Particularly toward the end of his letter to the Galatians, Paul talks about this liberty or freedom. The Christian is free from the law. He is no longer in bondage to hundreds of minute requirements, which can do nothing to save him. He has come to see that these things do not make him "righteous" in the sight of God. His belief in Christ frees him from bondage to the law.
But this freedom is not simply negative. It is "for freedom that Christ has set us free" ( Gal. 5: 1). Freedom for what? Not simply freedom to do "anything under the sun." Not simply "an opportunity for the flesh," as Paul puts it (v. 13), by which he means a chance merely to be concerned for the self. On the contrary, this freedom means that we can "through love be servants of one another" (v. 13). We are now free to love, as we never were before. This is Christian freedom-not to be wrapped up in oneself, but to live a life of outgoing concern for others. To "bear one another's burdens," is to "fulfil the law of Christ" (ch. 6: 2).
Suspicious READER (afraid of a trap): I thought there would be a catch to it. Free to serve. . . . H'mm. A plain contradiction in terms.
But this is not a contradiction. This is one of those living paradoxes of faith in which the New Testament abounds. The author of First Peter makes the same surprising kind of statement: "Live as free men," he writes, and then, in the very same breath, half a line later, he adds, "live as servants of God" ( I Peter 2: 16). A man who is "free" can be defined as a man who serves God.
The important point at the moment is that neither Paul nor anyone else can spell out precisely how, in every given circumstance, you live out this Christian freedom. You are now free to love your neighbor, but you cannot be given minute instructions on precisely how to love your neighbor, since love is not adherence to a series of rules, but a spontaneous concern for the neighbor. What love demands on one occasion may not be what love demands on another occasion. In this sense there are no "rules" connected with Christian ethics. Saint Augustine summarized Christian living from this point of view in a statement that is true and dangerous at the same time. "Love," he said, "and do as you please." Augustine meant that if you truly did love, then what you "pleased" to do would be what love demanded in the situation. As a protest against religious legalism, Augustine's point is important, and summarizes Paul's position.
But there is a problem here, as Paul himself is aware. When he began talking this way, the Corinthians, for example, rather gleefully said: "Fine! Dandy! We'll go right along with that. If there are no rules, 'anything goes.' We can do what we please." Paul dealt with this challenge in characteristic fashion, by discussing a specific local problem ( I Cor. 10: 23-31). And although the problem itself is a dead issue now, the point that emerges from the discussion is a tremendously live one.
Suppose (Paul says to his readers) you go to a banquet at the home of a pagan friend, and discover that the meat you are to eat has been offered to a pagan idol, say Serapis. Now this doesn't make any difference to you. You know that Serapis doesn't exist, and you can eat the meat with a clear conscience. However, perhaps to some other fellow Christian your action becomes a temptation to sin. He feels that it is wrong to eat meat that has been offered to idols, and that as a matter of principle he shouldn't do it. And yet . . . he sees you do it, and since it is so much easier not to stick out like a sore thumb socially, he imitates you and eats the meat, even though he feels that it is wrong for him to do so. Your action has led him into wrongdoing. So,
If some one says to you, "This [meat] has been offered in sacrifice," then out of consideration for the man who informed you, and for conscience' sake -- I mean his conscience, not yours-do not eat it ( I Cor. 10: 28, 29).
Thus the ethic without rules or regulations still provides a real basis for knowing what to do. As Paul puts it, "Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor" ( I Cor. 10: 24). The Christian man is free to seek the good of his neighbor. And "the good of his neighbor" is something he will find, not by turning to page 79 of a book entitled 613 Ways to Love Your Neighbor, but rather by entering into a living and loving relationship with that neighbor. The heart of the New Testament ethic, then, is a kind of spontaneous love that cannot be reduced to rules but attempts to seek the good of the neighbor.
This still may seem too vague and general, too lacking in specific guidance. We must therefore put more content into this notion of active, outgoing love, by taking a look at some of Jesus' teachings.
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