Freedom

The heart of every man craves a great adventure, but life doesn't usually feel that way. Jesus speaks of narrow gates and wide roads, but the masculine journey is filled with many twists and turns.

So, how do we keep from losing heart while trying to find the good way when life feels more like a losing battle than something worth dying for? Grab your gear and come on a quest with your band of brothers, who will serve as the guides in what we call the masculine journey. The masculine journey. Starts here now. Welcome to Masculine Journey.

We're glad that you're with us. You're about the only one that's with us. We have a sparse crowd tonight here at the Masculine Journey Studios. Yeah, yeah. There's three of us, you know.

But wherever two or more gathered, you know, the Lord's there with us.

So we at least have six with us, right? And as I said in our prayer when we started, thank you. God is kind of fond of threes. Yeah, three and one.

So yeah, yeah, yeah. And Keith's with us, which is always the most Most important thing there for it's he can make us sound really good or really bad. It's really good when Keith is here. Yeah, exactly, absolutely it is.

Well, we are talking about an interesting topic tonight. At least I think it is. And Jim, it was your topic. If you'd want to share that with us, well, I am pretty sure this is one God gave me because I was falling asleep and just heard freedom, and it wasn't. What's his name?

Yelling. You weren't watching Braveheart. Braveheart. Yeah, yeah. You weren't watching it.

No, but it's what freedom means to us, and we, if we've read the Bible, we're quite aware that freedom is a big thing that comes with following Christ. But what does that mean? I mean, are we free to just do whatever we want? Paul talked about that a lot, but it's not what we want—that we are free to do, and we can spend our freedom on that if we so choose. That's what freedom is.

But what really hit me about it was it's the choices we make, and just about everything is going to have a either evil consequence or a good consequence. Right. One thing when you're we didn't talk about this pre-show because it just came to me as you were talking, but you know here in the United States, you know we definitely have this topic of freedom in front of us all the time, and so I wonder what the freedom in Christ looks like differently in the U.S. compared to the rest of the world, right? They they probably actually understand it better than we do, you know, in most ways, yeah, because they don't have the freedoms that we have.

Speaking of that, I Sheila and I enjoy watching, you know, like America's Got Talent and Voice and different things.

Sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes. And there was a young lady that was on the show this week, and she was very passionate about. Why she was on the show, and she literally at one point said, "I didn't, I didn't come on here, you know, to win it. I came on here to express freedom." Because she's from Iran, and her parents were from Iran, and they were immigrants when they first came over. They were older; they didn't speak any English, and so she, as like a eight year old little girl, when they came, basically had to do all of the you know the rent contracts and just basically everything that needed to be done.

It was almost all done through her and. She was this little girl who had to grow up really fast. Obviously, and and she said, "I you know I wouldn't trade any of it, but I'm I'm doing this because I have the freedom to do it because there are so many girls like me in Iran today that don't." And one was executed last week, in fact, for. Having expressed her freedom in the last few months, and very very sad, but it's reality, very much reality. And to a large extent, in our society, freedom doesn't have the meaning that it did when the country was founded.

We're sliding down the. Path towards really to license, I can do whatever I want. Yeah, that's not what freedom's about. But freedom, liberty, license—you just do you.

Sorry, it's those terms that you hear. Yeah, yeah, gave me that thought that I can do whatever. What is your truth on that? Yeah, exactly, and that's part of the problem. Yeah, that's there's lots of those terms.

I I like the way you said it, though. That we've moved towards license rather than freedom. Right, good idea, and. Freedom to the founding fathers was extremely different, and to the first several generations, you know, was very, very different than what we experience today. Today means you can't tell me what to do.

It means I can do whatever.

Something all humans appreciate. Yeah, but yeah, that's it. It means I can do whatever I want, even if it's bad. You know, even if it hurts society or myself. You know, I'm free to be me.

So the saying goes. Yeah, one of the things is you're talking statistically. They'll tell you that by the time it gets to the third chair, they call it the third generation. The original meanings typically lost. That's where you have families that have a wealth that the the granddad earned, and and the the initial kids probably do a well to protect it because they remember what it was like to not have it.

