The Truth Will Set You Free

On January 1st, 1863, Abraham Lincoln spoke these bold words. In my virtue of the power and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated states and parts of states are, and henceforth shall be free. The executive government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said purposes." This is the famous Emancipation Proclamation. This is happening in the middle of Gettysburg. Abraham Lincoln has declared that the slaves will be set free. This is a powerful and bold declaration that began to shape and change American history. Now, it's debatable if he had the authority. to make this declaration. He saw that it was the people who elected him and he's speaking with authority that he assumes is his. What we see here is that he's declared powerfully a message against slavery. He's assumed he has authority to make this declaration and eventually it plays out. We have to realize the war went on for two more years. This declaration was powerful. It would eventually take place. But he didn't have the authority and the power to declare all slaves free at that moment and make it happen. Many of those who were slaves at the time that he made this declaration, they died as slaves. The people that he's speaking to, the slave owners in the South, They didn't care what he said. They'd already rebelled against him. They ignored what he said. Many slaves would never even know that they were declared free by the president. Well, this is a very bold and powerful proclamation. We have to realize Abraham Lincoln did not have the power to truly set slaves free. It would take years. It would take military action. It would take a dramatic change in American history. Now, this morning, we're going to be looking at slavery. And while the American slavery was gross and disgusting, it was owning men and abusing men. I don't want to downplay how disgusting it was, but the slavery we're looking at this morning is a worse slavery. It's a more powerful slavery. It's a more abusive slavery. The enslavement we're looking at this morning is our enslavement to sin. It's worse for a number of reasons. One, it's universal. Every human being is born into sin and is born into being a slave to sin. It's not just some who are slaves, it's universal. Every human being is a slave. Secondly, the enslavement, it takes away the dignity of man with guilt and shame. The dignity of the slaves and the American It took away the dignity by not giving them the freedom, but the slavery of sin takes away our dignity because it makes us shameful, makes us guilty. It turns us against our true purpose, which is to know God and to glorify God. It's demands control our thoughts and our actions, not just our physical bodies. It abuses us by allowing us to pretend that we're in control when really every thought and every decision is actually destroying us. It's destructive because it takes away our right relation with God. It destroys the relationship with others. It ultimately ends in eternal destruction. It has a power to bind that no man can set off. That is the power of sin. We need someone who can declare us free and truly make us free. In the words of the great him, a mighty fortress, Martin Luther, tells us who that man is. Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing. Were not the right man on our side, the man of God's own choosing, doth ask who that may be. Christ Jesus, it is he. Lord Sabbath, his name, from age to age the same. And he must, and he has, won the battle. Our message this morning is Jesus has come to set us free. His truth sets us free and it's freedom from sin, its consequence and its enslaving power. The message can be summarized as thus. True faith gives us freedom to follow Christ. True faith gives us the freedom to follow Christ. The three things we'll be looking at are our call to faith, our call to follow and our call to freedom, our call to faith, our call to follow, our call to freedom. We're in John chapter eight. As we continue to look at Jesus teaching ministry in the middle of the temple, he has declared, I am the light. He is the one who shines in their darkness. He is the one who calls us to repent of the darkness and to follow the light of life that he provides. He's declared, I am the son of the father. I have come with divine authority. I have come to set you free. I have come to die for your sin in your place, or else you will die for your sin. And here we pick up in John 8, beginning in verse 31. If you don't have a Bible, you can use our pew Bible. And this is found on page 894. So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, if you abide in my word, you're truly my disciples. You will know the truth and the truth will set you free. They answered him. We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say we will become free? Jesus answered them. Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever, the son remains forever. So if the son sets you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are the offspring of Abraham, yet you seek to kill me because my words find no place in you. I speak of what I have seen with my father and you do what you have heard from your father. Will you pray with me? Father, we praise you and we thank you that you have sent your Son to die in our place for our sin, to take away our condemnation, to take away our guilt, to free us now to live in obedience, observing what you have commanded. Help us, Lord, to recognize the freedom we have. Help us, Lord, first to recognize the enslavement that we suffer under so that we can see the power of Christ that frees us so that we can live a life that glorifies you. