Scripture Gives Spiritual Freedom

One of Jesus' chief purposes for coming was to set men free. Dr. Tony Evans says that kind of freedom comes from a devotion to God's word. You don't just need to hear it preached or hear it taught. He says you gotta hang out with it.

This is the assumption whenever you use the term free. And that is that slavery exists somewhere. To be enchained and in need of liberation. But to be under tyranny and be needing to be set loose.

Jesus speaks in this passage to some ignorant slaves. to some people who did not understand their need to be free. Because they didn't know how bad their slavery was. He begins by quoting them the oft-used verse. Abide in my word. You are truly disciples of mine. You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.

God's definition of freedom is to be liberated from an illegitimate slavery in order to be released to become what you were meant to be. Far too many of us haven't yet gotten around to being what we were meant to be.

Many people have the idea that freedom is having no master. Nobody telling them what to do. When really freedom means having the right master. One who knows how to help maximize your potential and not limit you to less than you were created or more importantly redeemed to be.

Jesus says You will know the truth. And the truth shall set you free. No. If you are not free. If I'm not free, if we are not free. It is either because we don't know the truth. Or we're not continuing in the truth.

See, he said in verse 30. One. It is my person who continues in my word. That is my disciple. You will know the truth. The truth shall set you free.

So, either, if you're not free and you are converted, It is because you do not know it. Or you know it, but you do not continue in it.

But before we go any further, we need to clarify what we mean by truth. Since truth shall set you free to be all that you are created and redeemed to be, if truth is that powerful, then you want to know what truth is.

Now that can be tough when we live in the information age. You look at all the news shows on television. Information being given to us at a rate we cannot absorb it, yet, people still do not know truth.

In fact, the Bible says in 2 Timothy 3 verse 7 that men are ever learning and never coming into the knowledge of the truth.

So You can have a BA. A PhD. A THD. You can have Letters behind your name ad infinitum ad nauseum. and simply be an educated fool.

It's not because you haven't studied, it's not because you don't have information, it's just that you haven't gotten the truth yet.

Now the correlation Between truth and freedom ought not for us to be hard to understand in Western society.

If we would just look at it from the standpoint of education. We encourage education. You, I'm sure, were encouraged to get all the education you could.

You are challenging your children not to stop with high school, but to go on to college and even further.

We challenge our young people here to maximize their opportunity. To learn, because in Western civilization, we know that there is the direct correlation between education and opportunity.

That when you have a certain body of knowledge about a certain subject. That that lends to opening doors In professions that you would not otherwise have opportunity to look into.

Simply because you have gained knowledge.

So, knowledge creates opportunity in just the natural realm.

Well, if knowledge can gain you opportunity or open doors in the natural realm. What do you think truth can do in the supernatural realm?

Truth to the supernatural realm is what knowledge is to the natural realm.

It opens doors you couldn't normally get through.

It allows you to become truly free.

Growth in spiritual knowledge, truth brings growth in spiritual freedom.

Which is freedom from sin to become all that you were made to be.

Please notice he says That you shall know the truth.

He did not say, you shall know a truth.

Because when you arrive at truth, that's it.

It is the final word.

It is the truth.

You shall know the truth.

And it is the truth, not a truth.

And our truth, there's only the truth.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

I like that word, make you free.

You won't be able to help yourself, but be free.

Truth will make you free.

It'll set you free.

It will deliver you to freedom.

When we're talking about truth, then what are we talking about?

We're not simply talking about facts.

We can repeat facts.

We can quote facts.

We can state things that are memorized.

and be totally unimpacted by them.

You can study to pass the test and know facts.

but not have truth.

Truth deals with the final standard by which reality is measured.

Truth deals with that.

To which all other things must conform.

It goes beyond probability, possibilities, and potentialities.

Truth is concerned with the meaning of facts.

And what to do with them.

It has to do with using facts in a legitimate way.

With fact.

If they're the real facts.

And an understanding is there with them.

for their utilization.

You now have the operation of a thing called Truth.

A fixed standard by which reality is measured.

The concept of being measured has to do with decisions made, choices carried out.

