person who misdefines liberty would never belong in a perfect world. In order to have a perfect world, true liberty would need to be established. True liberty can only come based on how and why the Creator of this world made this world. The main guidelines for people is God's Law--the Law of Liberty. When God led Israel out of Egypt, out of bondage, He set them FREE so that they could worship Him and live lives of BLESSINGS: life, liberty, good health, wisdom, prosperity, and harmony (see Deut. 4:40; 6:18, 24; chap. 28). True freedom is freedom FROM sin, not freedom TO sin. For EVERYBODY to have freedom and happiness, people must serve the Law of God, rather than serve sin (transgression of the law):
Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness (Romans 6:16, 20).
Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. (John 8:31-36)
Sin is the transgression of God's Law:
Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law (I John 3:4).
The Loving Creator created a man and woman to be joined together as husband and wife and share a close loving relationship. When a man goes to bed with another man's wife, feelings of hurt, betrayal, and stolen possession enter into the husband's mind. Also, sexually-transmitted disease can occur or unwanted pregnancy, as well as feelings of low self-worth. When a person transgresses God's commandment concerning adultery, are they truly enjoying liberty? Is that what people really like to call it? What about that husband's liberty? What about one's liberty when he or she is suffering from an STD?
The Loving Creator made some plants and animals compatible for eating so that they'd nourish us. Other plants and animals are harmful or potentially harmful for us to consume. Many such plants and animals feast on dead plants and animals or eat garbage off the land or filter garbage out of the waters. Do we really feel as if we're asserting liberty when we eat such unclean foods? Does it make us joyful and free to eat pork, lobster, crabs, and squirrels? Is it really so great to eat scavenging animals and rodents, taking their toxic meat into our bodies? Is it liberating to eat mushrooms and algae and seaweed? Should we pride ourselves on eating decomposers and water filters? Should we also pride ourselves for trashing out the earth and waters, and then making matters worse by removing the scavenging animals that would normally clean up the trash and pollution, so that we ourselves can eat them? That is disgusting! What an abomination!
The Loving Creator designed baby humans to develop and grow in a woman's womb (symbolic of a seed growing within the earth). The woman nourishes the baby and can enjoy feeling her baby move around within. Is it liberating for a woman to hire a medically licensed murderer to dilate her cervix and vacuum the baby out to its death; or take tools to manually rip the arms, legs, and head from the body so that the body parts can all be pulled out of her vagina; or even later in pregnancy to deliver the baby footling breech (legs first), until the head is at the cervix and then stab scissors in the baby's skull and vacuum the brain out? IS THIS LIBERATING?! Can THIS kind of thing exist in a perfect world? This is HEATHEN!
Homosexuality can lead to disease in both sexes. In males, it often leads to anal injuries, such as rectal tears and fecal incontinence. Stealing violates another's property rights. Rape and other unwanted, forced sexual sins can lead to deep emotional scars and even physical damage. Kidnapping/manstealing is a hurtful offense to both the captive and to those who lost the captive. Eating unfit ("unclean") things can lead to poor or bad physical health and even serious mental health problems. Gambling addiction, food addiction, drug addiction (including alcohol), etc. can cause numerous problems for the addict and his or her family members and friends. Overworking and neglecting to keep the sabbath holy to honor God can lead to serious fatigue and other physical health problems, mental health problems, and a continual straying further from God. Murder takes the life and liberty away from another individual and leads to pain in those who loved the victim.
Do adultery, eating disgusting plants and meat, and murdering unborn and half-born children fit in with a perfect world? Do any of the other aforementioned things fit in with a perfect world? Do you SEE NOW why God's Law is called the Law of Liberty and why it is GOOD for us and why it MUST be followed in order to have a perfect world?
