“Freedom.” The word is constantly on our lips. It’s in our thoughts and in our cultural DNA. The Western understanding of freedom is rooted in the belief that the highest and truest expression of human dignity is found in being able to choose our own path, determine our own identity, pursue our own happiness, and carve out our own version of a successful life. This way of thinking shapes everything from how we understand politics to how we make personal decisions. It feels so natural to us that we instinctively assume that when the Bible speaks of freedom, it must mean something similar.
Without realizing it, we begin to amalgamate the western idea of freedom of choice with the biblical freedom. But they are not the same.
In Deuteronomy 12:8, as Israel prepares to enter the land, and specifically in regard to how they ought to worship…God through Moses warns them, “You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes.” Later, during the period of the Judges, Israel repeatedly falls into spiritual chaos, idolatry, and civil collapse, and the inspired writer diagnoses the cause with the same phrase: “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6; 21:25). This is not a positive description. It is not a celebration of personal authenticity. It is not encouragement to claim individual liberties. It is a divine God and that, when God’s people begin to decide apart from God’s word, when and how to worship God, and begin to determine for themselves what they wish to consider to be right conviction and behavior, the result is always deception, confusion, moral disintegration, and alienation from God.
What our cultural moment calls freedom, Scripture consistently calls rebellion. The modern vision of unrestrained self-determination echoes the original temptation in the garden when the serpent promised that humans could “be like God,” determining good and evil for themselves (Genesis 3:5). When we elevate our personal choices above the will of God, we do not free ourselves; we simply trade one master for another, and the new master—our own fallen self—is far more oppressive than we usually dare admit.
Biblical freedom, by contrast, begins not with asserting ourselves but with surrendering ourselves. It begins with letting go of the illusion that life belongs to us to shape according to our preferences, emotions, and ambitions. It begins with acknowledging that the deepest chains in the human soul are not external but internal. When Paul writes, “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.” (Romans 6:6), he is not describing an optional higher life for especially devout believers, but the essential work Christ performs in every person He redeems. We are not freed to become sovereign individuals. We are freed from the tyranny of the old self. This is why Paul can speak so comfortably of believers becoming “slaves of God” (Romans 6:22). In our cultural vocabulary this sounds jarring, but in the biblical understanding it is deeply liberating. To belong to God is to be restored to the life for which we were created. To submit to God is to be freed from the internal compulsions that once dominated us. True freedom is not the absence of authority but the presence of the right authority. And that right authority is God, not us.
This contrast between cultural freedom and biblical freedom also shapes the way we read Scripture and understand theology. In a culture that prizes self-determination, we easily approach the Bible as if we have the authority to decide what is true, or at least what feels true for us personally. We often treat our biblical interpretation as an act of personal freedom rather than an act of humble submission. Yet biblical faith calls us to lay down the rule of self in our understanding just as much as in our behavior. True discipleship means surrendering our opinions, assumptions, and preferences to the authority of God’s Word, allowing Scripture to correct us rather than conforming it to our desires. Only when we relinquish the impulse to shape truth according to ourselves can the truth of God begin to shape us.
This truth becomes even clearer in Romans 8, where Paul explains that the mind set on the flesh is not only resistant to God but alienated from Him in a way that makes obedience impossible. When the modern world encourages us to follow our hearts, Scripture quietly reveals that our hearts, apart from the Spirit, are hostile to God and unable to submit to Him (Romans 8:7). In other words, the cultural vision of freedom—which assumes that authenticity flows from expressing whatever desires rise within us—actually leads us deeper into slavery. The biblical vision of freedom, grounded in the redemption of Christ and the renewing work of the Spirit, makes obedience possible for the first time. The one who has been freed from sin’s dominion can finally become the person God intended, not by fighting for autonomy but by walking in surrender.
This is where the contrast between cultural freedom and the freedom of Christ becomes painfully relevant for believers today. Many Christians assume that spiritual maturity means learning to “stand up for our rights” in the public square. They believe that the advancement of the kingdom requires that we win cultural battles, preserve personal freedoms, and ensure that no one takes from us what we believe is ours. Yet the New Testament presents a different picture. The path of Jesus is not self-protection but self-giving. His triumph came not by overpowering His opponents but by surrendering Himself to the Father’s will, trusting that obedience—even obedience unto death—would accomplish the work God intended.
This is why Paul can say in Galatians 5:1 that Christ has set us free, and in the same breath warn us not to use that freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. True liberty is not the freedom to assert ourselves but the freedom to love God and neighbor without being ruled by fear, pride, or the need to control outcomes. It is the freedom to obey God even when obedience costs us comfort or status. It is the freedom to let go of the patterns of the world from which Christ delivered us. It is the freedom to trust that God defends His people far better than they can defend themselves.
In the end, the worldly vision of freedom seeks victory by securing personal power, opinion, conviction, choice, and control. The biblical vision of freedom seeks His power, His opinion, His righteousness, His will and His Lordship. If we are going to reflect Christ faithfully in our generation, we must reclaim this truth. True victory in Christ comes not when we cling to our lives, but when we lay them down for the One who laid down His life for us. True freedom is found not in doing what is right in our own eyes, but in joyfully doing what is right in His.
Pastor Brian