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What does it mean to be ‘free’?

Thursday, July 3, 2025, 8:15 am | Randy Thomasson
What’s the real definition of “freedom”?

When it comes to being an American who’s truly free from sinful slavery, context and definition matter!
As you prepare to celebrate Independence Day, stop and realize that the “freedom” our U.S. founding fathers wrote about and fought for is freedom to do what’s right in God’s sight.

This is why an American Revolutionary War cry was “No king but King Jesus.” And it’s why U.S. Founding Father John Adams said he wanted to live in a free country where he could exercise his Christian values without punishment.

So embrace your freedom! But instead of redefining freedom as freedom to sin and do whatever you want, understand that true American freedom is our freedom to obey God rather than obeying immoral tyrants – including the tyranny of our own flesh.

From Heritage Foundation’s “Why the American Founding Matters”

The American Founding is a unique and remarkable moment in human history, marking the beginning of a new order of the ages. It was the first time the people, as the only earthly source of political authority, exercised their right to establish government based on their consent.

As Alexander Hamilton observed in the opening salvo of the first Federalist paper, Americans were “to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government on the basis of reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force.”

The Founding generation understood that they were dramatis personae on the world stage, cast and called to prove the capacity of mankind for self-government. If they succeeded, the forces of despotism would never again find their ambitions unobstructed.

Excerpt from Fourth of July sermon outlines:

Biblical freedom is not self-centered. It is others-focused. Christ sets us free not so we can do whatever we want, but so we can finally do what we were created for—loving God and serving others.

In a culture that defines freedom as individual rights, God’s Word reframes it as relational responsibility. The freest people are those who no longer live for themselves.

Practical advice: Look around. Who can you serve today? What can you sacrifice to uplift someone else? Use your freedom to bring life and healing to those in need.

So, stand firm. Don’t go back to chains. Live free—not for yourself, but for Christ and His Kingdom. Use your liberty to bless others, walk in holiness, and glorify God. That is true freedom—and you have it in Christ.

Confirmed quotations of U.S. founding fathers:

“Whosoever shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world.”
– Benjamin Franklin

“I have always said and always will say that the studious perusal of the Sacred Volume will make us better citizens.”
– Thomas Jefferson

“The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected, in one indissoluble bond, the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.”
– John Quincy Adams

“A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.”
– Samuel Adams

“Because we have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion … our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
– Letter of President John Adams in 1798

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