The Greatest Enemy of Freedom is Freedom

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Tommy.

Thank you all.

It's a tremendous privilege to be here.

I'm only sorry to break into Tommy and Laura's first Sunday back.

I'm sure you're raring to hear them.

And I'm breaking into that and very aware of it.

But you'll have them next Sunday, I imagine.

But it's a real privilege for Jenny and me.

Before we open the word, let's pray.

Lord, open your word to our hearts and our hearts to your word.

We ask in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

I'm sure many of you, if not most of you, have been to the Korean War Memorial.

And the most striking words there are well known.

Freedom is not free.

Brief, memorable, moving if you think about it.

It obviously speaks to that, what Lincoln called the last full measure of devotion that a citizen can give to his country in giving his life.

But what America needs to ponder today is not that, although it's still relevant, but the paradox of freedom, which is not so inspiring.

The paradox of freedom is very simply this.

The greatest enemy of freedom is freedom.

Freedom never lasts.

It never has in any country.

Freedom never lasts.

pages of history.

And it's ones that Americans need to wrestle with today.

But, of course, we know that the greatest textbook and the longest running tutorial on freedom is the biblical understanding.

And at a time when America is abandoning the American Revolution, which was decisively biblical in its origins through the Reformation, and going back to ideas that essentially come from the Enlightenment and the French Revolution and its heirs, very different ideas of freedom, many of them insubstantial and many of them dangerous and disastrous.

We, as followers of Jesus, we, as followers of Jesus, need to be people who think through and stand for deep and realistic views of freedom.

And I want to open up just one tiny part of that from Exodus this morning.

The Bible, I think, gives us the highest and most balanced humanism in all history.

In other words, the highest view of humanity, but the most realistic in its balance.

So humans are exceptional in their freedom made in the image of God, but they are consequential because they can always act in freedom for either good or for ill, and those choices have consequences.

So let me raise three questions of the passage we read or was read to us.

First, very simply, where does freedom come in the story?

Now, one way that's terribly obvious, but another way it's not actually that obvious.

Exodus is the story of the freeing of Israel from captivity in Egypt, yes.

But there's much, much more behind that that goes all the way back to Genesis.

And in contrast to all the nations around Israel.

In the ancient world, people were not free.

They were ruled by their stars.

If we go back to the Greeks, for all their stress on a certain type of freedom in the public square,

behind everything was fate, moira, destiny.

And if we read our secularist friends today, for example, most recently, Sam Harris,

freedom is a fiction.

The same simple fact is you cannot use naturalistic science,

which is the grounding of many of their worldviews, to justify freedom.

We are the greatest champions of freedom, along with our Jewish friends.

And it goes back to the Torah.

Many Christians say, well, where is freedom apart from the freeing of the slaves?

Christians love the word, the sovereignty of God.

What that means is freedom.

God's freedom to exert his will against any interference or resistance.

He is sovereign.

He is free.

I am who I am.

And as the Jews put it, the alternative translation,

I will be who I will be.

God is supremely free.

God is sovereign.

And we men in his image are not sovereign as he is, but we are significant.

So yes, we're part of nature.

And the laws of nature operate.

And there's a certain cyclical element to human life.

We're born, we grow, we decline, we die.

But at the same time, with the breath of life, we are the only form of life that has that freedom.

And you can see that coming out.

And in Exodus, God is calling for a free people to worship him freely,

and so he rescues them from their captivity.

But let's ask a second question.

Or put it another way.

The issue in that first one is lordship.

Lordship.

Again and again in Exodus, I am the Lord.

The Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.

You will know that I am the Lord.

When?

When he frees his people from captivity.

Now interestingly, the word serve here,

there's one word in Hebrew used for slavery,

used for service of the Lord,

and used for worship.

It's the same word.

Slavery to Pharaoh is the same word for the service and worship of the Lord,

but of course, it's a freedom,

and as our wonderful Anglican prayer book puts it,

whose service is perfect freedom.

But let's raise the second question,

because I think we need to explore the way freedom comes in so strongly.

But secondly, was God fair?

You heard in the reading,

Pharaoh will resist you,

and I will harden his heart.

And many people are puzzled over that.

