Freedom #2

Underground Curriculum on Freedom.

Week 2: The track

If you take a train of any kind and place it on the open road, what happens? Nothing. A train needs a track in order to progress. The train's freedom to do what it is supposed to do comes from the track. Without it, the train is just a heap of metal.

Our track is God's plan. Daily, we have to choose to follow God's plan in our lives or to jump off the track and find our own way. Unlike the train, our lives will move either way. But there is freedom in being the person God created each of us to be.
A disobedient child may choose the freedom of jumping out of the tree house, but once his leg is broken, his freedom is lost. The obedient child will choose to climb down and will then be able to run to his next activity.

There is a definite disconnect between the world view and God's view here. And it is understandable. Religion seems stifling and binding, the world offers a freedom to choose whatever we want to do or be. But that is part of Satan's lies to us. Following God does not mean following some prescribed set of rules that are solely meant to make life miserable. Jesus gave us few commands: Love God and Love Others (Matt 22:36-40) and tell people about Him and teach them who He really is and what He really wants (Matt 28:18-20). The Old Testament is full of rules that God gave his people, and some of those rules are just good common sense. But they aren't rules that are meant to rule us: God is to rule us. The whole point of those rules was to point us to the fact that we can't do it without God (Gal 3:24). The Pharisees and Sadducees in the New Testament were constantly being blasted by Jesus because they made the rules their god instead of looking to the true God.

Gen. 3:1-24
Satan convinced Eve (and she convinced Adam) that disobeying God would lead to more freedom. He told her that if she ate the fruit she would become like God. She chose that false freedom over God's plan. And the consequences were severe. The most severe was simply that sin was introduced to humanity. Adam and Eve became aware of their sin and felt shame. They hid from God, something they had never felt compelled to do before, out of shame and fear. God took them out of the garden, the beautiful place God had made just for them, and they had to find their own way in the world. They had to provide their own food and protect themselves from the harsh reality of the world.

In the same way, when we choose the world's way instead of God's, we lose the beautiful life that God has planned for us, and we lose God's protection and provision in our lives.

Freedom #1

I help program for the preteen ministry at our church, The Underground. The name came, in part, because we were given a section of a storage room on the bottom floor. But our graphics focus on the Underground subway system. Our focus is on Freedom, and our verse is Gal. 5:13.
In August we are going to do a short study on freedom as a way to introduce our program to our new 5th graders, and this post is the formation of that study. If it rambles, that's why.

Week 1: The train (Free will).
The movement of a subway train represents each person's life. We are always going somewhere, never just wandering around. Even when it seems like we have no destination, everything we do, every choice we make, leads somewhere.
Gen. 2:4-25. God made Adam in God's own image and then placed Adam in the Garden of Eden. It was an ideal place, and life was wonderful. Even in paradise, there was work to do and there were choices to be made. Adam chose to be obedient because he loved God and because God had provided and had been all he had ever needed. God created Eve as a helpmate, and they were happy. They felt no shame because there was no sin or guilt.

Each of us is made in God's image. We have the ability and freedom to choose every day whom we will follow. When we stick to God's plan, God provides for us and protects us. That doesn't mean there won't be hardships (this is earth after all, not heaven), but God is with us every moment of every day. Our relationship with God is solely dependent on our own decisions: that doesn't mean that God punishes us for our mistakes by withholding himself, it means that he won't force himself on us if we don't seek him out. God forgives our mistakes, and he will do that daily, hourly, or more, if need be, but he will not take away our free will.

Free will. Everyone wants freedom, that's part of humanity. A child wants to escape from his mother's grasp and toddle off. (For a moment or two anyway.) Who would ever want to be forced to love or to obey someone else? There is joy in making a choice to love. Why didn't God just take away the choice and make it easy on us all? Because he wants to be loved, not simply obeyed. I can force my children to obey me by using a belt on their backsides, but nothing I do can force them to love me. I must build that by showing them love and by teaching them to trust me. That is free will. That is the basis of love. And God is the origin of love. It is impossible to truly love without freedom.

I'm looking for a movie clip to illustrate this point. Maybe something in "The Chronicles of Narnia". Week 2 will follow.