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In Lesson Thirty-six we saw the freedom which we receive when we are redeemed. In this lesson we will continue to see the freedom which we enjoy when we are made a new creation. To be freed is to be released. When we are regenerated, receive the Holy Spirit and God’s eternal life, and are renewed and transferred, we are freed, released, from all bondage of sin, law, self, Satan, and the world.
No matter how well-educated a person is, how high his position, and how good his conduct, as long as he is a person of the world, he is a person under bondage. Not only is he serving under sin as a slave and as a captive (John 8:34; Rom. 6:17; 7:14), but he is also being held under law (Rom. 7:6). Furthermore, in his self he is entangled with the flesh (Rom. 7:24) and bound by the old man, and he is even under the hand of Satan (1 John 5:19; Acts 26:18), caught (2 Tim. 2:26), bound (Luke 13:16), and oppressed by him (Acts 10:38). Lastly, he is under the bondage of the world’s temptations (1 John 2:15-16), course (Eph. 2:2), and current (Rom. 12:2). Hence, man needs deliverance that he may be freed, released, from all kinds of bondage.
Now we will see the various aspects of the freedom that the believers enjoy after they have received God’s salvation.
The first kind of bondage to man is sin. Man under sin is just like a slave; he is dominated and manipulated by sin and has no freedom whatsoever.
Matthew 1:21 says, “He [Jesus] shall save His people from their sins.” We were sinking in sins and could not rescue ourselves, even if we tried. However, through incarnation the Lord Jesus came into the world to be our Savior (John 1:14). He was God incarnated as a man, that in His human body, through the redemption of His death and the power of His resurrection, He might deliver us from sins that we might become transcendent and free.
Once we are saved, we are delivered from the power of sin and we enjoy real freedom. Although people today greatly promote freedom and all like to enjoy freedom, they are under sin’s domination and are without freedom. They indulge in the enjoyment of sin as if they are following after their heart’s desires. But in fact, they are going contrary to their own wish and acting against their own conscience. Serving sin as slaves, as captives (John 8:34), they have no real freedom. It is not until they receive the Lord Jesus as their Savior that they are really free. This is because the Lord Jesus as the Son of God has the life of God in Him. When man receives Him as the Savior, the life of God which is in Him enters into man as the power of life that enables man to resist the enslaving sin and thus be freed from its power and enjoy the real freedom (John 8:36).
Furthermore, John 8:32 says that “the truth shall make you free” (ASV). The truth is Christ Himself as the reality of the divine things (John 14:6). Since Christ is the embodiment of God (Col. 2:9), He is the reality of what God is. When Christ comes into us as life, He shines within us as light (John 1:4; 8:12), which brings the divine element as reality into us. This reality, which is the divine element imparted into us and realized by us, sets us free from the slavery of sin by the divine life as the light of men.
When we are delivered from the power of sin, we no longer serve sin as slaves. Romans 6:6 says that “our old man has been crucified with Him...that we should no longer serve sin as slaves.” Since our sinning old man has been crucified and has died with the Lord Jesus, we are spontaneously freed from sin and no longer serve sin as slaves (Rom. 6:6-7). We escape the penalty of sin through the Lord’s vicarious death on the cross; we are freed from the domination of sin through our co-death with the Lord on the cross. Hence, the Lord’s cross has delivered us and set us free from these two aspects of sin.
When we are delivered and set free from the power of sin, we are also set free from sin. Romans 6:14 says, “For sin shall not lord it over you, for you are not under law but under grace.” Sin lords it over man through the law, for without law sin is dead, but when the law comes, sin revives (Rom. 7:8-9). Before we were saved, the more we tried to keep the law by ourselves, the more we sensed that sin was lording it over us, making it impossible for us to be freed from its power. After we are saved, the Lord’s salvation causes us to have the divine life, to be joined to the Lord, and to be crucified with Him. Therefore, we no longer keep the law of God by ourselves, but we enjoy the grace of God by the divine life. Thus, we no longer live under law but under grace, and sin can no longer lord it over us. Hence, we are delivered from the power of sin—we are freed from sin (Rom. 6:14, 18, 22).
