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**Highlights from the Newsletter
Immanuel UCC Living by Faith Newsletter
Christ Has Made Us Free
You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. Galatians 5:13
As we approach the month of July, many of us will begin celebrating our time of summer. We will gather with family having those backyard cookouts, those wonderful times at the park, or celebrate with family and friends at the beach or lake and some of us may just celebrate at home in the cool air conditioning beating the summer heat. But as we approach July 4, many of us will gather and celebrate our National Independence and our political freedom. Often when I approach this day, I focus on the word “freedom”, and wonder what is really meant by the word “freedom” and what others may be thinking about “freedom”.
In Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech delivered on Aug. 28, 1963, on the footsteps of the Lincoln Memorial he called for the liberty and freedom of all Americans. In his speech he says, that, if America is to be a great nation, we must let freedom ring. And when we let freedom ring, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men, and white men, Jews, and Gentiles, Protestants, and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last, Free at last, Great God a-mighty, we are free at last.”
Even as I love to read Dr. King’s speeches on freedom, I am more drawn to the Apostle Paul, as he declares: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” the Apostle Paul wrote these words in a letter where he was trying to
turn the Galatian church away from its fall into “Legalism.” “Legalism” is when you try to become righteous before God by obeying the Law perfectly, rather than by faith in Jesus. When we trust this freedom, it gives us the opportunity to be free from world views and follow the Holy Spirit that produces good works that will last forever because we have faith in God and obey his word.
So, as we approach and celebrate our independence, let us all remember that we all need to be freed, and the only way we can be freed is through faith in Jesus Christ. Paul says that freeing takes place when we’re united with Jesus in Christian baptism. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin--because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
The truth of the matter is that if Jesus has set us free, we will truly be free indeed. It doesn’t really matter how long we have lived in bondage to something, the Lord can set us free in a moment and help us live a life of freedom from every form of bondage and captivity in our lives.
God Bless….
Rev. Dr. Douglas Wooten