Is Pharaoh just God's plaything?

A puppet for him to push aside to free his people,

the Israelites,

and the great supreme act of favoritism?

And if Pharaoh was not responsible,

why is he judged in that way?

In other words,

behind that is the issue of justice for Pharaoh,

but behind that for us is the issue of justice in the universe.

As Abraham says,

Shall not the judge of all the earth do right?

We want to fight for justice in our world today,

in all sorts of fronts,

but how can we,

if justice is capricious and selective?

And you have here an example of what is really injustice,

as God is hardening Pharaoh's heart,

and Pharaoh has nothing to do with it.

Actually, if you follow the story carefully,

you can see the answer to that.

Partly in the mounting challenge of the ten plagues,

which we have no time to look at,

but you can see that it's not Moses against Pharaoh,

it's God against Pharaoh and the gods of Egypt.

And each of the plague addresses the people of Egypt

and Pharaoh behind them,

and the gods of Egypt behind them again.

But the real answer to the question of God's justice

comes in the wording of the ten plagues.

Because if you read it carefully,

and many people don't notice it,

in the first five plagues,

it explicitly says,

it is only in the second five plagues,

six to ten,

that it says the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart.

Now, of course,

the question is,

what on earth does that mean?

And the rabbis and the sages and Christian commentators

have puzzled over it.

Some have said it's a form of punishment,

God's hardening his heart,

for the first five hardenings.

Maimonides,

the great Jewish rabbi in the 12th century,

he said it's a way of God's withholding

the possibility of repentance

and hardening Pharaoh's heart.

Some have argued that it's actually God's stiffening

of Pharaoh's resolve.

Because halfway through,

even his own courtiers and counselors

urge him to let them go.

In other words,

he could give in easily

to the groupthink and the pressures around him,

and certain rabbis have said,

no, God sees his freedom,

and that's his resolve,

and God is hardening his heart

and stiffening his resolve

to be what he chooses to be.

But I think the simplest explanation

is by far the best

and the most profound.

The story of the plagues

is the story of Pharaoh

perverting and corrupting his freedom.

In other words,

as you see with evil always,

choice leads to habit,

habit leads to character,

and character eventually becomes compulsion.

In other words,

judgment in the scripture

is not a drone strike.

God's zapping people

from the heavens

with a lightning bolt or whatever.

Sometimes it's that.

More often,

it's God's leaving people

or driving people

to the logic

of their own settled choices.

So, free people

who can choose

either good or ill

can make choices

which become habits,

and Tocqueville's famous word,

the habits of the heart,

we think of as positive,

and it is.

Habits of the heart

which are virtue

and all those various good things,

but the habits of the heart

can be negative.

And choices made negatively

become habits of the heart

that are character

and eventually compulsion.

So, a third question

we might ask

of this little passage,

who was really free?

Now, you might look

at the passage,

so Moses

is the leader

of a slave community.

Yes, he was brought up

as a prince of Egypt,

but he'd spent

40 years on the run,

and he's now back

as a leader of slaves,

and he has to make

the requests.

He's the supplicant.

Pharaoh stands before him,

the most powerful man

on the earth

in his day,

and therefore,

with such power,

the most free man

on the earth

in his day.

Any of you been to Cairo

or to Egypt as a whole

and seen the incredible

Giza pyramid

and others,

it was a statement,

a sermon almost in stone.

The widest part

at the bottom,

the people.

And slowly,

you come up to the apex,

and at the very top,

one stone,

one man,

Pharaoh,

the incarnate representation

of the sun god.

He was the most powerful.

He was the most free.

But you see,

as the story goes on,

halfway through,

as I said,

his courteous come to him,

let the people go.

Don't you realize,

they say to Pharaoh,

Egypt is ruined.

But still,

he hardens his heart

and refuses to let them go.

Now,

you can see behind that

and behind the biblical

understanding of freedom

and power,

the various things

we need to learn

about both power

and freedom.

Power is essential

to freedom.

But in our world,

which is a postmodern world

and there's no truth,

freedom is only power.

And we need to learn

the lessons of the Bible.