One reason that God gave the law was to guard His chosen people until Christ came (Gal. 3:23). When the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, come of a woman, come under law, that He might redeem those under law, that they might receive the sonship and become the sons of God (Gal. 4:4-5). Therefore, Christ’s redemption has redeemed us not only out of the curse of the law (Gal. 3:13) but also out of the custody of the law, bringing us into the divine sonship to enjoy the divine life and obtain the real freedom.
We were also under the domination and bondage of the law (Rom. 7:1-2). However, Christ has brought us with Him into His death on the cross that we might die to the law. Hence, we are discharged from the law and are not required to answer to the law any longer. This is because the law lords it over a man only while he lives, but when he dies he is freed from the domination of the law. Furthermore, Christ has also brought us with Him into His resurrection that we may receive His life and enjoy God’s grace forever. Hence, we are not under law but under grace (Rom. 6:14); that is, we are not being controlled under law, but we are enjoying freedom under grace.
Christ has set us free from the bondage of law, that is, from the yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:1 says, “For freedom Christ has set us free;...do not be again entangled with a yoke of slavery.” Freedom here denotes freedom from the slavery of law. We were under law, entangled with a yoke of slavery, the bondage of law. Through His redeeming death and life-imparting resurrection, Christ has set us free, delivering us from the enslaving yoke of the law that we may enjoy freedom.
Since we have been set free from the enslaving yoke of the law, we are no longer slaves but sons (Gal. 4:7). As slaves under law, we were without freedom. But when we receive Jesus, the Son of God, as our Savior, the Spirit of God’s Son comes into us to impart the divine life to us and make us the sons of God. Hence, we are no longer under law as slaves to ordinances, bound by letters; we are under grace as sons in life, enjoying freedom in life. This freedom includes liberation from obligation, that is, liberation from the obligation of the law and its ordinances, practices, and regulations; satisfaction because of an adequate supply and support; true rest; and the enjoyment of Christ, the enjoyment of all that He is. Since we have such a freedom, we are no longer under any kind of enslavement, much less under the domination of law.
God’s salvation sets us free not only from the law and its bondage but also from the labor and burden of the law. In Matthew 11:28 the Lord Jesus says, “Come to Me all who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.” This promise was spoken especially to those who were trying to keep the law. The labor here refers in particular to the labor of striving to keep the commandments of the law and religious regulations, and it also refers to the labor of carrying out any work and responsibility. Whoever labors thus is always heavily burdened. The Lord is calling this kind of people to come to Him for rest, that is, to enjoy rest by being set free from labor and burden under the law and religion or under any work and responsibility.
The flesh is the corrupted human body. When God created man, man had only the physical body, not the flesh. At that time, neither sin nor lust was in the human body; it was simply a created body. However, when Satan tempted man to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Satan and his sinful life, which were signified by the fruit, entered into the human body, causing the human body to be transmuted and corrupted and thus to become the flesh. In the Bible this flesh is called “the body of sin” (Rom. 6:6) and “the body of this death” (Rom. 7:24). Although such a fallen flesh is utterly powerless in doing good, it is exceedingly active in committing sin. Hence, the flesh is a great bondage and entanglement to man, and it is something which man cannot rid himself of. After we have believed in Christ, we are transferred into Christ. In Him we are circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ (Col. 2:11). The circumcision of Christ refers to the proper baptism, which puts off the body of the flesh by the effectual virtue of the death of Christ, thus terminating our flesh. Hence, we are no longer in the entanglement of the flesh; rather, we have been freed from the flesh.
The fallen man has not only the problem of the flesh but also the problem of the old man. In fact, the two—the flesh and the old man—are one. In the old creation we are the old man. When the old man is lived out and expressed, it is the flesh. Therefore, both the old man and the flesh refer to our very being. As to the objective fact, we are the old man; as to the subjective experience, we are the flesh. The flesh is the living out and the expression of the old man; that is, the flesh is our experience of the old man. When we are baptized, we put off not only the flesh but also the old man (Col. 3:9). Our old man was crucified with Christ (Rom. 6:6) and was buried in baptism (Rom. 6:4a). We experience this putting off by the life of Christ, who has passed through death and resurrection. Hence, we are no longer entangled with the flesh nor encumbered with the old man.
