Faith: A Way to Freedom

 김정호목사 

Dr. Jung-Ho Kim, Pastor

그리스도께서 우리로 자유케 하려고 자유를 주셨으니 그러므로 굳세게 서서 다시는 종의 멍에를 메지 말라 ² 보라 나 바울은 너희에게 말하노니 너희가 만일 할례를 받으면 그리스도께서 너희에게 아무 유익이 없으리라 ³ 내가 할례를 받는 각 사람에게 다시 증거하노니 그는 율법 전체를 행할 의무를 가진 자라 ⁴ 율법 안에서 의롭다 함을 얻으려 하는 너희는 그리스도에게서 끊어지고 은혜에서 떨어진 자로다 ⁵ 우리가 성령으로 믿음을 좇아 의의 소망을 기다리노니 ⁶ 그리스도 예수 안에서는 할례나 무할례가 효력이 없되 사랑으로써 역사하는 믿음 뿐이니라. For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. ² Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. ³ I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. ⁴ You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. ⁵ For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. ⁶ For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. (Gal 5:1-6)

FCF: We tend to depend on our own works to live in freedom.

주제: 그리스도 안에 있는 자유를 누리려 믿음으로 굳게 서야 한다.

Theme: We must stand firm in faith to enjoy our liberty in Christ.

Introduction 

There have been stressful times on and off in my life. Looking back, I can tell how I have gone through such times, whether I have walked through them by sight or by faith. One of the most stressful times was when I was studying for PH.D in Old Testament Interpretation at Bob Jones Seminary. Since I came to the States, I had been studying without any break. As soon as I finished my undergraduate study and graduate course, I got into the PH.D program. As soon as I finished my course work in spring, 2000, I was supposed to prepare for the comprehensive exam before I wrote my dissertation. During this period, I needed extra self-discipline because no one was watching over me and there were no definite deadlines. When I thought I was prepared, I would tell the professor that I was ready to take three language tests, Greek, Hebrew, and German, and other tests. I had to raise myself up in the morning and bring myself to the seminary library to study for those tests. No one pushed me to do it. Sometimes, I didn’t go to school a few days, while mindlessly or aimlessly wasting my precious time.

Then, I felt so guilt that I should do something to take off a sense of guilt. While go through a vicious cycle of studying, daydreaming, repenting, and recommitting to my task, I was questioning why I was pursuing the doctoral program at BJS. I was wondering why I should need the degree to become a minister of God’s Word. I simply didn’t want to study any more because I was fed up with studying. At the same time, I couldn’t quit and had to continue on without much confidence in what I was doing. I was always tired. My motivation hit the rock bottom. I felt burdened or depressed by worrisome thoughts of upcoming tough tests. I was plagued with nostalgia. I missed my parents. On top of this, I felt so lonely because I had no one to share my struggles, worries, or fears with. I was inundated with floods of purposelessness, meaninglessness, and helplessness. As a result, my health was failing. I was losing my hairs. I lost appetite for food, life, and spiritual things. Chronic diarrhea and fatigue were my companions. Though I prayed, I felt no presence or help of God. My prayer was at best a religious ritual that failed to give my inspiration for the Lord’s work. I just wanted to give up, run away, and hide my wearied soul in a remote place no one would recognize me. I was spiritually bankrupt.

Then, I asked myself why I was living that way, or what I was living for, or whether there was any meaning in life. One time, I closed my door and put myself to sleep, refusing to eat. I didn’t want to go anywhere or do anything. I was half-awake and half-asleep. I simply desired to quit my existence. Then, I felt evil forces took me over completely. I felt so terrified when I felt a dark spirit trying to take my soul captive. Then, I saw myself fighting it spontaneously in the name of Jesus Christ. A few minutes later, I came to my senses. I knelt down and prayed. I raised myself up and ate food. I regained my spiritual senses. I realized I was living by sight, not by faith. I was completely overwhelmed by unfavorable internal, and external circumstances. I failed to look to God by faith. I ignored the spiritual presence of God. I forgot that Christ was in me and I was in Him. I reclaimed the truth that I was saved from sin and death. I reclaimed the calling that I received from God to preach the gospel. My faith came back to me. I was able to free myself from the heavy shackles of spiritual depression. It was by faith that God set me free again and again from the bondage of depression, meaninglessness, anxiety, fear, or hopelessness. As soon as I see Christ being with me by faith, I can sing praises to God and begin to walk in the light of God’s word.        