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. Again, our outline will be a call to faith, a call to follow and a call to freedom. Notice in verse 31, who is Jesus speaking to? There's a large crowd there. There's there's been Pharisees and scribes. They've been coming and they've been trying to challenge Jesus. And here he's focused on a very particular group. Jesus said this to the Jews who had believed him. Now, the whole point of John is that you will believe that Jesus is the Son of God. That is the thesis of John, to bring about belief. But here, what does he mean that they believed? Well, there's two options. One, John is presenting that they have saving faith. They have trusted that Christ is who he says he is. He is the son of God. They have trusted that he will do what he says he has come to do. He will die for their sins. They have submitted themselves wholly and completely to the master, the one who has divine authority. We see this kind of faith in chapter five when the official asked for Jesus to go heal his child. We will see this faith in the blind man being healed in chapter nine. We'll see the faith in Thomas in chapter 20. Again, it's the entire purpose of the gospel. So while John has this clear main purpose so that you will have saving true faith, he also lets us realize that there's such a thing as fickle, non-saving faith. You can see this most clearly in John 2, beginning in verse 23. After Jesus has done his first miracle, he's turned water into wine. Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in his name. When they saw the signs that he was doing, but Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man. Here, many believe that Jesus would not entrust himself to them. He knew that it wasn't a true faith. He knew that they wanted something other than the true Savior who would come with divine authority. You also see this in John 6, verse 60. Jesus has just said, you must eat my body, you must drink my blood. And some of the disciples said, this is too difficult. They had a fickle faith. They were there to see what they could get from Jesus. They did not truly say he has divine authority. Whatever he says, I'll believe. Whatever he commands, I will do. So there's two different kinds of faith presented in John. There's a fickle faith. I don't recognize that Jesus says great things, but it's what Jesus is saying to help me when I try. Jesus says wise things that will help me live a better life. That Jesus, he says, Great things that help me live a better life according to how I want to live. True faith, however, recognizes that Jesus speaks with divine authority. Whatever he says can be trusted. Jesus is mighty to save. I can do nothing. He has done everything. True faith says Jesus is my Savior and my Lord and I will follow him. True faith recognizes he is the Son of God. He is worthy of devotion. He's worthy of worship. So in John 830, what kind of faith do they have? Is it is it saving faith or is it fickle faith? I believe it must be fickle faith. We saw in John 830 that they responded with belief, but it's not clear what they believe. It is clear that Jesus is correcting them. He goes so far as to later on telling them, you do not know the father as I know the father, you know, the father. the God of the universe. Your father is Satan. And you were like your father. You believed in his lies. You were still in his lies. It's pretty clear that they have not had a saving faith because Jesus here is approaching them and correcting them who have a fickle faith. So our passage this morning is for those who profess faith, but it's not true in saving faith. We're to consider this morning, have we truly responded to Jesus Christ in such a way that we say he has divine authority? What he says has authority over me, what he says must be trusted over against anything I think. A true faith trusts the promises of Christ that define us. And a true faith trusts the commands of Jesus that orders our duty. Now let me make something very clear about faith. It is not how strong or sincere your faith is that saves you. It's not the power of your faith, it's the object of your faith that saves you. It's not the power of your own ability to put your faith in Christ. Fickle faith makes Christ what we want Him to be. A fickle faith confesses the object of faith according to our own desires. A fickle faith tames Christ so we can believe in Him. A true faith can be a weak faith. A true faith puts its faith in who Christ says He is and what He says He will do. A true faith actually always looks to the real object of their faith and realizes that there's nothing we can do to pay him back for what he's done. A true faith always looks to the true Jesus, the Jesus revealed in scripture, who he said he is and what he said he's done and always recognizes, I wish I could give you the faith you deserve because you're worthy of all that I could ever give you and more. See, a fickle faith, it tames Jesus to believe Him. A true faith, it trusts Christ, hoping that we will grow to trust Him more. Weak faith, it stumbles. It's always longing to grow. A fickle faith, you're satisfied because you make Jesus however you want Him to be. If you're a Christian, if you profess to be a Christian this morning, the challenge is Are you trusting in the sincerity of what you believe, or do you trust in Jesus Christ and what He has said He has come to do? If you're not a Christian this morning, you are called to believe in Jesus Christ. There's three things you must believe. There's a God who is holy and just. He is a righteous God and He will judge all sinners. The second thing, you are a sinner. You will be judged. You're guilty. You will be condemned. The third thing, Jesus Christ has come to take your place under your condemnation. Jesus Christ was the perfect man to come and die for sinners. He takes your guilt. You receive his righteousness. That is what you must believe. He is the God who became flesh to live the life. You cannot believe that you cannot live so that when you believe in him, You are declared righteous and he takes away your sin and your guilt. We are called to faith and those who truly believe are called to follow. Now, the fact that they are fickle in their faith, that really makes what Jesus says in verse 31 all the more focused and hard. If you abide in my word, you are my disciples. Have they believed in him to be their true, divine, authoritative master? Faith calls us to follow him. This is a call to discipleship, to walk in the way of Jesus Christ. This is not intellectual