Christian Freedom
“The perfect law of liberty.” — Jas. i. 25.
Law and liberty. To the natural mind these are the greatest contrasts in the world. To the heart of youth liberty presents itself as the breaking of law. The tempter comes to the young man and says, Why are you not free? it is an unmanly thing to be constantly under restraint; come, break your fetters, and be master of yourself. That is the voice of sin to every opening life, and it is a plausible voice; it promises a thing which we all value and which we all ought to value — freedom. It offers to give us that very boon which Christ expressly came to give — liberty. But now observe the difference between the mode of the tempter and the mode of the Divine Master.
The tempter says, You will be free by “breaking the law; Christ says, You will be free by perfecting the law. Ponder these words of the Apostle, “The perfect law of liberty.” He says, So far is restraint from being the enemy of freedom, it is the want of restraint that prevents perfect freedom; if law were perfect, if it were only sufficiently binding, if it could only obtain an undivided mastery over your soul, you would instantaneously be free — free as the winds of heaven, free as the child at play.
My soul, dost thou marvel at this doctrine? Dost thou not know that perfect law is love, and that where the spirit of love is there is liberty? Before love comes, the law is not perfectly thy master; it is only without thee. But when love comes, the law has possessed thee altogether; it has taken thy citadel, — the heart. And this possession is thy perfect freedom. Thou art never free in any pursuit until the love of that pursuit has mastered thee. Then, for the first time, thy will breaks forth into spontaneous action, and thy heart rejoices in the voluntary choice of its labour.
Thy most glorious moment, the moment in which the charter of thy freedom is for ever signed, is in the hour when thou art compelled to say, “I cannot help it,” the hour when love has become such a necessity of thy heart, such a law of thy life, that thou hast no longer any choice but to obey. The compulsion of thy heart is thy perfect freedom; when love shall take thee prisoner, captivity itself shall be taken captive. 0 golden chain, 0 glorious servitude, 0 free necessity, be thine my freedom evermore. Take possession of my heart, my reason, my understanding, my will. Enthrone Thyself in the empire of my being, that, in Thy sense of mastery, I may learn for the first time what it is to be free, and know what it is to be at rest. When I shall take Thy yoke upon me, I shall find rest unto my soul, for the yoke of Thy love is perfect joy, and the law of Thy life is perfect liberty.