What docs it mean to be Free?

II Corinthians 3:1-6; 12-18
Rev. John M. Buchanan
January 19, 1969

What does it mean to be free? There is no more important question
than that today, or in any age; and the answer depends entirely on who it is
who is doing the answering.

A young Marxist might say that to be free means to be rid of capi-
talisom and the whole free-enterprise system. An African might define freedon
in terms of the absence of the white man's presence,his institutions and his
money. ‘The American ghetto dweller might talk about freedom from the police
or slum lords. The middle class merchant might define it as freedom to malce
a profit: a real estate man —- to sell or not to sell to whom he pleases.
Certainly the Trustees of Purdue University and the Purdue Peace Union ciffer
when it comes to articulating what it means to be free. So would a plant
manager and union steward. So would we all because to this question , as to
all others, each of us brings his own personal freight, vested interests,
commitments and operating assumptions.

And yet, you and I, ought to be able to express some fundamental
unaninity, no matter who we are, or what our vested interests happen to be.
Because you and I have voluntarily chosen to place ourselves under the dis~
cipline of discipleship to Jesus Christ, and that discipleship may, in fact,
be understood almost entirely in terms of freedom.

The question of what it means to be free might be merely philo-
sophical, just an entertaining round of intellectual gymastics, except for
the fact that it is being asked today by all sorts of people and groups
of people. The Black Power advocate as well aS the member of the Jolm Dirch
Society; the student revolutionary and young republican: the devout Christian
who throws over the Church and his brother who stays in the church — all are
asking - "What does it really mean to be free?"

The disturbing thing is that we don't really seem. to peti: and
that foct makes the quest doubly important. We are inclined sometimes ‘to
look dowm our social noses at those involved in the quest. Too often we ~
dismiss an individual and the question he is asking because of his attire,
or his beard or the length of his hair. And to the degree we do this, we
exhibit our o¥M lack of freedom — our own captivity to certain styles and
forms. ‘The quest is on -— and we need to be part of it.

What does it mean to be free? One thing it doesn't mean is tho
complete absence of responsibility in the form of basic rules and regulations.
It does not mean to do whatever you feel like doing whenever you feel lilo
doing it. Absolute, philosophic freedom is called anarchy - which in ract
has proven to be synonymous with chaos.

It is interesting that there are those who seriously propose’ this
as a working definition of freedom. To effectively espouse their cause, they
have an international organization of anarchists, which of course can havenmo
rules or regulations. They met last year in Rome and spent three days arguing
and fighting among thereslvres sbout who would be the leader. Anarchy just
doesn't work. The assumption tnaat men live in some predictable relationship
with cach other rules out totally any form of absolute freedom. Walter Lipp-
man said it well in his little book, Preface to Morals ~ "We have come to see
that Ihley was right when he said that a man's worst difficultires begin
when he is able to do as he likes."

—3+

That, very briefly, is theNew Testament on Freedom. And from tliat
point we can begin to answer, from a Christian vantage, the question “lhat
does it mean to be free?" ; .

i would begin with the church itsclf. When I say the Church, I
mean, of course, the universal Christian Church in. all its expressions. But
_ let us not be guilty of excluding from that mystical universal body the
Church as we know it best - here in the life of this congregation. If the
gospel is a word of freedom, then the church ought to be supremely the
one institution in society where men are free. Collectively free - the
Church itself ought to be free withinsociety to be itself. But it igs
not, and if you think it is, you're not thinking very well.

