Romans 6:15-23
There is nothing a man values more than his liberty. Now this is a complete illusion. "Free-will is only the slavery of the Devil" (J.N.D.). However, a man does not realize that until after his conversion. It is by attempting to fly away that the captive bird realises that its wings have been clipped. "Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin", the Lord Jesus taught. But He added: "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed" (John 8:34; John 8:36). Free . . . not to do our own will: this would be placing us back again under the same bondage! Let it be sufficient that "in time past" we carried out the will of sinful man (and for what sort of fruit? v. 21; 1 Peter 4:3) and that we worked for Satan the imposter, tricked into a deal with such terrible wages: death, which Christ has undergone in our place (v. 23). No! if we are free, it is to serve God and to obey Him from the heart (v. 17; 2 Corinthians 10:5), just like that young African, bought and set free one day in a slave market by a sympathetic passer-by. Instead of going off to live his own life, the slave asked to stay with his benefactor; his sole desire was henceforth to serve him for ever.