Needless to say that faith is of utmost importance in Christian life. Indeed, without faith we can neither be justified nor please God. Without faith, we are still under darkness. By faith in Christ, however, we receive the benefits of salvation such as regeneration, justification, adoption, sanctification, and glorification. We are united with Christ by faith. By faith, we know Christ is in us and we are in Him. By faith, we know we are set free from spiritual bondage to enjoy freedom in Christ. Unbelievers are under the bondage of sin, self, and Satan, while believers are under the control of the Holy Spirit. As believers, we are given freedom Christ earned by paying His life and death. Paul says we are free in Christ and we are to keep and enjoy it in Christ. If we try to earn freedom by our performance, we will soon discover we bind ourselves with an unbearable burden. So, we have to adopt God-ordained way of living. We must stand firm to enjoy liberty in Christ. Last Sunday, we learned that relationship, not rule, and grace, not works are ways to stand firm to keep freedom. Today, faith is another way to stand firm to enjoy what we have in Christ.

However, before we enjoy it by faith, we must appreciate what faith is. When we understand characteristics of biblical faith, we can live accordingly, not to submit ourselves to the yoke of slavery. Without faith, we can do nothing to please God. Also, without understanding what faith is, we can’t enjoy what we have and what we are in Christ. To enjoy our liberty in Christ, we must stand firm in faith in Christ. Now, let’s see what characteristics of faith we may learn from Gal. 5:5-6. First, faith….

I. 믿음은 성령의 역사이다.

 Faith is the work of the Holy Spirit.

To live a life of freedom in Christ, we must be focused on Christ, grace, and faith. Faith is a key to keeping and enjoying liberty in Christ. Paul says: 우리가 성령으로 믿음을 좇아 의의 소망을 기다리노니 ⁶ 그리스도 예수 안에서는 할례나 무할례가 효력이 없되 사랑으로써 역사하는 믿음 뿐이니라. ⁵ For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. ⁶ For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. From these two verses, we glean some important truths on faith. First, faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit. Faith is not something we can work within ourselves. We can’t get it by trying to believe something our hearts can’t believe. When the Spirit of God moves our hearts to believe in Christ, we come to have faith in Christ. Faith wrought by the Holy Spirit leads us to live in freedom from sin and freedom in Christ. The Holy Spirit uses our faith to lead us to enjoy liberty in Christ. If you don’t have a saving faith, you must ask God for it instead of keeping trying to believe because faith is God’s gift (Eph. 2:8).

Because God gives us faith through His Spirit, we can’t conjure faith up on our own. We may desire to have faith. But God gives and increases our faith through His Spirit. So, to stand firm in faith, we have to look to the Holy Spirit, not to our self. When we try to believe something our hearts and minds are reluctant to accept as true, we may mesmerize ourselves by saying, “I believe, I believe” to reach the state of confidence. In this case, faith is man-made. It will fail when it faces reasonable doubt or fiery trials. On the contrary, when the Holy Spirit works within our souls, we come to believe God and His Word.

Faith becomes natural to Spirit-filled Christians. Faith-filled Christians are Spirit-filled. Spirit-filled Christians are faith-filled, neither information-filled nor profession-filled. We often equate faith with knowledge. If we have knowledge of Christ’s death and resurrection, we assume we have faith. But faith is more than intellectual assent to the truths of the Bible. We may have a vast amount of Bible knowledge, and yet have not biblical faith. When the Holy Spirit works faith within our souls, we know we have faith in Christ. Here, faith is experiential, not intellectual. Though faith knows what to believe, it is more than intellectual assent to the historical information on the person and work of Jesus Christ. Our faith indicates we have encountered Jesus Christ personally as our Savior and Lord.

Faith is more than mere profession of Jesus Christ or possession of historical knowledge of Jesus. The church is filled with mere professors of Jesus Christ. But the Lord Jesus denies these professors. We must pay attention to the Lord’s warning: 나더러 주여 주여 하는 자마다 천국에 다 들어갈 것이 아니요 다만 하늘에 계신 내 아버지의 뜻대로 행하는 자라야 들어가리라. "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven (Matt. 7:21). It is true that true believers profess Jesus as their Lord. But their profession is not lip service. It is the Spirit-led and so genuine. Thus, it is life-changing. Our profession of Jesus is to be evidenced by bearing the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Mere profession and accumulation of Bible knowledge alone are not faith at all. Liberty-enjoying faith is the Spirit-filled faith. To stand firm in faith, therefore, we must resort to the Holy Spirit and seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Spirit-wrought faith humbles us. Genuine faith frees us from self-exaltation. It is self-effacing. It doesn’t seek attention to itself. It is focused on Christ. It always exalts Christ. But, we often see people bragging about their faith. They brag about how God has blessed them because of their great faith. If our faith becomes a means to promote our interests, it enslaves us, not frees us. Our justifying faith is to be sanctifying faith. Our faith should be never used as a ground for pride. If we equate our knowledge or profession with faith, then we may have reason for boasting. If a greater amount of factual knowledge of Jesus or a louder profession of Jesus is equal to a greater faith, then we will try to amass more knowledge about Christ and say more about Christ’s name to have a greater faith.