And you remember,

the most famous statement

on this was by

a Christian

in the 19th century,

Lord Acton,

all power

tends to corrupt.

Absolute power

corrupts absolutely.

In other words,

power does three things.

Most obviously,

power oppresses the weak.

And we need to address

truth to power

as the prophets did.

Less obviously,

power corrupts the powerful.

But also,

power creates anxiety

because the powerful

are worried

that their power

may slip away

and a rival may take it.

And power needs to be

well watched carefully.

Think of what's called

the suicidities trap.

When a ruling power

is challenged

by a rising power,

say America and China,

you have the most

serious challenges

coming.

But the biblical view

of power

is profoundly realistic.

But not just power.

Freedom.

As the rabbis,

the sages,

the Christian commentators

have said,

freedom

in a negative form

when it becomes evil

has always

two faces.

One face is outward,

what evil does

to the victim.

But the other face

is inward,

what evil does

to the perpetrator.

He or she gets away

with it,

but actually,

through the choices

that become negative

habits of heart,

that become character,

they are slowly

trapped by their choices

and eventually

becomes compulsion.

obsession.

And you can see

that ideas

that are compelled

become obsessions.

And behavior

that is compelled

becomes addictions.

And so,

by the end of the story,

you see that Pharaoh,

the most powerful

free man

in the world,

is actually on a course

for self-destruction

because he hardened

his heart.

God leads him

and drives him

to the logic

of his choice

of a hardened heart

and it proves

in the end of the day

self-destructive.

Again,

as the sages say,

who is really mighty?

Not the one

who conquers

his enemies,

but the one

who can conquer

himself.

himself.

One last question.

What are the lessons

that we can learn

from this passage

and wider still

from Exodus

as a whole?

With a short time,

I'll just mention

them all rather briefly.

First,

liberty

is God's goal

for humanity.

Put it in

New Testament terms.

It was for freedom

Christ set us free.

For the words

of our Lord,

you will know

the truth

and the truth

will set you

free.

As Paul says

in chapter 5

of Galatians,

you were called

to freedom.

Sadly,

at a time

when freedom

is in crisis today,

Christians are not

known for being

the greatest champions

and guardians

of freedom.

And we need

to think this through

and live it out

and speak it out

and show a way

to a more robust

and nuanced

realistic freedom

that truly points

the way forward

for genuine

human shalom

and flourishing.

Second obvious question

from lesson

from Exodus.

Liberty

is always

more

than liberation.

Liberation

is only the negative.

Freed

from Egypt.

Liberty

must be a way

of life

that goes on

from generation

to generation.

Or again,

as the rabbis

put it,

it took the Lord

one day

to get Israel

out of Egypt.

But it took them

more than 40 years

and counting

to get Egypt

out of Israel.

They were free,

but they still

weren't really free.

And I think

that's part of our

lesson again today

in the church.

Take, say,

the born again movement.

It puts such an emphasis

on born again,

testimonies,

what the Lord

has saved us from,

and not on

discipleship,

and living lives

of freedom

and communities

of freedom.

And we need to see

that it's that second,

the first,

of course,

essential.

It has to be there.

But the second,

the one that really

needs to go on.

Much American freedom

today is a libertarian

freedom,

which will just

dig its own grave

and already is,

and very different

from the founder's

freedom,

and certainly from

the Reformation freedom,

and behind that,

from the biblical freedom.

Thirdly,

what you see in Exodus,

liberty is not

either or.

It's always more

or less.

In other words,

it's not you're free

or not free.

But rather,

are we growing

in freedom?

Are we exercising

freedom?

Think of the

10,000 hours principle,

say, of piano playing

or ballet dancing.

The same is true

of freedom.

It's not just a matter

of freeing people

from whatever it is,

but of their

exercising freedom

and making freedom

a genuine habit

of the heart

and a growth

in character

and so on.

And we need

to stress that

in our world today,

which has got

a very lopsided

view of freedom.

But surely,

this particular passage

points to a fourth

simple lesson.

The freest people

become slaves

when they rule

everyone

except themselves.

I'm a visitor

to your country.

It's a strikingly

obvious thing.

You call yourselves

the land of the free.

No country

in the world

has a greater

amount of addictions,

recovery groups,

and so on today.

