Liberation from bondage brings freedom. Or can it mean becoming bound to something else? Both? We explore the bondage from which we seek liberation, and the exchange for bondage to what we seek, to what is worthy.
There is the bondage of being enslaved, like the fortune-telling girl in the story in Acts 16. Paul exorcises the demon, freeing her from it. But her value to her masters disappears, and they're quite unhappy.
They press charges against Paul and Silas and the others, bringing the bondage of imprisonment to the Jesus team as they are all jailed.
We find the jailer set in a dire predicament when an earthquake buckles the walls and the jail doors spring open. The inmates can easily escape now, and the jailer figures he is doomed by their liberation.
Instead, the jailer finds Paul and company have remained in their cell. We don't learn about the motivation, but the jailer certainly realized in all of this that he was trapped by the bondage of the jail as much as those jailed. He wants liberation himself. He finds that it is offered by these Jesus preachers, and he is baptized.
In the end, everyone leaves the jail, goes to the jailer's house and shares a meal together. Everyone is liberated, but the jailer has joined Paul and the Jesus people in being bound in service to the Lord.
The mind-numbing passage in John 17 is from Jesus' final prayer with his disciples before his arrest. Jesus talks about how all are now bound together in relationship: Jesus, God and the disciples. Jesus will soon experience bondage in his arrest, but they are all bound together in working for the Kingdom of new life.
It is the bondage sought in Jesus - liberation - as opposed to the bondage that confines and restricts. Jesus offers liberation and new life, but it comes by being bound in communion and covenant with him and with the way for the Kingdom.
There is the bondage of being enslaved, like the fortune-telling girl in the story in Acts 16. Paul exorcises the demon, freeing her from it. But her value to her masters disappears, and they're quite unhappy.
They press charges against Paul and Silas and the others, bringing the bondage of imprisonment to the Jesus team as they are all jailed.
We find the jailer set in a dire predicament when an earthquake buckles the walls and the jail doors spring open. The inmates can easily escape now, and the jailer figures he is doomed by their liberation.
Instead, the jailer finds Paul and company have remained in their cell. We don't learn about the motivation, but the jailer certainly realized in all of this that he was trapped by the bondage of the jail as much as those jailed. He wants liberation himself. He finds that it is offered by these Jesus preachers, and he is baptized.
In the end, everyone leaves the jail, goes to the jailer's house and shares a meal together. Everyone is liberated, but the jailer has joined Paul and the Jesus people in being bound in service to the Lord.
The mind-numbing passage in John 17 is from Jesus' final prayer with his disciples before his arrest. Jesus talks about how all are now bound together in relationship: Jesus, God and the disciples. Jesus will soon experience bondage in his arrest, but they are all bound together in working for the Kingdom of new life.
It is the bondage sought in Jesus - liberation - as opposed to the bondage that confines and restricts. Jesus offers liberation and new life, but it comes by being bound in communion and covenant with him and with the way for the Kingdom.
| 06-02-19-sermon.mp3 |
| 06-02-19-ff-answers.pdf |
| 06-02-19-liberation_in_bondage_together.pdf |