acknowledgement that Jesus is great. This isn't just being baptized and having your name on a membership roll. This is saying who you say you are and what you say you have done. I trust. Above all other reason, above all other information, I trust you, Jesus Christ, as the one and only master. If you abide in my word, what I have said, what I have taught, then you are my disciples. You trust them with your sin and your condemnation, and then You live your life according to his way. What does it mean to abide in his word? It means to hold to his teaching, to cling to them, to trust them above all other teaching. It's not just intellectual. When you hold to his teaching, it means there's ethical and moral implications. There's fruit from your faith. We're called to abide in his truth. Now, this is very significant because next week we'll see they're all Their father is the father of lies. Later, they'll be accused of believing the lies. They must believe in his truth. We're to call to walk in his light and quit playing in the darkness. In order to abide in his word, we must trust his promises that declare who we are. as new creations and trust his commands that determine what we should do. This is a call to the church. This is a call to every Christian. You cannot be a disciple and say, I'm not going to trust exactly what Christ has said, and I'm not going to seek to do what Christ has told me to do. So how do you abide in Christ? How can we better abide? How can we more faithfully abide? Well, this is the point of the sermon where I tell you to read your Bible and pray. These are the clear, faithful instructions that every Christian must hear regularly. If you want to know how to abide, you must first know his word. You must have his word in your heart. Study it. Read it. Memorize it. You've got to know before you can abide in it. But it's not just intellectual. You need to pray from Scripture. You need to pray through Scripture. Our prayer life is the power, the prayer and fasting that Christ commands is the power that allows us to abide in what he says. I want to challenge you with something. One of the greatest movements away from true Christian discipleship is the movement in the West towards an individualism and an independence. Christian discipleship means you were committed and called to be disciples with other believers. There is no category in Scripture for being an individual, independent Christian. Being a disciple means you're growing in grace with other believers. We abide in Christ's Word by studying God's Word with God's people. We're called and committed to be praying with other believers. We're called to be committed to submit ourselves to other believers. One particular study that should convince you of this. Go through and look at all of the one another's. These are commands from Paul throughout the New Testament. Look at all of the one another's. You cannot be a true disciple of Jesus Christ without having some others to fulfill the discipleship of the one another's. Discipleship requires a commitment to other disciples. Some other guidelines as we think about what it means to abide in him first, if you are in Christ. If you have a true saving faith in Christ, your position is secure because of what Christ has done. We will always be tempted to think we need to do things better in order to make our position secure. No, it's what Christ has done. It's what he has done on the cross. It's what he now declares at the right hand of the father. It is not what we do that makes our position secure. It's what Christ has done. Secondly, If you are in Christ, you are called to regularly repent. In order to come to Christ, you have to recognize your sin. That's what the cross tells us above all else. If our life is truly a cross centered life, you're always looking at how horrible your sin is, because the son of God had to come and die to take away your condemnation for your sin. The Son of God had to die in order to free you from its power. If you truly are following Christ and looking to the cross, as Paul calls us to, your sin must always be in the forefront, which means we're always repenting. We are sinners. That's one of the truths that unite us as a church. We have to stop being bashful and shy about talking about our sin. It's the one thing we know we have in common. That and Christ has died so that we can confess it with boldness, knowing we will be forgiven. The third guideline, if you question your salvation, do not go through that trial alone. This is a simple implication. This is a call out of an individualism, independence. If you question your salvation, the first thing Satan wants to do is isolate you. so that you're left with your own despairing thoughts. No, you need believers. You need those who can tell you, I see evidences of grace. You need those who are going to point out, I see the work of God in you. You need to hear the gospel regularly from others because you're having a hard time believing it for yourself. We are called to follow. This means our conduct has changed. This means our speech has changed. This means our thoughts are changed. We're being transformed from sin into Christ's image. Now, one final warning before we move on to the freedom. We must be careful in using legalism as an excuse to not be obedient. We need to be careful of not using legalism as an excuse not to be obedient. Now, we've all battled with legalism, both within our own hearts and wanting to be self-righteous. We've all battled with legalism with those who teach us and try to tell us, you need to do this to be a Christian. But we need to define what legalism really is in Scripture. Paul says legalism is when you think your works complete the work of Christ. True legalism is when you say Christ's death and resurrection was not sufficient to make your position with God true and secure. You need something else to be really forgiven, to be really sanctified. That's what legalism really is in Scripture. Legalism is not saying you need to do something. As a Christian, we must recognize our position is secure in Christ, and we are now