Americans are far

from free.

And you can see

that the unrealism

of modern American

freedom is a long way

from the early American,

let alone

the Reformation

and the biblical.

We need to put

our stress

on the habits

of the heart

and really think

it through carefully.

One last lesson,

though,

from Exodus

and in this passage,

too.

According to Exodus,

where is God

to be found?

I love apologetics.

I don't understand

what I'm about to say.

But if you say,

where is God

to be found

and how can I get

to know God today,

most Christians

will immediately

give you something

along the lines

of the theistic proofs

or a powerful case

for the proof

of the resurrection.

That isn't actually

the biblical way.

In other words,

our Western church

is much more Greek

than we realize.

The Greeks did think

of philosophy,

logic,

how you can tell things

from the course

of nature.

But while the Greeks

talked of philosophy,

the Bible talks

of history.

History.

And you can see it

very clearly here.

You shall know

that I am the Lord

when I bring you

out of Egypt.

You can think

of the Ten Commandments.

As the Jews point out,

what's the introduction

to the Ten Commandments?

You might have expected,

I am the Lord your God

who created heaven

and earth,

therefore,

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,

8, 9, 10.

What you actually have is,

I am the Lord your God

who brought you

out of Egypt,

and therefore,

etc.

in other words,

where is God?

God,

biblically?

The key is history

more than philosophy

and theory

by itself.

Not that we reject

the other,

but we know where God

is profoundly

to be seen,

and we need to see God

today

in history,

acting in our lives

in powerful ways.

So I'd urge you

as Americans

and Christian Americans

here,

very easy to consider

freedom

over against tyranny.

We are free

compared with

George III,

Hitler,

Stalin,

Pol Pot,

you name them.

And certainly,

the scriptures

have a lot of warnings

for tyrants,

the complacency of power,

triumphalism,

hubris,

and the way God

brings down the arrogant.

But surely,

the challenge

for us

in a very free society

is to wrestle

with the subtleties

and the paradoxes

of freedom.

You know the old saying,

the worst

is often

the corruption

of the best.

Our German friends

have to wrestle

with the awful fact

that their country

was the most educated,

the best

in civilization

and culture.

And it was out of that

that came

Hitler

and Himmler

and Heydrich.

So we can't just say

this is the land

of the free.

Freedom

never lasts.

And the Bible

gives us

all the warnings

of this.

Now I don't want

to end

in a negative note.

To me,

one of the great things

I think

in addressing

the present moment

is the biblical

notion

that the end

is not the end.

I'll put it differently.

In the Bible,

there are two ends.

There is an end

as an ending

and a conclusion.

The Latin word

finis,

ending.

And there is an end

as the Greek word

telos,

the end,

the purpose,

the goal,

the climax,

the culmination.

So you take

our great brother

St. Augustine.

While many Christians

were lamenting

the collapse of Rome,

his vision

of the city of God

within the city of man

looked to God's end

even in the ending

of Rome.

And his vision

gave the church

strength

to go through

what became

the dark ages.

I'm not saying

this is the ending.

Certainly we're seeing

the decline

of the West

and America

suffering its

gravest crisis

since the Civil War.

But whatever

endings you see

in that sense

of finis,

we know

as followers

of Jesus

there is always

an end,

a goal,

a purpose,

a climax,

a culmination

and God is working

those purposes out

even through

the other type

of ending.

So this is no time

to be dispirited

or downhearted

or demoralized

but rather

to explore

the full richness

of what it means

to follow Jesus.

and understand

the freedom

that he gives us.

The dignity

of humanity

that he shows us.

What justice means,

what peace means,

what equality means

and in a world

dying for the lack

of these deep things

to go out

and to be the people,

be the community

which demonstrates

those to our world

and shows

the glory of the gospel.

We of all people

should be the champions

and the guardians

of freedom

at this extraordinary moment.

The Lord be with you.

This is a midst Quest

and a friend

and unattended

to be the reason

and on not

the extent

of the gold

to be the wicked

and the power

ofShoxia

and the council

oforious

to be the

and peace

to be the

and the inscription

ofpex

America

has already

mentioned

that

and