Freedom of conscience

[AI translation] In the public mind, the Reformation and freedom of conscience go hand in hand. And indeed, one of the greatest achievements of the Reformation was what we call freedom of conscience. So what do we mean by this? Calvin discusses it in detail in the last chapter of his Institutio, under the title "On the freedom of the Christian man". It is with his reflections in mind that we now seek to understand this great legacy of our reforming forefathers, freedom of conscience.Paul exhorts the Galatians, "In the liberty to which Christ has made us free..." So Jesus sets those who believe in Him free, His name is Saviour! By what Jesus did for us in His death and resurrection, He has set us free. This freedom is twofold: freedom from something and freedom for something! Even a boat, if it is only untied from the shore, if it is only freed from the chain, is not freedom in itself, it is untied so that it can freely use the power of the wind to move as it is meant to move. This is also how Jesus sets us free: not only from something, but for something: from bondage to the good, to the useful.
Freedom of conscience therefore begins with an actual experience of liberation. The death and resurrection of Jesus means for us that a door has been opened: our sins, our debts to God, even the dreadful prison doors of death, the grave, judgment, damnation, have been opened. And this is not only figurative, but also real. That is to say, you no longer have to commit the same sin that you could not overcome in yourself. You are not a slave to sin, you are not powerless against it. Jesus' death and resurrection not only saved you from the curse of sin, but also from the dominion of sin. It is so wonderful that every time someone truly surrenders to Jesus, the Saviour, it is as if chains have fallen off. I knew a man who was addicted to drink. He had gotten into a lot of trouble with this addiction. He once found himself face to face with the God of grace, surrendered to the Savior, and was freed from the feeling that had enslaved him to drink. Even the desire was gone from him. He was liberated!
That is the real secret of Christ's death and resurrection, that he has a real liberating power. When a person comes into a relationship with Him by faith, he is set free from his sins to a new life of devotion to God, of glorifying God. In practical terms, this means that if you have been freed from, for example, anger towards someone, you can love that person, even if they were your enemy before. If you have been freed from envy by Christ, you can now rejoice in another person's good fortune. If you are freed from the desire for revenge, you can do good to him. If you are freed from complaining about your fate, you can give thanks for it. This is the freedom Christ has set us free to have.
The man thus freed is now freed from the compulsion of the law - to do the law voluntarily. What does this mean? There is no more dreadful torment than when a man tries in his own strength to do God's good pleasure. He torments himself, counting his merits, gathering his good deeds, while his conscience is constantly troubled: is it not enough? He lives in perpetual dread, wondering when God's punishment will fall on him because he has been found wanting in his many good efforts. But if I know that it was Jesus, and not I, who fulfilled the law for me, and that it was He who suffered the penalty of my sin for me, and that it is not by my own efforts, but by His merit, that I am a beloved child of God, then my conscience is at once freed from the constraints of the law. It is precisely the great privilege of the believer in Christ to have the mercy of God embraced in his soul, to be able to look away from himself to Jesus. When his conscience is troubled as to how he can find grace with God, how he can give account to Him, he looks not to what God requires in His law, but to the righteousness of Jesus alone, to the satisfaction of Jesus in His stead. Thus the conscience of the believer is freed from the yoke of the law.
But this does not mean that he now has nothing to do with what God demands in His law. But at the same time he is freed to do voluntarily, out of gratitude, what God requires of him in the law. Thus Calvin says: "My conscience does not keep the law under the constraint of the law, but, freed from the yoke of the law, it voluntarily obeys the will of God. For example, when the law says: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart'... I try, but I feel that I fall very far short of this requirement. What should I do? Well, I do not despair, because I do not love God so that he will have mercy on me, but because he has already had mercy on me, - I do not obey his will so that he will receive me as his son, but because he has already received me as his son. I do not relate to God now as a servant to whom a certain work has been appointed by his lord, and who is always afraid whether it will be done in due time, but as a son, as a beloved child, who is not afraid to present to his Father his unfinished work, even if it is a mistake, because he knows that the Father does not love him for that. For even if we did everything the Father commands us to do, we would be useless servants without Jesus! But through Jesus, even our feeble service is welcomed by the Father. Our works are no longer judged by the measure of the law, but by the love of our Father."
Do you feel how liberated you can be to serve others with such a clear conscience? I no longer seek to do good to men to secure my own salvation, but free from all such spasmodic efforts, entirely for the benefit of that other man, not for my own! Only in this way can it be done what Jesus said, "And he that maketh thee to go one mile, go with him two." (Mt 5,41) The first mile: the obligatory service, the second: the voluntary, which is above and beyond the obligatory. If you go one mile, you are a slave, whether you like it or not, forced to obey. But if thou goest with him voluntarily two miles, thou art free, thou art exalted above him that forced thee. You're freed to live a life of sacrifice above duty, of sacrifice! That's why I said Jesus sets you free from the law to the law.
Finally, let me mention one more great area of freedom of conscience that Calvin, among others, also speaks of: the believer in Christ obeys the worldly superiors with a free and good conscience. Calvin teaches, fully in the spirit of Scripture, that the secular authorities exercise the authority God has given them, and that the believer should therefore respect and honour the authorities as God's servants and agents. The believer submits to the authority not because he fears that he will be punished if he disobeys, but because he owes his obedience to God himself, because he sees God behind the authority of the supreme authority. To prove that believers do not only feign obedience, but obey sincerely and heartily: they pray for the work of the authorities. Indeed, Calvin says, following the Apostle Paul, that we should even submit to tyrannical authorities, for they too have received their authority from God. Rulers who rule unjustly and arbitrarily: God has sent them as punishment for the corruption of the people. In the words of Calvin: "In the wicked king the wrath of God is manifested on earth. Once he has public power in his hands, he is the bearer of the majestic and divine authority with which God has invested him. It is also by the will of God that he fulfils the role of judgment, upon which God himself has impressed the stamp of inviolable majesty."
Behold, then, Christ frees us to obey all authority with a good conscience, with inward spiritual liberty, voluntarily. A believer who has come of age is always a good citizen, a good patriot, with a pure heart, a clean hand, doing his work in the sight of God, fulfilling his duties, and keeping the laws of his country.
It is truly as Jesus said, "If the Son sets you free, you shall be free indeed." (Jn 8,36) But good for us that we can live on earth, relate to people and events, with this great, happy, inner freedom of God's children! In the freedom, then, to which Christ has set us free. Stop, and do not bind yourselves again with the yoke of slavery!
Amen
Date: 31 October 1959, Reformation afternoon.