But by the time to get they get to their kids, it's usually a different story. They've never lived it; they've only heard stories of it. And I think it's kind of that way with the things you talk about with our founding fathers. That they knew it passionately. I'm sure their kids knew it passionately because they were involved in it some degree.

But as it started to wane. Over those next generations, because it was a concept instead of a reality, right? They never experienced it, and so put yourself self in the shoes easy for me to say, of the first century Christians, right? Who some of them were enslaved by governments, some of them were enslaved by legalism, um.

Some of them were enslaved by their own sin or enslaved by demonic presence, all sorts of different things. And so here you have this guy Jesus coming along that is setting people free. After that bit about the founding fathers, I almost think we should start with a clip with John Adams. We'll get to that later. The clip I chose is from The Lord of the Rings.

It's a talk between Sam, who makes a flippant Frodo. Frodo. Oh, excuse me. I'm looking at Sam. I look like a hobbit.

He's the guy in the orange shirt. Are your feet, Harry? I never checked. That's why I wear socks.

Okay. Everybody's kind of a hobbit from my perspective. That's true. But the sorry, but Frodo is talking to Gandalf and sort of flippantly says something that gets challenged as it should be and. This is sort of a discussion of freedom and and choice, and we'll go ahead and run it.

I don't think it needs more setup than that.

Okay. It's a pity Bilbo didn't kill him when he had the chance. Pity. It is pity that stable bears many that live deserve death, and some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo?

Do not be too eager to deal a death and judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends. My heart tells me that Gollum has some part to play yet, for good or ill. Before this is over, the pity of Bilbo may ruin the fate of men. The power that comes in our freedom to make decisions is enormous, and I think most of the time we don't recognize that.

And that's freedom is a huge responsibility, and will. I'm sure get around to talking about why some people not want to be free, but the the thing that I saw in being given the freedom that God gives us is so that He can appreciate our choosing Him, and without the freedom to choose. It would just all be these little monkeys on a string, and that's not what God wants. Worshiping Him, so this was a decision that was life or death. It was good, evil, and when our decisions are along those lines, which is not whether to have a corned beef sandwich or.

On rice or something else, you know that's not an important decision. But when we have the important decisions, we have the freedom to make the ones that will lead to good to life, and we're offered that in the Bible. Or we can choose evil and death, and that is, like I said, a tremendous responsibility to have that freedom. But it's one we need to take seriously. Yeah, it is, and there's no sitting the fence.

You know, you can't make no choice is a choice. As as we were joking before here.

So, oh, what's what's your truth? What's yeah? What's right to you? No, it doesn't work that way. No, yeah, you're making a choice one way or the other, and so you have to choose wisely in what you do.

Yeah, we've got a little bit time before we go to break. What What are some other thoughts you guys have on this topic? I loved your question, Jim. What does freedom in Christ mean to you? I have lots of ways I could answer that, and I just don't know which one I want to use because there's so many different ways to look at that.

I mean, I'll just I'll be as honest as I can be. Um. When when you threw out the question, it it really grabbed me, and um, and I I enjoyed digging into mainly Galatians five to dig into this a little bit, but the the the difficulty for me is I know my sin. And so I can say, well, freedom in Christ to me is freedom to treat this person that way or this way or that way in the good sense of things, right? Or even myself, or to worship God in a particular.

In life, I mean, everything we do ultimately is is to glorify Him, or should be. And yet, I struggle, and with my own sin, and my own anger, and my own, you know, depression or or sadness or greed or whatever. You know, we're all struggling with that.

So, the question for what do I do with freedom?

Well. Satan's right there to help you interpret that. Absolutely, thank you. Welcome back. We'll talk more about that.

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Still, feels different because God is wanting to speak to me in a different way. No matter what, and this time he's really been digging in on me, growing up without a dad in my life, and him really trying to impress on me what it means to have a father that loves you in your life, and that's been really difficult for me. And I'm still going through that and unpacking a lot of that, and what that actually looks like in my life. If you're available, you need to come to this. If you're listening to me or listening to this show, you need to register for the next one.