And the ETERNAL commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the ETERNAL our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as it is at this day. ~Deuteronomy 6:4
Thou shalt keep therefore his statutes, and his commandments, which I command thee this day, that it may go well with thee, and with thy children after thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days upon the earth, which the ETERNAL thy God giveth thee, for ever. ~Deut. 4:40
And now, Israel, what doth the ETERNAL thy God require of thee, but to fear the ETERNAL thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the ETERNAL thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, To keep the commandments of the ETERNAL, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good? ~Deut. 10:12-13
Once again, as I cannot state it strongly or often enough, the only way everyone can have perfect and true freedom and peace is for everyone to live accordingly with the Law that was set in motion for this world! The Lawgiver of this world (and all worlds) is the Most High God, the Eternal One Who created the heavens and the earth. In order to have a perfect world where everyone has liberty, we must all follow His Law. That's the only way it will work. If Jimmy Joe likes fornication and drunkenness in the world, then ol' Jimmy Joe is simply not cut out for a perfect world. A perfect world is God's desire. Jimmy Joe can't create his own world. Men have made (not created) lots of awesome things, but I've yet to see any man create or make a world, much less one like the earth.
All the aforementioned examples and more cannot exist in a world where everyone has true freedom. A perfect world is the only world where everyone therein is truly free. Liberty doesn't mean males may have anal sex with each other or that women may hire a medically-licensed hit man to barbarically murder her unborn child. Freedom doesn't mean people may get drunk on alcohol or overindulge in other psychoactive drugs (caffeine, cannabis, etc.). Liberty doesn't mean someone can eat whatever he sees, nor eat with no consumption limits. Freedom doesn't mean a person may step onto his neighbor's property to take something he wants for himself. These things are NOT liberties. These things do NOT fall under "freedom of choice" in a perfect world. Since this world in which we now live is imperfect, every individual DOES have the "freedom of choice," but making choices such as the aforementioned ones will NOT qualify a person to enter into a perfect world.
If these kinds of things are YOUR idea of freedom and liberty, then you are making your choice, namely that YOU do not want any part in a perfect world. This is because the Most High God who dwells in the heavens is the Creator of all, and He has defined perfection. He has set the Law for this planet, including everything from the command of gravity, the commands of jet stream and ocean currents, the commands of earthly axis rotation and revolution around the sun, to the Ten Commandments (and their statutes) for mankind. WHO are any of WE to say what is right and what is freedom? If it doesn't line up with the Truth (the set Law), then it's obviously not right! So, for those who are foolish and wicked, totally disagreeing with the Most Wise One, His Most Excellent Majesty will have to give them eternal death (meaning their bodies and spirits will be destroyed and never able to be resurrected again). He doesn't want that for any person (2 Peter 3:9), but there are some who love and choose death and destruction, rather than life and true freedom. A father/parent can't make a child love and obey his rules. He wants the child to, but if the child is stubborn and chooses death and destruction, the father must eventually give the child over to death and destruction.
If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them: Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place; And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you (Deut. 21:18-21a).
At first, this judicial statute may sound awful, but it's righteous. First of all, no good and loving parent would ever, ever want to have a child who turned out in such a terrible way as he reached adolescence and adulthood. Sadly, though, there have been and are parents in the world who properly reared their children and gave them love and good instruction, and yet the children turned out to be foolish and wicked. What grief and sorrow such children bring to their parents! But, most people have indeed heard of least one story about a wicked man who had good parents and nevertheless committed terrible offenses, such as murder and did not have any remorse. The parents have even turned in such children before. (Children have also turned in wicked parents.) Now, when a person is evil and unrepentant, the person's parent(s) will naturally be deeply grieved, very sorrowful, full of weeping and sadness, but even so will want the child to be put to death because of the evil he has done to others and will continue to do if not killed. I love my children very much, but I hate evil. I would be DEEPLY grieved if I had a child turn out to be a glutton and drunkard, a murderer, a rapist, or any other wicked person; but I would want the evil to be dealt with. If my child grew up and did great evil to himself and others, I'd want him to be put to death. I have a mind of love but also of justice. That grown child of mine would be part of the problem in this wicked society.
