God had dignified man by weaving into his nature the divine gift of freedom.
When we see what man has done with his Godgiven freedom, we can only wonder why God didn’t make us without it. He could have bound us to His sovereign will as a machine is bound to ours, and thereby relieved us of the risks and consequences of choice.
But for reasons of His own, God chose to place us in a rough and risky world with the awesome power to accept or reject His truth, to make or mar our destiny, to climb to the heights or sink to the depths.
There is no such thing as absolute freedom. The stars don’t have it; they are bound by the laws of the unseen hand of the universe. The oceans don’t have it; they are bound by the shoreline that will not retreat. Man doesn’t have it; he is hemmed in by other men and by the laws they make.
To most young people, freedom means liberation from the restraints of their parents. They don’t want to be hemmed in by stuffy moral standards. They don’t want to be limited by curfews. They don’t want to be shackled by responsibilities. They want the freedom of an adult and the responsibilities of a child.
This quest for freedom without responsibility is repeated millions of times every year by people of all ages. Husbands and fathers leave their wives and children for new lovers. Teenagers leave home, yelling over their shoulders at their weeping parents, “Don’t try to tell me what to do!” They are free from all discipline, restraint and responsibility—or so they think.
God gives us freedom so that we might serve one another in love!
We are never truly free until we are voluntarily mastered by something greater than ourselves. We see this in the story of God’s leading the children of Israel out of bondage in Egypt. They had been slaves; they were accustomed to being told what to do and when to do it. When God led them out of bondage, He did not say, “You’re free to do as you like, so party till you drop!” He took them straight to Mt. Sinai and gave them the Ten Commandments!
There is no freedom until we are bound to something greater than ourselves. Only when we are willing to say, “Make me Your captive, Lord,” will we know true freedom. That’s the day we will be happy in an unhappy world!
Source: Being Happy in an Unhappy World
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