Now, in order to do that, Two. learn the truth.

There must be an assumption that you don't automatically know it.

It's not innate to you to know the truth.

Now the reason why it's not in aiding you and me to know the truth on our own is because we are finite.

A great theologian once said, a man has got to know his limitations.

That wasn't a great theologian, actually.

I think it was Dirty Harry.

A man has got to know his limitations.

And only a fool would I know his limitations.

When a pilot is up in the sky.

He is dependent upon a control tower because a control tower can see what he can't see.

Jesus says You shall know the truth.

Therefore, truth exists.

Truth is knowable.

And truth is powerful because it will set you free.

It will release you to be what you are created to be.

But he puts this proviso out there.

He says, This only works if you, here it is, abide in my word.

Now we've been studying the scripture and we won't want to cover all the territory we've already gone over.

Jesus has already said in John 17, 17, thy word is truth.

He claims truth for his own words, and why would he not, since he is the way and the truth?

He is the truth.

He is the final definition of truth.

And why would that not be the case given that he is Almighty God in flesh?

He says, but you got to abide in the truth.

And you don't just need to hear it preached.

Or hear it taught.

He says, you got to hang out with it.

Dr. Evans says truth isn't something we just visit, it's something we live with.

And that starts by learning what it really means to abide.

He'll tell us more about that in just a moment.

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Well, let's get back to more now from Dr. Evans.

The word truth means to hang out.

The word abide from the Greek word mino, to stay or to remain.

Or to hang out.

We live in a microwave world today.

Folk don't like to hang out.

They like it quick.

Children want microwave lives when we took 30 years to accumulate what they want in a moth.

The problem with microwaving is that you can get it hot.

And you can make it look like it's been cooked.

But it's highly possible to look cooked on the outside and be raw on the inside.

But if you let that baby hang out all night in the oven.

You'll set meat free from the bone.

Cause it's hung out there.

It stayed there for a while.

To abide meant where you hung out with.

What you stayed with.

A believer is abiding when he's enjoying God's company through his word.

Don't get me wrong, it's not simply reading the Bible.

It's reading the Bible in order to snuggle up to God.

It's reading the Bible in order to get close to him.

Jesus says, when the truth is abided in, You are my disciples.

And when you are my disciples, because you are abiding in the truth, that truth is so powerful, it will set you free.

Therefore, if you are not free, it is because you are not abiding in the truth.

Now, I want to point out a Principle that Many of us take for granted.

In John chapter 2, verse 23.

Now, when he was in Jerusalem, the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name.

So many became Christians.

Beholding his signs which he was doing.

Verse 24.

It's a little curveball.

Okay.

But Jesus on his part was not entrusting himself to them.

For he knew all men.

And because he did not need anyone to bear witness concerning man, for what he himself knew what was in man.

Now, please notice that.

Many believed on him.

But he was not entrusting himself to them.

Why?

Because he knew what was in man.

He knows whether You are in fact a disciple.

Or whether you are a visitor.

He knows whether you're committed.

or whether you're an attender.

And so it must be this disciple.

This person who continues or abides in the word, that is in a relationship of applying God's truth to their existence in order to experience more of him.

Now the Jews who heard this Had a problem with it.

Verse 33.

We are Abraham's offspring.

And have never yet been enslaved to anyone.

How is it that you say you shall become free?

They said that doesn't apply to us.

Because we've never been anybody's slave.

Never been anybody's slave.

Yeah, sure.

Okay, now now explain Egypt.

Why don't you?

Explain Babylon, why don't you?

Okay.

Explain Persia, why don't you?

In fact, we don't have to go that far.

Explain why you under Rome right now.

Why don't you?

They had been slaves so long, they forgot it.

I did that.

You see, you can get used to being a slave.

It can become old hat being a slave.

So you don't even know that there was anything called freedom.

In fact, Okay.

Some of us are slaves.

and been slaves a long time.

You can give it a lot of names.

You can call it an addiction.

The spiritual name, stronghold.

Yeah.

But they say that that's not us.

