chapterNINE: freedom

[Ryle] "...Blessed indeed are those men and women who know and feel that they are free!"


I. The general excellence of freedom.
II. The best and truest kind of freedom.
III. The way in which the best kind of freedom may become your own.


I. The general excellence of freedom.

• We live in a land where our bodies, actions, and consciences are free; personal civil, religious, and national freedom
• Remember, want of this freedom has been the most fertile cause of misery to nations in every age of the world! 
• Bondmen under Pharaoh in Egypt or Philistines in Canaan
• Inquisition
• Atlantic slavery 
• Do not undervalue the liberty we enjoy
• we tend to exaggerate the number and intensity of fancied evils we see around us, yet refuse to see the countless blessing and privileges, or underrate them.
• Do not overvalue our liberties
• temporal slavery is not the only slavery, and temporal freedom not the only freedom;
• what shall it profit you to be a citizen of a free country, so long as your soul is not free?

II. The best and truest kind of freedom.

     Spiritual freedom -- freedom of the soul!
     We are ignorant of the best kind of freedom if we are not Christ's freemen.

• Christ's freemen are free from the guilt of sin.
• Christ's freemen are free from the power of sin.
• Christ's freemen are free from the slavish fear of God.
• Christ's freemen are free from the fear of man.
• Christ's freemen are free from the fear of death.
• Best of all... Christ's freemen are free forever!

     This is the freedom which, above all, is worth having. 

     We can never value it too highly: there is no danger of overvaluing it.

III. The way in which the best kind of freedom may become your own.

• We are not born Christ's freemen.
• We are born slaves and servants of sin: we are by nature "children of wrath," and destitute of any title to heaven.
• We are not made Christ's freemen by baptism.
• We are not made Christ's freemen by mere membership of Christ's Church.

     *Christ's redemption is sufficient for the whole world

     *Baptism & church membership ought not to be lightly esteemed

• Is it faith that makes men's souls free.

Are you free?

Very few find time to think of spiritual liberty, yet Rom 8:34 "He that committeth sin is the servant of sin."

Do you feel any desire to be free?
Do you find any longing within you for a higher, better liberty than this world can give --a liberty that will not die at your death, but will go with you beyond the grave? Seek Christ, repent, believe, and be free. John 8:36 "If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed."

Freedom like this is the secret of true happiness.
Freedom like this is the secret of being a good politician.

If you have this freedom:

• Rejoice & be thankful
• Philippians 3:20 "For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ"
• Psalm 16:6 "The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places; Indeed, my heritage is beautiful to me."

• Stand fast & be on your guard & hand it down to your children
• Think everyday you live of the millions who are yet bound in spiritual darkness
• Shall it be proclaimed at the last day that Pharisees and Jesuits have compassed sea and land to make proselytes,--that politicians have leagued and laboured night and day to obtain catholic emancipation and free trade, --that philanthropists have travailed in soul for years to procure the suppression of negro slavery, --and shall it appear at the same time that Christ's freemen have done little to rescue men and women from hell? ...Surely if the children of this world are zealous to promote temporal freedom, the children of God ought to be much more zealous to promote spiritual freedom.
• Look forward in faith and hope for good things yet to come.
• Take courage!
• Our great Redeemer and Liberator has gone before us to prepare a place for His people, and when He comes against our redemption will be complete. The great jubilee year is yet to come. A few more returns of Christmas and New Year's Days, --a few more meetings and partings, -- a few more births and deaths, --a few more weddings and funerals, --a few more tears and struggles, --a few more sicknesses and pains, --a few more Sabbaths and sacraments, --a few more preachings and prayings, --a few more, and the end will come! Our Master will come back again. The dead saints shall be raised. The living saints shall be changed. Then, and not till then, we shall be completely free. The liberty which we enjoyed by faith shall be changed into the liberty of sight, and the freedom of hope into the freedom of certainty... Blessed indeed are those men and women who know and feel that they are free!

...that last part made me cry... twice!

Ryle, J. C. "Prayer." 2009. Practical Religion. Carlisle: Banner of Truth, 1998. 210-229. Print.