January 17, 2021 | Worship

What is freedom to you? When you hear the word, what images does it conjure? In America, I’m sure that we all have some idea of what Freedom is about. It is one of our core values. It shapes us from the first time we learn the flag salute—which was likely preschool or kindergarten for most of us—as we recited “liberty and justice for all” with high voices and wiggly bodies. What did they describe liberty to mean to you, as you were there in all your worldly 5-year-old glory, shifting from one foot to the other, eager to lift your voice loudly enough to earn a kudos from the teacher?

From my place in the world as an older millennial white woman, when I hear the word freedom, if I close my eyes, the vision usually bears some resemblance to a post 9-11 t-shirt emblazoned with flags, eagles, and the faint sound of some patriotic country tune in the background. There’s a hint of irony to it—also probably part of my social location as a millennial—because the image and the Toby Keith song silently floating through the air strike a dissonant chord with the ways that freedom is actually lived out in America. I can’t scrub the flags and eagle from the way I visualize the word—they’re too imbedded—but I can also hear the cries of people screaming for equality, for equity, for liberty and justice as they attempt to break through.

I share my own visualization because words are important, and words can be loaded with a lot of implied meaning that carries emotional weight. My formed-by-being-a-college-kid-during-9-11 imprinted image of Freedom is likely not the same as yours. Before we go any firther, I invite you to take a moment and think about what freedom looks like to you. Not the definition. What is that first image? What do you hear? How does it feel. Is it a swelling of pride? Is it discomfort? Is it tinged with irony, or disappointment? Is it hopeful? There are no right answers to this exercise. My final question, when you hear about freedom, and be honest as we turn inwardly with this loaded word, if it your freedom, or is a freedom that belongs to others?

In our text from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, we are given some words about freedom. I know, I know, there’s a whole lot loaded into the 8 verses that make up our lectionary epistle reading today, and not one of them is “freedom.” The words we do have to work with are kind of…uncomfortable. I want to unpack this text before we jump back to “freedom” because if you heard or read it this morning and it set you on edge a bit, you’re not alone. Just a note for for those who are listening to the sermon with their kids, there will be some PG-13 content moving forward.

“Shun fornication!” is harsh. Just the word “fornication” is enough to raise some red flags for anyone who has been hurt by their church. We really don’t hear “fornication” anywhere outside of these scriptural contexts, and when it comes up, it often gets weaponized and used as a tool of shaming. This scripture can be pulled out of the larger context to be used as a means of controlling the ways in which we use our bodies.

This isn’t a “sex is bad” argument.

Rather, Paul is writing to the Corinthians to get them to look at the bigger picture of what they’re doing and who they are as members of the church.

This community is one that has a lot of freedoms. In the graco-roman world, prostitution is pretty common, and is socially accepted. As we look at power dynamics of the time, we also know that women do not have much agency. Prostitutes are probably not in the business for the love of the work in this time (or now, in most cases) but instead it is because of the lack of options available to women. A woman who does not have family, a woman who has been divorced, a woman who has experienced some sort of scandal may have limited ways in order to survive in the time of this writing. They are more likely to be enslaved than they are to have decided to take this career path. Paul is addressing men in this letter—paul is rarely concerned with addressing women—and he is telling men that taking out their fantasies on women who are oppressed is not a proper use of their bodies. Our bodies are the vessels that tie us to the larger body of the church, and so to use our bodies at the expense of other people’s bodies is a sin that is not external, but is one that is internal. If the body is a temple, than using one’s body to overpower another’s is akin to using the temple to conduct some shady business deals. To paraphrase Paul, just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.

So, we come to the issue of Freedom.

In America, with all of our visualizations of the soaring eagle and the red white and blue flag on the breeze, what are our freedoms? This is pertinent as we’ve seen the word freedom thrown around a lot lately. Was Trump’s freedom of speech violated when he was dropped from multiple social media sites for the irresponsible spread of misinformation and using the platform to incite violence? Is an individual’s freedom impeded upon when they are mandated to wear a facial covering in public? Are the people who chose to illegally storm the nation’s capitol while wearing anti-semitic t-shirts and posting live video to their social media free from the repercussions of being recognized and fired from their jobs?

When I read paul’s words, ‘“All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are beneficial.’ I think about the way that we have perverted and distorted the meaning of the word “freedom.” In true American fashion, we think that liberty belongs to us. Me. My freedom. The freedom that can be taken away from me. It is individualistic as can be, and does not factor in how our “freedom” impacts the freedom of others. Paul warns the Corinthians against this kind of freedom that sees only individuals, and implores them to recognize what their freedoms cost the larger community.

With tomorrow being Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday, a day when we sit with how un-free our nation has been historically, we as called to consider the ways in which the unsacred reverence of our personal freedoms trump the freedom of the collective. It was legal to own slaves in America, and our country was built upon stolen lives. Was it beneficial? As we see the racial tension that only continues to grow, the disparities between communities of color and white communities, or I’m just going to say it, the differences in the ways that the terrorists who stormed the capitol on January 6^th were treated by law enforcement versus the ways that Black Lives Matter protestors were greeted by militarized presence everywhere they went—as we see these things, we can’t say in good conscience that just because it was legal, that it was beneficial to us as a nation. We are experiencing the painful fallout from an American assumption that an oppressive use of individual freedom is free from any sort of reckoning.

Liberty and Justice for All is not an individualistic statement. It is not liberty and justice to put lives at risk by my behavior. Liberty and Justice for All recognizes the same principles that Paul is writing to the Corinthians about. If our individual freedoms are carried out in ways that hurt or trample on someone else’s freedom, then they are not contributing to the freedom that God has in mind for us. We are not in beloved community when our own interests get in the way of our neighbor’s health, safety, or humanity.

The process of divesting ourselves of the individualistic “My Freedoms!” will be difficult, but in shedding this and asking ourselves “just because I can, should I?” will help us to draw nearer to the kind of community that God wants for us. The kind of world where our bodies are not instruments of oppression, but are used in sacred ways that free others, that see the larger picture and usher in a true realization of liberty and justice for all.