Today's Daily Lesson comes from Deuteronomy chapter 6 verses 20 through 25: 20 “When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh's slaves in Egypt. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 22 And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes. 23 And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers. 24 And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. 25 And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the Lord our God, as he has commanded us.’
When the LORD brought the Israelites out of Egypt and out from under the bond of Pharaoh, the LORD gave the Israelites statutes and commandments which were to govern the people in the new community. Formerly the slaves of Pharaoh, the Israelites were now to belong to the LORD their God. The LORD was to be their new master and governor and they were to live in community with one another in such a way as the LORD was now commanding. Coming now out of Egypt they would come into a new land where they would obey God, honor mother and father, and do right by their neighbors. As Desmond Tutu has said in the context of his own post-apartheid South Africa, the Israelites were not only set free FROM something but they were also set free FOR something -- namely set free for the sake of being God's people.
We hear much today of freedom -- namely the idea that we are free to do as we please in the pursuit of our own life, liberty and happiness. And it is true; we have been set free. But, ultimately, real freedom is not freedom from something -- whether that something be government or taxes or religion or family, but freedom for something -- the freedom to be the kind of people and nation God would have us to be.
Augustine said, "True freedom is the freedom to choose the good." We have been bought with a price -- the blood of the Lamb has bought our redemption from sin just as the Passover Lamb bought the Israelites their redemption in Egypt. But our freedom has not been given for its own sake. For we were not set free to live for our own sakes. We were set free to live for God and for others. We were set free that we might choose the good, that we might be good, and that we might seek the common good.
Freedom from the old, slave nation Egypt is one thing. But freedom for the new, free nation Israel is quite another. Freedom from Pharaoh is one thing; freedom for God and each other is even more.
God has set us free; let us be free indeed.
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