On the contrary, the Church has allowed itself to become captive
to the culture in which it find itself: that culture being overwhelmingly
white and middle class. In his excellent book the Suburban Captivity of
the Churches, Gibson Winter discusses the exodus of main-line Protestantisin
from the Chettoes, and then issues a very ominous warning. The Church in
North Africa, he points’ out, lived for several hundred years. And then i+
disappeared without a trace. “This collapse can certainly be attributed
in part to the expansion of Islam; however, the core of the problem was
the identification of North African Christianity with the upper social
Classes. ‘The Churches became centers of upper-class culture; consequently
they lacked widespread support among the people. When Islam. swept across
North Africa it erased Christianity. Where Christianity has become identified
with upper class elites, it has lacked a substantial base in the workin:
population and has been unable to weather social change." ~(p.50)

It happened a thousand year ago, because Christianity in the
Church was captive to one class. I+ happened in Cuba, and today is
heppening all over Latin America. The Church is so completely identified
with and dependent upon the wealthy land-owning class that it has become
almost totally estranged from the great mass of people.

Can it happen here? I would suggest that it already . has. “he
Church is not free to be itself - conssequently it has very little to say to
anyone but white, middle class people. The ghettoes just aren't listening

Where, .or instance, did we ever get the idea that the success of
a church could be measured in terms of its statistical and financial -
size? tle got the idea, of course, from American middle class culture, which
puts a great premium on statistical and financial strength. That cultural
valuc - has become an ecclesiastical goal, and to the degree the Church
reaches for it, it is just as much a captive as it would be if the govern—
ment forcibly closed all its doors.

In Jesus Christ the church is free. It is free to be the kind
of institution he called it to be - loving, serving, helping, healing.

It docsn't have to worry about survival ~ God will take care of that. I+
has to worry only about being what Christ called it to be-g If only we

could understand that about ourselves: if only we could see that we arc
called together not to be successful - but to be faithful - if only we could
exercise the freedom God gives us.

“hat does it mean to be free? We began with that question, and
now I would pose it personally. What does it (or could it) mean to you and
me to be free?

You know, I think somewhere in the back of our minds we know, or
at least we have some image - some hint. I think our over—reaction to the

The Hour Strikes
Isaiah 40:1-5; 9-11
Matthew 3:1-17
January 10, 1971
John M. Buchanan

He came out of the desert, as had the people themselves, and as had their
prophets time and time again in the past. He was a strange man; mad — some
would have said: "a little touched" - which is one way men have always
described an individual "touched" by the hand of God. He was strange, and yet
compelling in a deep and irrational way. The people knew about the prophets:
the prophets had been strange too. They had dressed, eaten, spoken and acted
differently. But in their long history, the prophetic individual had played
a major role in keeping the people in touch with the word and will of God.

So, in spite of misgivings and suspicion and fear they came out of the
towns and cities to hear a man by the name of John the Baptizer. Like a
prophet from centuries past he zeroed in on the facade of piety they used to
disguise immorality. He told them to repent: turn around: start all over
again. And as a sign and seal of this fresh beginning he invited them to join
him in the Jordan River, in a ritual known as baptism. Thus, his name — John
the Baptist. To Christian tradition John.is important because he was a sign
that something was about to happen. In the idiom of the Old Testament — he
was one breaking new ground for a unique coming of God himself.

Of all the personalities presented in the pages of the Bible, John is
one of the most interesting - and, in a sense, disturbing to our button-down
mentality. Like the Jesus who came out to hear him, we find him at the same
time compelling and repelling. 3

We know next to nothing about his origins. The New Testament tells us
only that his mother, Elizabeth was a relative of Mary, the mother of Jesus:
that his father was a priest; and that the conception of the child was a very
surprising event because it happened when his parents were far beyond the
ordinary, age for things like that to happen. We know, that is to say, that

there was something special, something out of the ordinary, about his birth.

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ethical content and the peculiar style of life.

His message was one of repentance, renewal and preparation for God's
activity. In this sense it is not unlike the prophetic message of his
predecessors. But John practiced Baptism, a rite common.to many of the
Eastern mystery religions, but within Judaism reserved soley for Gentile
converts. A Jew, by birth, never in history had been baptized. A Gentile who
wished to become a Jew, had to submit to circumcision saorifice and baptism.
So John, standing in the river and inviting Jews to repent and be baptized
was, in effect,excommunicating the whole nation: he was saying that something
so great, so important was about to happen, that nothing short of a total
renewal experience was adequate as preparation. It did not, needless to say,
win him friends from among the Pharises, Saduccess and Temple Priests.

