Set Free

Ephesians 1:3-14 January 3, 2021
A football game between The University of Georgia & the
University of Texas. Georgia wasn’t moving the ball. In the third
quarter they didn’t have a single first down. They were backed
up near their own end zone. Suddenly, on third & 10, the
young third-string quarterback ran onto the field. No one had
told him to go into the game. But, no one tried to stop him
either. The A-string QB saw his substitute number and
assumed the coach was replacing him, so he trotted off the
field. This bench-warmer led the team down the field for a
touchdown and the rest is history, as they say.
Fran Tarkenton was the third string quarterback on
Georgia’s team with no prospect of advancing. He went on
to become the scrambling quarterback of the Minnesota
Vikings and one of the most prolific passers in NFL history.
How could a player on a major college team be so brazen
as to substitute himself? He felt his destiny had come. He
was chosen for that moment. That sure knowledge set him
free. – King Duncan, Dynamic Preaching
The good news for us at the beginning of 2021 is that God
has set us free. How does such freedom come? Paul tells
us. “[God] chose us in Christ before the foundation of the
world to be holy and blameless before him in love.”
“God destined us for adoption,” Paul writes, “as his
children through Jesus Christ.”
The words “in Christ” appear 10 times in the book of
Ephesians. “In Christ” we become children of God. In God’s
great realm there are no grandchildren, there are no stepchildren, there are no ILLegitimate children, because each
of us is a child of God “in Christ”. We are set free. We are
chosen. There is great freedom in a feeling of chosenness.
Today is a great day for letting go of the bones of the
past. God created us with eyes in the front of our heads so
that if we tried to look back we would get a stiff neck. The
possibilities of the future call us to look forward.
We are set free, because our sins are forgiven!
Paul is a powerful example. Paul wrote, (1 Corinthians 15:9-10)
“For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an
apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by
the grace of God, I am what I am.” Even though Paul once
persecuted the church, through the grace of God he was
forgiven and given another chance. With this new life, Paul
set out proclaiming the message of salvation to Jews and
Gentiles alike.
Christians proclaim the good news of forgiveness in God’s
love for the world.
Willie Nelson recalls his boyhood days attending a small
church. “I was one of those kids who kept down to the front
when the preacher called for converts at the end of each
sermon,” Nelson wrote. “I’d see somebody next to me start
to the front, and, well, there I’d go again. I joined that
Church at least thirty times. Every time I’d do something
bad, I’d walk down to the front and renounce my sins and
ask Jesus Christ to come into my heart. And all of a sudden I
had a new slate in the eyes of the Church. Then I’d slip off
and smoke a long strip of cedar bark rolled up in a newspaper –
and suddenly I was back in the fiery furnace again.”
“Each time I went to the front and rededicated my life,” Nelson
writes, “I wanted to leave my sins with God and walk away clean.
I felt I shouldn’t have gotten off so easy. I mean,the Church had
let me off, but I hadn’t let myself off.” — Willie: An Autobiography, Willie Nelson with
2
Bud Shrake, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1998, p. 57-58.
Sometimes the hardest person to forgive is yourself. You
are set free in Christ. You are forgiven through Christ.
You are set free when you realize that you are not
trapped by the past. Sometimes we get stuck because we
remember and relive old painful memories. We get stuck
and become paralyzed by old bones.
On Johnny Carson’s farewell program in 1972, he
introduced his family in the audience. Except a son who
had been killed in an accident the year before. Johnny said,
“Life does what it’s supposed to…then you move on.”
Some think last year was the worst year ever. The
economy closed down. Many got sick. People lost jobs.
Many lost money. Many had to cope with less income &
more stress.
Maybe your candidate lost the election. A death might
have left your family hurting & grieving. Maybe COVID 19
filled you with fear. Whatever happened to you in 2020,
2021 is a time to get free from the past & start over.
NEW BEGINNINGS ARE POSSIBLE.
Early in the 12th century in a valley near Lausanne,
France, young Bernard was robbed and held for ransom.
The crime was nothing new to the province. The valley was
known as Wormwood because of the bitter sufferings
sustained by the victims of the outlaws who controlled the
land.
The kidnap victim was an orphan. His father was a Knight
who lost his life in the First Crusade. His mother also died
when he was young. He could have given up.
Legend says Bernard was forced to entertain his captors.
Instead, he shared with them his hope in the one who is the
Light of the World. His testimony so moved them that they
set him free.
This young man entered the Cistercian Order and became
a minister and a great scholar. He gathered others around
him who shared his concern for the poor, and they
established hostels where travelers could find shelter and
safety. The first of these was built in the Valley of Darkness,
Wormwood.
Some of the men who had held the young man captive
helped him build the retreat. They called it Clairvaux.
Bernard became known as Bernard of Clairvaux — Bernard
of the Valley of Light.
He reflected the light of Jesus Christ and he illuminated
the darkness by that light. The darkness has been defeated.
And it is being defeated daily by the countless followers
who shed light in the dark world that sometimes seems to
have gone mad. Frakes, EMPHASIS, 1-93, p. 13
Bernard of Clairvaux was orphaned, robbed, held captive
for ransom. He could have given in, given up.
Yet today we recognize him as the composer of 5 hymns
in our hymnal, (116/117, 316, 356, 489, 537) the organizer of the Second
Crusade, & founder of the two hostels in Switzerland
famous for their dogs named for him, the St. Bernards.
It was a time of new beginnings. New beginnings for
Wormwood, the valley of Darkness. New beginnings for the
thieves and kidnappers. A new beginning for St. Bernard.
He was set free from the bones of the past.
Praise God they had a church that proclaimed grace and
forgiveness for all sinners!
We, too, are set free. We are set free! We are chosen.
We are forgiven. It’s a New Beginning.
Lord you chose us to say no to whatever makes it more
difficult to say yes to you. 1223 words