People in the world today have been captured by the devil and have fallen into his snare (2 Tim. 2:26). They have lost their freedom and they have no way to rescue themselves. Satan utilizes many things, such as sin, money, and pleasure, to deceive and capture man. Moreover, he uses sickness and affliction to bind man (Luke 13:16) and to oppress man (Acts 10:38), thus depriving man of his freedom. However, the Lord Jesus came to set the captives free and to release those who are oppressed. Christ destroyed Satan through His death in the flesh on the cross (Heb. 2:14), thus setting us free, releasing us, from Satan’s hand.
Christ has set us free not only from Satan’s oppression but also from his authority of darkness (Col. 1:13; Acts 26:18). Satan’s authority of darkness is his kingdom. People are controlled and held by Satan in his kingdom. When we were sinners, we were held in Satan’s kingdom of darkness, controlled and cruelly treated under his authority. However, since we have received God’s salvation, we have been delivered out of Satan’s kingdom of darkness, Satan’s authority, by Christ through His death in the flesh and His resurrection life, and we also have been transferred into the kingdom of His own light (Col. 1:13; Acts 26:18), that we may enjoy freedom in the light.
Because man is born into the world, which is degraded and which renounces and even resists God, man is trapped in its snare and dominion. Man simply cannot free himself from the usurpation and enslavement of the world’s temptations, such as the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the vainglory of the present life (1 John 2:15-16). Neither can he free himself from the world’s course (Eph. 2:2) and from the world’s fashion, the world’s current (Rom. 12:2). When we are joined to the Lord organically by our believing and being baptized, through our co-death and co-resurrection with Him we are set free from the world’s power, or we may say from its charm, and are brought into a new realm to live the life of the new man in God’s new creation.
Galatians 1:4 says that Christ “gave Himself for our sins, that He might rescue us out of the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.” An age is a part of the world as the satanic system. The present evil age, according to the context of Galatians, refers to the religious world, the Jewish religion, because in 6:14-15 Paul pointed out that the circumcision practiced by the Jewish religion was a part of the world. Therefore, the purpose of Christ’s giving Himself for our sins was to rescue us out of the evil age, the religious world which is a part of the satanic system, and to thus set us free.
Colossians 2:20 says, “If you died with Christ from the elements of the world....” The elements of the world refer to the religions, ordinances, and philosophies (Col. 2:8, 21-23) of the world. Actually, all the religions, ordinances, and philosophies of the world are inventions of man’s wisdom and cleverness through Satan’s initiation that man may be bound. Since we have been joined to Christ by believing into Him, through our co-death with Him we have been rescued from the world. Hence, we have also been rescued from the bondage of the worldly religions, ordinances, and philosophies that we may enjoy the freedom of the salvation in His life.
First Peter 1:18-19 says that “you were redeemed...from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers... with precious blood...of Christ.” The vain manner of life of people today was handed down from their fathers, generation after generation, and it is difficult for them to be freed from it. However, Christ accomplished redemption on the cross, shedding His precious blood to redeem us back to God. Hence, we have been delivered from the vain manner of life handed down through the generations, that we may be free to live out a sanctified life that expresses God in His holiness.
To be freed is to be released. The freedom which the believers enjoy when they are made a new creation is their being freed, released, from all bondage of sin, law, self, Satan, and the world. When Christ sets us free, He first saves us from sins and from the power of sin that we may have the real freedom, that we may no longer serve sin as slaves, and that we may be freed from sin. He also saves us from law and its bondage that we may be no longer under law as slaves of ordinances, bound by letters, but under grace as sons in life, enjoying freedom in life, and that we may be freed from labor under law and religion or any work and responsibility to enjoy rest. Furthermore, He saves us from the flesh and the old man so that we are no longer entangled with the flesh or encumbered with the old man. He also saves us out of Satan’s oppression and his authority of darkness. Moreover, through His death in the flesh on the cross, He has destroyed Satan, thus setting us free from Satan’s hand, delivering us out of his kingdom of darkness, and transferring us into Christ’s kingdom of light that we may enjoy freedom in the light. Lastly, He has rescued us from the world’s temptations, course, and current, from the religious world and the elements of the world, and from the vain manner of life handed down from our fathers, that we may be free to live out a sanctified life that expresses God in His holiness.
