For even mature Christians, the question of how we should live and our essential role as a believer can be a perplexing one. In any body of believers, there hardly exists two people who approach every issue or question the same way. On the fringes, you have those who live for Christ by choosing not to participate in anything that is questionable or deemed unnecessary. On the opposite side you have those who embrace Christian liberty as if it is a blank sheet of paper on which we are allowed to craft our own standards of righteousness.

In the middle are those who try to find balance and responsibility.

If there is a constant, it is that those who are more conservative are deemed legalists and those who are more moderate are deemed liberal.

As with any foundational question, the methods of approach and attack are nearly endless.  Instead of listing each and responding to each, I’ll give my approach.

First of all, we must remember that it isn’t a question of freedom vs. moderation. Paul preached both and it is safe to say that he agreed with himself.  We, as believers, must take Paul’s admonishments to enjoy our freedom and practice caution for the sake of our own and other’s conscience with equal importance.

But the most important thing we must remember is that we, as believers in Christ, are not evaluated on our own merits or our own righteousness. When God looks at us, he sees only Jesus’ sacrifice and Jesus’ righteousness.

So why should we live righteously? For the glory of God. Our natural response to God’s mercy and favor, in light of what we deserve, should be thankful obedience. Obedience not out of fear of reprisal, but out of gratitude and devotion.  The new person, the part of us that is saved and set apart for God’s work should be naturally inclined to seek God’s glory and honor.

When we forget this, righteousness and righteous behavior becomes a burden. Why? Because we know we’re terrible at it. Consequently, we become weary and view every sin as an arrow for God’s cosmic quiver of punishment and every act of righteousness as preventative maintenance or at the very least, futile in light of how much easier it is and always will be to sin.

It’s poison.

Properly understanding our position before God and our motive for righteousness is crucial, but it is also important to understand freedom.

Truthfully, most of us view freedom as an outward journey…finding the limits. We envision freedom as the opposite of slavery or imprisonment. But this isn’t exactly the kind of freedom we have in Christ.  In Romans, Paul says that we are no longer slaves to sin and now are slaves to righteousness.

How do we reconcile our slavery to righteousness with our freedom from the tyranny of the law and the liberation that is Christ?

Freedom isn’t always the opposite of slavery. Sometimes it is the ability to willingly place ourselves under the authority of another…namely, God.

Even as we are liberated from the Law, we are freed to subject ourselves to the law of Christ.  Paul refers to this in 1 Corinthians 9:21:

“To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. ” [Emphasis my own.]

Following Christ, devoting our lives to Him is synonymous with willingly subjecting ourselves to His way of life.

The question of caution vs. freedom is really an invalid one. The answer is both.

So don’t look for ways to shackle yourselves unnecessarily for the cause of increased “righteousness”.  But by the same token, also avoid the temptation to discard your obligation to be holy and set apart in the name of poorly defined freedom.

If you were looking for specifics,  that’s where you freedom really flexes its muscle. For each question, you have the freedom to use the Bible and your own conscience to resolve the issue.

Now go do it.

Clifton