Legalism is like a child going into a candy store with his mother, who then says he can choose one candy from among a limit of five specified different selections. There are definite boundaries. Freedom is like a child walking along by himself and discovering a $20 bill on the sidewalk outside the candy store. What’s he going to do? Try and find the owner who has lost the money? Go into the candy store and go hog wild?

Legalism can be quite comforting with its’ preset limits and defined boundaries. You don’t need to exercise much self-discipline. You don’t need to be very responsible; someone else is being partly responsible for you.

I haven’t yet seen Bruce Willis’ new action movie although I’m a fan of his John McClean character. But I love the title for this latest installment, “Live Free or Die Hard”. That’s a pretty good summary of what it really means to be a Christian. Either live free in Christ or die hard. The problem is that many don’t really understand what it truly means to live free in Christ.

“Picture two skydivers. They are both free falling. Their speed is the same. They both seem to be free. They are not entangled in any cords. They are not restrained by any safety wires. They are free as birds–it seems. But there is one crucial difference: only one of them has a parachute. Does this change the sense of freedom that they enjoy? Yes. Both are free to fall with gravity, but only one of them is free not to. The other is a slave to gravity, and gravity will kill him in the end. If he can somehow deny that he has no parachute he might be able to have an exhilarating experience. But if he realizes he is doomed, he will be enslaved through fear during his entire fall, and all the joy of this so-called freedom will vanish. He must either deny the reality (which will mean slavery to illusion), or succumb to fear (which will mean slavery to terror), or be rescued by someone with a parachute. So it is in this world.”