But we must know knowledge puffs us up. If it makes us arrogant over others, knowledge doesn’t liberate us; rather it imprisons us. Liberating knowledge is truth of God that humbles us. We must keep in mind God rejects the proud and gives grace to the humble. There is nothing we should glory in our faith. Our faith is not our work, but the Spirit’s work. This doesn’t mean the Holy Spirit believes on behalf of us. It is not the Spirit, but we, who have faith in Christ. But it is the Holy Spirit who works faith in our souls, so that we come to believe in Christ. In this sense, faith is a gift of God. So, faith is not our merit. We don’t glory in our faith. We glory in Christ alone. Our faith is God-ordained means of justification, which is a way to freedom in Christ. So, we must stand firm in faith to enjoy freedom in Christ.  

To enjoy liberty in Christ, we must first know we should rely on Christ alone, not our faith, because faith is a gift of God granted to us through the Holy Spirit. Secondly, we must know faith…

II. 믿음은 끝까지 소망 중에 기다린다.

 Faith waits in hope until the end.

Faith waits in hope. If you have faith in Christ, you will be a person of endurance and hope. Hope in the Bible is not wishful thinking, but confident expectation. Faith gives us hope for God’s final deliverance. “The hope of righteousness” here refers to the consummation of salvation at Christ’s return. By faith, we eagerly anticipate the day of the Lord’s return. Faith fixes our eyes upon the day we will be with Christ in heaven. Such faith-based hope frees us from spiritual bondage. It helps us stay away from sin. It helps us purify ourselves from pollutions of this world. The apostle John says: ² 사랑하는 자들아 우리가 지금은 하나님의 자녀라 장래에 어떻게 될 것은 아직 나타나지 아니하였으나 그가 나타내심이 되면 우리가 그와 같을 줄을 아는 것은 그의 계신 그대로 볼 것을 인함이니 ³ 주를 향하여 이 소망을 가진 자마다 그의 깨끗하심과 같이 자기를 깨끗하게 하느니라. ² Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. ³ And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure (1Jo 3:2-3).

Faith works with hope to sustain us under all circumstances. The reason we have hope for tomorrow is that we trust a God of faithfulness and goodness. Such trust looks forward to a brighter future when we will be perfectly vindicated. Faith waits under harsh circumstances in hope until Christ returns. Adversities bring about hope in us. Hope will be fulfilled as we go through entangling troubles in life. Paul says, ² 또한 그로 말미암아 우리가 믿음으로 서있는 이 은혜에 들어감을 얻었으며 하나님의 영광을 바라고 즐거워하느니라 ³ 다만 이뿐 아니라 우리가 환난 중에도 즐거워하나니 이는 환난은 인내를, ⁴ 인내는 연단을, 연단은 소망을 이루는 줄 앎이로다 ⁵ 소망이 부끄럽게 아니함은 우리에게 주신 성령으로 말미암아 하나님의 사랑이 우리 마음에 부은바 됨이니. ² Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. ³ Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, ⁴ and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, (Rom. 5:2-4).

To wait in hope until the end, we must understand faith is a new vision, trust, and faithfulness. First, faith is a vision. When the Holy Spirit wrought faith in our hearts, we begin to see things from a new perspective. Faith is a new vision whereby we see everything from a new perspective. Spirit-wrought faith changes our vision, perspective. It leads us to see ourselves sinners first. When we didn’t have faith in Christ, we were self-righteous. We didn’t feel we needed Christ as our Savior. Or we thought we were able to get justified before God through our good works. But when we receive a new vision of faith from the Holy Spirit, we begin to see ourselves entirely dependent upon Jesus Christ. We begin to appreciate the sufficiency of Jesus Christ and worship Him with our hearts. We begin to see Christ died for our sin. We begin to see Christ’s perfect righteousness endowed upon us in grace.