The hour struck for John the Baptist, when Jesus of Nazareth appeared in
the orowd one day along the banks of the river. John sensed that He was the
one; said it and at Jesus request - baptized him. John maintained a following
after that, was in correspondence with Jesus and his disciples — but was
arrested and executed finally by the puppet king as a favor to a step~
daughter.

The one who was baptized, Jesus of Nazareth, comes to the center of the
stage with little more history than John. We know about his birth: we know
about a trip to Jerusalem for the Passover when he was a boy and that is all.
Again, educated speculation is that he grew up in a Jewish home in the town
of Nazareth: that he was schooled in the Synagog: that he learned his
father's trade: that he had brothers and sisters: that his father Joseph
apparently died and accotding to custom, Jesus would have assumed responsibility
for the care and support of eu family.

The debate about when Jesus knew that he site the Messiah has raged for
years, and often times, I think, reflects our discomfort with his manhood.

A recent book suggests that he mast have been married liegt and while there

is no evidence for that, the suggestion does remind us of his humanity, his

a
by reviewing very familiar material. Let us now go deeper — and think together
about the issues raised by this event. It is really one issue — a very important
one ~ a very immediate one for your life and mine. The name of the issue is
"Revelation", and the question is “Does it really happen?" "Does God do it?¥ —
or is it all the issue of the fertile imaginations of peculiar people?

The importance of the issue is documented by the number of books in which
theologians have struggled with it. In semi-academic terms it is stated this
way. Is the truth of the Christian Gospel born out intellectually - in the
theological, philosophical brilliance of the human mind? Or are we dealing,
in the final analysis, with something so totally subjective - so intensely
personal — that its truth is validated in each heart and each set of emotions?

Scholars of equal capability line up on both sides. But the real problem
is that Western man stopped paying much attention to the subjective -— the
feeling, emotion side of things several centuries ago. The soientific method,
the rational approach to every problem dragged civilization out of the middle
ages and gave birth to the machine age, modern science and the age of tech~
nology. And in things religious it said "if you can't prove it, it isn't
true. if you can't weigh it, measure it, analyze it, place it in a certified
category, and make a scientific law out of it, it doesn't exist."

Now, you and I wouln't say it quite that way, but we are very much the
childfen of Western civilization. As Middle Class Americans, we are very much
the ultimate result of the scientific method. The very rich consult the stars:
the very poor consult their emotions and empty stomachs: we consult our
computers. And the effect of it all is the word "revelation" has very little
meaning to the vast majority of Middle Class American Protestants. Revelation
after all, is not a very scientific idea.

It is, however, a very important theological idea. Our faith is built
on the idea that Almighty God, in his eternity and power, does intrude into
human history at certain times and places. Correspondent to that idea is that

God does intrude into the lives of individual men and women: that he reveals

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they sense their own brand of revelation, we simply are not alert to the self
disclosure of God when it happens right in front of our faces.

The most incredible affirmation of Christian Faith, and that which distinguishes
the Judeo-Christian tradition from all the religions of the world, is that it is
God's nature to disclose himself to men. And that at given points in time and
space he comes into the lives of individual men and women — into, that is, your
life and my life.

The word of God in all of this, it seems to me, is for Christian people to
tune in ~ to be alive to every event, to keep eyes and ears open to the revealing
of God. And whan it happens, as it will, to give thanks for it: to rejoice
in it: to repent and commit oneself; and to begin anew that life in the new

Kingdom which it heralds.

Our father, awaken us to your continuing revelation. Keep us from the
sterility of intellectualized religion: ‘tune our hearts and minds and senses
to the miracle of your presence in the common events of our lives. Through

Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.