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That is Daryl Evans. I don't know if you guys remember from boot from boot camp in in Colorado. That was at my first boot camp. That was one of the ones that came back when they did a worship. They they played that song.

I never heard it. Before and it's a long one. It's like six minutes, right? Because he does it in concert. But it's so powerful when you hear the whole room echoing, you know, about freedom and singing about freedom.

It was just so cool. And so when I heard the topic, I'm like, oh, I got a song that I know that will really speak, at least to me. But you guys have both been to Colorado to boot camp as well, and I didn't know if they played it there when you were there. I know we sang several Daryl Evans songs. I don't remember that one specifically, but it it Probably was yeah, Jim.

Well, at least once we were there at the same time. Yeah, yeah. I it it rings familiar, but at my age everything does.

So that's not saying much. Lunch rings familiar. Yeah, lunch. Yeah. Anybody say lunch?

Well, it was at the basic boot camp, and so for me it was. That was the one that I. Not necessarily retain the most, but it's the one that got me going in a direction that I never thought I'd be going. Yeah, and it and it it it was really powerful. Those experiences where I remember going and actually those worship sets probably meant almost more to me than anything else because the first boot camp I went to.

Um, I was really struggling with a. Do I do I believe what I'm hearing? Can I refute it scripturally? Do I have you know? And if if I do believe it, if I do say yeah, that's what the Bible says, then what's my responsibility?

And that's you know, I'm that analytical guy, so it was really hard for me to. Back out of that, and and so, and we didn't start with worship on Thursday when we got there. We didn't even do worship Friday morning, Saturday when we got there. How could you possibly exist? Yeah, you know, I mean, and.

When we finally did, I think it was Saturday morning when we walked in was the first experience. And Friday's a big day at at in those boot camps. Friday's a huge day, and a lot of guys do begin to experience some freedom from real life issues, whether that's their own sin or their own wounds, abuse. Marital issues, whatever you name it, and there are guys that are starting to experience that.

So, when you walk in, you know Saturday morning, you're expecting, okay, you know, can I even handle today? Because yesterday was pretty, pretty, pretty heavy, and and then you know you're you're worshiping, and and one of the things I appreciated the most about that experience was. And I would love to do it every Sunday, where I, you know, wherever I am worshiping. But I'm not king. But I think John or somebody said, "Hey, we're just worshiping, and not in a that's flippant sort of thing." But.

If you want to be sitting down and with your head down, if you want to be praying, if you're crying, if you want to be on your knees, if you want to stand up, if you want to walk around, you can do whatever you want. Because this is between you and God, it's not. You don't have to stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down. You know, turn right, turn left, like we do at church. Corporate worship almost has a negative ring to me.

Yeah, I mean, I love corporate worship. I love it, and I know you do too. Yeah, I do. You've participated in it and led it. You know, most of your adult life, and I have done a bunch of that too.

But every week when I go to church and I stand in worship with us, and I'm thinking, why can't I sit down in worship? I mean, why can't I get on my knees if I want to? And I can. Don't get me wrong. Where I go to church, nobody's going to you know.

Fault you if you do that, but rather than those things, I wish somebody would just say, "You know what? Worship the way you want to worship right now. You've got freedom." We're wired the same way in that because you know I love my church I go to, but when they say stand and worship with us, it just irritates me. You know, because it's telling me how, and I know they don't mean it that way. No, their hearts are good, not at all.

You know, it's just offer. It's an offering to come do this, but yeah, I always prefer you know worship. Worship as you would like to, right? Right. Sit in your seat, do whatever you'd like.

It's between you and God. is Is my preference, you know. Don't subscribe to whatever is politically correct in the church. One of my many quirks is addressed regularly because at our church, it's a rare Sunday, at least two, three times. Give the Lord a hand, and I was raised Presbyterian.

We didn't clap in church, and I still you could move both hands at the same time as long as they never touch. To me, that there are ways I could do it, you know, but waving my hands around to hit the bike, it is. To me, I want to be reverent, and I applaud for performers that have done a good job. And somehow, applauding for God seems off.

