1.5 And that each Church has Liberty

Liberty. But liberty from what? ‘Liberty’ suggests a state of bondage or oppression, from which there is need of escape or deliverance. There are three aspects of liberty to note.

 

Firstly, for our baptist forefathers, there was an understanding of liberty as escape from politically prescribed religious observance. In the Scottish tradition, baptists were dissenters from a form of religion that was joined to the institutions of Government and State. In this sense, baptist have always been ‘non-conformists’, seeking liberty from the constraints of political and social conventions. Linked to this first liberty, there was a second perception of liberty that was important to them: the freedom to read and interpret the Scriptures, both personally and together as church, gathered in Jesus’ name. This is a liberty to gather as disciples, seeking after the revelation of God’s will and way for our faith and its practice, as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. Thirdly, there is the liberty that the Scriptures speak of, for those who belong to Jesus Christ: the freedom to be free from the dictates of culturally contrived law and regulation (Galatians 3.1-18), as we are gloriously liberated into life as the children of God (Romans 8.21).

This said, it leads us towards another question, to ask of ourselves. Are we free from patterns of tradition, religious regulation and a relationship with God defined by observing cultural norms? What is it that we need to be freed into? In that we are to have liberty, what is it that we should have liberty to be or do? The answer to these questions has been laid out in this first part of our Declaration of Principle. We are to have freedom to recognise the Lord Jesus Christ, our God and Saviour, as the sole and absolute authority in all matters pertaining to faith and practice in our lives. We are to have freedom to recognise His authority, as revealed and indicated in the Holy Scriptures. The primary aspect of the liberty that we share together, within our Union, lies in the conviction that our lives, in terms of faith and practice, are under the authority of Jesus Christ and Him alone. The basis of our conversation, discussion and decision making, as to what this means and leads to, is to be founded in our reading and shared understanding of the Holy Scriptures, in discovering what the practical implications and outworking of this liberty might be.

Let us note two, pastorally important aspects of this liberty, that flow from we have outlined above. On the one hand, we are freed from the imperatives or dictates of the preacher or church leader! The role of preaching, within a baptist context, must not be confused with the authority of Jesus Christ Himself. For the baptist, the role of the preacher or teacher must be to open up the Scriptures and their possible interpretation and application to faith and practice, so that other believers present may weigh up and consider what is being said or shared. Those of us who listen have a duty to reflect on whether the message is consistent with faith and practice, expressed under the authority of Jesus Christ, as revealed in the Holy Scriptures.  Preaching and the advices of leadership should be persuasive, not prescriptive, towards the gathered church. In contrast to other traditions, where the role of the preacher or leader may be taken as definitively stating or interpreting the will of God, the baptist congregation never surrenders that right. We are gathered to the Lord Jesus at the centre, not to the preacher’s sermon nor a leader’s dictates. The message of the sermon needs to be considered thoughtfully, weighed and confirmed or rejected in the light of Jesus Christ’s authority, as attested to in Scriptural testimony.

On the other hand, a second reservation must be that we have not been liberated by God to be autonomous individuals, self-regulating and self-governing as isolated persons. No society, civil or religious, can operate on this basis. We need structures and we also need good leadership. Where these functions are managed and exercised properly, we are liberated to discover and discern together, as Christians gathered as church, what is the will of God and the way of Jesus Christ. Together, we discuss and discern how it should be outworked within the culture and context in which we find ourselves.

 

In seeking to better grasp a Biblical perspective on ‘Liberty’ and what it means for care of each other within our contemporary culture, there are two further aspects that we need give attention to.

Firstly, we need to pursue and develop, as Christ’s disciples, an understanding of liberty as propriety and proper behaviour in Christ. In this, we recall that Jesus came to fulfil the righteous requirements of the Law of God and its prophetic interpretation (Matthew 5.17). Ignoring the history of Israel’s relationship with the Covenants of God, which finds fulfilment in Christ, does not simplify matters, but obscures them. We have to encourage each other to live lives that exhibit how our life in Christ is a fulfilment of the standards and intention of Old Testament imperatives and directions, where these express the unchanging character and purposes of God.

Secondly, we need to work hard, in an increasing atomised and fragmented society, to comprehend how our newfound liberty is to bring us into interdependence as church, not independence from one another. Individualised authentication of faith or practices is not part of our Scottish, baptist tradition. What we are called into is the liberty of a collective consciousness, as communities of conviction. In other words, being baptist should not be mistaken for nor confused with a mandate for individualised anarchy. We are only Christ’s when we understand our calling is to belong to and love Him; and to express that liberated, holy love towards others (Galatians 6.2). Freedom in Christ brings with it the responsibility to manifest what we are freed from; and what we are freed into. We have liberty to live as those who belong to the God of holy love. Such liberty is that which is birthed, enabled and directed by the Holy Spirit, as He works to equip and build up the church as the Body of Christ.

 

Questions for reflection:

·         In your journey of faith, in what areas have you experienced most liberty, developing your discipleship?
·         In what areas have you been most encouraged by others, in seeking counsel as to the will of God?
·         In what ways might increased interdependence better enhance our witness to Jesus Christ?