We begin to see the invisible. We begin to see heaven. We begin to value the invisible. We see God the Father. We see His overflowing grace. We view ourselves as His precious children for whom Christ shed His precious blood. We begin to understand Christ did everything for our salvation and we did nothing to deserve and earn it. We get humbled. We begin to see others better than ourselves. As we see ourselves accepted, forgiven, and loved by God, we begin to see fellow Christians in the same way. Here, we find reason to have peace with fellow Christians. Furthermore, we begin to see unbelievers need God’s eternal love. With this new perspective, we begin to see our new purpose in life. However, if we do not have such a new perspective or anticipation of the future on the basis of God’s promises, we may not exercise our faith or do not possess faith.

John Maxwell tells about a small town in Maine that was proposed for the site of a great hydro-electric plant. A dam would be built across the river and the town submerged. When the project was announced, the people were given many months to arrange their affairs and relocate. During those months, a curious thing happened. All improvements ceased. No painting was done. No repairs were made on the buildings, roads, or sidewalks. Day by day the whole town got shabbier and shabbier. A long time before the waters came, the town looked uncared for and abandoned, even though the people had not yet moved away. One citizen explained: “Where there is no faith in the future, there is no power in the present.” That town was cursed with hopelessness because it had no future. Christians have hope in the brightest future because they believe the promise of the consummation of our salvation in Christ. Thus, we have the hope that works with our faith today whereby we work hard for the kingdom of God and we enjoy freedom in Christ.

Thus, to claim to have faith in Christ means to have a new vision and perspective of the future. We look at ourselves, others, and God from the perspective of faith. We look at life from the perspective of faith. Life is no longer a meaningless pursuit of happiness.  It is full of meaning for God and others. It is God’s calling for a higher and freer life in Christ. Through the lens of faith, we begin to see suffering and pain in life as God’s means of training, sanctification, and blessing. Instead of letting suffering locking us up in the dungeons of habitual sins, fear of death, despair, or depression, we must look at it from the perspective of faith in the sovereign, almighty, good, and faithful Father who has given us His Son. When we see the Father suffering in His Son on the Cross, we are enabled to endure under all circumstances and find rest in the unconditional love of the Father. The perspective of faith saves us from a lot of pain, struggle, or doubt. When we see God by faith in all things, we can find meaning, strength, confidence, and happiness in Christ by faith. With God, we can enjoy liberty in Christ. We need faith to see God in all things. By faith, we can endure patiently to the end until we experience the consummation of salvation in heaven.      

Second, faith is trust. The new vision of faith leads us to trust. Since we see God under all circumstances, we are able to trust God. No matter what we go through, we know God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and gracious. So, we commit ourselves to God. We rely on God. Faith is trust and commitment. We can jump off the cliff, knowing God will take us up down there. When we trust God, we can overcome doubt and fear. Peter was sinking down when he took his eyes off from Christ. He was fear-gripped when he looked at the raging sea and wind. He was supposed to keep trusting Christ who commanded him to walk on the water. The disciples, who thought they were dying though Christ was asleep in the boat, should have trusted Christ’s power and faithfulness. They should have realized they couldn’t perish with Christ in the boat. It was a matter of trust and commitment. Christ, after He woke up, rebuked their faithlessness. Faithlessness always leads to doubt, fear, and worry. It binds us with the bondage of doubt, fear, and worry. But faith-trust gives us confidence and freedom in Christ. This is what we need. We can ask it of the Holy Spirit.

Third, faith is faithfulness. Faithfulness refers to steadfastness, stickability, or persistence. If we stop believing or trusting in Christ on the way to heaven, it may mean we may never have believed in Christ. Once we believe, we continue to believe. We may go through ups and downs in our faith life. But, we will stick to Christ until we get to heaven, because we have hope of our final salvation. How can we be faithful to Christ? We have to depend on Christ’s faithfulness. Christ never leaves us nor forsakes us. He is our faithful and good Shepherd who died for His sheep. We can count on His faithfulness. When we see God is faithful to us, therefore, we can be faithful to Him. Though we change on the way, God never changes from His faithfulness. Though we may swerve from the right path, God is still faithful and brings us back to it. God’s faithfulness is His unchanging love and grace whereby we can wait in hope until the final completion of our salvation at Christ’s return.