Now, does do other people have to think the same way I do? I sure hope not. Yeah, but. You know, it's a little thing, but that's sort of one of mine. Is I want to honor God with reverence as part of my worship, and that's why I was saying about corporate worship.

I love singing, yeah, but singing is not—I mean, it is a form of worship. Yeah, it's far from the only one, and the most critical worship time I've had has been the. Periods of silence at the boot camps, when I am one on one with God. Yeah, that's. I mean, for me, it's hopefully every morning.

You know, I I try to get two three hours in the morning where nobody's saying anything except God. Hopefully, I do a lot of talking to Him, but I I was very convicted if you. Months ago, that. You know what I'm doing most of the talking, I I and I teach guys to stop and listen, and I'm not stopping and I'm not listening there as much as I should, and so, um, but that thing that we're talking about is freedom, right? Right, and and so we don't the the thing that we don't like about it, I mean, I definitely I would say all three of us are kind of in the same boat there, is that it encourages people to pose, right?

If if they were not I mean, I see. You know, I'll just be honest. My dad was handicapped; he was crippled, and standing up in church, especially for ten or twelve minutes, or fifteen or twenty minutes, um, would have been impossible. Not just would have been, you know, painful. It would have been impossible.

But the entire time that he was there, he would have been sitting in shame as well, because I am not doing what everybody else is doing, and so that's where my desire for oh, let's let's free people's hearts to to to tell them you don't have to do it exactly like I am doing it right now. And you know it's that freedom, absolutely.

Well, we won't get our next clip in probably. We have about four minutes, so by time we set it up and play it, we'll probably be right at the end. Unless you think we can get to it, we can probably get to it. Go ahead. This clip comes from the movie Amistad, and it's actually John Adams, who is talking to the court, and he's.

Pretty much, you know, at his wits' end by this time, trying to help some enslaved men be rightfully taken care of and set free, rather than punished for rebelling against their slavery. And it is when John Adams basically stands up and and offers a speech, and the speech is directed towards his founding father friends, who obviously he was one of, and he basically starts with saying, you know, we we've held off asking you for this, but here we are, and so it is a prayer. It sounds very much like a prayer, but it it it's kind of a prayer to this group of people that helped found the country. To to help them with the guidance of what they need to do. We have long resisted asking you for guidance.

Perhaps we have feared in doing so. We might acknowledge that our individuality, which we so so revere, is not entirely our own. Perhaps we have feared in an appeal to you might be taken for weakness. But we have come to understand, finally, that this is not so. We understand now.

We've been made to understand, and to embrace the understanding that who we are is who we were. We desperately need your strength and wisdom to triumph over our fears, our prejudices, ourselves. Give us the courage to do what is right, and if it means civil war, then let it come. And when it does, may it be finally the last battle of the American Revolution.

So you hear him basically saying that we are what we were, and I understand that better just now listening to it than I did, you know, thirty minutes ago. What he was basically saying is, we all came from a form of slavery. We came to this country. We founded this country to be free men, and.

Now sitting in this courtroom, where we have taken people because of the color of their skin or the place that they came from, and we've chosen that they are not the same as we, and that they have every right to enslave them, that we now have become, we are what we were, and so you're still enslaved by your beliefs, even if you're. The master, so to speak, you're enslaved by your beliefs, and the belief that Paul is trying to get to in Romans five, I mean in Galatians five, he literally Galatians five one, it is for freedom's sake that Christ has set you free, and he's saying that to say you've been set free because God wanted you free. That's that's all. Period. And there's no way in the world you should think about giving that freedom up.

And so we'll talk about that in the after hours as well. Yeah, thank you. One of the things on that bump that we had from Daryl Evans, long song. There was a couple segments I looked at, but the part where the crowd responds, he sings, "Where the spirit of the Lord is, and they echo, 'There is freedom.'" Now, once you think about that, that the spirit of the Lord is in you, right? In you is freedom.

You just have to claim it, fight for it, and believe in it. We'll talk with you next week.