Bailed Out--April 25, 2023

Bailed Out--April 25, 2023

"You know that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without defect or blemish." [1 Peter 1:18-19]

You have been set free.  As in, it is already accomplished.  As in, your release has been secured, the fines are paid, you've been bailed out, and the door is open.  You are already freed.

The trouble is, so often, we refuse to believe such news is a present-tense reality, and we keep staying stuck in old ruts thinking we have no choice but to remain trapped in the same old deathly cycles and the same old miserable habits we feel trapped inside.  And, to be honest, often Respectable Religious Leaders aren't very helpful, because they've [ahem... we've] often mangled the Good News to sound like it only speaks to our future after death, like it's about one day being free in heaven rather than knowing we have been redeemed now.  And as long as we think that "freedom" is just off in the future, it will always seem out of reach, conditional, and hypothetical.  It won't seem real to us until we understand it is already accomplished on our behalf.

There's a great line of the late theologian Robert Farrar Capon that comes to mind. He's reflecting on a passage from Paul's letter to the Romans where the apostle says, "There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus," and Capon says this:  

"Saint Paul has not said to you, 'Think how it would be if there were no condemnation'; he has said, 'There is therefore none.' He has made an unconditional statement, not a conditional one--a flat assertion, not a parabolic one. He has not said, 'God has done this and that and the other thing; and if by dint of imagination you can manage to put it all together, you may be able to experience a little solace in the prison of your days.' No. He has simply said, 'You are free. Your services are no longer required. The salt mine has been closed'."

That's the idea here in what we call First Peter, as well.  Our release from captivity is already accomplished.  God doesn't dangle it out in front of us like a carrot to a harnessed donkey, saying, "If you work hard enough for long enough, there will be a treat in store for you," but rather, "You can rest already--I've already redeemed you."  

Frankly, that's just the opposite of how so much of life in this world works.  For centuries, people found themselves in debt-slavery [or, politely, "indentured servitude"] where the hope of being freed was contingent on doing enough labor from the one who held your contract.  In our day and age, people find themselves burdened with huge student loans that keep them struggling along for decades with the hope that one day, they might be able to climb out from under the mountain of debt they are struggling with.  Companies tell employees to keep working loyally, and eventually [after they've "paid their dues"] they'll be promoted to a corner office or a better salary... only to find that the pay-off keeps getting pushed further into the future.  We are used to those kinds of arrangements, where the hope of release or freedom or "making it" is held out in front of us as something just over the horizon, but that we never seem quite able to reach, like chasing after the setting sun.  But the God we meet in the Scriptures doesn't work that way--from God's standpoint, we are already free.

And that, dear ones, is because God doesn't view us as a means toward an end, but as people worthy of love apart from what we can "do" for God or what God can "get" out of us.  When you are working for a company or trying to pay off an indentured servitude contract, your worthy is tied up in how you can benefit the boss.  Your work has a cash value to it, and you matter only insofar as that relationship is profitable to the ones holding the contracts.  But God's love doesn't hold debts against us like that, and God doesn't see us in terms of what God can "get" out of us. God's love--like all genuine love--seeks our flourishing, not our financial contributions to the bottom line.  And so from God's vantage point, the only thing love can do is to declare us already freed, rather than holding our release hostage as something we have to work for or earn.  You are already freed, and God has paid whatever price was necessary to accomplish it.  God has paid that price in Christ, because God loves you.  

Today, we are called to step out into the world taking God's gift of freedom seriously--knowing that God has already secured our release, and there are no strings or fine print.  And then, for others around us still stuck in the old mindset of thinking that God is just one more boss or master to be impressed, we are sent to bring the same message First Peter gave to us:  you are already set free.

Lord Jesus, let us dare to live in the freedom you have already accomplished for us.