Christian faith is not a mere profession of Christ. It is more than the knowledge of Jesus Christ. It is the gift of God that changes us. It waits in hope until we get to heaven. While waiting in hope for that day, faith is a new vision, trust, and faithfulness to Christ. Such faith is not dead. It is a saving faith. Finally, faith…

III. 믿음은 사랑과 함께 일한다.

 Faith works together with love.

Faith works. It is effective to change us positively. It has power to move our lives. It changes a Paul persecutor into a Paul evangelist. It changed timid disciples into lion-hearted martyrs. Faith is energetic. But tradition like circumcision does not change our status at all. It doesn’t change our character. Paul says circumcision or un-circumcision is ineffective to change us from sin to righteousness.

As James says, faith that does not work is dead. Saving faith is always a working faith. How do we know that our faith is working or not? Among other things, we have to check on whether our faith is working itself to be expressed in love. Love is not only a result of faith, but also a companion of faith. Love comes from a sincere faith (1 Tim. 1:5). In fact, love sums up the whole law. Faith energizes us by grace to love God and others. When we say to poor brothers and sisters, “Go and warm yourself. Feed yourself,” instead of giving them food, our faith is not working through love.

This is what James says: ¹⁴ 내 형제들아 만일 사람이 믿음이 있노라 하고 행함이 없으면 무슨 이익이 있으리요 그 믿음이 능히 자기를 구원하겠느냐 ¹⁵ 만일 형제나 자매가 헐벗고 일용할 양식이 없는데 ¹⁶ "너희 중에 누구든지 그에게 이르되 평안히 가라, 더웁게 하라, 배 부르게 하라 하며 그 몸에 쓸것을 주지 아니하면 무슨 이익이 있으리요" ¹⁷ 이와 같이 행함이 없는 믿음은 그 자체가 죽은 것이라. ¹⁴ What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? ¹⁵ If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, ¹⁶ and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, be warmed and filled," without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? ¹⁷ So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. (Jam 2:14-17). Love is evidence of faith. Faith makes us fulfill the law of love in Christ. 

Believers are those who love God and others in the transforming power of Christ’s love. When we fail to love, we fail in faith. When our faith is not working properly, we will not love. We will love ourselves rather than God and others. When faith fills its tank with the fuel of grace and love, it moves its engine forward into the world to be the light in the world. When our faith is cool and intellectual, then it will be self-loving. What do we hear about Christianity in Korea? Pastors’ moral failures, church splits, sexual scandals, legal suits against one another hit headline, providing the world for its gossips. The world is worried about the church today. The church is to be concerned about the spiritual deadness of the world. But the world is more concerned about the deadness, spiritual decay of the church. This means Christian faith is failing. People in the world no longer see Christians as those who love one another. They see us as those who claim to believe and yet do not live accordingly. They point out a visible difference between our profession of faith and our action. We must remember what Paul says here. Faith works together with love to enjoy liberty in Christ. Faith and love are inseparable twins. They are essential Christian virtues that truly free us from sin and its bondage. True love frees us. We see it in God’s love that truly liberates us.   

Why then are we enslaved by sin and law even when we claim that we have faith in Christ? One of our mistakes is that we see faith as a mere profession of Christ’s death and resurrection. If we profess that Christ died for our sin and rose from the dead, we count ourselves as believers. But devils know that Christ died and rose from the dead. Mere confession of factual information on Christ and mere historical knowledge of Jesus Christ are not equal to biblical faith. It is true that faith professes and possesses the historical facts on the person and work of Jesus Christ. But faith is more than intellectual assent to the information on Christ. Faith is a personal trust in the person and work of Jesus Christ. It is not a reliance on one’s possession and profession of the knowledge of Christ. But it relies on Christ, not on self-righteousness. Faith is a denial of self-righteousness. Also, it is faithfulness to Christ. Those who have faith in Christ are faithful to Him. As Christ is faithful to believers, believers are those who keep faithful to Christ. 

Such faith waits, hopes, works, and loves. It abandons self-glory. It glories only in Christ. It forsakes self-reliance. However, if we live by self-reliance, then we will be enslaved by law and self. Self-reliance keeps us in the prison of self. We know by experience that our self is too unreliable to achieve salvation by works.  But if we live by faith, then we will use our freedom to love God and others. Faith is a link where we connect heaven with earth. It is a vision whereby we see the invisible in a visible world. Faith is trust. Faith is faithfulness. How germane it is for Paul to say, “The just shall live by faith.”

