Thesis 45 We must not look to others for our value or importance.
It is supposed to be part and parcel of being an American that we would both delight to be and aspire to be free. Freedom is our corporate, cultural highest good. To be sure we understand what freedom means less and less with each passing day, but whatever it means we know it’s good. We know it’s worth fighting for. We honor our forefathers for the sacrifices they made to make us free. We inhabit the land of the free.
It is true enough that political freedom is something we ought to aspire to and long for. But we ought to note that governmental tyranny is not the sole kind of tyranny in the world. Governments alone are not our potential slave masters. We not only live in an age where governments tell us where we may live, how much of our income we may keep, and how much rent (real estate taxes) we must pay on “our” land. We also live in an age where the broader culture seeks to enslave us. It wants to ensure that we drink this brand of soda, that we wear this label on our clothes, that we stream these television programs.
The same basic principle can be often at work even in our relationships. We exchange a bit of our independence for the approval of our peers. We only believe that we are of value or significance when other people, friends, customers, employers, etc. likewise believe it. We can even be enslaved by our relationships.
Our dignity, however, is not wrapped up in our friends or in other merely human relationships. It is not under the control of those for whom we work, or who work for us. It is outside the baileywick of our peers. Instead it rests in Christ. Our Father in heaven, if we are in Christ, has cast His love upon us. We are the exceedingly great reward of His Son. And His Spirit has consented to not only dwell with is, but within us. We are called to be a free people; Jesus makes us free indeed (John 8). A mature believer not only knows who he is, but whose he is, and rests therein. A mature believer rejoices to remember that he not only bears God’s image, as all men do, but is being made into the image of Christ, the express image of the glory of the Father.
This is true of us as individuals, and true of us corporately. The church too often seeks the approval of those outside her doors, believing ourselves significant only when we are trending on twitter. We are together the bride of Christ. We are, though we in ourselves are not at all worthy, that for which He suffered the wrath of His Father. We cannot allow ourselves to be enslaved, because we have already been bought with a price. We must cherish and protect our freedom, for so our Master, the one who set us free, commands.