called to obedience. Our works do not give us a proper standing before God, but our works demonstrate a saving faith. As James says, faith without works is dead. Your faith is true when you know it demonstrates itself through good works. Claiming legalism sounds like a really righteous excuse, but unless you're actually claiming it against someone who's saying in order to be a Christian, you have to do this, you're using the wrong way. And I really fear this. We love our sin. And so we like to use that facade as a righteous excuse to keep sinning. We love our sin. We're sinners. We're enslaved to it. And we like to use the excuse of legalism as a righteous facade so that we can pretend we're being real faith people, not legalists. It's amazing. Paul, who gives us the greatest teaching against legalism, he also gives us many commands in Scripture. He tells us to do things. We have duty as a Christian. He gives us commands we must believe and follow. The Ephesians is a beautiful picture of this. Chapters one through three, he tells us of the glorious position we now have because what Christ has done. And then four through six, he's telling us how to live. Walk worthy of the manner of your call. We have commands in Scripture. Obeying them doesn't make you a legalist. It makes you a follower of Jesus Christ. This really goes back to what some have called the most dangerous omission from the Great Commission. If you look behind me, therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. There's an omission. Teaching them to observe all I commanded. That's part of making disciples. We have to teach one another to observe all our commandments. It's not just going and baptizing. It's teaching one another to obey. We must constantly seek to put our lives in alignment with what Christ has taught us. And one of the most hopeful things you can do for yourself is let someone else know they have the freedom to be a correction for you, to be watchful over you. Who has the freedom to speak truth into your life that you know will correct you and teach you about your sin? Finally, it's a call to freedom. a call to freedom. And now I realize many of you are calculating. This is already, you know, more than halfway through the normal time of a sermon and we're only two verses in. This section isn't going to be as long as the others, given the meaning of the amount of verses. Verse 32, and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. This is bold. This is bold and aggressively telling us, profoundly telling us. If you walk in my truth, you're my disciple, my truth sets you free. He's giving us the authority to do what he's declared us to do. Now, notice how the those who have gathered around him and they've had fickle faith, they believe in him at some level. Notice how they respond. You will know the truth and the truth will set you free and they respond. We are offspring of Abraham and have never been a slave to anyone. How is it that you say you'll become free? Now, I don't think these Israelites are ignorant of their history, and I don't think they're Reconstructionists either. Israel had been enslaved numerous times throughout their history. One of the most defining marks of Israel is that they were enslaved to Egypt and they were redeemed by God. They were then also enslaved to Syria, to Babylon. They're currently under the rule of Rome. They're practically indentured servants to Rome, even as they're speaking. So I don't think they're ignorant of these things. So what do they mean? Well, Israelites, they trusted in their position of being children of Abraham, which meant they were sons of a kingdom. And though they may have a physical restraint from other nations, they are always truly free because the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, they are always King's sons. So, they always saw themselves, because of their heritage, because of their lineage, as truly free. Now, notice what they've done. They've boasted in their biological connection to Abraham, and that boasting is actually going to keep them from true belief. That is what is keeping them from true belief. That is what Jesus is putting his finger on right here and right now. They said that you will be free. They've declared, well, what do you mean free? We're always free. We're children of Abraham. He corrects them. Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever. The son remains forever. So if the son sets you free, you'll be free indeed. Look at verse 37. I know you're offspring of Abraham, yet you seek to kill me. because my word finds no place in you. I speak of what I have seen with my father and you do what you have heard from your father." Later referring to Satan. Jesus is making a point for them to hear. They're claiming that they're the offsprings of Abraham. They're claiming that they are the children of Abraham and that blood connection makes them always free, makes them always kings. That boasting in the bloodline of Abraham is keeping them from seeing the one offspring, the one promised child that God told Abraham would come and would conquer sin and death, reverse the curse and give them new life. They're boasting in the fact that they're children of Abraham and they're missing the point that the one promised child who God always said would come was standing right there in front of them because they're boasting in their lineage and their bloodline They're missing it. They're missing that God would one day send us a son. And like he took Abraham and sent him up the mountain with Isaac and he told Abraham, sacrifice your son. He bound him. He pulled the knife back. And as he was about to kill his own son, God provided a sacrifice. He provided someone who would die in the place of his son for his sins. They're missing that this is the son that God always promised. but did not spare. Jesus is the one son of Abraham, the one son of God who came to die for sinners. They're missing. They're missing the fact that they could be worshiping the one son they're boasting in their bloodline, and that keeps them from boasting in the blood of Christ that died on the cross. They're deceived also by the power of sin. Notice verse 27. Beginning of verse 34. Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever. I tell you the truth. Listen up. Truly, truly, I'm telling you this. If you choose sin, you're a slave to sin. If you choose to disobey, you're a slave of that disobedience. When you commit to living against God, you're committing yourself to having a different master that you worship. Now, this is important for us because we pretend we're free. That's part of the great deception of Satan. That's part of the power of the enslavement of sin, is that we actually think we're free. We think we're free to do what we want. But when we truly understand what God is saying, what Christ is saying, we think we go in and we play in the darkness with control over it. But as soon as we choose sin, as soon as we choose to indulge ourselves in sin, we lose control. We're enslaved and we're entangled. We're ignorant of that enslavement because we've chosen that enslavement. We numb ourselves to the master. We're entertaining ourselves with sin. C.S. Lewis captures this picture very well in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The queen let another drop fall from her bottle into the snow and instantly there appeared a round box, tied with green silk ribbon, which when opened turned out to contain several pounds of the best Turkish delight. Each piece was sweet and light to the very center of Edmund. Edmund had never tasted anything more delicious. At first, Edmund tried to remember that it is rude to speak with one's mouth full, but soon he forgot about that and thought only of trying to shovel down as much Turkish delight as he could. And the more he ate, the more he wanted to eat. At last the Turkish Delight was all finished, and Edmund was looking very hard at the empty box, and wishing that she would ask him whether he would like some more, probably the Queen knew quite well what he was thinking, for she knew, though Edmund did not, that this was enchanted Turkish Delight, that anyone who had once tasted it would want more and more of it, and would even, if they were allowed, go on eating it till they killed themselves. At least C.S. Lewis has captured something here. Our sin is enchanting. It's enticing. Once we get a taste of it, it doesn't satisfy us. But once we get that taste, we want more and more and more. The power of sin is that it entangles us by enticing us and enchanting us to think it will satisfy us. Once we commit to serving it, it is our master. as we will long for more and more until someone comes and frees us from those perverse and corrupted desires. We need someone to free us from its enchanting power. We need someone to free us and can truly make us free. That is Jesus Christ who speaks with divine authority. No one is more powerful than sin. That's why playing with it is so dangerous. You're not more powerful than sin. Only Jesus Christ is. Now, how do we as Christians battle the entanglement and the enchantment of sin? This is my best understanding of it. Before you were a Christian, you had a master and it was sin. Sin would bark orders and it had a chain like a chain on your neck and you had no option. But when it barked orders, it jerked you and you had to obey. But now when you're a believer, Christ has come to set you free. He's broken the chain. However, sin keeps barking his orders. And because you've been trained to respond to those orders, we continue to have a tendency to obey sin. What we have to realize is that we need to know the word so that when sin is barking its orders, we recognize it as deception and sin. We must recognize the power of Christ and the Holy Spirit so that we know how to defeat sin. We must trust his power. and his guidance. From Romans 6 that Ron read earlier, we can see the three steps of being free. First, you must know you're free. You must know that Christ died to set you free. His death is sufficient. The second step is really the hardest. You must consider yourself free. You must constantly remind yourself and be reminded that sin no longer has dominion over you. You've been redeemed and delivered from the domain of darkness. You must constantly remind yourself, I do not have to obey sin. And then third, we must yield ourselves to obedience. We must stop giving ourselves over to simple practices. We must seek to live a life of righteousness that obeys everything. Christ has instructed. Finally, let's look at verse 35 and 36. Here, Christ gives us a mini parable. The slave does not remain in the house forever. The son remains forever. So if the son sets you free, you'll be free indeed. The slave has no inheritance. The slave is there and he has no inheritance in the house. They are not true sons of the house of God. They're servants. However, Jesus Christ, the true son, if they believe in him, they will be made sons. They will receive the inheritance that is Christ. He will give them the true eternal inheritance. That's what we read about in Galatians in our call to worship. We must believe in Jesus to receive the adoption. Finally, let us return to our call to faith. We are called to believe so that we have the freedom to follow Christ. We must believe what he has done that gives us our secure position. We must believe what Jesus teaches, what Jesus teaches is right and good and true. We must believe that his grace is sufficient, not only to forgive us of our sins, but to set us apart, to follow him and obey him so that our lives now glorify him. Will you pray with me? Father, forgive us. Forgive us for not always thanking you for what you have done for us. Forgive us. For not trusting your reliable and faithful word that you've given to us to teach us who you are, to teach us who we are in Christ, to teach us how to now live. Help us to live that life that is worthy of the call, that is worthy of the position we've now received in Christ. Help us to recognize that it is what he has done that sets us free. And now we are free to obey, to observe all the commands you've given to us. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.