Jesus hears them, and Jesus says, truly, truly, that means for real.

I say to you, every man who commits sin is a slave of sin.

Even worse, verse 35.

and the slave does not remain in the house forever.

The sun does remain forever.

If therefore the sun shall make you free, you shall be free indeed.

He says there's a fundamental difference.

between a slave and a son.

If the sun shall make you free.

Yeah, we You shall be free indeed.

Jesus says, I am the legitimate heir of God's house.

And I'm the only one.

Everybody else is a saccharine substitute.

is a slave.

They may look like they got some power for a while.

Till they get booted out.

And anybody who infringes on the authority of Jesus Christ will get booted out.

They may look legitimate for a while.

They may carry some power for a while, but they're going to get booted out.

Because in this house, God's house.

Jesus Christ is the Son.

Yeah.

Therefore, because he is the son.

He has the legitimate authority to set people free.

When you're sick, you need more than a medical book.

You need a doctor.

When you're in trouble, you need more than a law book.

You need a lawyer.

Okay.

In other words, you need information on paper.

personified.

You don't want somebody when you sick bringing you a book.

You want them taking you to a hospital.

So, what he's saying is, when you abide in my word, you got the book.

But because you abided, you got me.

And if the sun shall set you free.

You shall be free indeed.

Let me talk about ND.

Indeed means show enough.

It means certainly.

It means for real.

Yeah.

I remember in college.

In my dorm, there was a prankster.

And his name was Marvin Crafter.

And Marvin was a prankster.

Marvin was always looking for stuff to create.

and problems and you know One day My particular dorm is a Christian school.

My particular dorm I had been out of town.

And the door was empty.

I mean completely empty.

Nobody.

There was So when I came back, I started walking around campus and there was still nobody.

Mm.

Now We had just studied prior to my leaving the rapture.

And how Jesus was coming back for the saints.

And there is nobody in sight.

So I'm getting a little shaky here.

There is nobody in sight.

And we had just studied, coming in the twinkling of an eye, dead in Christ arrives first, then we who are alive.

And there's nobody in sight.

So this is real curious to me.

I don't understand this.

But then out of nowhere comes Marvin Crafter.

I see Marvin.

And I think to myself, That doesn't mean anything.

Because he surely could have been left behind.

Jesus is saying, when I say it, it means something.

When I show up, it means something.

And notice this phrase.

It's a phrase that's easy to miss.

If the sun shall make you free.

You know what that means?

I don't have to free myself.

Mm-hmm.

I don't have to free, I must walk in the freedom granted, but I don't have to find my own freedom.

I have to continue in the word.

I I know a lot of people don't like ice cream soft.

But I like ice cream soft.

Anybody soft ice cream?

Spiritual people like soft ice cream.

Okay.

I like ice cream sauce.

So when I get it and it feels like a rock, it can break your counter, bam, you know, that's not it.

Some people like it that way.

You can't even dig it out, you know.

So like if it's real hard, I won't even go through all that trouble.

I'll put it in the microwave.

Anybody do that?

Don't make me look like a fool up in there.

I know I'm not by myself.

Put it in a microwave.

Push, depending on how hard it is, 30 seconds or a minute.

And The microwave As the ice cream abides in it.

For whatever time I pressed the button for.

begins to melt.

It is set free from how hard it is to make it edible so I'm free to eat it.

It becomes set free, it becomes reduced, its components are broken down, so it now becomes edible and it is set free for me to eat.

Jesus is saying, if I Set you free.

And when you think about that, maybe I'm not free.

You're not free.

We're not free.

Because the sun is not setting us free.

We trying to set ourselves free.

So we get free for a while.

We don't get free indeed.

Free indeed means it's final freedom, it's complete freedom.

Dr. Tony Evans, reminding us that true and lasting freedom is found in the truth of God's Word.

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When something's wrong in your body, you go to a doctor.

But when the pain is deeper, when it's in your soul, Dr. Evans says there's another kind of help you need.

Tomorrow, he explains how the Bible can diagnose the root causes of our struggles and guide us toward healing.

I hope you'll join us for that.