We must stand firm by faith in Christ. This is the way we keep and enjoy liberty in Christ. Christ has set us free to be free. Christian freedom is not freedom to be left alone, but freedom to serve God freely. The best and truest freedom is the kind described by John Stott: 하나님과 다른 사람을 사랑하며 책임 있게 살기 위해서 나의 어리석은 자아로부터의 자유이다. “freedom from my silly little self, in order to live responsibly in love for God and others.”. Philip Ryken says, 우리가 그리스도를 의지하여 그분의 사랑으로 가득찬 헌신적 사랑으로 하나님과 이웃을 능히 사랑하게 될 때에 우리는 가장 자유하다. “We are most free when we so trust in Christ that we are filled with His love, and thus enabled to love God and others with selfless sacrifice.” So, the apostle Peter exhorts this way: 무엇보다도 열심으로 서로 사랑할찌니 사랑은 허다한 죄를 덮느니라. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins (1 Pet. 4:8).

When we truly experience God’s love, we enjoy freedom from a sense of inferiority, meaninglessness, or unhappiness. When we feel God’s love, we are happy and free. God is most free because He is perfect love. Likewise, when we truly love God and others, we are most free and get closer to perfection. Love labors. Love involves trouble. Love is still happy because it is not bound by hate, laziness, or unforgiving spirit. Think of a loving mother who sacrifices everything to take care of her baby. Surely, it seems that she is bound with ceaseless efforts to feed, entertain, protect, and care for her infant. However, she gladly labors for the welfare of her beloved baby. She is willing to die for her baby. When she looks at her smiling baby, she forgets all her labor. She freely enjoys love with her baby. It is her love that freely serves her baby. She is not forced to take care of her baby. She is willing to do anything for the baby because she loves her baby. Love truly frees her. Love makes her happy. When she most freely loves her baby, she is happiest and freest. Love sets us from the shackles of self-love. Ironically, the more we try to love our self, the less likely we will be happy and free. True love that comes from faith in God leads us from true freedom in Christ.    

Conclusion 

If you feel you are shackled by a sense of meaninglessness, hopelessness, or depression, you can come to the Lord Jesus Christ who freely loves us with perfect love. You are loved, forgiven, and accepted into the family of God. You are redeemed free from the slavery of sin, self, and Satan by Christ. You are free from sin and free to serve God. Remember our Lord Jesus Christ had lived a life of freedom. He was perfectly free from sin. His freedom was in the Father’s unfailing love. He was not bound by traditions. He was not bound by legalism. He was not bound by people’s perception. He was totally free in the Father’s perfect love. He truly trusted the Father. He did everything in dependence upon His Father, though He could do it on His own. God demonstrated His own love for us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. You should let God’s love free you from the slavery of self. You should let it move your heart to love God and others. If you refuse God’s liberating love, you will get caught up in your pride. Pride imprisons us. Take your eye of faith off from yourself to Christ. Enjoy freedom in Christ. Keep and enjoy it in Christ, not by rule, but by relationship with Christ, not by works, but by grace, and not by self-reliance, but faith in Christ.

Now, I encourage you to check on whether your faith is working or not. Saving faith is a working faith with love. It endures through all in this life, sticking to Christ. When your faith is solid and sound, you can stay faithful, fulfilling the high calling of God. Don’t assume your faith is working well because you attend church regularly, read the Bible and pray regularly, and do not smoke and drink, etc. A sure way to check your faith is working is that you love God and others in the transforming power of Christ’s love. Your faith frees you to see things from the perspective of God, endure under all circumstances, and faithfully wait until the day of Christ’s return. The threefold gift of God, faith, hope, and love, shows we are on the right track to freedom in Christ. You should be determined not go back to the slavery of sin and death. Please, look up to Jesus the author and perfecter of your faith. He is to us God’s wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption (1 Cor. 1:30). Please, let Paul’s exhortation ring in your heart: 그리스도께서 우리로 자유케 하려고 자유를 주셨으니 그러므로 굳세게 서서 다시는 종의 멍에를 메지 말라.  For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Benediction 

²⁴ 능히 너희를 보호하사 거침이 없게 하시고 너희로 그 영광 앞에 흠이 없이 즐거움으로 서게 하실자 ²⁵ 곧 우리 구주 홀로 하나이신 하나님께 우리 주 예수 그리스도로 말미암아 영광과 위엄과 권력과 권세가 만고 전부터 이제와 세세에 있을지어다 아멘. ²⁴ Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, ²⁵ to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

(Jud 1:24-25)