First Congregational Church United Church of Christ
in Canandaigua, New York
UPCOMING EVENT LINK:
“Making Freedom Real”
Galatians 3:28; 5:1, 13-14
The Rev. Tom Herbek
July 4, 2010
In Galatians, Paul describes true freedom, a freedom that breaks down boundaries, divisions, anything that keeps us from loving one another. The freedom that we have as God’s people is the freedom to become all that God has created us to be.
On July 4th, we celebrate our freedom, a value that has been extremely important since our ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War. And we all treasure our individual freedom, our ability to make our own decisions, and live our lives in our own way. Individualism is a dominant theme in our society. It is a core cultural value for us. As Marcus Borg writes:
There is much that is good about individualism. The value it gives to individual lives, the importance of individual rights, individual choice and opportunity. It emphasizes freedom, and freedom is one of the gifts from God.
But one of the problems with individualism is that it focuses so much on the individual that we sometimes lose sight of how interconnected our lives are. And in stressing that the main factor responsible for our success and well being is individual effort, we lose a sense of how many other factors affect us. According to this way of thinking, we get what we deserve as individuals. If we are not successful, are not well off, then it is our own fault.
This is one reason that so many people in our society, who have done a great job for a long time, find it unfathomable, unbelievable, and cannot understand it when they are laid off. One of the most difficult tasks for people in our society who have lost their jobs is dealing with the sense of failure, shame, and guilt – and the idea that this must be their own fault. If nothing else comes out of this recession we are in, perhaps we will learn to be less judgmental, a little kinder to people who are not so fortunate as we are, and not blame them for their struggles.
As we recognize our interrelationships, our interconnectedness, then we begin to realize that none of us are free until we are all free. In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela tells of an understanding that he came to during his 27 years in prison:
“It was during those long and lonely years that my hunger for the freedom of my own people became a hunger for the freedom of all people, white and black. I knew as well as I knew anything that the oppressor must be liberated just as surely as the oppressed.
A man who takes away another man’s freedom is a prisoner of hatred; he is locked behind the bars of prejudice and narrow-mindedness. I am not truly free if I am taking away someone else’s freedom, just as surely as I am not free when my freedom is taken from me. The oppressed and the oppressor alike are robbed of their humanity.”
Individual freedom is great, but if one person in our community, in our society, is not free, then all of us are not as free. That is our interconnectedness. D.H. Lawrence once commented that we also are not free alone. We need other people, and we need to fulfill our freedom in a community dedicated to helping others. Lawrence said: “We are free, when we belong to a living, organic, believing community, active in fulfilling some unfulfilled, perhaps some unrealized purpose.”
So let us continue to create a church family, a community and a world where we work together for freedom, a freedom to care for and care with each other. Let us remember Paul’s comment about not using our freedom for self-indulgence, but for love, and he reminds us that what is truly important is this: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
If we focus in our society solely on our individual freedom, then we will miss the boat, miss the opportunity to have real freedom. In order to make freedom real, we must realize that freedom means that we use our freedom to stand up for anyone who is not free to become all that God has created them to be. Real freedom means we come together to make this happen. And although we recognize and respect personal responsibility, we also recognize and respect that we are all connected, that lots of factors affect our success- from our jobs to our retirement to our family relationships to our status and power. Some of these things we are responsible for, but there are things that powerfully affect us, over which we have little or no control. And that is why we need each other to be truly free.
So let us make freedom real, not only for ourselves, but for those who journey together with us on the journey of life. Let us love our neighbor as we love ourselves on this 4th of July. Let us not settle for a freedom that only allows us to do what we want.
Let us make freedom real for all people- the haves and the have-nots, the healthy and those who suffer, the hopeful and those who have given up hope, the satisfied and the struggling.
Let us make freedom real by doing all we can to create a society and a world, a community and a church family, where every person is set free to become all that God has created them to be.
