Galatians 3.23-29; Luke 8.26-39
I wonder if you have ever been inside a prison? … Or ever felt trapped, either in a relationship or a situation where you could not be yourself? You did not have total freedom… Many years ago I visited a prison on three occasions, discerning whether God was calling me into prison ministry and I felt, I think quite rightly, that it was not for me. People are put into prison, at least in this country, because they have done something wrong, something which harmed another person or property. One of the things that struck me about my visits, was that the prison chaplain who escorted me had keys for each wing and a master key for each cell. But inside a cell there was no lock, if you accidentally closed the door while speaking to a prisoner in his cell, you had to wait for someone to come and unlock the door from the outside.
Paul in this letter to the Galatians wrote of being imprisoned before Jesus came, and guarded by the law. He is writing of the Israelite nation being bound to God under the law given to Moses - a series of over 500 rules and regulations summed up in the Ten Commandments. Rules about behaviour, how to relate to each other, how people were to be punished, even killed to preserve the pure identity, the holiness of the nation. Sin was to be eradicated, holiness preserved at all cost. There were also rules about what to eat, how to keep the sabbath day as a day of rest - limiting the travel and work. Every action was set out in these rules and they guarded or were supposed to guard the integrity and purity of the nation but they also acted as a form of prison. Boundaries were placed on individual and corporate freedom. All were held accountable to each other for the nation’s sake.
But now in Jesus Christ, these rules and regulations have been abolished, have been replaced by a relationship by each individual with God himself. Each person now can come to God the Father and there are only two commandments which we say in our Holy Communion service - “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is the only Lord, You shall love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second commandment is this: Love your neighbour as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” And our response to this is: “Amen, Lord, have mercy.”
If we do not place God first in our lives, do not love him with all that we are, we are breaking the first commandment. If we harm another person, if we lie to them, cheat on them, ignore them, look at them with lust, we are breaking the second commandment. We are not relating to others with the love that God has for them, we are not seeing the image of God in them, we are failing to recognise how wonderfully made each of us are. How loved and precious we are to God.
My friends, I do not know about you but I fail in this. I do not spend all my day focussing on God, yes I aim to have a quiet time with God each day, but it does not always happen. Some days are really special and I connect with God in a wonderful way. There are also days when I know God is in a conversation, I know that he is working in both my life and the life of the person I am with, and that is very wonderful. But I know I could do more, could spend more time being in his presence and I need to keep asking for his help to do this.
I believe God wants us to go deeper, and deeper into his love. Paul wrote in his letter to the church in Rome in chapter 12:
12 I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.
And later in the same chapter Paul wrote of the Marks of the True Christian
9 Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; 10 love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honour. 11 Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. 12 Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. 13 Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.
The list goes on and finishes with the exhortation to love your enemies. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Easy? In an earlier chapter of Romans (7) Paul wrote of no longer being held captive to the law, instead we are living a new life under the promptings of the Holy Spirit. He is affirming our verses from Galatians. Yet a few verses later in that chapter he wrote “I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.” Oh woe is us. Is there no hope for us? Paul is having the same struggles that we have. Just like the man in our gospel reading he is saying he is held captive. Yet he finishes that passage with these words: “Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”
Yes. Thanks be to God for Jesus. Jesus set the Gerasene man free who had been bound by Satan, bound by evil spirits and Jesus can set us free from whatever binds us.
Last week at the Gathering, a monthly time of worship in Marton Village Hall, a man stood up and said that he had struggled with fear for a long time and a while back he started repeating psalm 56 verses 3 and 4 to himself.
O Most High, when I am afraid,
I put my trust in you.In God, whose word I praise,
in God I trust; I am not afraid;
what can flesh do to me?
Over time, his fears dropped off one by one until now he is no longer afraid.
Jesus is the key to our freedom. He has already done all that is needed to set us free. Free from fear, free from sin, free from addiction, free from emotional hurts, from anger and bitterness. Free from anything that interferes and disrupts our relationship with God the Father. Jesus has achieved all this in his victory on the cross. Without him we are locked inside our prison cell with no lock on the inside. When we ask him to be our Lord and Saviour he opens the prison door and sets us free and with the help of the Holy Spirit we step into the freedom that he offers. So be honest with him now, in this coming week. If you are in any form of prison, emotional, physical, spiritual, talk to Jesus about it. Ask others to pray for you. Meditate on his word, set aside regular time to spend with Jesus, ask for more help from the Holy Spirit and seek him more deeply. And in all of this remember the words from Luke’s gospel of Jesus’ manifesto: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free.“(Luke 4.18). Amen.