God desires for all persons to love His perfect ways and to obey so that they can become His children and inherit all that He has planned for them, but He can't and won't force any person to go against his or her will. He wants HIS will to be done, but He has given us all free wills (just as we will for our children to do the right things that are good for them but cannot force them to do so against their wills). God is full of love, fairness, and justice. Wicked-doers don't have a place in perfection, so God must put them to death. It's no different than with us and our children. If I had ten children, and one of the children was wicked and did much evil toward my other children and even started murdering them, I'd want that wicked child killed to put an end to the wickedness. Although I would desire that child to be good, too, I would never sacrifice my children who love me and desire to obey and do good to others to save an unrepentant wicked child alive. And God will not do so, either. He did give His Son, the Righteous Jesus Christ to be sacrificed for our sins (Jesus willingly agreed), but Christ's sacrifice does NOT cover unrepentant wicked doers. REPENTANCE is a requirement to be set FREE, to be given LIBERTY. Remember the example I gave--Jack's World--and how the warranty was conditional. Freedom from the death penalty that sin deserves is also conditional. Jesus' sacrifice is there for those who REPENT. God gives us what we will, what we choose, for ourselves. Those who choose LIFE and LIBERTY serve His perfect Law and will be given eternal life and an inheritance in a perfect spirit world and in the entire empire of the Most High. Those who choose DEATH and DESTRUCTION will be given eternal death and destruction. Since they did not choose life and liberty, they shall never again see life and liberty. They'll simply be GONE, dead for eternity, their molecular structure of body and spirit completely destroyed.
Back to the United States: Our nation proudly proclaims to be a nation of freedom, the "land of liberty, home of the brave, a nation under God." The truth is we neither have liberty nor bravery. We don't have liberty, because we are not truly following the God we claim to follow. We do not follow His Law. We've rather ADDED and TAKEN AWAY from His holy Law of liberty (see Deut. 12:32). Our nation's wicked government has placed great BURDENS upon us (similar to how ancient Israel did). Our government is also very UNJUST, condemning the innocent (by God's Law) and not condemning the wicked (by God's Law), both of which are an abomination to the Eternal One, my Father in heaven (Prov. 17:15). Our nation's majority is not made up of brave souls. Bravery means "courageous behavior." The word courage has its origins from the Latin word cor, meaning "heart." What is in the hearts of our people? We have a people who fear man rather than God. We have a people who do not have the courage to stand up for what is right.
The Liberty Bell in the United States has part of a bible verse etched into it, Leviticus 25:10. The whole verse states:
And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.
As wonderful as that sounds, our nation does not truly uphold God's Law, and it throws more and more of it out the window as time goes on. It would be nice to live in a land of TRUE liberty, where we had such things as a jubilee every fiftieth year. Instead, this is a time of WEEPING, for we are on the brink of destruction. This is a time to look over what's left of the beautiful land God has graciously given us in this nation and start WEEPING in great mourning over what we're doing to our land, our plants, our animals, OURSELVES. We are sick and becoming very sick. We are allowing more and more abominations to go unpunished, and we're condemning the just. And this "nation under God," "land of liberty" now has a half-gentile president who has recently claimed to the world that the United States is NOT a Christian nation but rather a mixed nation of Christians, Muslims, and other faiths. His public boasting of this basically tells everyone we're a nation full of heathen faiths and fornicating faiths. Woe to our blind leaders who are leading the sheep to the slaughter! And woe to our nation full of sin!
Repent America! Your day of reckoning is on the horizon. Wake up and realize you are NOT FREE. This people is servant to sin--bondage! And the only one who can free you is the Lord Jesus Christ, but you must REPENT and believe the gospel! There is NO other law, no other government that has EVER made the entire world a perfect place in which to live where every person and every other creature has peace and harmony, good health and prosperity, love and joy. For those of you who yearn for a one world government to bring peace, heed this!
ONLY the government of God, the Law of God can bring the world into a state of PEACE. World peace and liberty will not be achieved until the Kingdom of God is established with the new-coming government officials--the King of kings Jesus Christ and all the sons of God in the first resurrection, the saints. And an absolute perfect world will only come AFTER the plan of salvation is completed, when our Father God comes down with the NEW SPIRITUAL EARTH.
Come quickly, Lord Jesus!