Dependence Day--July 4, 2025

Dependence Day--July 4, 2025

"By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. And those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit." (Galatians 5:22-25)

With all due respect to the poet William Ernest Henley, I am not "the master of my own fate," nor the "captain of my soul." Lots of folks are familiar with those lines from his famous poem, "Invictus," I know. But that's not how disciples of Jesus are taught to see ourselves.  We are no longer in command of our lives, charting our own course according to whatever whims of the day direct us.  We are people seeking to be directed by the Spirit who dwells within us, and we are on a course that puts us in the footsteps of Jesus, rather than our own wishes.  To be a disciple, in other words, means giving Jesus control of the steering wheel, rather than keeping him at second-in-command as the old bumper sticker had it, "Jesus is my co-pilot." To be a disciple means no longer being driven by the principle of "Me and My Group First" but rather to be guided by the Spirit who brings forth love, joy, peace, and self-control.

In a sense, then, to be a disciple of Jesus is to learn to live as sailboat people rather than automobile people.  That might seem a bizarre claim to make, so allow me to explain.

When I fill up my car's gas tank, the gasoline doesn't get any say in where I go once I've got it.  It is merely an object under my control.  I can do something wonderful in my car, like delivering a bouquet of flowers to the volunteers at the puppy hospital... or I can be a selfish jerk and drive myself alone to a casino where I could blow all my family's grocery money and college savings on slot machines.  The fuel can't stop me, because it can only give the car motion--but not direction.

By contrast, if I am navigating a sailboat, the wind that carries my ship has both.  It pushes in a certain direction as well as with a certain force. I can adapt my sails' position or adjust the rudder, but the wind definitely blows in a particular direction. The wind's force is what science-minded people call a "vector" rather than a "scalar" reality--it has both magnitude and direction.  We don't just say that the wind is blowing 10 miles an hour, but 10 miles an hour to the east, or to the west.  The gas in my car doesn't have a direction, but the wind that fills my sails does.  

And that difference is important when we think about the Christian life.  In fact, it's the key to understanding our life of discipleship and keeping us from imagining that Jesus is just along for the ride while we take the wheel.

Here's what I mean: I believe it is accurate to say that Christians are filled with Christ's own life.  Or as Paul said it in these words from Galatians than many heard in worship this past Sunday, we both live by the Spirit and we are guided by that Spirit.  The Spirit is not merely the "fuel" that makes us go, but the guiding hand at the ship's wheel giving us direction.  And I believe that when we say it, it is more than merely a metaphor or a figure of speech.  But, just to be clear, when we say that we are filled with the Spirit, it isn't the same as saying you have filled your car up with gas for your next road trip.  The Spirit isn't just a source of energy for us, to be burned up and consumed traveling in any direction we please. The Spirit gives us direction in the shape of Christ's own life--his own life within us also comes with his kind of living.

On a day when many of us (especially among us Americans) talk about freedom in negative terms (as in, "You can't tell ME what to do! I'm the boss of my own life--I'm FREE!"), these words from Galatians say something rather different.  We aren't looking to shake off the direction of the Spirit in our lives. We aren't looking to do whatever the hell we want in the name of "freedom," but rather, we are seeking to let the Spirit guide us, to give us direction as well as power.  We are looking, in other words, for the Spirit to shape us to be like Jesus.

And when Paul starts describing what that kind of life looks like, he doesn't use qualities like "greatness," "winning," "impressive," or "powerful." Rather, he starts with the character of Jesus, which of course is also the fruit of the Spirit: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control." That's the direction the Spirit will guide us in.  There is no version of the Christian life where we simply tap the Spirit's energy but go off in our own self-centered direction. There is only the life where the Spirit who gives us life also guides our course.

While the notice on your calendar today will call today "Independence Day," in honor of our nation's rejection of British rule, for disciples of Jesus, every day might just as accurately be called "Dependence Day," in the sense that every day we actively seek to depend more and more fully on the direction of the Spirit to bring forth love from us, so that all of our lives might be spent walking in Jesus' path, loving the way he loves, putting the good of others before our own self-interest.  Maybe today it's time to hand control of the wheel back over to Jesus, and to see where he will lead us today.

Lord Jesus, fill us with your Spirit anew like wind in a sail, and lead us where you will.